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Do Not Drink the Rocket Kool-Aid, Just Yet

Monday, March 5th, 2018

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

The Houston Rockets are very very good! Their winning streak is at 15 and counting. They have the best record in basketball, which if maintained would give them home court throughout the playoffs. They have won two of three from the defending champion Warriors. James Harden would get my vote for MVP up to this point.

Yet, if you tell me that Houston Rocket Kool-Aid taste like a team that will win the NBA title, I am just not ready to drink.

In no particular order, I am going to outline the four reasons why I refuse to drink:

When has a Mike D’Antoni coached team played enough defense to be a threat to win an NBA title? The answer is NEVER! It is a highly entertaining brand of basketball, without a doubt. His teams remind me of Big 12 college football teams; high scoring, very little defense, and as much as you may want to believe that they can win it all, you know in your heart of hearts, they will not beat defensive-minded SEC teams.

Another concern is that no eventual champion team has ever blown a 26-point lead to lose a game as the Rockets did earlier in the year to Boston. Some will cite the Cavaliers blowing the same lead last year against the Hawks. The difference is that they blew that after having won a title. It is indefensible in either case but Cleveland already achieved the essential goal. Houston has not reached that level.

Yet another reason is James Harden’s Game 6-elimination performance against San Antonio last year. After a disappointing overtime loss in game 5, in which Harden was great with 33 points, 10 rebounds, and 10 assists. After averaging 20 shots in the first 5 games, at home in game 6 he only took 11 shots, making 2 to score 10 points. It is one thing to go 9 of 30 with the season on the line. At least we could say he left everything on the floor. However, this effort, in my mind, can only be classified as quitting. We have seen great regular season performers across sports that simply did not duplicate the performance in the post season. The best example is Dodgers Ace Clayton Kershaw. Even as a die-hard Giants fan, I freely acknowledge Kershaw as being the best….regular season pitcher in baseball. In the playoffs, he has simply been subpar.

The last reason, which if I were ordering would be the first: The Golden State Warriors. We should not over think this folks. If not for Draymond Green’s suspension in The Finals two years ago, the Warriors likely would be pursuing their fourth straight NBA title.  That ain’t luck. The simple reality is that they are that much better than everyone else. It is the only team that need not play its best to win it all this year. Health is a far greater threat than the Rockets or any other team, to the Warriors.

We have seen with LeBron James, especially in 2015, that even a Herculean effort by a team’s best player can at best stretch the series to six games….and that was before Durant came to Golden State. Even if you believe Harden is ready to play at that level, why would you believe it would be enough?

So in spite of these reasons to doubt, why are so many ready to crown the Rockets? I suspect it is Golden State Warrior fatigue. As sports fans, we prefer some degree of suspense about who will eventually wear the crown. With that in mind, people want to believe that there is a worthy challenger. In wanting that, many do what the human mind often does, which is to embellish evidence to validate its hopes.

What is the evidence that the Rockets are ready? The addition of Chris Paul? He is a great player and I believe is unfairly blamed for the failure of his teams to advance in the playoffs……but the fact is that they have not. Would it be the 15 game winning streak? Excluding this year’s Celtics, 11 other teams in NBA history have won 15 straight that did not win the title. James Harden? How can you trust him after San Antonio last year?

Therefore, as much as I want a worthy challenger for the title, I am holding off on anointing the Rockets as the answer. Maybe I should have been born in Missouri because you have to SHOW ME and the Rockets have not done so yet.

 

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

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The Baffling Hall of Fame Denial of Joe Jacoby

Thursday, February 15th, 2018

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

JJ

It is not uncommon for an honor or denial of an honor to happen in sports with which I do not agree. However, in most such cases, I at least understand the why. For example, Terrell Owens should have been a first ballot Hall of Famer. He was not simply because a number of voters just did not like him. As sorry of an explanation as that is, it was an explanation.

No such explanation is at all clear why after 20 years of eligibility, the great Washington offensive tackle Joe Jacoby is still not a Hall of Famer.

The resume is easy to note. He was a four-time Pro Bowler, two-time All Pro, and three-time Super Bowl champion.

The situational case for Jacoby is even more compelling. He was undrafted out of Louisville and thus perhaps the greatest undrafted linemen (argument from Miami’s Jim Langer) in NFL history. Along with guard Russ Grimm, who is deservedly in the Hall of Fame, he was one of the two best linemen on one of the 2-3 best offensive lines of the Super Bowl era, along with the Cowboys of the 90s and the Raiders of the 70s. This line was affectionately known as, “the Hogs”. My primary reasoning for liking his team was that they could beat the Cowboys. Jacoby’s arrival initiated a changing of the guard in the NFC East from Dallas to Washington as the “Bully on the Block”. But in addition to that, what was fun and unique about the Washington O-line of the 80s is that their effectiveness was not so much based on scheme or chop blocking, but on raw smash-mouth football.  It is said that they only used four different running plays. They were known to walk up to the line of scrimmage and literally tell the opposing defensive linemen what they intended to do and never bluffed. As Grimm said in his Hall of Fame induction speech, “there is nothing more satisfying than to move a grown man in the direction you want to move him and there is absolutely nothing he can do about it”. That is about as good of a drop the mic statement I have ever heard in football.

