Sad or not, it’s been reality for decades, so there’s really no point to whining about it now. If you really think there’s no need for a coach to inspire, then you’re turning a blind eye to the successes and the failures in the NFL.
For example, the Cowboys last year - a vastly uninspired team - finished 5-11. This year, with a real motivator at the helm, they finished 10-6. With virtually the same players.
The right coach for the right team can have a huge positive impacton that team’s fortune. The wrong coach can have a huge negative impact.
Whining?.. I’m loving it! I love to see the boys from the nations capital in such a sad sorry state. I think one of Spurriers biggest downfall was believing one of his former college qb’s could get the job done!
I think inspiration is only part of it. Today’s NFL is also heavily reliant on system. You need a good game plan to win. You need to inspire your players. And you need your players to be talented. In that order.
I’d say it’s 40% system, 35% inspiration, and 25% talent.
Reviewing why my poor, hapless Giants currently possess the #4 overall pick, I’d say the inspiration was gone. Similar to the Jets, though the Jets’ system was more flawed than the Giants, whose system was dictated by OL (lack of) talent.
It was the mentality of “We’ll turn it on later in the season. We did it last year.” It can too easily get too late.
Now the Redskins are a completely different story. The system did not fit the talent. That will kill every single team in the league. The fact that Spurrier replaced Davis with Canidate, and then went to RB protection schemes, is the most blatant system failure I’ve seen in a long time.
Two tight end sets? Great. So, who are those two tight ends? Granted the Giants sucked ass this year, but hear me out. Last year, the Big Blue ran two tight end sets more than any other set. Shockey and Campbell ruled the edges; Shockey inspired Campbell to competence in the passing game, and likewise Campbell inspired Shockey’s blocking. This year, we had Shiancoe instead of Campbell. Not only can he not catch, he’s a worse blocker than Shockey. (Who isn’t the worst blocker ever, but he’s no Dan Campbell.) So what did Fassel do? He changed the system to move away from two tight end sets. Mostly, we had a fullback in there, or 3 wide, or 5 wide shotgun. Spurrier is incapable of admitting a flaw in his precious system.
Whatever happened to pounding the ball up the gut to take the pressure off the passing game? That’s the adjustment he needed to make. Oh wait, that adjustment got shipped to Carolina.
Spurrier is a momumental idiot. Good riddance.
I want Fassel on the Redskins and Johnson on the Giants. That would make for 4 excellent divisional games next year.
My only remaining wish this season is for Philly to lose yet again. Pats-Rams rematch! Go Pats!
“Call bullshit” all you want to, Ash. (It’s not the world’s stupidest phrase, but it’s in the top 20.) But who else was lined up behind the Bucs to grab the architect of one of the greatest defenses ever, if they were to decide (as they did) on someone else?
Nobody. That’s right, nobody.
And now, exactly how many teams are lined up to interview Fassel, moments after his Giants went down the tubes?
It’s a big jump from being an O-line coach or a QBs coach or something on that level, to running an entire team. There’s no telling what Snyder will actually do (though I’d bet on a name with a lot more star power than Grimm, obviously), but if you’re smart, you’d kinda like to see how a guy handles being offensive or defensive coordinator, before running the whole shebang. What Ellis Dee says about the importance of system in the NFL is dead on, and it’s going to be a rare O-line coach who’s going to be ready with a system in his head to run a team.
Yeah, not only do they have talent, they have heart. :rolleyes:
But seriously, great thread here guys, and at least Spurrier had the decency to get the hell out of Dodge City when he realized his gun was firing blanks [insert Levitra joke here.]
I agree that Spurrier was not a success at the pro level. I also agree that it is his job to improve the blocking. OTOH, the Redskins could not block tackles shooting the A gap. That’s not coaching, just bad blocking. The center and guards must always block the DTs in any scheme.
Second, the defense – which Spurrier never coaches – was a huge disappointment. The Redskins may not just be a coach away, in other words.
[aside] Spurrier is a class act, whether anyone wants to admit it or not. He could have stuck it to Snyder and the Redskins as he was under contract. He left with a much smaller buyout. Not every coach does that. Moreover, he always takes responsibility for his failures. Honesty is not always the best policy, IRL.
RTF, I think you’re right that these coordinators and assistants exist, but I don’t think that every team is set up to allow them to succeed. In Marvin Lewis’ case, the Bengals ceded him a lot more control than they had ever given a head coach, and they significantly upgraded their front office. Before this year, they never even had a scouting department - assistant coaches had to travel and scout prospects in between game planning. Lewis was put in charge of a sinking ship, and he’s done an admirable job with it, but the guys who can do that, given a minimal amount of support, are few and far between.
The other assistants who succeed as first-time head coaches are usually put into places with a strong front office filled with good scouts and excellent talent evaluators, and often inherit a strong team to begin with. Steve Mariucci took over the 49ers from George Seifert, Bill Cowher inherited the Steelers from Chuck Knoll, Andy Reid has a strong front office in Philly, and Chuck Sherman got Holmgren’s Packers along with the front office. The guys who get a weak team and a weak front office end up like Mike Riley, Dave McGinnis, Marty Morninwheg, Bruce Coslet, Vince Tobin, Gregg Williams…
The Redskins have talent, but they really haven’t been coached in two years, and the closest they get to a strong front office is forty miles up I-95. Snyder’s not going to turn the organizational reins over to a head coach. From all appearances, it’s not an environment where a first-time head coach is going to succeed.
