GM,
The Redskins have made Mike Shanahan the highest-paid coach in all of football, and the misery will continue in Washington, at least for one more year. In most professions, the elite don't get fired unless they sleep with the wrong guy's wife. In football, though, the numbers don't always add up. You can be fired for a memorable collapse in 2009 and hired in early 2010 for what you did early in 1998 and 1999!
Shanahan entered the scene for the Broncos in 1995--a time in which John Elway's talent was being underutilized and it looked like he'd never win a SuperBowl. Of course, we know the rest of the story, but few people realize the rarity of Shanahan's grace period. Denver won one playoff game--a sweet, sweet defeat that ended the Patriots' championship dynasty (oh yes, it's over)--in the decade after Elway retired. Extending his leash even further was his close friendship with Broncos owner Pat Bowlen.
Obviously, the man was going to get another job as soon as he wanted one, but Dan Snyder's typical approach--throwing money at personnel with high quotes regardless of fit or actual abilities--may not even work on head coaches. Surely he knows Mike Shanahan is far from a sure bet to turn the team around, but he also knows that he's incapable of picking the right guy for anything! He's hired five head coaches this decade, including Marty Schottenheimer, Steve Spurrier, and Gibbs--three guys who are bound for the Hall of Fame because of their abilities to coach. Somehow, all failed under Snyder. He's hired an offensive coordinator for every year Jason Campbell has been in the league!
This contract is nothing but an admission by Snyder that he has no idea what he's doing, but he's willing to pay his way out of any possible blame. After all, who could blame you for getting Mike Shanahan?! Too bad you still have an average quarterback, a post-prime running back, one of the shortest "big-play" split ends in the league, and a culture of losing. At least we won't see this anymore.
-JW
JW,
Once a fairly low bar of competence is cleared, coaches don't particularly matter in the NFL. Yes, I said it. If the Redskins compete next season, it will be because the Collective Bargaining Agreement didn't get renewed and we're playing without a salary cap. Give Mike Shanahan every significant free agent and the financial upper hand in trade negotiations and he'll be just fine. Stick him with Jason Campbell and Clinton Portis--calling Clinton Portis post-prime is like calling Barack Obama post-partisan: both descriptors are the best their marketing people can hope for--and he'll lose as often and as badly as Jim Zorn. Not only has Shanahan never won a ring with mediocre talent, he's never won one without a Hall of Fame quarterback and a 1,700-yard rusher. What he has done is choked in the playoffs, held decades-long grudges, and followed the money to what has got to be the worst coaching vacancy in football. If you want to win, that is.
Elsewhere in the league, the coaching carousel appears to be operating with similar illogic. In Cleveland, team president Mike Holmgren's first order of business was keeping the universally loathed Eric Mangini--a move that ESPN has rightly called Mangini's "biggest win yet." In Dallas, certified buffoon Wade Phillips continues to function beneath the previously mentioned competence bar solely because Jerry Jones likes weak personalities. In Kansas City, a hideous defense and a $63 million career backup at quarterback will apparently be bailed out by yet another New England Patriots transplant whose name isn't Bill Bellichick.
Only Carolina seems to be behaving reasonably, refusing to fire the perfectly tolerable John Fox just because Bill Cowher has a house nearby. Why should they? The same squad will lose for both of them.
-GM
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Owning Up . . . Maybe a Little Covering Up
JW,
Looking over old NFL predictions is a bit like watching drunken videos of yourself. You barely remember any of it, and you just want it to be over. In that spirit, how about an abridged retrospective of what we got right and wrong this season? Here's my top three in both categories, presented in the order in which they occurred to me:
Things I Nailed
1) The New York Jets did not make an appearance in my home this season. I wrote in August that I'd watch the Russian ballet first, and even though the Jets slipped into the playoffs (How?! Why?!), I don't see that changing. Seriously, was a single word spoken or written about this team all year? They're strangers to me!
2) The Dallas Cowboys will indeed scare the hell out of everyone in the playoffs after enduring some rocky times mid-season. Of course, I also predicted that Shanahan would be coaching them by now, but I'm still putting this in the win column.