That is what this offensive line routinely did for the better part of 12 years. It was the mainstay over the Joe Gibbs era, the greatest in franchise history. For the three Super Bowl titles, there were three different starting QBs, 3 different primary running backs.  The constant was Art Monk at receiver and the offensive line with Grimm and Jacoby. That point cannot be overemphasized. If you look at Super Bowl winners, you will find a 68 Jets team that was subpar on defense. The 81-49ers team did not have much of a running game. What you will not find is any Super Bowl winning team that is subpar on the offensive line.

Another factor that speaks to Jacoby’s greatness and Hall of Fame merit was the caliber of pass rushers he faced. The Bears had Richard Dent, the Vikings had Chris Doleman, the 49ers had Fred Dean and then Charles Haley, the Saints had Rickey Jackson and Pat Swilling, and the Rams had Kevin Greene. Those were merely pass rushers outside of the division. Within the NFC East, twice a year from the all-important left tackle positon, the QBs blind side, Jacoby saw Clyde Simmons and Reggie White from the Eagles, “Too Tall” Jones, Harvey Martin, and then Jim Jeffcoat from the Cowboys, Curtis Greer and then Freddie Joe Nunn from the Cardinals, and finally Leonard Marshall and the great Lawrence Taylor from the Giants.  Every pass rusher listed here is either in the Hall of Fame or at the very least recorded multiple double-digit sack seasons over his career. There is no way Washington gets out of the NFC 4 times, much less win three Super Bowls unless Jacoby could hold his own blocking these game wreckers.

Therefore, for me the case is clear. I do not know why it is not for Hall of Fame voters, but I have two theories. One is that Jacoby is not the best at lobbying for himself. He is clearly intelligent and a man of diverse talents, which is evident from his starting multiple successful businesses in his post football days. However, he is not the most articulate and it just does not seem to be in his personality to promote himself. Of course, in the world of professional sports where one’s work is as transparent as any other endeavor, being well spoken should not have anything to do with one’s Hall of Fame candidacy.

My only other theory is the fact that the Jacoby teams during that era are generally underappreciated. When most think of that era, they think of the stylish offensive trendsetting 49ers, deservedly so given they won five Super Bowls, to include a repeat in 88-89. Others will think of the Bears with their Super Bowl Shuffle and historic 85 defense, or the Giants playing out of New York more than Washington does. Yes, New York had Washington’s number but Washington won three Super Bowls, which is the the same as the Giants and Bears combined, in that era. In 1983, Washington also set what was then the single season scoring record. Would the Washington teams from Jacoby’s era be more appreciated had they finished the mission of repeating as Super Bowl champs by beating the Raiders? Likely. That is no excuse.

Joseph Erwin Jacoby belongs in the Hall of Fame and the longer he is denied the more the voters indict their own credibility.

 

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

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TEN REASONS TO HATE THE PATRIOTS THAT DON’T HAVE A DAMN THING TO DO WITH FOOTBALL

Saturday, February 3rd, 2018

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

NEP

The football related reasons have been covered: they are cheaters; they own my Steelers and they just win too damn much.

But there are even more non-football related reasons to hate the New England Patriots. Coming up with 10 was not hard. Deciding which reasons to leave off the list was near impossible.

So, feel free to reorder as you see fit. Here they are:

Reason 10: “New” England??? The name New England shows that the area suffers from Stockholm syndrome, which is characterized by an oppressed or kidnapped victim identifying with and even defending their oppressor or captor. Why on Earth would you name yourself after the tyrannical country you fled, if those circumstances were the primary reason you left? The only explanation for this is that their intention all along was to do to others the very thing they called unjust in England. In other words, they were not against oppression. They just wanted to be the oppressors rather than the oppressed.

TB

Reason 9: Brady gets the model wife. No jealousy here from me. I have never thought Giselle Bundchen was all that attractive. Throw a nickel out the window and you’ll hit 25 women by accident that look as good or better. It’s just that the storyline of QB marrying the super model is clearly hate worthy.

Reason 8: Ted Williams. The late Red Sox Hall of Famer said that Joe DiMaggio was the best player he ever saw. DiMaggio was truly great. But he was not Willie Mays, period.

Reason 7: Boston Tea Party hypocrisy. Taxation without representation is what we have always been taught was the rallying cry. And yet to this day, if you are a resident of Washington DC, you have no full congressional representation, despite being among the most highly taxed regions in the country. You would think the area of the Tea Party revolt of all places would be allies against this injustice, but noooooooo. Not a peep out of New England in DC’s defense.

