The Grump Factor

 Couple of days now since Bill Belichick got the big snub from the Pro Football Hall of Fame voters, and the prevailing zeitgeist has boiled down to two basic reactions:

1. This is (choose one) completely ridiculous ... an abomination ... or, as Woody Allen famously said in "Bananas", a travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham.

2. Stupid sportswriters.

The first, of course, is absolutely on the mark. That perhaps the greatest coach in NFL history will not be a first-ballot Hall of Famer is ... well, a travesty of a mockery of a sham of a mockery of a travesty of two mockeries of a sham. The man has eight Super Bowl rings, six as a head coach and two as a defensive coordinator. Only Don Shula won more games as a head coach. If there were a Mount Rushmore of NFL coaches, his face would be on it.

His scowling face.

And therein lies the rub.

It is not, see, that Belichick did not have the resume of a first-ballot Hall-of-Famer. He so plainly did it's hardly worth saying so. If Belichick wasn't a first-ballot HOFer based on accomplishment, no coach from here until judgment trump should ever go in on the first ballot.

No, sir. The reason Belichick got the big nuh-uh, more than likely, was the Grump Factor.

Which is to say, he didn't play nice with the stupid sportswriters, and we are a vindictive lot. All of those years of gruff one-word answers and obvious reluctance to provide them came back to bite him. In every interaction with the media, he looked like he was being waterboarded -- while someone yanked out his fingernails with pliers.

If only he'd smiled once or twice. Cracked a joke or two. Been more down-home-y, spinning yarns like some codger down at the feed store.

Or as an acquaintance put it: "That's what you get for being an a**hole."

Which is entirely unfair to the man, sure, but,  again, sportswriters. If only we'd written more about Bill's zany side, like the time he dressed up as a pirate for a Halloween party. Or that other time when, at the geriatric age of 72, he started dating a 24-year-old hottie.

Oh, wait. We did write about that.

Are writing about it.

Ad nauseum.

Of course, the main reason we're doing that is to paint Belichick as some sort of weirdo. Which, let's face it, he kinda is. But he's also a damn smart weirdo.

Now, some folks will say another reason the stupid sportswriters might have snubbed Belichick is because of Spygate and Deflategate and all his other 'Gates. The guy did get caught cheating a few times, after all.

(Although Deflategate, in the Blob's opinion, wasn't all that scandalous. It basically was a psych job -- the lineal descendant, if you will, of Hayden Fry painting the walls of the visitors' locker room pink when he was at Iowa, or Red Auerbach putting visiting teams in a locker room where the windows didn't open, and then cranking up the heat.)

But enough of that. The point is, it was the Grump Factor that mainly did in Belichick, not the Sleaze Factor. And as illustration, I offer a moment back in 2012, when Belichick's New England Patriots were taking on the New York Giants in the Super Bowl in Indianapolis.

It was Media Day in Lucas Oil Stadium, which anyone who's ever attended will tell you is about anything but Media. It's a three-ring circus -- and, as one of the featured acts, Belichick was penned up in a booth down on the field, surrounded by Media..

Including yours truly.

Anyway, at one point in the proceedings, some radio foof next to me started waving a red plastic tricorn hat at Belichick. "Bill!" he cried. "Bill! Will you  put this on?"

To which Belichick growled, with perfect Belichickian form: "No, I'm not gonna do that."

See what I mean?

If only he'd put on the hat.

If only he'd, I don't know, done a little dance, sung a few bars of "Yankee Doodle," maybe made an off-color joke or two about Paul Revere and his horse.

Why, the man would have soared into the Hall of Fame this week on the wings of eagles. Guaranteed.

Transferrable

 Coach Cig and some of the boys were in the house, and they brought their shiny new hardware with them. So straightaway the mojo was right. 

