A week ago, total unknown Harvard-guy rookie quarterback Ryan Fitzgerald came into the game by surprise and led the Rams to a stirring comeback victory. This week little-known quarterback Sage Rosenfels -- 26 pass completions in five years when he buckled his chinstrap Sunday -- came into the game by surprise and led Miami to a stirring comeback victory. One week after Fitzgerald was unstoppable in his surprise role, he started against the Redskins and looked like he soon will be applying to graduate school. So Rosenfels should feel lucky he won't start this coming weekend. There is a long tradition of defenders mentally clocking out if an unknown backup quarterback unexpectedly enters the game. When Fitzgerald entered the game against Houston, or Rosenfels against Buffalo, you could practically hear the defenders thinking, "We can take the rest of the day off." In contrast, when an unknown reserve quarterback is scheduled in advance to start, the tradition is he gets hammered. Defenders spend a week saying to each other, "We are not going to let that upstart embarrass us like he embarrassed the last guys."
