What reportedly happened in Denver or Portrait of a whiny-ass titty-baby:
Shanahan and the O-Coordinator get fired. Cutler starts grumbling and asks to be traded. Mgmt says no. Patriots are trying to unload Cassel, they contact Denver about a 3-team trade. Denver thinks, “Well, Cutler wants to leave, our new coach knows Cassel well, maybe this can work out for everyone, let’s explore it”. Deal falls through; now Cutler gets all extra- petulant, goes to his room, slams the door and holds his breath. He demands a trade and will have nothing to do with the Broncos. He doesn’t even have the courtesy to take phone calls from the owner of the team that drafted him and paid him millions of dollars. Great. This is the professionalism that the likes of Eli Manning have wrought.
Let’s contrast this with the portrait of a professional:
Kansas City, 2008-09 season. The team sucks, they’re not going anywhere, and it is pretty obvious that they aren’t going anywhere for a while. Stud TE/receiver Tony Gonzalez, a potential first-ballot hall-of-famer who is getting on in age, asks to be traded so that he can play for a title contender while he still has a good year or two left in him. The KC GM (at that time) Carl Peterson makes a verbal deal with Tony that if KC gets a third-round pick for him they'll trade him. Two different teams offer KC a third round pick for Tony. Then Peterson decides he wants to up the asking price to a second round pick. He gets no takers and the trade deadline comes and passes. Tony Gonzalez is left to languish in KC. He is clearly and openly disappointed that the organization didn’t do the right thing by him after all that he has given them. Then he gets on the field the next week, actually for the next 11 weeks, and racks up another 75 catches for 865 yards and 8 TDs. He finishes the season as the team’s leading receiver. Tony totaled 96 catches, 1058 yds and 10 TDs for the season. On a bad team that went 2-14.
Cutler, Manning, TO, and other crybabies that go “Waaah! I wont play here! Waaaaaah!” could learn a thing or two from pros like Tony Gonzalez.
Saturday, April 4, 2009
Contrast
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5 comments:
Haha. Nice attempt at trolling, CPP!
But you know as well as I do that the NFL is set up to be a socialist league. Who else would share revenue and let the worst teams get first crack at the best talent?
I agree, Stache... these fucks are a bunch of babies and have no idea what it's like to work for a living. They've been pampered, many of them, since damn near Pop Warner level and have never matured emotionally beyond that point. "I want what I want or I'm taking my ball and going home!" I always think, what must the Sam Huff's, the Dick Butkus's, the Jim Taylor's (remember him from Green Bay?) and the rest of those tough fucks think about the money these guys make now and how they pout and whine about it. ("I need two million six per year not two million three... I have to think of my family.") Hey, as good as Cutler is I wouldn't want him on my team. The QB position comes with the diva gene in place to begin with and if you add to that precociousness, well now you have Diana fucking Ross!
Good point Scrib50, about the pampering and stunting of emotional development in many cases. I really think the NFL, as good a league as it is, needs to somehow cut down rookie contracts upfront and reward them with big money on a performance-based approach (and maybe let them get into free agency a year earlier, if that's what it takes). Performance-based reward scale means they are at the mercy of the coach for playing time, calls etc, but so what? They can learn to suck it up and listen to their boss. The argument against this will be "But then if a #1 draft pick doesn't start for the team then he wont make a jillion dollars", to which one can honestly reply "Correct. Because he doesn't yet deserve it".
If the league keeps going the way it is, it will suffer the same fate as basketball and baseball where guaranteed salaries have done serious harm. The NFL players' union needs to see what's good for them in the long run.
I know that with the primadonnas the big money is only part of the problem, but still....
You hit it on the head, Stache, the part about incoming rookies. And it starts with the fact that this year's #1 pick has to make x-amount more than last year's #1 pick, as if they're taking into consideration the cost-of-living factor. As if these fucking people actually live in a fucking world where they actually have to worry about what something costs. Sadly it'll never change because the union's too strong now and the agents are running the show but what they should've done is exactly what you said but with this twist... make it incentive laden commencing in year two and let year one be a welcome to the league experience. "Here's your bonus and signing money, but you'll only make this base salary because you haven't proven a thing yet." And hey, a coach will play him or not play him not because of contractual demands but because of what will serve that coach and the team's best interests. And a rookie won't have to be concerned with playing time and performance incentives being met because thirty touchdowns gets him no more in swag than two snaps. And the experience of that rookie spending a year with that team gives everyone a better idea of what they have for the future. And not just regarding talent but whether the guy's an asshole, a burglar or a fucking drug addict!
Thus, the real reward for being drafted is... you've qualified for an opportunity to play in this league, your signing bonus makes you a millionaire, now turn it into multi-millions if you prove to have what it takes!
Look at this mess Steve Fisher has down in Tennessee with quarterback Vince Young. Young broke the bank but so far he's emotionally unfit to justify a cent of it. And that may not change so the owner is supposed to suck up that fucking loss. A lot of this started with Joe Namath who held out and got $400,000.00 before his rookie year (an unheard of amount at the time) and in protest, John Brodie, the 49er's quarterback who had had an all-pro year the previous season said something like, "I've already proven myself, this guy hasn't even laced up his spikes yet." So he held out and got what was in his case a well-earned contract. But then then money grab was on and it hasn't stopped since.
I know my thinking sounds like Socialism (CPP?) but not really, it's sound business practice where a company makes what it thinks is a good hire and if their instincts are correct, performance gets rewarded and not before. Plain and simple.
And one more point, this is why the draft is so fucked up now. "Ooh, so-and-so dropped from a #3 to a #5, that'll cost 'em!" When it should really be all about the excitement of being brought into the league. Ah well, all sports are fucked up now, why not the NFL. That's why golf, boxing and tennis are still pretty much pure in one respect. You win, you get paid. You lose, you don't get paid. You don't get paid for what you might do in the future!
---"its just good business practice..."---
Bingo! When did it become acceptable to get paid on potential and not performance? And absolutely right on re golf, tennis etc---I happen to respect them for the same reason. Except for a handful of players, your pay is proportional to your performance!
As far as all sports being fucked up, couldn't agree more. I really need to get back to writing that sports/economy piece. I'll try to at least advance it some this weekend.
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