From the day of his hiring, Dan Campbell was lauded as a culture changing guy. A natural born leader of men who drew comparisons to Bill Cowher.
His press conferences were the topic of many pundits, but the honeymoon phase was on in earnest, and it was laughed off as a breath of fresh air. That, unfortunately, has quickly become an ill wind.
The Chicago game was a culminating condemnation of this coaching staff and the direction they are heading. The team came out flat as a pancake. Mental errors occurring all over the field, highly questionable gameplan, and coaches failing to make adjustments. Chicago was a very winnable game.
Minnesota was also a very winnable game. What is the definition of insanity? We got to see it in action during the Ravens, I mean Vikings, game winning drive.
Does Campbell feel Deja Vu? Does he feel the ghost of his old coach Marinelli? It’s all coming together to make his first season as Head Coach here look exactly like his last season as a player here. Motivating speeches and raw emotions only become a side show when you can’t back it up in the win column, and losing the locker room becomes inevitable.
Let me bring out one of my favorite quotes, because it applies here, from the movie Bull Durham. “Your shower shoes have fungus on them. You’ll never make it to the bigs with fungus on your shower shoes. Think classy, you’ll be classy. If you win 20 in the show, you can let the fungus grow back and the press’ll think you’re colorful. Until you win 20 in the show, however, it means you are a slob.”.
Right now, Dan Campbell is a slob. He needs to clean up and focus on winning. Unfortunately, I don’t believe he has it within him to become the scythe wielding, results demanding, A-Hole that both coaches and players need to bring out more than what they would otherwise be capable of. Diamonds are made under pressure, and right now this team is just a lump of coal.
I believe that the Cleveland approach needs to occur, sooner rather than later. The Holy Grail treatment of allowing a coaching staff to muck around for three years of wasting players careers and fans lives needs to stop, and Sheila Ford needs to step up, lest she cultivate her father’s culture that led to Darryl Rogers to ask, “What does it take to get fired around here?”.
Cleveland kept a revolving door policy until they found someone who would quit making excuses and start winning. The same approach needs to happen here. It’s clear that Campbell doesn’t have “it”, the team needs to pour ketchup on his contract and eat it, immediately. Let Lynn take over for the remainder of the season and see if he can right the ship.
The time, sadly, has already come to end this ill fated experiment. It’s time to break out the torches and pitchforks.
I would like to thank RickOShea as my inspiration for this post. I would also like to thank my friends and family, the Academy, the little people, and I know I’m forgetting somebody. My agent! Weaselpuppy! I couldn’t have done this without him! Get on down here and take a bow!