Reason 6: The Red Sox. They were the last team in baseball to get a Black player. Jackie Robinson came up in 1947. It would be 12 more years, in 1959, before the Red Sox would yield.

Reason 5: The Celtics. Beyond beating my Lakers year after year, how the city treated the Great Bill Russell when he played for them was shameful. For years he would not return to the city of his greatest athletic accomplishments.

Reason 4: The annoying accent. All New Englanders should be mandated by law to learn sign language so that we wouldn’t have to hear them talk.

Reason 3: They gave us Dr. Seuss. a straight up bigot who reinforced racist notions through his cartoons.

Reason 2: School desegregation. It was every bit as vicious in the this northern “Liberal” city as it was anywhere in the South.

Reason 1: They gave us the Bush family. I do not subscribe to the notion that either daddy or baby Bush weren’t so bad just because of how bad the current president is.

There you have them. I could have written 20 or 30 but no time or space. Of course, whenever one is this vested in hating a sports team, rest assured that team is very good. In this case, for the better part of the past 20 years, the Patriots have been even better than very good. They have been great, which is why this amount of hate is actually the highest compliment you can pay them. Hate is too valuable of a sports commodity to be wasted on losers. You will never hear anyone express frustration over how much they hate the Browns.

Rings

Any reasonable person must give the Patriots their due. But reason and hate cannot occupy the same space. You must choose one or the other and when it comes to the Patriots, I choose hate. They will always occupy a special place in my HOF (Hate of Fame), alongside Notre Dame Football, Duke Basketball, and of course those damn LA Dodgers.

So, for all the reasons alluded to here, this Super Bowl Sunday, I’ll kick back, raise a Bud Light to salute and root for PHILLY, PHILLY!

 

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

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Washington was Right About Cousins All Along

Thursday, February 1st, 2018

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

KC

With the agreement to acquire Kansas City QB Alex Smith, the marriage between Washington and its QB, Kirk Cousins, is all but over. Though Smith’s contract extension details have yet to come out, my guess is that it is front loaded for him and back end friendly, which would allow Washington to get out should he start to decline quickly. Cousins will become a free agent and command in the range of $27-29 million per year, making him the highest paid player in the league.

The issue was not if Washington would have saved money signing QB Kirk Cousins to a long-term deal two years ago. They obviously would have. If I had purchased a nice car in 2016, it would have cost me less than in 2018. But could I have afforded the maintenance and up-keep necessary for that vehicle to function at its maximum best? If the answer is no, why buy the car?

The issue was if they had signed him, would they have been any better off than the Baltimore Ravens have been since they re-signed Joe Flacco? Is Kirk Cousins a top 5-10 caliber QB that will keep you in the hunt for a Super Bowl every year? If the answers to these two questions are no, then Washington was right all along about Cousins.

Kirk Cousins is a more than adequate starting NFL QB. He was never as bad as ESPN talk show host Bomani Jones suggested, comparing him to Ryan Fitzpatrick. He also is not a top 5-10 guy, which is the only QBs teams should lock up with the big money.  The two glaring concerns I have about Cousins as a QB are: 1) that he is not a confident down field passer; and 2) he is not a good improviser. These happen to be the two QB aspects that defenses fear the most. They do not fear a guy whom they know will stay in the pocket and throw short passes most of the day. That is what Kirk Cousins has been.

It’s about now when some reading this will respond with stats. They do in fact look good for Cousins over the past 3 seasons. They are also terribly misleading. At no time in football history have QB stats been as artificially embellished as they are today. There are several factors that have created this environment: 1) the generational influence of the West Coast offense which emphasizes the short passing game (of which Washington Head coach Jay Gruden is a disciple) and; 2) increased defensive sophistication in scheming, especially in taking away big plays.  As a result, what was at one time the 3rd or 4th option, the check down pass to a back has now become the second and sometimes primary target. This leads to higher pass completion percentages and appeals to the defensive-minded coaches as well, as it is more risk averse. These same coaches are from the school of thought that says, “just don’t lose us the game”. This philosophy leads to a game manager mindset in the QB and less down field passes.

Don’t feel bad for Cousins. He is going to benefit greatly from a perfect storm of factors, most of all being the fact that the demand for quality QBs so far outweighs the supply. That is how the likes of Brock Osweiller and Mike Glennon could cash in and neither are near as good as Cousins. Some team will make Cousins the highest paid QB/player in league history. That’s just the way this thing works.

It’s not that you can’t win a Super Bowl with Kirk Cousins as your QB. You can. The 2000 Ravens won with Trent Dilfer, the 2002 Bucs won with a Brad Johnson past his prime, and of course the 2015 Broncos won with a washed-up Peyton Manning. What did all 3 of those teams have in common: all-time great defenses and the inability to sustain the success on an annual basis. Bill Cowher kept my Steelers in contention with a QB list of Neil O’Donnell, Kordell Stewart, and Tommy Maddox. But they could not get over the hump until Big Ben came. The Steelers were also an aberration in that they draft and develop players on an exceptionally high level, which makes them less desperate to over pay to sign free agents or re-sign their own proven players.