I don’t know who the Redskins best coice is, but I don’t think it’s Dennis Green. Part of the reason he left Minnesota was a lack of discipline, and it seems to me that the 'Skins need someone to whip them when they could use it.
And upon preview… Beagle, I couldn’t disagree more with you when you say that Spurrier is a class act. He accepted a job that he didn’t really know, and then didn’t put in the time to learn it or even do a passable job. He took $10 million dollars from Snyder to coach an NFL team and put forth a half-assed effort. During his tenure, he never acknowledged that the system wasn’t working, never looked for ways to improve it, and never earned his salary. He did not quit because he was concerned for Dan Snyder’s wallet; he quit because he couldn’t stomach the weekly articles about how his system, and Spurrier himself, weren’t up to the challenge of the NFL. He started his head coahcing career chiding people like Gruden for working at 4:00 am, and never realized that sometimes that’s what it takes to be competitive.
For me to say that Spurrier was a class act, he would have to give Dan Snyder a check for the work that he didn’t do. I’ve got no love for Snyder - I think he’s a fool who has no business doing what he’s doing, but Spurrier’s lazy. It takes brass balls to accept $5 million a year and not do your job.
We’ll have to agree to disagree on some of that. He was loaded before he took the Redskins job. He didn’t take the money to get rich, as he already was. I think you misunderstand why Snyder threw so much cash at him: to pry him from his cush coaching job at the University of Florida making something over a mil a year, plus incentives – with job security.
As for class, it depends on what kind. He’s honest to a fault. He takes responsibility for losses. He never sugarcoats a poor coaching job. OTOH, you’re right, he won’t admit expressly that he’s a lousy coach. Not many coaches will do that.
Spurrier did, in fact, acknowledge that the system wasn’t working, over and over. I could provide cites if you want me to. He certainly poor-mouthed (Southernism) his win/loss record and the Redskins’ ability to put up passing yards. He joked about running the ball more. What should he say, “My whole coaching philosophy sucks”?
That’s too honest. Moreover, it doesn’t. It’s a fair weather (literally) scheme which works with the right quarterback. Like any scheme, it requires an offensive line which can block the interior guys. He needs at least four good wide recievers (they have to make sight adjustments with the quarterback on every play). Still, he won the most games when he had his best tailbacks at the college level. However Stephen Davis got out of Washington should be the focus of your anger. Oh, that was Spurrier.
[as for the parallel discussion]
It will be interesting to see who Snyder hires. If I were him I would consider Russ Grimm (former “hog”) or Lovie Smith. I know that college coaches are on the way out of favor in the pros after Spurrier. He makes caldera eruptions – as earthquakes are too insignificant – wherever he goes.
BUT, ever the contrarian, what about Willingham at ND? He has that pro demeanor.
He didn’t have to take the cash. One reason he wanted to coach in the NFL was that he was convinced his system would work there, despite the advice of almost everyone. If he didn’t take the money to get rich, as you say, then there was no reason for him to take so much money. I could admire his principles if he had refused Snyder even as the salary escalated (“No, no amount of money can pry me from Florida!”), or if he had agreed to take the job shortly after it was offered, rather than “settling” for $5 million a year. I’m sorry, but someone accepting a job for $5 million a year is most certainly doing it for the money when no other head coach in the league was making anywhere near that amount of money.
Yeah, he takes responsibility, and that’s a classy thing to do. What’s really classy, however, is finding ways to solve the problems of the previous game. He learned nothing from the first snap of the first game he coached; he simply stuck to what had made him a successful college coach, never concurring with other people who advised him to make adjustments.
In other words, saying “I’m sorry, my fault” is only classy to a point - when you repeat it every damn time, then something has to be done. Why was it your fault, in other words? What did you do wrong? And most importantly, what can you do to make sure it never happens again? He never seemed to ask himself these questions.
No, he didn’t acknowledge that at all. He kept saying that other people wanted him to have more of a balanced attack, and on a couple of occasions this season he acquiesced and tried to run a little bit more, to no avail - at wchich point he threw up his hands and said, “Well, I tried it their way, now I’ll go back to my pass-happy stuff.”
And yes, he should have said that what he was doing obviously wasn’t working, and that he and the coaching staff needed to make some adjustments to compensate for flaws in their plans at the NFL level and the inability at times of his players to execute those plans. Instead he stubbornly plugged on with his Gator offense that never really worked (and left his QB very vulnerable).
No offense intended, but in 32 games he used “his” offense nearly all of the time, only on occasion going with a more-balanced attack, and he wound up winning 12 games. So of course it sucks, at least at the NFL level. This is another example of a hotshot college guy thinking he was all that and could easily win in the NFL - remember, college football is nowhere NEAR the same talent level as the pros.
You mention adjustments, and that’s something he was loath to do. A good coach realizes the limitations of his personnel and makes adjustments. You have an immobile QB? Then you better provide optimum protection so he doesn’t get killed. That one lack of adjustment alone nearly ended Ramsey’s career.
I think one of Spurriers biggest downfall was believing one of his former college qb’s could get the job done!