3) The Bears stunk! I couldn't be happier about this one if I had caught Cutler's interceptions myself. I wrote in August that the Bears are "a team that's seemingly perfect for underachieving," and they went right out and did so. The good news: It won't be possible to underachieve next year. Everyone knows you suck.
Things I Badly F----d Up
1) The Bucs will win their division? Holy s--t! In retrospect, it was our last day of predictions, and I was bored. So what if they lost it by a league-leading ten games? That's nothing compared to how bad they'll be when they start this guy at quarterback.
2) Like you, I doubted the Arizona Cardinals. When will we learn that the NFC West doesn't require youth, agility, or stamina from its quarterbacks. Warner won it the minute he decided to return for another year, and you and I should have known better.
3) I slept, slightly, on the Denver Broncos. How they missed the playoffs after that start is beyond me, as is how they gave up 259 rushing yards to Jamaal Charles . . . in week 17 . . . at home . . . a mile above sea level . . . with the playoffs still a possibility. 2-14 was a bad guess for these guys, but an utter lack of clutchness apparently wasn't.
-GM
GM,
No need to come up with polar-opposite categories the way I see it. After all, the only prediction I completely botched was that
Things I Was Close Enough to Being Right Enough About to Still Brag
1) The Packers and Ravens were my favorites to win their respective divisions. They didn’t do that, but as wildcard teams, they’re clearly the best teams in their divisions right now.
2)
3) I said Aaron Rodgers was the best quarterback in the NFC North. I still believe it, by the way. Favre is obviously the most popular among them, and he had an incredible year, but take a look here to see how good A-Rod was even though his line didn’t protect him for half of the season.
Things I Want to Be Remembered By
1) I said the NFC North would definitely lead the league in interceptions. Of course Favre disappointed me, but
2) Mark Sanchez was indeed dreadful. He had 12 touchdowns and 20 picks—the worst ratio of anyone who started all year. Somehow, in a league in which the traditional way of winning, strong defense and running game, has become passé (three of the top four rushing teams failed to make the playoffs), the Jets used such a strategy and their schedule (beating two uninspired division winners in the final weeks) to overcome Sanchez’s failures and squeeze into the playoffs. Congrats to Rex Ryan, who will make me laugh for one or two more pressers.
-JW
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
'Learning to Fly' . . . Still
GM,
Watching a wretched Monday Night Football game (which turned out to be incredible after we started this post), the only thing worth mentioning is that Mike Tirico's winter hat has done the impossible--made him look even nerdier. (Here's a shot I just found of Tirico explaining to Jon Gruden how to sexually harass a coworker without losing your job.) It's a good thing the game is boring, though, because two events from this weekend clearly stood out as the most relevant. (My Christmas-Day unwrapping of towels and bedsheets wasn't one of them.)
I wonder what went through Urban Meyer's mind in the 25 hours and 9 minutes between his decision to step down as Florida coach and his decision to stick around after a leave of absence. What is it about having two national championships and living in Gainesville that breeds such indecisiveness?! Meyer's similarities to Florida basketball coach Billy Donovan are great. Both won two titles, of course, but both were also leaving teams that were loaded but would soon be bereft of all their talent. And if you don't think that was at all a factor, well, you're less cynical and jaded than I. But both men thought about it a little while, decided that coaching an average team was still better than almost every other job in the country, and ultimately made the right decision.
Meanwhile, the federal government is having a change of heart before our eyes--through no choice of its own. You may recall its post-9/11 commitment to making air travel safer.
More frustrating? Sure. More invasive? You bet. More bureaucratic? We can only assume. But on the first- or second-most significant Christian and American holiday, were we capable of stopping a bomb-carrying Islamic extremist named Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from boarding a Detroit-bound plane in Amsterdam? Not even close. And news like this makes that fact even piss poorer:
In November, Abdulmutallab had been placed in a database of more than 500,000 names of people suspected of terrorist ties. But officials say there was not enough information about his terror activity that would have placed him on a watch list that could have kept him from flying.