Don’t let this year’s NFL conference champion QBs fool you. Yes, you can win with a less than top 5-10 QB, but good luck at sustaining a team in the Super Bowl hunt without one. There are only two viable tactics for getting an NFL QB: you either lock up the top 5-10 guy to a long-term deal or you get a guy at a discount and invest the rest in your defense and other areas of your team. What hamstrings a team is when it locks up a guy in the 12-15 range, which is where Cousins is, to a long term deal that won’t allow it to add the talent around him.

Washington concluded this about Cousins and they were right. As one analyst put it, they wanted a prenuptial agreement with him and he found it insulting and refused to sign it, knowing what he could get on the free market. I don’t blame either side.

 

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

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Why the Rooney Rule is Not Enough

Monday, January 29th, 2018

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

RR

In the Spring of 1994, I was completing my first year as a teaching intern at the Lowell School in Washington, DC. It was one of several prestigious private schools in the area, predominantly white, that had formed a minority teaching intern program. The idea was that this would create a pool of teaching candidates from which the schools could choose from to increase the diversity among their teaching cadre. As a result, that Spring I had multiple interviews with schools in the area, from Sidwell Friends (where the children of presidents have attended) to Landon. The interviews had two things in common: 1) all the schools were run by and served the upper class of DC; and 2) there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that I was going to get hired.

But I served their purpose of being able to say, “We reached out”.

Whenever this time of year in the NFL comes around, it reminds me of that experience.  Black coaching candidates are on display like show ponies, often with little to no chance of actually getting hired. It’s all a byproduct of the Rooney Rule, which mandates that teams interview a minority candidate for NFL head coaching and general manager vacancies. It also validates my contention that the Rooney Rule, though effective to some extent, is not enough to get a management demographic that is reflective of the player demographics in the NFL.

To really understand the core issues here, it’s important to realize that the hiring process anywhere consists of two fundamental aspects: 1) Systemic; and 2) Cultural.

Systemic change can be largely accomplished through changes in policies, especially those with foreseeable outcomes. In this respect, the rule has been generally effective. Since its inception in 2003, more minority head coaches and GMs have been hired than in all the 70 years prior in the NFL. Its major limitation is that it does not extend to the most common source of head coaching candidates, which is offensive and defensive coordinators. The conventional thinking is that a head coach needs to be able to hire his own staff to give him the best chance to succeed. I have no football-based rejection of that notion, so I will not pretend otherwise.

The other aspect of hiring is culture. While systemic change is largely fostered by changes in policies and rules, the only way to change a culture is to either change the minds of people or get rid of those whose mindsets are at odds with the culture one wants to build.

And that is essentially where the Rooney Rule is limited in its capacity to change the hiring practices in the NFL. As the old saying goes, “you cannot legislate morality”. What happened when laws were introduced to curb money laundering, mandating banks to report deposits of $10K or more? The launderers simply kept their deposit under that number, because while the law could modify observable behavior, it could do nothing to change the mindset of the launderers. They put on the dog and pony show of compliance while continuing to think in a way that undermined the spirt of the law. Likewise, NFL teams do the same when they invite Black men to interview for jobs that they have no intention of seriously considering to hire.

I am not suggesting that there is no value in going through the interview process. I actually believe that there is. I am suggesting emphatically that the interview skills of Black head coaching candidates are not remotely the central issue. The mindset of those in power is the issue.

I serve as a Know Your Rights facilitator through The American Civil Liberties Union. The trainings are geared to educate the public about what to do and what not to do when pulled over by the police. I believe that they can literally save lives and thus cannot be trivialized. I am, nevertheless, somewhat conflicted when I do them because it can leave the impression that those being killed are the problem. They are not. The problem is the mindset of the people with the power to kill them with impunity.

The problem is not the coaching candidates. The problem is the mindset of those with the power to hire the candidates, which specifically are the 32 NFL owners, most of whom are white and all of whom are very, very rich. If you believe anyone that gets to that place in life is going to change his mind because of a rule, good luck.

Ultimately, the Rooney Rule needs to stay in place for the clear improvement it has shown and because doing nothing is not an option. It is an important step in the right direction on the systemic side of the issue. But we should be sober about its limitations.

 

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

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Coaching, Parenting, and Lessons from the Saints’ Collapse

Friday, January 19th, 2018

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

MW

Nothing in sports is second-guessed and dissected more than coaching. Few other things in the lager society are second-guessed and dissected more than parenting. Without question, coaching is hugely influential on the development of a player. Likewise, parents are even more so in the development of their children. Another common thing between coaching and parenting is the degree to which both are prematurely judged by people who are not privy to all the factors that go into coaching or parenting. The last play of the Saints vs. Vikings playoff game made me think of this.

