November 25, 2001: The Indianapolis Colts lose to the San Francisco 49ers, 40-21 at the RCA Dome in Indianapolis. It's the team's 3rd straight loss, and they fall 4-6.
The Colts' coach, Jim Mora is rightly upset. He was 66 years old, a football lifer, from the Los Angeles area. He'd been the head coach at Occidental College in L.A., and served on Dick Vermeil's staff at UCLA and Don James' staff at Washington. He coached the Philadelphia/Baltimore Stars to all 3 USFL Championship Games, winning 2 of them. He coached the New Orleans Saints for 11 seasons, including the franchise's 1st 4 Playoff berths. He was now in his 4th season as head man in Indianapolis, having made the Playoffs the preceding 2 years.
He had seen it all. He now acted like he'd seen enough, and launched into one of the press conference tirades he was known for occasionally giving:
Well, I'll start off by saying this: Do not blame that game on the defense, okay? I don't care who you play, whether it's a high school team, a junior college team, a college team, much less an NFL team: When you turn the ball over 5 times, 4 interceptions, 1 for a touchdown, 3 others in field position to set up touchdowns, you ain't gonna beat anybody I just talked about, anybody. All right?
And that was a disgraceful performance in my opinion. We threw that game. We gave it away by doing that. We gave 'em the friggin' game. In my opinion, that sucked.
Uh, you know, you can't turn the ball over 5 times like that. Holy crap, I don't know who the hell we think we are, when we do something like that. Unbelievable. Five turnovers. One of 'em for -- We threw 4 interceptions for touchdowns this year. That might be an NFL record. That's pitiful. I mean, it's absolutely pitiful, to perform like that. Pitiful.
At this point, Tim Bragg of WRTV-Channel 6, the ABC affiliate in Indianapolis, asked Mora if he thought his team could still make the Playoffs. His response might be the most famous coach's press conference rant of all time:
What's that? Ah -- Playoffs? Don't talk about -- Playoffs? You kiddin' me? Playoffs? I just hope we can win a game! Another game!"
Mora was right to worry: The Colts won only 2 of their last 6 games, finishing 6-10, and missing the Playoffs. The Colts averaged 30.4 points per game, more than any team in the NFL. So, maybe he should have blamed the defense.
Mora was fired, and has never coached again. Although his regular-season record was an impressive 125-106, and he won a Division title with New Orleans and another in Indianapolis, he went 0-6 in the... Playoffs!
The Colts replaced him with Tony Dungy. He was able to get more out of Mora's former quarterback, Peyton Manning. But, as a defensive back who played on the Pittsburgh Steelers' Super Bowl teams of the 1970s, Dungy also built a better defense. As a result, he coached them for 7 years, and, every season, made the Playoffs, including the 2006 season, which ended with him leading them to win Super Bowl XLI.
Mora's son, usually listed as Jim L. Mora, served on his father's staff in New Orleans, and as head coach of the Atlanta Falcons and the Seattle Seahawks, and at UCLA, winning an NFC South Division with the Falcons and a Pac-12 South Division with UCLA. As of November 25, 2022, Jim Mora is still alive, age 87; and Jim L. Mora, 61, is the head coach at the University of Connecticut.
On September 17, 2013, while writing my original blog, Uncle Mike's Musings, I discovered that, if you Google just that one word, "playoffs," the first thing that came up was Mora's rant. Not a link to any sport's postseason. I checked again while writing this post, and found that that was no longer the case. Still, it held up for at least 12 years.
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November 25, 2001 was a Sunday. These other NFL games were played that day:
* The New York Giants lost to the Oakland Raiders, 28-10 at Giants Stadium at the Meadowlands.
* The Washington Redskins beat the Philadelphia Eagles, 13-3 at Veterans Stadium in Philadelphia.
* The Atlanta Falcons beat the Carolina Panthers, 10-7 at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte.
* The Baltimore Ravens beat the Jacksonville Jaguars, 24-21 at Alltel Stadium (now EverBank Stadium) in Jacksonville.
* The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Tennessee Titans, 34-24 at the Adelphia Coliseum (now Nissan Stadium) in Nashville.
* The New England Patriots beat the New Orleans Saints, 34-17 at Foxboro Stadium in the Boston suburb of Foxborough, Massachusetts.
* The Miami Dolphins beat the Buffalo Bills, 34-27 at Ralph Wilson Stadium (formerly Rich Stadium) in the Buffalo suburb of Orchard Park, New York.
* The Cleveland Browns beat the Cincinnati Bengals, 18-0 at Cleveland Browns Stadium (now named Huntington Bank Field).
* The Chicago Bears beat the Minnesota Vikings, 13-6 at the Metrodome in Minneapolis.
* The Arizona Cardinals beat the San Diego Chargers, 20-17 at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego.
* The Kansas City Chiefs beat the Seattle Seahawks, 19-7 at Husky Stadium in Seattle.
* Three days earlier, on Thanksgiving Day, the Green Bay Packers beat the Detroit Lions, 29-27 at the Silverdome in the Detroit suburb of Pontiac, Michigan.
* Also on Thanksgiving, the Denver Broncos beat the Dallas Cowboys, 26-24 at Texas Stadium in the Dallas suburb of Irving, Texas.
* The next night, on ABC Monday Night Football, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers beat the St. Louis Rams, 24-17 at The Dome at America's Center in St. Louis. (That stadium has gone through some name changes, but now has that name again.)
* And, in this last of 3 seasons between the arrival of the reborn Cleveland Browns and that of the Houston Texans, when the NFL had 31 teams, the New York Jets had a bye week.
The Grey Cup, the championship game of the Canadian Football League, was played at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal. The Calgary Stampeders beat the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, 27-19.
Baseball was in the off-season. There were 5 games played in the NBA:
* The New Jersey Nets lost to the Golden State Warriors, 101-85 at the Oakland Coliseum Arena (then named The Arena in Oakland).
* The Toronto Raptors beat the Philadelphia 76ers, 107-88 at the Air Canada Centre (now the Scotiabank Arena) in Toronto.
* There was a doubleheader at the Staples Center (now the Crypto.com Arena) in Los Angeles. In the opener, the Los Angeles Clippers beat the Houston Rockets, 90-83.
* In the nightcap, the Los Angeles Lakers beat the Denver Nuggets, 105-98. Nick Van Exel led all scorers on the day with 34 points.
* And the Seattle SuperSonics beat the Indiana Pacers, 99-88 at the KeyArena in Seattle.
And there were 6 games played in the NHL:
* The New York Rangers lost to the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, 3-2 at Madison Square Garden.
* The Vancouver Canucks lost to the Philadelphia Flyers, 4-1 at the First Union Center (now the Xfinity Mobile Arena) in Philadelphia.
* The Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Carolina Hurricanes, 4-0 at the Raleigh Entertainment & Sports Arena (now the Lenovo Center).
* The Columbus Blue Jackets beat the Calgary Flames, 4-3 at the Nationwide Arena in Columbus.
* In an "Original Six" matchup, the Chicago Blackhawks and the Detroit Red Wings, arch-rivals, played to a 4-4 tie at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit.
* And the Dallas Stars beat the Minnesota Wild, 4-3 at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minnesota.
And in English soccer, Arsenal beat Manchester United, 3-1 at Highbury in North London.
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