Mike Ditka

[SmootSmack]

Originally Posted by SBXVII

Some people say bad move on Ditka's part, who the heck cares. At the time I thought it was awsome, innovative, and creative thinking giving the ball to someone who no one would have expected to be out there on offense and expect to be carrying the ball. I can remember at the time the announcers thinking Fridge was going to be a decoy, but instead he got the ball and rumbled in.

Personally Payton scored many times throught out the season. Lineman never get to score and to me it was awsome seeing a player who hardly gets to score ...get to score. It doesn't trivialize Payton's work, it was his hard work that got them to the SB, and as Ditka said the other team kept stuffing Payton everytime he saw the ball.

It just goes to show Ditka would do anything to win the game instead of worrying about stats and feelings. Lets look at it another way.... Payton got a ring didn't he?

No one player is bigger or better then the team as a whole.

I couldn't disagree more.

Linemen never get to score? So that's why Perry should have gotten the ball at the goal line to run it in for a Super Bowl TD instead of arguably the best running back of all-time? That's like saying WRs never get to kick field goals so David Patten should have gotten the chance to kick the winning SB Field Goal instead of Adam Vinatieri.

Secondly, the Bears were up 37-3 in the 3rd quarter when Perry scored the TD so this wasn't some big strategic move on the part of Ditka.

I get the whole team is bigger than the player aspect but there's no reason for Payton, after everything he did for that franchise, not to get the ball in that situation. If anything, Ditka bought into the Fridge hype and by giving him the ball made him bigger than the team