The Search For A Scapegoat

[next2nothing]

Originally Posted by King of Kings

- Mike Holmgren. We were leverage to make a return to Seattle. He left Mora high and dry and was angling for THEIR Team President gig. He fancied that he could walk in, scapegoat Mora(kinda like he did EM) and play the role of savior once more. He even attempted to get Dallas involved in the bidding war but even Jerry Jones turned him down. Obviously as did Seattle. NOBODY was showing interest in Mike Holmgren except for Randy Lerner, a lesson he should have thought on.

- Tom Heckert. Hey, like I said I bought into their bullshit and like I bought into Sewage's bullshit I truly thought Heckert was this draft guru. Until I started taking a look at our drafts which were unimpressive. Then I asked myself why Atlanta and KC said no thanks to this guy and opted for Belichick men instead. Then I asked myself if this guy was so great then why the hell did Philadelphia eagerly show him the door and hire Howie Roseman instead of keeping him? The answers came via the Philly press. He ISN'T a draft guru. His duty was largely to fetch Andy Reid's doughnuts and Red Bulls on draft day while Reid made all of the decisions. A pliant sock puppet, which explains why after blowing us off in 2009 he quickly accepted the job as soon as it was offered in 2010 even though it came without final GM authority.

The truth is Tom Heckert was about to be fired in Philadelphia. The ownership and F.O. looked at him as little more than Andy Reid's personal yes man who signed off on EVERYTHING Reid wanted. They also reportedly felt he has no back bone. This hire was Holmgren doing a favor to his coaching tree and giving a "Holmgren guy" a job before he could be fired like all the other "Holmgren guys." It also fits that a guy Ron Wolf describes as "an unbendable egomaniac" who "will only accept things done his way" would bring in a yes man.

- Eddie Haskell, The Beav's buddy. A guy looked at across the NFL as a formerly elite OC in the past but the game had passed him by. He wasn't getting a job anywhere else. Holmgren was here what, 4, 5 minutes before he signed Haskell to a 7 figure contract as a vague sort of "consultant?"

- Pat Shurmur, you'll see a recurring theme here. The news in STL was Shurmur was about to be fired. If ANY rope was going to be given to him it was one more season. The Rams brass felt the offense should have been ALOT better than it was and that he could hold Bradford back. Had he been fired as the Rams OC he wouldn't have touched another OC job much less a HC gig. Despite the 3 man Holmgren fanclub on this board claiming otherwise Shurmur is NOT "well respected in the NFL" as anything more than a QB Coach. You will not find another team that was ready to pursue him as a HC or OC even.

I would ask that you ask yourself why we would hire a guy who failed to improve a 1st round QB in Donovan McNabb, failed to rebuild the Rams offense with a #1 overall pick at QB and who was about to be fired. Ask yourself what is it that made him qualified to become a HC to a rebuilding franchise. He's a "Holmgren guy" and a guy Holmgren refers to as his nephew.

- Dickless Jauron, like the first two his job in Philly was in jeopardy. He's been passed around the NFL and shit canned more than Derek Anderson for one reason: He fucking sucks at his job. He's never been more than an average DB's coach and a failure as a DC AND as a HC. His schemes are outdated and only effective against shitty offensive lines and bad QB's as we are witnessing. Andy Reid had no desire to keep the guy, in fact he opted to let him walk and promoted the Oline coach to DC instead. Once again we pick up Holmgren's #1 lackey's table scraps. Ironic that Reid sends Jauron here while all but begging Mangini to run his D for him in Philly. Then again he admittedly told Holmgren that Mangini is a good coach and the perfect guy to rebuild a franchise.

- Ray Rhodes, ANOTHER old man who many in the NFL had said the game passed by. Like Heckert, like Shurmur and like Jauron before him Rhodes was on his way out the door in Houston. Wade Phillips, a gentleman who has forgotten more about Defense than Holmgren's entire tree will ever know had zero desire to keep Rhodes on his defensive staff and sent him packing. We of course picked up the scraps.

- Billy Davis, the other Reid guy/failed DC who was sent packing from sorry assed Arizona due to his ineptness. Rumor has it he was the HC candidate Heckert pitched to Atlanta when they hung up the phone laughing their asses off.

- The QB Coach guy. I care so little about him I can't even recall his name. The College reject who was demoted OUT of the NFL down to College for a reason.