What could that possibly mean? We knew enough to figure he might be a terrorist, but we didn't know enough to watch out for him at airports?! While that doesn't make sense, here's a suggestion that does: We give a firmer frisk to anyone with any of these in his name.
Remember what people told us after 9/11? "Sometimes you have to trade freedom for safety." We seemed pretty divided on whether or not that was a worth-while trade. What's for damn sure, though, is that we should all be willing to trade political correctness for both.
-JW
Watching a wretched Monday Night Football game (which turned out to be incredible after we started this post), the only thing worth mentioning is that Mike Tirico's winter hat has done the impossible--made him look even nerdier. (Here's a shot I just found of Tirico explaining to Jon Gruden how to sexually harass a coworker without losing your job.) It's a good thing the game is boring, though, because two events from this weekend clearly stood out as the most relevant. (My Christmas-Day unwrapping of towels and bedsheets wasn't one of them.)
I wonder what went through Urban Meyer's mind in the 25 hours and 9 minutes between his decision to step down as Florida coach and his decision to stick around after a leave of absence. What is it about having two national championships and living in Gainesville that breeds such indecisiveness?! Meyer's similarities to Florida basketball coach Billy Donovan are great. Both won two titles, of course, but both were also leaving teams that were loaded but would soon be bereft of all their talent. And if you don't think that was at all a factor, well, you're less cynical and jaded than I. But both men thought about it a little while, decided that coaching an average team was still better than almost every other job in the country, and ultimately made the right decision.
Meanwhile, the federal government is having a change of heart before our eyes--through no choice of its own. You may recall its post-9/11 commitment to making air travel safer.
More frustrating? Sure. More invasive? You bet. More bureaucratic? We can only assume. But on the first- or second-most significant Christian and American holiday, were we capable of stopping a bomb-carrying Islamic extremist named Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from boarding a Detroit-bound plane in Amsterdam? Not even close. And news like this makes that fact even piss poorer:
In November, Abdulmutallab had been placed in a database of more than 500,000 names of people suspected of terrorist ties. But officials say there was not enough information about his terror activity that would have placed him on a watch list that could have kept him from flying.
What could that possibly mean? We knew enough to figure he might be a terrorist, but we didn't know enough to watch out for him at airports?! While that doesn't make sense, here's a suggestion that does: We give a firmer frisk to anyone with any of these in his name.
Remember what people told us after 9/11? "Sometimes you have to trade freedom for safety." We seemed pretty divided on whether or not that was a worth-while trade. What's for damn sure, though, is that we should all be willing to trade political correctness for both.
-JW
JW,
I suppose it's not an accident that the hyperlinked hat with which you illustrated Tirico's was a woman's. For the record, his actual hat wasn't nearly that feminine. And you left off the propeller on top.
With that settled, let's move on to Urban Meyer, a story that resolved too quickly for me to predict its resolution, dammit. Nevertheless, I'm happy to report that I saw Meyer's "return" (Did he even physically leave his office during that retirement?) coming a mile away. As I wrote in a Sunday email, "There is absolutely no need for coaching to be life-threateningly stressful if you've already won two national championships and will never under any circumstances be fired. Just care slightly less."
And speaking of caring less, how about a prediction for the Abdulmutallab story? It disappears. Vanishes. Quicker, even, than the Fort Hood story. The media knows that a continued examination of Abdulmutallab's motives, strategies, and actions can only hurt an administration that prefers to eliminate the word "terrorism" from our vocabulary. Literally. Just like Afghanistan is now Obama's war, Abdulmutallab is Obama's bored, privileged Islamofascist. We need to stop talking about him before the President gets hurt.
-GM
I suppose it's not an accident that the hyperlinked hat with which you illustrated Tirico's was a woman's. For the record, his actual hat wasn't nearly that feminine. And you left off the propeller on top.