Straightaway you knew Tuesday wouldn't be one of those nights when Matt Painter brought those ornery Purdue Boilermakers into Assembly Hall and trashed the place. Not with the Hall -- full to the last seat for the first time this season -- bringing a barely remembered thunder. Not with Coach Cig as its monitor, sitting courtside and posing for pictures. Not with that glorious, newly-won CFP National Championship trophy that came along as sidekick and inspiration and, who knows, maybe even spirit animal.

Could the basketball Hoosiers do less than they did, given all that?

Were the Purdues toast on a stick from the start, with all that arrayed against them?

No, and yes. And so here came Indiana 72, No. 12 Purdue 67 -- and barely a flicker of surprise, because if football's mighty example wasn't transferrable, what possibly could be?

First blood to Darian DeVries in this old and fable-shrouded rock fight. First Quad 1 win for the Hoosiers in seven tries this season. Third straight loss for Painter's Boilers, who have hit a patch of black ice as January gives way to February.

The book on this Indiana team is it lives and dies at the 3-point arc, and, OK, so that's mostly true. Last night, for instance, the Hoosiers splashed a dozen threes in 33 attempts, five more than Purdue, who stuck seven of 20. Nick Dorn had four of the 12 for Indiana, and finished with 18 points. Lamar Wilkerson scored 19. 

But it wasn't all a three party. Tucker DeVries stuffed the stat sheet with nine points, 10 rebounds, three assists, three steals and a blocked shot. Indiana's starters outrebounded Purdue's 22-20. The Hoosiers' bench outscored Purdue's 16-12.

The game seesawed back and forth for most of a half, and Purdue almost filched it at the end, turning a 10-point Indiana lead into nervous time. But the Boilers once again couldn't finish, and once again some of their leading lights mirrored that struggle.

Fletcher Loyer, one of the premier shooters in the Big Ten, continued to search for his wandering shooting eye, missing seven of his 10 shots on the night. And Braden Smith, the nation's top point guard, was uncharacteristically quiet, scoring 14 points but missing eight of his 14 shots and racking almost as many turnovers (4) as assists (5).

By contrast, his opposite number, Conor Enright, had three more dimes (8) and one fewer turnover (3). Who had that on their bingo card?

Who had the Indiana players rushing over to celebrate with the student section, and Darian DeVries pumping his fists right in the middle of it? As if, you know, he wasn't still new to all this, just as all the imports on his roster are new to it all?

"Every time we needed the crowd tonight, they were there," DeVries said when it was done. "They never took a possession off either. They played 40 minutes tonight ... 

"Tonight was as good as it gets in college basketball."

Lot of that going around these days.

Disappearing act

 Cruising through my socials today, and I came across a couple of posts from a Facethingy bro that made me sigh and shake my head.

(This is not to say I don't sigh and shake my head at virtually everything these curmudgeonly days, mind you. But sometimes I really sigh and shake my head, and occasionally mutter the more blasphemous version of "Jeezly crow.")

Anyway, what Facethingy Bro -- he has a name, and it's Michael Pointer, a former sportswriting colleague -- had put up were three items about the Washington Post, which was one of the nation's great newspapers until Jeff Bezos got his mitts on it. One item noted that the Post reportedly would not be sending a beat writer to Nationals' spring training this year; a New York Times piece reported the Post had abruptly decided not to send a team to the upcoming Winter Olympics. 

And the third item?

It highlighted the logical conclusion a reasonable person might reach from the previous two: That there are strong indications the Post will soon be doing away with its sports desk altogether.

It was right about then I thought about Bill Gildea.

Bill, you see, worked the sports beat for the Post, along with a number of other luminaries.  You had Bill and Tom Boswell and Christine Brennan and Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon and Chuck Culpeper, and a bunch of others. John Feinstein worked the sports beat there for a goodly stretch. Ditto Sally Jenkins, who worked there twice and is still there.

They were the '27 Yankees of sports scribbling, in other words. The Lombardi Packers/Chuck Noll Steelers/Bill Walsh Niners/Bill Belichick Patriots. And now they're bailing on spring training? And -- good grief -- the Olympic Games?