- Brad Childress. Word around the campfire is "Chilly" is the OC Holmgren desires. He didn't come last season due to wanting to collect the balance of his HC contract from MN. Yep, that's right, ANOTHER failure on the Holmgren tree being offered a job after being fired elsewhere. A guy with ZERO respect in the NFL outside of the Holmgren-Reid inner circle. A fucking laughing stock across the NFL by players and coaches alike. THAT is "the candidate we're after" Holmgren is talking about.

Great. Freaking. Post.

You put basically everything I've been thinking about this current regime in words. This is the first I've heard of Childress being looked at and all I can say is... I hope to God this idiot doesn't get hired here...

Funny thing about all these guys, except for Holmgren, all of em are guys NO ONE ELSE wanted. If that right there doesn't cause red flags, I don't know what would. I still hold out hope that Heckert will be good for us because I have liked some of his picks so far and remember, the draft is a crapshoot, you can't judge him all on the draft. Not going for some people in FA is causing me to scratch my head though but I do kind of believe the theory that they wanted to see what we had before we cut the fat from the roster, though I doubt it would make a difference with this coaching staff.

[Flugel]

Originally Posted by Brown Warrior

Oh, I think great quarterbacks have learning curves, mostly in their rookie seasons... but Colt's well into his second season and I certainly don't see the upside of the great quarterbacks who had so-so or even bad rookie seasons.

But you could absolutely see greatness in, say, Peyton Manning in that rookie year. He threw 25 picks... but he also threw 26 TDs.

Wrong again! He had 28 INTs and led his team to 3-13 in spite of weapons like Marvin Harrison and Marshall Faulk. Do yourself a favor and actually USE stats instead of editing them. What part of beating NE and New Orleans and taking the Jets to OT sucked prior to a high ankle sprain on the plant foot sucked?

You make Colt sound like he had a full rookie season of starting from the first OTA with ALL the practice reps to the last game; but he only started 8 games and didn't get starter's reps in practice until the Wednesday before the Steeler game. After just 8 games, he was handed a brand new playbook, no OTAs to get coached up for it and a head coach that needed to place Hillis in the doghouse. And all your yammering about avg yards per completions and passer ratings - here's the first 3 years of Alex Smith:
2005 passer rating of 40.8 with an avg of 5.3 yards per complete
2006 passer rating of 74.8 with an avg of 6.5 yards per complete
2007 passer rating of 57.2 witn an avg of 4.7 yards per complete
There's nothing consistent in your criteria or side of the arguement at all. If the QB played high school ball in CA - he deserves at least 7 years to prove himself in order for assessments to be fair. Alex didn't get benched in 2010 because he was WINNING or playing well. Besides your fetish for QBs that played high school ball in CA - what was so freakin promising about this kid early especially at the overrated value of a #1 overall draft pick? Now we have a young QB with much better numbers but he grew up in Texas with a combination of big ears and freckles so you're complaining about a betetr start than Alex had. You might be the ONLY person on the planet that understands WINNING less than Charlie Sheen. Apples to apples isn't comparing a QB under 20 starts to 7 year veterans with nothign but first round WRs on the perimeter and Frank Gore behind him and Jim Harbaugh protecting him.

It's amazing how hypocritical you get when you used to tell people that Tom Brady is an exception to the rule (so please don't use him as the rule) and yet all you want to do is pretend Aaron Rodgers and Peyton Manning are the rule. You haven't see Bill Polian HERE hiring the staff around QB since 1999 so let's not pretend this is total apples to apples nor do you see Marvin Harrison or Marshall Faulk on board yet. Faulk had 4.2 forty speed which put his fanny in the HOF in case you want to belittle that perk for a rookie QB vrs the blitz. Before I get accused of being mean - I'm just calling you out for beign massively inconsistent with WHO deserves to be assessed fairly and who does not.

[Enigmatic Evil]

Originally Posted by Solon16

So you disagree with me as usual and only point out McCoy... hmmmm

I meant about McCoy. We continually disagree about Colt McCoy. That's all. I agreed with the other points you made, if you actually read my post.

[King of Kings]

Originally Posted by next2nothing

Great. Freaking. Post.

You put basically everything I've been thinking about this current regime in words. This is the first I've heard of Childress being looked at and all I can say is... I hope to God this idiot doesn't get hired here...