With that settled, let's move on to Urban Meyer, a story that resolved too quickly for me to predict its resolution, dammit. Nevertheless, I'm happy to report that I saw Meyer's "return" (Did he even physically leave his office during that retirement?) coming a mile away. As I wrote in a Sunday email, "There is absolutely no need for coaching to be life-threateningly stressful if you've already won two national championships and will never under any circumstances be fired. Just care slightly less."
And speaking of caring less, how about a prediction for the Abdulmutallab story? It disappears. Vanishes. Quicker, even, than the Fort Hood story. The media knows that a continued examination of Abdulmutallab's motives, strategies, and actions can only hurt an administration that prefers to eliminate the word "terrorism" from our vocabulary. Literally. Just like Afghanistan is now Obama's war, Abdulmutallab is Obama's bored, privileged Islamofascist. We need to stop talking about him before the President gets hurt.
-GM
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
'Tis the Season. What?!
JW,
The NBA season has started. Who knew?! Looking around the league this morning, I was startled by some occurences, reassured by others, and pleased as Punch by yet more. Here's a brief overview.
1) As an entire generation of fans has come to expect, the Eastern Conference stinks. Of its five teams with a winning record, one of them, Miami, is a humble one game over. Of its five (different) teams with a per-game average of more than one hundred points, two, New York and Toronto, are verifiably terrible, and one, Boston, is so old they're still pissed off about Dred Scott. Conversely, the Western Conference has eight teams over .500, nine with a positive point differential (as opposed to the Eastern's pathetic five), and a whopping ten with a PPG of more than one hundred. At the top of the conferences, the Lakers look simply incredible, whereas the Celtics look relieved that yet another jump shot fell. I'll let you guess which playoffs I'm more excited about.
2) At 2-26, the New Jersey Nets have the potential to be the worst team ever assembled. (Hell, they're already the worst; they're just searching for the worst record.) According to this handy ESPN chart, they're tied with the 97-98 Nuggets and a couple of pre-Cuban Mavericks teams for futility through twenty-eight games, and they're behind only the 70-71 Cavs for worst all-time. (No worries, though: the Cavs recovered in 71-72 with an impressive twenty-three wins!) A look at the Nets' starting five just made me go blind temporarily, but I'm pretty sure it was Josh Boone, Chris Douglas-Roberts, Brook Lopez, Devin Harris, and Courtney Lee. Yikes! You know things are bad when an entire fan base is anxiously awaiting the return from injury of Yi Jianlian--a thirty-eight percent shooter last year, by the way. In other news, Nets tickets are still available.
3) Despite Sports Illustrated's August claim that "no one in the West made as many direct hits in bringing in new players as the once-and-still contenders," the San Antonio Spurs may be getting a little too old for this. Sure, they're 15-10 and hanging on to the seventh seed, but their road record is a pitiful 3-6, and they've played fewer road games than any team in the league. Projecting their final record based on their performance thus far puts them at 44-38. Congratulations on missing the playoffs.
4) If we're going on the past few games alone, your 09-10 MVP is Zach Randolph. Since December 18th, he's averaged thirty-three points and nineteen rebounds. The Grizzlies are 3-0 during that stretch. Surely this is not the world.
-GM
GM,
1) Strangely enough, the Eastern and Western Conferences have been trading blows since 2003 when it comes to championships. Still, the generation you spoke of has every right to expect futility from the East. For a significant period of time, the Jason Kidd-led Nets and the Allen Iverson-led 76ers were the class of the conference, and Keith Van Horn contributed on every Atlantic Division team. In 2002-2003, there was only one 50-win team in the East--Detroit--and I do mean 50. The West had six teams with 50-plus wins that year. The next season, the 36-46 Celtics made the playoffs, and I'll pay for your Christmas ham if you can name me a player from that team besides Paul Pierce. (Hint: Antoine Walker was with the Mavericks that year; I checked.) Even when the Pistons and Heat won championships, we knew they were fraudulent, and Boston's 2008 title only came because an alumnus decided it was time to renew the dynasty.
