Sports, for me, have always been best defined by moments. Even more than by outcomes.
I won't always remember a score, but I'll always have crystal-clear recollection of a sequence. Of the good, the bad. Of the reaction. And from a purely personal standpoint, when I'm a first-hand witness, what I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to cover.
This was a strange year for all three of our city's teams. The Steelers drove an 11-0 start last season into a playoff ditch, then showed up the next year to try again ... without an offensive line. The Penguins won a tough division title, entered the playoffs on a healthy high ... without a goaltender. The Pirates ... yeah.
But here, too, I've already forgotten nearly every score from the nearly 200 games I've covered, and I can promise I won't forget what follows here, my first-ever best/worst list of the most memorable 21 plays of 2021:
THE BEST
11. BEN TO FREIERMUTH
Dec. 9, 2021, Minneapolis
My 11th spot, essentially an honorable mention, just has to go to Ben Roethlisberger's brilliant throw on a night of such stuff. Whatever time capsule Ben uncovered at halftime of the Steelers' 36-28 loss to the Vikings at US Bank Stadium ... he kept firing bullet after bullet, almost completing what would've been -- should've been -- the greatest comeback in franchise history, with the visitors having been down by 29 points.
To me, whether one faults Pat Freiermuth for a drop or credits Harrison Smith's outstanding coverage, it does nothing to diminish what would've been -- should've been -- the highlight of a Hall of Famer's farewell tour.
Maybe he'll whip up another Monday night.
10. THE BANNED SLIDE
Dec. 4, 2021, Charlotte, N.C.
It'd take a lot for me to notice a college football play, but Pitt quarterback Kenny Pickett's fake/accidental non-slide happened to be on a TV while we were having a business meeting over at Mike's Beer Bar, and it became impossible to not notice with all the fuss it kicked up in the days that followed.
I believe Pickett's own description that he merely re-thought sliding because the other team's defenders "were so far away," and that it was, in turn, no big deal. But hey, it worked, and it set an early tone within the ACC Championship Game, the Panthers' most important event in multiple decades.
9. SCRIPTED ENDING
Dec. 17, 2021, PPG Paints Arena
Having lived a life of relishing chances to show non-hockey people how much strategy hockey really has, this one's an all-timer.
It was three-on-three OT, there was a faceoff at center red, Jeff Carter made eye contact with Kris Letang lined up to his left and ... boom! Off they erupted into the Buffalo zone, where Letang would thread the sweetest pass to Carter for the almost comparable touch on the redirect.
Best of all, yeah, it was scripted. The two worked it out beforehand.
8. DIONTAE'S FLARE
Sept. 12, 2021, Orchard Park, N.Y.
Wonderful throw, far better catch by Diontae Johnson, and the offensive catalyst to a season-opening upset of the Bills that brought way, way too much false hope.
7. JACOB CLIMBS THE LADDER
July 17, 2021, PNC Park
For a team that went 61-101, the Pirates had an astonishing ratio of comeback wins at 31 -- more than half! -- and walkoff wins at nine, and they even had four games where they overcame deficits of five-plus runs, most in Major League Baseball.
Nothing topped what's above, with Jacob Stallings yet again showing that a clutch gene just might exist.
As I mentioned to Derek Shelton in a lunch meeting a couple weeks ago at PNC Park, it's as close as he could've come to experiencing his first sellout there. Place went berserk.
6. JOE SAYS NO
Dec. 19, 2021, Heinz Field
Sometimes, as James Harrison once told me in Latrobe, football's as simple as beating the man in front of you.
Joe Haden had the Titans' Nick Westbrook-Ikhine in front of him, needing no more than an additional inch to move the sticks and, in all likelihood, find a way to push the AFC South leader to victory. But Haden, utilizing a level of physical/mental strength more commonly seen in wrestling, wouldn't be denied.
Beautiful football in its rawest form.
And that's to say nothing of his awareness of the sticks, as teammates would later laud.
5. TANEV STRIKES
May 20, 2021, Uniondale, N.Y.
The Penguins' most intense, most physical, most relentless effort of the calendar year culminated with their one player who best matched all three attributes coming up huge late. And the atmosphere in the old Nassau County Barn was a match, too. Amazing.
Ron Hextall's found solid replacements since losing Brandon Tanev in the Seattle expansion draft but, at the same time, there's no replacing Tanev.
4. GAMEL VS. THE IVY
Sept. 5, 2021, Chicago
If anyone reading this column has done any skipping past any of these videos, stop that at once.
Ben Gamel made not one, not two, but three stupendous catches in Wrigley Field's perilous outfield, capped by one of baseball's best anywhere all summer. Anyone who's had a seat out there in the Friendly Confines knows what I'm talking about when I say the man put his livelihood on the line with the finale.
Imagine three other plays being better than this, right?
Well, as they say, here we go ...
3. T.J. VS. THE CLOTHESLINE
Dec. 19, 2021
That's Rashaan Evans and David Quessenberry, together doing a Tennessee Waltz, even clasping hands, to keep T.J. Watt from Ryan Tannehill. Which, of course, they couldn't.
It was a breathtaking display of everything that makes T.J. what he is, not least of which is his persistence through officials' failure to throw flags. And no, there wasn't a flag
This is our city's premier athlete at work.