What a world. What. A. World.

But back to Gildea.

I met him 29 years ago when he was traveling around Indiana, gathering material for his paean to high school basketball in the state. It was the last year of Hoosier Hysteria, Indiana's fabled single-class tournament. One of the teams Gildea was following was DeKalb -- which that season featured soon-to-be Mr. Basketball Luke Recker, and which was right up the road from my port of call in Fort Wayne.

In other words, I saw Bill more than a few times that winter. Reviewed the subsequent book, "Where The Game Matters Most." It was as graceful, and gracious, as Bill himself, who was a first-rate gentleman without a whiff of pretense.

He's gone now, alas. Shuffled off the mortal coil in 2020, at the age of 81. But I'm wondering if, somewhere in the Good Place, he's sighing and shaking his head and saying "Jeezly crow" or some variation, too.

Because the '27 Yankees are skipping the World Series, as it were. They're surrendering the field. It's a disappearing act we're seeing everywhere these days, distressingly. 

Yet it still confounds those of us who remember when a top-drawer sports staff sold the book, so to speak -- and never mind that the metro-desk drones called it The Toy Department.

Now?

Now the Washington Post isn't sending scribes to the Olympics. It's not covering spring training. There's no all-star lineup flooding the zone, as it were;no Tony Kornheiser cracking wise about luge or cross-country skiing or the Zen-like appeal of curling.

Kornheiser, by the way, left the Post years ago for a pile of TV dough. So did his sidekick, Wilbon. In Kornheiser's case, his exit deprived us of one of the funniest writers in America -- a man whose second compilation of columns bore one of the all-time great (and honest) titles: "I'm Back For More Cash."

Pretty much the theme music for the Jeff Bezoses of the world, come to think of it.

To our detriment.

The Who Cares Bowl

Lots of people ... OK, some people ... OK, a few people ... have been caterwauling lately about Shedeur Sanders being named to the Pro Bowl as a replacement for Pro Bowler Drake Maye, who's busy getting ready for the Super Bowl. Lots, or some, or a few, think it's ridiculous that a guy who started just seven games for the hideous Cleveland Browns and threw more interceptions (10) than touchdowns (seven) should be in the Pro Bowl.

"Where's, I don't know, Trevor Lawrence?" they say. "Where's the guy who was a finalist for NFL MVP, threw for 4,007 yards, 29 touchdowns and just 12 interceptions and led Jacksonville to the AFC South title? Where's that guy?"

One supposes they have a point.

One also supposes it doesn't matter.

That's because, hello, it's the Pro Bowl, which is nothing but recess in a warm place these days. There are relay races and skills contests and then a flag football game on the beach. Afterward there's a cookout.

(OK. So it's not on the beach. But it could be.)

(Also, as far as I know, there's not a cookout, either. But there could be.)

Point is, who really cares who plays in the Who Cares Bowl, so heck, why NOT Shedeur Sanders? He's new. He's fun in the sense that you never know when he's going to do something harebrained. And he has a brand, which is a big deal in corporate America these days.

"But ... but ..." you're saying now.

But what? Look around the AFC. Patrick Mahomes and Bo Nix are on the shelf. Ditto Daniel Jones and Cam Ward. Lamar Jackson and Joe Burrow missed big chunks of the season with injuries, and CJ Stroud is likely still in hiding after throwing four picks in an ugly playoff loss to the Patriots.

As for Lawrence ...

Well, he was a Pro Bowl alternate. Lots of people, or some, or a few, think he should have been chosen ahead of  Justin Herbert, who's one of the three AFC quarterbacks. The fact Lawrence is not, after the breakout season he had, suggests he was asked and said, "Nah, I'm good."

This in turn suggests Trevor Lawrence is smarter than your average bear, so to speak.

Although he will miss the cookout. I hear it's a hell of a feast.

(Just kidding.)

Welcome to the big city

So, OK, then: Patriots vs. Seahawks in the 60th Super Bowl.