As you all likely know by now, the Vikings were down 24-23 with less than a minute remaining and in desperation mode. Vikings’ QB Case Keenum lofted a pass up for receiver Stephon Diggs, who leaped to catch the pass and then ran another 40 yards or so for a game winning TD. He was able to do this due to one of the worst defensive non-plays I have seen in my life, on any level of football. Saints DB Marcus Williams lowered his head and blindly missed him, completely allowing Diggs to run for history.

 

I was, as I imagine most of you were, speechless.

 

Then I noticed a few comments on social media questioning how he was coached? Still others theorized that he was afraid to get a penalty. I thought to myself, “What the hell are these people talking about?”. Youth football players are taught at 6 years old to see what they hit.

 

Sometimes a rock is just a rock.

 

This had absolutely nothing to do with inept coaching. The young man simply messed up. He has had a very solid rookie season with 4 interceptions and if he survives this mentally, he seems to have a bright NFL future. But there is no need to overanalyze this. It’s not throwing the ball into traffic on the goal line in the Super Bowl when you have Marshawn Lynch in the backfield. Now that was boneheaded coaching and we didn’t need to know any other factors to conclude that when the Patriots beat Seattle in the Super Bowl a couple of years ago.

 

These two examples are extremes. Sunday with the Saints, coaching was clearly not the issue. With Seattle, coaching clearly was the issue. But most coaching decisions, like most parenting decisions, have a great deal more nuance and gray factors to consider, and only those involved or very close to the situation are privy to these factors.

 

One of the best examples was how the late former Eagles coach Buddy Ryan handled the substance abuse problem of a young talented receiver named Chris Carter. When the team cut Carter, everyone familiar with his talent wondered why take such a young dynamic weapon away from QB Randall Cunningham? To that Ryan would only say, “All he does is catch touchdown passes”. For years, Ryan took ridicule for that comment and the decision to let Carter go. The receiver would go on to resurrect his life and career in Minnesota, which eventually led to his enshrinement in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Carter would set the record straight years later, acknowledging that his release was all about how unreliable he had become, due to his substance abuse problem, and had nothing to do with his on-field performance. Had that come out, Ryan was afraid that Carter would be blackballed from the league. So, Ryan took the hits for years, never revealing the real reason until Carter was ready. He was actually trying to protect his player.

 

Go to any town hall meeting, hair salon, or barber shop, and listen closely for that inevitable moment when the discussion turns to today’s youth. That will start the clock toward the “it all starts in the home” declaration. The issue is not if the statement is largely true. It is! The issue is that it is often a simplistic cookie-cutter, broad-brush explanation for the behavior of youth by people who have little interaction with the very youth they castigate. Regardless of parenting, there will always be youth who decide to drink and drive with disastrous results. It does not mean parent modeling or condoning of such behavior was the root cause. Likewise, players will sometimes fail well below their professional standard. It doesn’t mean bad coaching is the root cause.

 

Whether it’s coaching or parenting, I don’t know why so many are so hell bent on making such conclusive public critiques while being so poorly informed about the individual situation. I do believe it often says more about the critic than it does about those being critiqued.

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

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And the Platform Pimp of the Year is…………………..Jon Gruden!

Thursday, January 11th, 2018

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

Donald Trump won it last year, with Daddy Ball taking a distant 2nd.

When the Oakland Raiders rehired Jon Gruden to a 10-year/$100 million contract, he without question did the best job of pimping his Monday Night Football analyst platform for the greatest return. Yes, the deal is back loaded with the first 5 years actually paying him in the range of “only” $5 million per year and the last 5 paying in the range of about $15 million per year. One would think even that amount is heavily incentivized with bonuses for making playoffs, winning super bowl, etc…but this is the Raiders. Common sense isn’t so common.

Let me be clear what I mean by “Platform Pimp”. A platform pimp is anyone that exploits a high-profile situation, under the guise of problem solving, for their own benefit.  The really good pimps raise expectations to unrealistic levels, even without much of a track record of meeting such expectations. These people are very good at giving the impression of expertise in a certain area that is either in high need of a solution and or very popular.

I am not actually even mad at Gruden. I am just dumbfounded at how often and easily these 3 Card Monty players can actually get someone to play his game. In this case, that someone is the Oakland Raiders…who have gone for this okie-doke before…see Lane Kiffin.