2) What was Jay-Z thinking when he fired Lawrence Frank? I assume he's the key decision maker anyway. After losing Vince Carter and Richard Jefferson to free agency--from a team that stunk with them--the Nets were simply talentless. The fact that Frank had them shooting at the right basket almost every possession should have been enough to secure his job. By the way, I somehow managed to see the '97-'98 Nuggets twice in person! They won one of the games! But even they had players who could start for other teams. These Nets don't.
3) The Spurs' current road mark is no matter for concern. Those fossils could roll their wheelchairs into the playoffs and still annoy the piss out of any team that's too lazy to box out or play defense. Here's how old the Spurs are: Bruce Bowen played 80 games last year and shot 43 percent behind the arch (from that same spot in the corner, no doubt), and I saw him last night hosting NBA Fastbreak on ESPN2. These guys can still produce with one foot in the grave!
4) Congratulations to Memphis for trying so hard. I could see that team making a run with jumpshots and hustle, winning 44 games, and getting swept out of the first round of the playoffs for the fourth time in four franchise playoff appearances. In the pros, great effort doesn't win; stars do. This truism deserves its own post at a later date.
-JW
The NBA season has started. Who knew?! Looking around the league this morning, I was startled by some occurences, reassured by others, and pleased as Punch by yet more. Here's a brief overview.
1) As an entire generation of fans has come to expect, the Eastern Conference stinks. Of its five teams with a winning record, one of them, Miami, is a humble one game over. Of its five (different) teams with a per-game average of more than one hundred points, two, New York and Toronto, are verifiably terrible, and one, Boston, is so old they're still pissed off about Dred Scott. Conversely, the Western Conference has eight teams over .500, nine with a positive point differential (as opposed to the Eastern's pathetic five), and a whopping ten with a PPG of more than one hundred. At the top of the conferences, the Lakers look simply incredible, whereas the Celtics look relieved that yet another jump shot fell. I'll let you guess which playoffs I'm more excited about.
2) At 2-26, the New Jersey Nets have the potential to be the worst team ever assembled. (Hell, they're already the worst; they're just searching for the worst record.) According to this handy ESPN chart, they're tied with the 97-98 Nuggets and a couple of pre-Cuban Mavericks teams for futility through twenty-eight games, and they're behind only the 70-71 Cavs for worst all-time. (No worries, though: the Cavs recovered in 71-72 with an impressive twenty-three wins!) A look at the Nets' starting five just made me go blind temporarily, but I'm pretty sure it was Josh Boone, Chris Douglas-Roberts, Brook Lopez, Devin Harris, and Courtney Lee. Yikes! You know things are bad when an entire fan base is anxiously awaiting the return from injury of Yi Jianlian--a thirty-eight percent shooter last year, by the way. In other news, Nets tickets are still available.
3) Despite Sports Illustrated's August claim that "no one in the West made as many direct hits in bringing in new players as the once-and-still contenders," the San Antonio Spurs may be getting a little too old for this. Sure, they're 15-10 and hanging on to the seventh seed, but their road record is a pitiful 3-6, and they've played fewer road games than any team in the league. Projecting their final record based on their performance thus far puts them at 44-38. Congratulations on missing the playoffs.
4) If we're going on the past few games alone, your 09-10 MVP is Zach Randolph. Since December 18th, he's averaged thirty-three points and nineteen rebounds. The Grizzlies are 3-0 during that stretch. Surely this is not the world.
-GM
GM,
1) Strangely enough, the Eastern and Western Conferences have been trading blows since 2003 when it comes to championships. Still, the generation you spoke of has every right to expect futility from the East. For a significant period of time, the Jason Kidd-led Nets and the Allen Iverson-led 76ers were the class of the conference, and Keith Van Horn contributed on every Atlantic Division team. In 2002-2003, there was only one 50-win team in the East--Detroit--and I do mean 50. The West had six teams with 50-plus wins that year. The next season, the 36-46 Celtics made the playoffs, and I'll pay for your Christmas ham if you can name me a player from that team besides Paul Pierce. (Hint: Antoine Walker was with the Mavericks that year; I checked.) Even when the Pistons and Heat won championships, we knew they were fraudulent, and Boston's 2008 title only came because an alumnus decided it was time to renew the dynasty.
