Super Bowl and Redskins Coaching Reactions

I went to a fun Super Bowl party - the same one I went to last year.  Good times, except I wish my brother had the opportunity to see the game.  As you might recall, I used to be a casual Patriots fan until their running up the score became impossible to ignore.   I will always love Tom Brady for becoming the best pro quarterback in Michigan history, but he and his team became more and more unlikeable as the season progressed (spygate, running up the score, arrogant pre- and post-game comments, etc).  Remember when the Patriots were lovable, team-first underdogs?  Yeah...me too.

Even though I'm a Redskins fan and thus primed to dislike the Giants, someone had to end the Pats' reign of terror and take them down a peg or two.  Besides, it's much more fascinating to remember a team that almost achieved perfection than a team that actually makes it through undefeated.  Thus, I was rooting hardcore for the Giants.  I told my friends they had a genuine shot at winning as long as they could get pressure on Brady and disrupt their timing.  And the G-Men did not disappoint.

From the first play, you knew the game would be a dogfight.  And for once, the Pats caved under pressure.  For once, they couldn't play perfectly when it mattered.  The whole game had the feel of a Patriots squad that expected to win, then couldn't believe the Giants were able to shut them down.  After Randy Moss' TD with 2:39 left, Pats players were embracing on the sidelines as if the game was over -- another ominous sign.  My friend Noah was right when he said that, as a Patriots fan, he would love to see the team lose a game during the regular season.  You got the feeling that they were just tired of the spotlight's glare after it was all over. 

Now, on to the Redskins.  It took them 32 days to find a new coach, and owner Dan Snyder managed to destroy all the goodwill he had curried by his reaction to the Sean Taylor tragedy.   He dicked around with several candidates, and totally destroyed, angered the fan base when he threatened to choose Jim Fassel over Gregg Williams, then left people scratching their heads at his final choice. 

However, even though I don't agree with the process, A few friends of mine (especially my roommate) might remember my words at the beginning of this coaching search: "It would be fantastic if, for once, the Redskins chose someone we've never heard of."  Why can't my favorite team be the one that discovers the unknown coaching talent?  Why can't the Redskins be the team that creates new management stars?  Why do they have to choose someone based as much on name recognition as talent?  Nobody had ever heard of Joe Gibbs when he first became the Redskins.  Most people didn't know about Andy Reid, or Mike Tomlin, or Jack Del Rio. 

So in the end, I'm happy with Jim Zorn as a coaching choice.  I'm just unhappy Snyder dicked over people in the process, stringing them along beyond any reasonable length of time.  Give Snyder this, though -- he doesn't seem to give a shit what other people think of him.

And let's remember that the media has a tendency to view anything they can't understand as negative.  I think a lot of the hate Snyder generates comes not only from the fact that he seems to think that paying someone entitles him to treat them any which way he wants to.  It's also comes from the Redskins being so opaque as an organization that it frustrates the people covering the team. 

The media likes leaks; they don't like surprises...and they don't like to be wrong.  So when the media gets it wrong, they tend to lash out.  It's easier to say the Redskins are 'dysfunctional', as Mark Schlereth put it last month, or perhaps a 'laughingstock' than to simply acknowledge that your sources aren't giving you enough inside dope to make the call ahead of time.  That way, you can project negatively upon the organization you cover instead of being self-critical and admitting you were wrong all along.  I think the Redskins' coaching search coverage was a good example of that.

I only hope JZ is as good as he seems.      

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