2. BANK ROBBERY
Feb. 18, 2021, PPG Paints Arena
Show me something in sports I haven't seen before, and I'll always be impressed.
Show me something in hockey I haven't seen before, given my lifelong participation and passion for it, and I'll be flat-out floored.
Mike Matheson, among the NHL's most mercurial defensemen, can give as easily as he can take. But on this sequence, all he took was everyone's breath away by faking a shot from the left point, freezing the Islanders' Josh Bailey, banking a pass off the end boards to himself, taking a shot on goal, then being rewarded with an assist when Teddy Blueger buried the rebound.
Everyone fusses now about all these 'Michigan' goals out of the air. This involved five times the creativity, five times the daring.
And when I asked Matheson afterward how in hell he thought to do this, he came back with a description that it might it sound like he was selecting toothpaste at Rite-Aid.
1. KE'BRYAN ... FROM KANSAS!
June 21, 2021, St. Louis
I mean ... what to say about that?
Probably the highest praise anyone can offer for a play is that, as it's developing, one becomes 100% certain that there's 0% chance it'll be pulled off.
I don't care that it's Yadier Molina doing the running. I don't care that it came in a game that, like the Pirates' 161 others, meant not a thing. I do care that young Ke'Bryan Hayes, a precious part of the franchise's future, had the presence of mind and confidence to even dream of making that play, much less actually doing so. The only thing anyone should be conceiving that far into foul territory is ordering nachos.
The kid's special. Don't lose sight of that because a wrist injury temporarily sapped his power at the plate. That's needlessly negative.
And on that note, let's flip to the dark side ...
____________________
THE WORST
10. BEN TO FREIERMUTH
Dec. 9, 2021, Minneapolis
Need me to go over this again?
Nope. Thought not.
But I'll add that this qualifies for the opposite list on sheer disappointment, way more than any measure of failure.
9. TOUCH 'EM ALL ... FOR REAL!
June 8, PNC Park
Still largely speechless over this, other than to wonder how it doesn't happen more often. Such an innocent mistake. Particularly in the context of Hayes, in this instance, sprinting full-bore by the bag because he wasn't sure it was a home run.
8. CLAYPOOL'S FIRST DOWN
Dec. 9, 2021, Minneapolis
Dude. No.
And the answer he gave afterward when I asked what he could've been thinking there ... also no.
7. CORA + MORAN = NO MAS
Sept. 17, 2021, Miami
It's the only play on this list that contributed to not one but two people losing their jobs, with Joey Cora having repeatedly waved Colin Moran home ... to see him thrown out by 20-30 feet. Occasionally with slides that stopped almost that short.
By season's end, Cora was fired and Moran non-tendered.
They'll both receive word of that in about a month, based on precedent.
6. TWIN FUMBLES = TIE
Nov. 14, 2021
If either Johnson or Freiermuth hangs onto the ball in those post-catch runs, the Steelers beat the winless Lions, rather than tying them, and all of their math -- to this day -- stacks up very differently. Because I haven't a doubt Chris Boswell would've booted the next play of either sequence through the uprights to end overtime.
No excuses. Nowhere to hide.
Anyone really want to keep reading?
5. NO SAFETY IN SIGHT
Nov. 21, 2021, Inglewood, Calif.
You know, in hindsight, I could've put these worst ones at the top, then listed all the best so everyone would feel all warm and fuzzy.
I'll try that next year.
In the interim ...
NFL NETWORK
4. OH, THAT O-LINE
Dec. 9, Minneapolis
This'll be the only entry on either list without an accompanying video. Because the video wouldn't do it justice.
In a way, it's the freeze-frame of the Steelers' season: Ben's about to get sacked by the Vikings' Sheldon Richardson, while Dan Moore and Najee Harris double-team one-guy, Chuks Okorafor gets his guy, and the other three ... well, there they are.
Renaissance painting, baby.
3. THE POUNCEY SNAP
Jan. 10, 2021, Heinz Field
Which was sadder, Maurkice Pouncey's snap sailing over Ben's head, James Conner appearing terrified to tumble onto the loose ball, all the picks Ben threw after that, or the sight of Maurkice and Ben seated on that sideline bench in tears after a playoff loss to the Browns, of all teams?
The correct answer: Another full year of Baker Mayfield commercials.
2. WILL CRAIG
May 27, 2021, PNC Park
"I'm not going to let one play define me," Will Craig admirably spoke after one play had just defined him ... and within a couple weeks, he was off to Korea to try to start anew on the other side of the planet, where maybe, just maybe, there was someone who hadn't seen it.
1. THE JARRY ASSIST
May 24, 2021, PPG Paints Arena
OK, look, enough's enough. I'm stopping here.
In the spirit of the new year and continuing hope that not every new year needs to be worse than the one that just passed -- thanks a lot, 2021 -- I'll instead apply this entry toward a toast ... to the one athlete in Pittsburgh who's already enjoyed the biggest year-to-year rebound of anyone.
Say what one will about Tristan Jarry's showing against the Islanders, it takes a hell of a lot more to bounce back from adversity than it does to make any kind of linear ascent. He's done that in a big, big way, ranking fourth among all qualified NHL goaltenders with a .932 save percentage, not to mention having been his team's MVP to date.
Good thoughts, my friends. Think good thoughts.
Happy new year to everyone!
TOMORROW: Our staff's picks for top stories of 2021