In fairness to the Raiders, Gruden is far more accomplished than Kiffin was when they hired him. Gruden has had some success as a head coach, including winning the Super Bowl with Tampa Bay. But we all know that Tony Dungy built that team. His best work was actually prior to that with the Raiders, the team his Bucs beat in the Super Bowl after the 2002 season. He did make the Raiders matter again, going 38-26 over 4 years. His two playoff losses could only be classified as bad luck. His 12-4 – 2000 Raiders lost to the Ravens, in no small part due to Baltimore tackle Tony Siragusa falling on QB Rick Gannon, knocking him out of the game. I have never been convinced that the Trent Dilfer-led offense of the Ravens come out of Oakland with that AFC title win if Gannon does not get hurt. I am convinced that the Raiders would have beaten the Giants to win that super bowl after the 2000 season. Then after the 2001 season, the infamous “Tuck Rule” game loss to the Patriots. One can’t blame Gruden for either one of those.

However, in Tampa, even with one of the greatest defenses of the past 25 years, his record was 57-55. The man who has promoted himself as quarterback and offensive guru couldn’t get much from his QB nor offense in his last coaching stop in Tampa.

The bottom line is that we are not talking about Bill Parcells in the 1990’s. Jon Gruden is basically Mike Shanahan, minus 1 Super Bowl ring.

So the central concerns are two: 1) if this happens, in the closest thing in American society to a transparent meritocracy, imagine what is happening where there is no transparency; and 2) It isn’t just the Raiders’ or even Davis family money. Though not directly, it’s taxpayer money as well. Connect the dots: part of the Raiders profit margin comes from generous tax breaks the city of Oakland granted them to move back and since to remain. These are tax breaks that have been pocketed and will certainly not be returning to the struggling working-class city, even though the team is slated to move. This Gruden contract is like the Raiders giving a final middle finger to one of the most loyal and greatest fan bases in all of sports.

What’s most important is to figure out why platform pimping works and how to recognize and avoid falling for the act. The simple reason it works is that there will always be a critical mass of people who love a messiah. This is true beyond sports. The notion that one person will come along and solve all of your problems, and in the process let the collective you off the hook is appealing. Though irrational, it is a lot easier to conceptualize one hero than it is to imagine the collective engaging in the tedious and often unsexy ground level work necessary for success. It’s the same as those whose primary economic freedom plan is to win the lottery.

Only the self-delusional have difficulty recognizing platform pimps. The three things necessary to avoid their game are as follows: 1) always remember that a platform in of itself does not equate to credibility…especially in the social media age; 2) Can you reasonably foresee the collective benefiting from this person’s work more than the person; and 3) does the person have a track record of success? Parcells always said, “You are what your record says you are.”

I hope that Terrell Owens is paying attention. His on-field performance is without question Hall of Fame worthy and yet he has been denied twice. I suggest he interview to become Gruden’s replacement on Monday Night Football. It would give him a platform to clean up the perception many of the HOF voters have of him….a perception that he surely had a role in creating.

If you are fortunate enough to secure a platform and stay in the public’s consciousness long enough to build a positive image, the fallacy of recently will impact its impression of you more than your actually merit based record. This is a good thing for Jon Gruden. Not so good for Terrell Owens.

 

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

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Appreciating the Greatness of Nick Saban

Friday, January 5th, 2018

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

Image courtesy of USA Today's FTW

Image courtesy of USA Today’s FTW

I missed a call the other day from my brother who is also a big sports fan.  He left a 3-word message that said more than we could have said in an actual hour conversation.

The message was: “ALABAMA IS ALABAMA!”

He was of course referring to the Alabama Crimson Tide smothering the Clemson Tigers 24-6. The same Clemson Tigers that were the defending national champs could not even score a touchdown against Alabama.

Why is Alabama, Alabama? That answer is easy:  head coach Nick Saban, who has 4 national titles there and will field a team to win a 5th on Monday against SEC rival Georgia.

His track record extends beyond Alabama, which is a card-carrying college football blue blood. Saban began his coaching career at Toledo in 1990 and went 9-2. In 1989, that same program won 6 games. In 1991, after Sabin left to be Bill Belichik’s defensive coordinator in Cleveland, it won 5 games.

After a stint at Michigan State with moderate success, Sabin went to LSU where he would lead them to essentially a co-national title, along with my USC Trojans in 2003.

Who knows how good of an NFL coach he would have been had he stuck it out or had the Miami Dolphins not passed on Drew Brees.

So, Saban’s resume is clear and even the most die-hard Auburn Tigers fan would not dare question his greatness.  What fascinates me is, how does he do this?

Never trust the pundits or self-proclaimed coaching gurus to answer that question. If they knew, they would be doing the same or bottling the formula for sale.

Sure, there are other great coaches. “The” Ohio State’s Urban Meyer actually has a significantly better bowl record than Saban and isn’t far behind him in any other category. But every now and then, the Buckeyes will simply lay an egg, such as was the case this year when they gave up 55 points to an average Iowa team, or when they were shut out last year in the playoffs to eventual champion Clemson.

You can’t find those games in Saban’s time at Alabama. Search for yourself. It won’t take long, since under him the Mighty Tide is now 131-20 over 11 years. Let that sink in for just a moment. In the toughest conference in college football, even if some of you still resists acknowledging this, Nick Saban’s teams haven’t even lost 2 games a year. Sure, he loses games. Only non-participants are spared that fate. What his teams at Alabama don’t have are total throw away games. When they lose, they simply get beat. His teams are ready to play every week.

