The NFL is a league where parity looms large, teams consistently play inconsistently, and players who get the large amounts of cash, i.e Randy Moss, become cancers by never playing up to their potential. It seems through all this, the coaches are bearing the brunt of the retaliation from the front office.
Tony Dungy, Dennis Green, Mike Riley, George Seifert and Marty Schottenheimer are the NFL coaches that are rumored to be, or have already been, dismissed from their respective teams, because they have not lived up to front office expectations.
That’s all fine and good, but at what point do the teams expect too much out of coaches and do not realize what the real problems are?
George Seifert deserved to be fired. His team had more talent than a 1-15 team. And even if they didn’t have that much talent, they should not have been last in both total offense and total defense throughout the league.
Granted, he has a rookie (keep in mind, a 50-year-old rookie) starting for them, and a running back situation that was not pretty. However, he still had solid receivers with Mushin Muhammed and Donald Hayes.
Losing 15 straight does not leave the front office much of a choice, and Seifert had to go. He looked like a dead man walking by the end of his reign in Carolina.
Mike Riley had his team starting off on a very good note with a 2-0 beginning, but the Chargers’ true colors showed, as they finished the year with a record of 6-10.
But was it Riley’s fault? Who did Doug Flutie have to throw the ball to? Curtis Conway? Any team could just pack the line against LaDainian Tomlinson and completely freeze the Chargers offense and effectively kill the team.
Dennis Green might have had to be fired, because the team was completely out of control. When the inmates are running the asylum, there is no way the coach will ever resume control of the team.
It’s not completely his fault. Randy Moss decided to run his mouth, and Cris Carter did nothing to help the situation, as both the receivers turned their backs on Daunte Culpepper.
Marty Schottenheimer had his team start off 0-5, only to finish the season with an 8-8 record. It’s not a great record, but if you look at his quarterback, you can truly see how much 8-8 is overachieving. Tony Banks will NEVER be a successful quarterback in this league.
The rest of the offense wasn’t much better. Stephen Davis was the only good-skill player the team had on the offensive side of the ball. Oh, don’t let me forget Ki-Jana Carter. Yeah, he really makes a difference.
Finally, we look at Tony Dungy, whose offense rivals that of a pee-wee football team. Relying on Jacquez Green to become a consistent secondary receiver will never get it done for the Buccaneers.
The defense is good, but not great anymore. Lee Flowers stated it best when he said, “They [Buccaneers] are nothing but a bunch of paper champions, all they do is run their mouth, and that is why they all get voted into the Pro Bowl.”
If the Bucs could get Bill Parcells, then, by all means, they should fire Dungy because Parcells has won with every team he has coached.
However, with all these coaches being put under the microscope, I can see one specific problem in each of the respective franchises?THE PLAYERS.
It’s not that the coach isn’t important, but some teams in the league have all the discipline in the world, but the talent level just isn’t there, and the coaches get sacrificed because of it.
And guess what?there is no way that anyone will be able to stop this vicious cycle. Who is going to stop paying the players? They tried it in baseball with mass collusion by the owners, and all of a sudden Jerry Reinsdorf signed Albert Belle to a huge deal, because he wanted to win.
Being part of a rebuilding team means that you are building the team for another coach, and that should be reason enough to leave the league of horror.
The coaches aren’t the problem, the players are, but hey?who cares? It’s the NFL. Nothing is ever reasonable in the greatest league on the planet.
Asad welcomes feedback at: [email protected].