Here’s a nugget about Saints quarterback Drew Brees that might at first glance feel like a dagger in the heart for Vikings fans.
In the current SportsCenter rotation, some guy we’ve never before seen explains on behalf of something called “Sport Science” that Brees was asked to throw ten footballs at an official Olympic archery target.
Brees hit the bull’s-eye every time. Four of the throws hit the dead center of the target.
In contrast, archers at the 2008 Olympics hit the bull’s-eye less than 50 percent of the time.
Of course, the circumstances are entirely different. The Olympic archers were competing under the pressure of, you know, the Olympics. And while the archers who qualify for the games are indeed the best in the world, the best archers from whichever country dominates the archery competition (we assume it’s England because of, you know, Robin Hood) are likely a lot better than the Kazakhstan contingent.
Brees, in contrast, was throwing the balls under zero pressure, with no pass rush and no coverages to be discerned and no targets moving at 4.4-in-the-40 speed.
Then there’s the relatively significant fact that Olympic archers (according to ESPN.com) fire their arrows from 230 feet away. (That’s 76.6 yards.) Though the guy we’ve never before seen was careful to point out the speed (52 mph) and the launch angle (six degrees) of the balls Brees threw, no mention ever was made of Drew’s distance from the target.
And the guy we’ve never before seen said nothing about the 76.6-yard firing distance for Olympic archers. So because the guy we’ve never before seen was so careful to point out the speed and launch angle of the balls but omitted reference to the concept of distance from target, most viewers probably assumed that Brees was throwing his balls from the same spot that the Olympic archers shoot their arrows.
So, basically, the comparison is pretty much useless. But since ESPN spent good money to trademark the phrase “Sport Science,” they have to use it for something.
UPDATE: As it turns out, Sport Science is a show on one of the various ESPN networks. It previously aired on FSN. The Brees experiment occurred months ago, at which time the folks at FOX were still paying the bills. Here’s the video. Brees was throwing from 20 yards; the eight-plus-minute segment fails to mention that the Olympic archers are shooting from nearly four times that distance. And video images of people shooting arrows create the false impression that Olympic archers fire from a much shorter distance than five feet longer than three-fourths of a football field.
SECOND UPDATE: Apparently, some of the commenters fall squarely within the least-common-denominator demographic that ESPN was targeting with its subtly misleading segment on Brees’ accuracy. The story was presented TODAY on ESPN, with no mention as to when Brees threw the balls at the archery target. As far as the audience knew, he did it this week.