Funny thing about all these guys, except for Holmgren, all of em are guys NO ONE ELSE wanted. If that right there doesn't cause red flags, I don't know what would. I still hold out hope that Heckert will be good for us because I have liked some of his picks so far and remember, the draft is a crapshoot, you can't judge him all on the draft. Not going for some people in FA is causing me to scratch my head though but I do kind of believe the theory that they wanted to see what we had before we cut the fat from the roster, though I doubt it would make a difference with this coaching staff.

The word on the street is Chilly is the guy.

Anyhow i'm judging Heckert on the total package so far and it isn't impressive. You'll notice he has some influence in Holmgren's staffing choices as MOST of the guys being picked up are ex Eagle staff that Reid bounced. Likewise the guy has traded draft picks for Eagles that were on the way out anyways and continually picks up Eagle castoff players.

I'm judging him on 4 hits out of 22 draft picks.

- Trading three draft picks to draft an injury prone RB, overruling the coaching staffs wishes to use the first of the three picks on a RT who is playing better than anything we have had in that position in years.

- Trading away a 3rd rounder in addition to using a 1st on a 350lb Rubin type NT when we already had that on the roster and NEED a speedy passrushing UT if we're going to run this 4-3 bullshit.

- Using an early 2nd rounder on a SS with limited coverage ability that graded out by every other GM as a late 3rd to 4th rounder.

- Trading two draft picks for a 31 year old CB that had lost a step and a mediocre linebacker.

- Trading away a draft pick for a career backup DE.

- Signing an aging veteran LB who was good... Years prior. I like Fujita as a person and for his leadership ability but he wasn't a spring chicken when we signed him and it reeks of Willie McGinest 2.0.

- Signing Eagles rejects like Dimitri Patterson, Fenuki Tupou, Artis Hicks, Reggie Hodges and Richmond McGee despite all of the above minus Hodges establishing themselves as trash heap players.

- Lowballing Peyton Hillis and Marcus Benard on contract extensions while handing out a premium money contract to the mediocre Chris Gocong simply because it was a guy he helped draft in Philly.

- Never taking responsibility for HIS mistakes and pawning them off on others.

- Doing barely anything in Free Agency outside of picking up a bunch of rookie UDFA's on the D and career backup Usma Young, DURING a once in two decades free agency when there was an excess of 23-26 year old free agents that could improve this team now and for years to come.

- His stating that hardworking, high character types don't matter and reverting to drafting low character guys like Sheard and Little, guys who put themselves before their College careers and academics. Character matters.

- Outside of picking up Seahawks, Rams and Iggles rejects does NOTHING in regards to scouring the waver wires and practice squads in the NFL.

- Refused to give Matt Roth a contract extension last season and this season instead letting the "Mangini guy" walk and play elsewhere. Matt Roth playing 4-3 DE in Jacksonville has more sacks as well as tackles as Heckert pet project Jayme Mitchell.

- Despite having plans to switch to a 4-3 and WCO this season wen he got here trades was Wimbley who is a BEAST as a 4-3 SLB and traded away Corey Williams who fits the system we're now trying to run and at 30 and 31 is performing about as well as Mr. 1st and 3rd round draft picks in a rotation.

- Decided he needs two seasons to "evaluate" the roster and i'm sure it'll turn into 3 seasons.


The more I see of this guy the more he looks like a Phil Sewage wannabe honestly. You've honestly gotta be pretty bad to mess up 22 draft picks, 30+ million dollars in salary cap room with two awesome free agencies along with GOOD players hitting waivers.

[Brown Warrior]

Tom... you're a bit of a phallus today and I'm not sure why. I wasn't even a little wrong about Manning (52 TDs in his first two years!!) and I think you totally understand my point. He threw a ton of picks but also led an offense to a lot of points. There was no doubt where that train was headed if you were paying attention.

The Browns offense has been the worst in the league at scoring over the past three seasons, and McCoy has been the starter 17 of those games. You need to think BEFORE writing. But hang in there... I'll be wrong some day!

The question here, and based on OBR and here I believe we've figured out the answer: Has any quarterback "led" an offense this bad, this points-challenged, for an extended period of time over two seasons... and turned out to be "great?"

I don't think so. I don't think great quarterbacks lead horrible offenses. They elevate the teams around them. I think McCoy is looking decent the past two weeks but his ceiling still looks low to me.

But if we win 5 games or more, we won't be shopping in the Luck/Barkley/RGIII aisle anyway.

[King of Kings]

I swear bro if you start pimping RGIII as "the guy" we sould draft i'm gonna fly to L.A., kidnap you, tie you up and place you into a cold dark room with Gary Busey until after the draft.