Having been in education for nearly 25 years and also having coached myself, I can tell you from actual experience that keeping a group of 18-19-20 something young men focused enough to avoid such let downs is not only short of a miracle, it’s a biological aberration. By that I mean that the last part of the brain to develop is the frontal lobe, which is responsible for impulse control, executive functioning, and appropriate social and emotional responses.  It is essentially to the brain what brakes are to a car, and in males it typically is not fully developed until about 24-25 on average.

This explains why, based on biology alone, we can foresee much of the unpredictable behaviors in the pre-24 male age group. We often wonder, “What was he thinking?”. The answer often is that he wasn’t thinking.  Thus, inconsistent behavior is the norm.

You simply don’t see this in Nick Saban coached teams.

In looking at Saban’s educational background, he earned a BA degree in Business and a Masters’ degree in Sports Administration, both from Kent State. That might explain his elite organizational competence and even his capacity as a salesman, which gets buy-in from the youth he recruits. But there is also a psychology necessary in that no sales pitch is cookie cutter. The ability to understand personality nuance from athlete to athlete or student to student is indeed rare among coaches and educators of all types.

Some will say Alabama gets the best talent. Yes and no. Alabama certainly gets the cream of the crop at every position…except the most important position, which is quarterback. Not one of Nick Saban’s QBs at Alabama has gone on to distinguish himself in the NFL. The best eventual professional QB he has ever had was Tony Banks at Michigan State. The same Tony Banks that could not hold off Trent Dilfer from taking his job with the 2000 eventual super bowl champion Ravens. Nick Saban even managed to make Matt Flynn and JaMarcus Russell look like viable NFL starting QBs. Either both the brass of the Seattle Seahawks and Oakland Raiders were idiots or Nick Saban is a coaching magician.

Ok, in the Raiders case, it’s more likely the former. LOL

I don’t know if we will ever have a comprehensive answer to how Nick Saban does what he does. I do know that we are witnessing greatness on a high level that we may never see again in college football. Even those of us who are not fans of Alabama should appreciate it while we can.

 

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

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Why Fans Feel That They Can Throw Things at Athletes

Friday, December 15th, 2017

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

JJ

By now, you have witnessed the scene in Jacksonville last Sunday when a fan (or fans) threw objects at an ejected Seattle Seahawks player, who then attempted to go into the stands. I could parrot the “company line”, which says under no circumstances should a player go into the fan seating areas with malicious intent, regardless of provocation. But there is a part of me that feels perfectly comfortable with the notion of a 300-pound man going into the stands to “lay hands” on any coward who throws an object at him.

To understand why I don’t think this is the worst thing that could happen, we first need to look at why fans do this. There are basically 4 primary causes, being alcohol, the ever increasing prices fans pay for their tickets, envy, and the impunity that they have learned from the larger society about how they can treat Black men.

The last point about Black men is not to suggest that they are the only athletes that are the targets. It is to say that they are the overwhelming targets of this behavior. The first is easy. Some simply can’t hold their liquor and contrary to the common narrative, alcohol does not make one do what one would normally not do. Alcohol does encourage one to do what one has ALWAYS wanted to do but never had the nerve to follow through. Sobriety can act as a filter and catch certain thoughts and behaviors. But it only catches what was inside to begin with.

The second cause is the increasing prices fans are paying for seats. A fan needs to be reasonably close for whatever he or she throws to have a chance to actually hit and harm an athlete. Seats in the section from where the objects came last Sunday in Jacksonville, price at about $238 per seat. These are among the cheapest in the league at that proximity to the field. Imagine what one would pay in New York or Dallas for the same seats? With the price of that ticket, all too many fans feel entitled to do whatever they want.

The third reason is envy. The overwhelming majority of the fans in these seating areas are white and middle to upper-middle class. While the majority do not engage in such behavior, even when drinking, there are some who feel that regardless of how accomplished and wealthy the Black athlete is, he is still subject to them. This leads us to the fourth and most complex of the causes.

It has to do with the message the general society has received loud and clear about how it can treat Black men. That message has been that violence and disrespect is not only permitted but one need not concern him or herself with any accountability. Add all four up: alcohol, entitlement, envy, and a sense that they can treat Black men any way they like with impunity, and we really should not be surprised when this happens.

The insult to injury whenever this sort of thing happens is the focus which shines much more on how the Black athlete reacts to the treatment than the treatment itself. The NFL is like most institutions in that managing the reaction to injustice is a far greater priority than the injustice itself.