Two head coaches who've never been to the Big Supe as head coaches.

Two quarterbacks who've never been there, either.

It's Mike Vrabel, who's 50 years old and in his second gig as an NFL head coach, vs. Mike Macdonald, who's 38 and in his first. It's Drake Maye, who's in just his second year as an NFL starting quarterback, vs. Sam Darnold, who's the journeyman of all journeymen, bouncing around from place to place as a starter and backup before finding his mojo in Seattle.

This isn't Lombardi vs. Landry or Reid vs. Shanahan in the Big Six-Oh, but never mind that. And it's not Montana vs. Marino or Mahomes vs. Brady, but never mind that, either.

What it is are two teams who talk less about scheme and analytics than about heart and will and belief and vision, all the old verities. They talk about team unity and pieces fitting together into a cohesive whole, and everyone pulling an oar in the same direction for each other and the organization and, hell, even their cities.

They're new schoolers, these two, but they talk as old school as inkwells. It's heartwarming and wonderful and, OK, a little corny, too.

The Patriots, for instance?

Their fresh-faced quarterback looks like Johnny Be Good and plays like Billy Be Damned, out-gritting the Broncos yesterday on a snow-swirled day in Denver with his legs and his guile. It was the Patriots' ninth road win against zero losses this season -- which no one ever does in the NFL, especially not a team that was 4-12 last season.

Know something else about their quarterback?

He's married to his middle-school sweetheart, Ann Michael. Know what she does?

She bakes cookies for Maye and his teammates before every game.

Does it get any more "Little House On The Prairie" than that?

Out in Seattle, meanwhile, you've got a kid head coach who got the Seahawks to buy in on Day One. He did it by envisioning a team that never, ever quits, and that would wind up playing in the NFC championship game on a rain-soaked day Seattle.

Except for the fact it was a gorgeous day in Seattle, everything he envisioned came true.

The Seahawks won 14 games during the regular season in the toughest division in football, earned the NFC's No. 1 seed, and, yes, wound up playing in the NFC championship game. And they never quit, just like their leader -- Sam Darnold himself -- never quit through all his travels and tribulations. 

Matthew Stafford and the nemesis Rams kept coming at them; Darnold and Jaxon Smith-Njigba and Kenneth Walker III kept answering back. Smith-Njigba caught 10 balls for 153 yards and a touchdown. Walker ground out 62 yards and another six against a Rams defense that had no other back on whom to key. And Sam Darnold ... well, Sam Darnold played the game of his life in the biggest game of his life, throwing for 346 yards and three scores without a turnover. 

Does it get any more Shane-Falco-in-"The-Replacements" than that?

It's all a damn movie script, and in two weeks it culminates in the most cinematic of our Roman circuses. Will Drake Maye and the resurrected Patriots win on the road again? Will Darnold and JSN and Walker et al complete their young coach's giddy vision? 

We shall see. But in the meantime ... 

Welcome to the big city, Pats and 'Hawks.

Wear sunglasses. Those lights are some bright.

Another one gone

 Little by little these days, my childhood disappears. This will happen when you ascend to the first class section of codgerdom, which I can reliably claim to have done.

(Great place, codgerdom first class. You get free tapioca. Also unlimited supplies of "consarn it," "dadgum it" and various other codgerisms.)

Where was I again?

Oh, yeah. Disappearing childhood.

Another piece vanished yesterday when the news came down that John Brodie had died, and, boy, that's bummer. For one thing, he was 90 years old, which seems impossible. Wasn't it just yesterday he was throwing to Gene Washington and handing off to Ken Willard?

Who were two others I remember from those 1960s San Francisco 49ers, who used to battle the seagulls in decrepit Kezar Stadium. Every Sunday afternoon, it seemed, we'd get the Bears, the Lions or the Vikings on the early game, and the Niners or the Rams on the late game. Sometimes we'd get both when they played one another.