2) What was Jay-Z thinking when he fired Lawrence Frank? I assume he's the key decision maker anyway. After losing Vince Carter and Richard Jefferson to free agency--from a team that stunk with them--the Nets were simply talentless. The fact that Frank had them shooting at the right basket almost every possession should have been enough to secure his job. By the way, I somehow managed to see the '97-'98 Nuggets twice in person! They won one of the games! But even they had players who could start for other teams. These Nets don't.
3) The Spurs' current road mark is no matter for concern. Those fossils could roll their wheelchairs into the playoffs and still annoy the piss out of any team that's too lazy to box out or play defense. Here's how old the Spurs are: Bruce Bowen played 80 games last year and shot 43 percent behind the arch (from that same spot in the corner, no doubt), and I saw him last night hosting NBA Fastbreak on ESPN2. These guys can still produce with one foot in the grave!
4) Congratulations to Memphis for trying so hard. I could see that team making a run with jumpshots and hustle, winning 44 games, and getting swept out of the first round of the playoffs for the fourth time in four franchise playoff appearances. In the pros, great effort doesn't win; stars do. This truism deserves its own post at a later date.
-JW
Monday, December 21, 2009
Brad Bench Brett? Bright, Bold, or Brainless?
GM,
If you watched Sunday night's game between the Panthers and Vikings, you know that Carolina owned the fourth quarter (20-0), that Matt Moore had the best game of his life (299 yards, 3 TDs, no INTs), that Steve Smith can still dominate a game despite his size deficiency (9 rec., 157 yards, TD), and that Adrian Peterson is very containable all of a sudden (12 rushes, 35 yards, TD). If you read anything after the game, you probably know that Brad Childress tried to bench Brett Favre and that Favre refused to leave the game. This didn't surprise me at all until I learned that Childress tried to take out his franchise, future-Hall-of-Fame, most-touchdown-passes-thrown, most-consecutive-games-started, can't-stay-retired-to-save-his-life, legendary, 2009 MVP candidate quarterback in the third quarter--when the Vikings were ahead 7-6!!!
Those, however, are not why he came back. Brett Favre came back to playing football (drum roll)............... to play football. Not hold a clipboard and mentor the young guy. Not latch on to a team late in the season because he understands its offense. And certainly not to leave meaningful one-point games in the third quarter.
The Vikings had clinched the NFC North an hour earlier when Pittsburgh stunned Green Bay on the game's last play to take the Packers out of contention for the division crown. They no longer had to worry about that. But with New Orleans' loss Thursday, they were one more Saints loss away from getting home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. And if you think the difference between the No. 1 and No. 2 seed is big--and it is--consider that Minnesota is now just one loss away from losing its first-round bye to Philadelphia. In other words, that game was as big as a non-playoff game could get, and Childress wanted to rip the heart from his offense with the results hanging in the balance.
If he had gotten his way, we'd be talking about this much more, and Favre himself would be blaming Childress for a fourth-quarter beatdown. And Coach, Brett Favre's sh** list is not the best place to spend Christmas.
-JW
JW,
Well put, sir! While headlines like this one suggest that Favre is wrongly usurping Childress' authority, thoughtful fans understand that Minnesota would probably be better off if he were. Consider, for example, last night's Adrian Peterson line. Of Peterson's twelve carries, seven occurred on 1st and 10 and went for a total of twenty-five yards. His three receptions, on the other hand, went for seventy-three yards. Every Vikings game includes multiple comments about Peterson's open-field ability, but Childress is apparently going to be damned if he puts it to the test. Peterson is obviously a talented (though mildly overrated) guy. Why waste him on hopeless runs up the middle that my mother-in-law sees coming?