In defense of the NFL, there is only so much it can do about this issue. It can and should certainly cancel any confirmed offending fan’s season tickets and push for any applicable criminal charges. While it should do these at minimal, it would be a band-aid. It’s not as if fans come to games as blank slates, free of any of the biases that exist in the larger society. When one looks at the message from the larger society, which clearly says Black Lives Don’t Matter, it’s understandable why they think this way.

Throughout history, from the reaction to the Black Panther Party till today, America has made it very clear that the idea of Black men standing up for themselves in any venue for any reason, regardless of provocation, is to be suppressed. The fact that there is a simultaneous obsession with the right of just about every other demographic to bear arms is not considered a contradiction. Therefore, until the root of this behavior is addressed in the larger society, there is no reason to believe it will cease to exist in the sports world.

 

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

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College Football and the Myth of American Meritocracy

Friday, December 8th, 2017

by Gus Griffin

gus

 

 

 

 

UCF

For the most part, sports are the closest thing in American society to a genuine transparent meritocracy. Unlike other areas of American life where who you know, race, class etc. are as much or more relevant than ability, this is not the case in American sports. If you cannot play, none of the above noted factors will save you. Furthermore, from a team concept, if you accomplish predetermined goals, you are guaranteed via systemic triggers the opportunity to go further. This is reflected by winning your division or conference to qualify for a PLAYOFF.

The only team sport in America that has no such structural system is major college football.

Enter the University of Central Florida (UCF) Knights.

They completed an undefeated season in which they never scored less than 31 points in a game.  Still yet, there was a better chance of Donald Trump showing humility than there was for UCF to make it to the college football “playoffs”. Even Ohio State, which was beaten handily in both of its TWO losses, was going ahead of undefeated UCF. Am I suggesting UCF was better than Ohio State? No! But then again, I did not believe that the 2010 7-9 Seattle Seahawks would beat the defending super bowl champion New Orleans Saints. They did and in doing so, treated us to one of the greatest runs in NFL history by Marshawn Lynch. We would have never seen that under the college football “system”. Likely outcomes are not the issue.  Systemically guaranteed opportunity is, and college football does not allow for this in spite of how often we tout the feel-good underdog narrative.

Some will argue that UCF is in a weak conference and played a weak schedule. I agree…but that is a woefully incomplete analysis that assumes this reality was completely within their control. It isn’t. Colleges are contractually bound to their conferences and to leave for a more competitive conference, one must pay a costly exit fee. Even if the college decided to pay the fee, it would need another conference that wanted it…or should I say wanted the Orlando, Florida TV market, because that is the issue more so than the quality of the program. The SouthEastern Conference couldn’t care less about Texas A&M or Missouri as football programs. It did care about the Houston and St. Louis TV markets. That was even truer of the Big Ten’s courting of Maryland. It was all about the Washington DC TV market.

So, could UCF strengthen its non-conference schedule?  Not likely…especially after a season like the one just completed. Think about it, if they call in-state powers Miami, Florida State, or Florida for a home and home two-year series, why would either of them accept? There is nothing for either of them to gain and everything to lose because they are supposed to win the game.

So, what it comes down to is no matter what UCF did, they NEVER had a remote chance of making it to the college football final four or playoffs. No amount of hard work on their part was going to change that reality because the system is structurally biased in favor of the “haves” in the form of the 5 power conferences, to which UCF does not belong.

So too is the larger American capitalistic economic system in favor of the “haves”.

The latest example was this week when CVS pharmacy bought Aetna Insurance for $69 billion.  It’s the first time in American history that we have seen the merger of a retail pharmacy chain, an insurance company, and a pharmacy benefit manager. This acquisition will accelerate the extinction of the small family owned pharmacy and there is absolutely no amount of hard work alone on the part of that small family pharmacy that will stop this process.

That small pharmacy has about as much of a chance surviving as UCF did of making to the playoffs.

So, it’s clear both in big time college football and the larger American business world that hard work alone is not enough to maximize one’s potential. The question is: why do we keep promoting the myth that it is? Why aren’t we willing to be honest enough to say, be it to UCF in college football or that small pharmacy, that the system is structurally rigged and we must dedicate continuous energy to changing that system?

I am not suggesting that hard work is irrelevant. It is in fact a significant part of the formula for success, both individually and collectively. It just is not the only ingredient.

The good news is that the big-time college football system has actually improved. There was a time when tradition alone dictated the college football champion via bowl match-ups and the number 1 and 2 teams were not guaranteed to meet. Then, due to fan demand, they moved to a system that guaranteed the top two teams would meet. Today it’s determined, albeit subjectively, that the top 4 teams will play one another for the title. I suspect eventually that the current format will be extended to 8 teams. While it’s still very flawed, it is moving in the right direction because fans demanded it move.

If we want to transform American meritocracy from myth to reality we must demand it as much as college football fans have steadfastly demanded a playoff system.

As Frederick Douglas said, “Power Concedes Nothing without a Demand. It never did and it never will”.

 

Gus Griffin, for War Room Sports

 

 

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