Brodie, of course, was the quarterback of those Niners, and thus the ringleader. Besides Washington and Willard, they had some guys named Dave Parks and Charlie Krueger, and some other guys named Howard Mudd and Dave Wilcox and Bob Windsor. Even had a young Jimmy Johnson back there at cornerback.

Brodie played 17 seasons for the 49ers, retiring after the 1973 season with 214 career touchdown passes and 31,548 yards. In an era when it was a whole lot tougher to complete passes, he completed 55 percent of them. The 49ers during his time were sometimes decent, more often "meh" and occasionally awful. 

But in 1970 Brodie had his big year, winning league MVP while quarterbacking the Niners to a division title for the first time in his career. They lost to the Cowboys in the NFC championship game, 17-10.

And now he's gone, and those Sunday afternoons of my kid-hood grow that much dimmer. Brodie, Roman Gabriel, Gale Sayers, Dick Butkus, Mel Farr, Bart Starr ... the list goes on, as lists like this always will.

 'Bye, guys. See ya later, alligator.

Musical coaches

 Listen, I don't know what the Buffalo Bills are thinking. I make it a rule assume no NFL team is ever thinking much of anything, on the excellent chance none of them are.

So, yeah, Bills, OK, go ahead and fire Sean McDermott for not getting Josh Allen to the Super Bowl. McDermott's had plenty of chances, after all. So I guess it was time.

And, yeah, go ahead and interview Mike McDaniel, even though the Dolphins just got sick of him. Ditto Brian Daboll, who couldn't even get through the this season before the chronically putrid Giants fired him because he couldn't make them less chronically putrid.

Hey, you don't know! Maybe Mike and Brian will do better this time! Could happen, right?

Same goes for Robert Saleh, fired by the Jets only to be hired as the next head coach of the Titans. Also for Jeff Hafley -- whom the Dolphins just hired to replace McDaniel, and whose last head coaching gig was at Boston College, where he drove a pretty decent program onto the rocks.

But that was college! And this the pros! Whole different ballgame, right?

Which brings us back to the Bills.

Who, yesterday, down in Florida, interviewed not a former college head coach, but a current high school coach. Come on down, Philip Rivers!

"Wait ... what?" you're saying now.

Yes, that's right. Philip Rivers, last seen being called in off the couch to quarterback the Indianapolis Colts at the age of 44, got a sitdown with the Bills. He's never coached at the pro level. He's never coached at any of the various college levels. But Josh Allen thinks the world of him, so ... 

"So this is Gerry Faust 2.0?" you're saying.

Maybe. Although probably not. 

Probably the Bills will go with one of the retreads they're interviewing in this game of musical coaches, unless they go with some flavor-of-the-month offensive or defensive coordinator. It's a roll of the dice either way, especially given the less-than-stellar ownership and front office in Buffalo.

Sometimes, after all, retreads find second lives in new places (See: Bill Belichick, Mike Vrabel, etc.). And sometimes coordinators flourish as head coaches (See: Sean McVay, Ben Johnson, a host of others), and sometimes they crash-and-burn (See: McDaniel, Daboll, Josh McDaniels). 

But a guy with no tread or coordinator chops whatsoever?

Yikes.

Which is not to say Philip Rivers wouldn't be really good at the coaching thing. He probably would. And maybe the Bills are smarter than I'm giving them credit for, or that they've ever shown themselves to be. Maybe what they're really doing by interviewing Rivers is feeling him out for a gig as their quarterbacks coach. It's possible.

All I know is this: If they were really serious about him as a head coaching candidate, let me tell you about the last guy to go straight from the playing field to head coach in the NFL.

According to the Elias Sports Bureau and ESPN, that would be Norm Van Brocklin, also a quarterback, who finished his 12-year playing year in 1960 and was hired the next year by the Minnesota Vikings as their first head coach. Van Brocklin went on to coach 13 seasons with the Vikings and Atlanta Falcons, compiling a 66-100-7 record. He had just three winning seasons in those 13 years.

Not sayin'. Just sayin'.