But forget Childress' predictability for a minute. Given that he characterized his in-game conversation with Favre by alluding to a literary technique popularized by James Joyce (not known for coaching), William Faulkner (not known for sober decision-making), and Virginia Woolf (not known for taking defeat reasonably), perhaps there are bigger issues here. How about the fact that a house built on Favre not screwing you will not long endure? The Vikings have proven--repeatedly, inexplicably--that when the game is on the line, a run is not on the menu. Only Indianapolis, New England, and New Orleans have more passing attempts in the red zone this season, and the Colts and Patriots barely dress running backs. If the last few weeks are any indication, Favre will end this season with a crucial interception--we're all waiting for it--and Childress will be sent packing. He'll deserve it, too. As John Travolta once said, he should have f-----g better known better.
-GM
If you watched Sunday night's game between the Panthers and Vikings, you know that Carolina owned the fourth quarter (20-0), that Matt Moore had the best game of his life (299 yards, 3 TDs, no INTs), that Steve Smith can still dominate a game despite his size deficiency (9 rec., 157 yards, TD), and that Adrian Peterson is very containable all of a sudden (12 rushes, 35 yards, TD). If you read anything after the game, you probably know that Brad Childress tried to bench Brett Favre and that Favre refused to leave the game. This didn't surprise me at all until I learned that Childress tried to take out his franchise, future-Hall-of-Fame, most-touchdown-passes-thrown, most-consecutive-games-started, can't-stay-retired-to-save-his-life, legendary, 2009 MVP candidate quarterback in the third quarter--when the Vikings were ahead 7-6!!!
I think we can safely say that Brett Favre enjoys the following:
- Accolades
- Locker-room comradery
- Fan adoration
- Money
- Winning
Those, however, are not why he came back. Brett Favre came back to playing football (drum roll)............... to play football. Not hold a clipboard and mentor the young guy. Not latch on to a team late in the season because he understands its offense. And certainly not to leave meaningful one-point games in the third quarter.
The Vikings had clinched the NFC North an hour earlier when Pittsburgh stunned Green Bay on the game's last play to take the Packers out of contention for the division crown. They no longer had to worry about that. But with New Orleans' loss Thursday, they were one more Saints loss away from getting home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. And if you think the difference between the No. 1 and No. 2 seed is big--and it is--consider that Minnesota is now just one loss away from losing its first-round bye to Philadelphia. In other words, that game was as big as a non-playoff game could get, and Childress wanted to rip the heart from his offense with the results hanging in the balance.
If he had gotten his way, we'd be talking about this much more, and Favre himself would be blaming Childress for a fourth-quarter beatdown. And Coach, Brett Favre's sh** list is not the best place to spend Christmas.
-JW
JW,
Well put, sir! While headlines like this one suggest that Favre is wrongly usurping Childress' authority, thoughtful fans understand that Minnesota would probably be better off if he were. Consider, for example, last night's Adrian Peterson line. Of Peterson's twelve carries, seven occurred on 1st and 10 and went for a total of twenty-five yards. His three receptions, on the other hand, went for seventy-three yards. Every Vikings game includes multiple comments about Peterson's open-field ability, but Childress is apparently going to be damned if he puts it to the test. Peterson is obviously a talented (though mildly overrated) guy. Why waste him on hopeless runs up the middle that my mother-in-law sees coming?
But forget Childress' predictability for a minute. Given that he characterized his in-game conversation with Favre by alluding to a literary technique popularized by James Joyce (not known for coaching), William Faulkner (not known for sober decision-making), and Virginia Woolf (not known for taking defeat reasonably), perhaps there are bigger issues here. How about the fact that a house built on Favre not screwing you will not long endure? The Vikings have proven--repeatedly, inexplicably--that when the game is on the line, a run is not on the menu. Only Indianapolis, New England, and New Orleans have more passing attempts in the red zone this season, and the Colts and Patriots barely dress running backs. If the last few weeks are any indication, Favre will end this season with a crucial interception--we're all waiting for it--and Childress will be sent packing. He'll deserve it, too. As John Travolta once said, he should have f-----g better known better.
-GM
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