Matt Schaub looked like he was going to pull it out. The Houston Texans had dominated the Oakland Raiders on the statsheet, and now they were going to take the win they believed they'd earned. But as Schaub began to scramble left on the final play of the game, instead of deciding to scramble into the end zone, he let the ball loose to Jacoby Jones coming back to him, and Michael Huff stepped easily in front of it to secure victory.
Tommy Kelly of the Oakland Raiders happily offered his opinion on Schaub's last play to Dale Robertson of the Houston Chronicle.
Many folks, however, are going to be second-guessing the quarterback for a long time to come about his opting not to run like a fool to daylight, such as it was. It won't help any, either, when they hear about Tommy Kelly's assessment of the situation. The Raiders' defensive tackle didn't cut Schaub one iota of slack.
"Old boy choked," Kelly chortled. "All he had to do was run it in. He choked, simple as that."
Schaub hadn't heard about the comment when he glumly addressed the media later, but, to be sure, he wouldn't have agreed with such an assessment. In his opinion, neither the geometry nor the physics favored him beating [the pursuing Tyvon] Branch across the goal line.
It's really hard to say someone choked when they just led their team all the way down the field for the game-winning score. And Schaub was in a tough position as Raiders defenders like Branch would have likely pursued him in the open field and taken him down short. Schaub probably just ran out of options instead of outright choking.
To discuss the Raiders-Texans game with fans of either team, head to Silver and Black Pride (Oakland), and Battle Red Blog (Houston).