The Madness Of Method

Filed under the "Comes As No Surprise" category, I like much of my sports-obsessed demographic spent the past four days consumed with college basketball.

After a pretty blah opening weekend, the great games this weekend were a welcome rebound: Michigan State-Kansas, Mizzou-UConn, and of course Pitt-Nova.

Whether it’s the opening round upsets or the Sweet Sixteen buzzer beaters, every year college basketball taunts the rest of organized sports with its overwhelming and dramatic playoffs.

And I like many can’t help but ruminate on what playoffs would do for college football.

College basketball’s appeal is as much the sport as it is the tournament itself. As the Counselor says, “The tournament is beautiful in its simplicity, I'll never understand why pro football and thunderdome are the only other forums that recognize the value of the ‘Two Men Enter, One Man Leaves’ competition structure.”

Amen.

Why then it is impossible for the NCAA to grasp what a true playoff would do for the football?

Change of course threatens entrenched and lucrative interests. The NCAA and top-performing programs make cash hand over fist in the current system. Even mid-tier schools walk away handsomely compensated with shared revenues off the field or being offered up as sacrificial lambs to powerhouse programs on the field. Everyone wins in the BCS system… except for the players… oh, and the fans. The customers get the shaft. The NCAA plays up the purity of the college athletics when it suits them, while acting like a business when profitability is involved.

The concerns are many. A playoff would add too many games to the season. A playoff would undermine the tradition of the bowl system. A playoff would magnify the disparaties in talent between the conferences.

The excuses are just that. If you believe hallowed tradition includes split national champions in 16 seasons over the course of 50 or so years, you have a skewed idea of what’s untouchable. Or, if you believe it’s USC’s right to destroy a lesser Big Ten opponent in the Rose Bowl every year, you’re a true football masochist.

The public defense of the current college football system runs something like this: the regular season of college football is without peer, functioning as a playoff of sorts.

The breakdown in this logic of course occurs once we reach the postseason. I can think of no better illustration of college football’s faults than pointing to the disparity between the end of the football season and the end of the basketball season.

Every year, the college football season ends in bickering and bitching. Every year, teams excluded from a shot at the championship call for change. This past year it’s Utah among others. But every year, it’s several someones. And this in turn undermines the work players and coaches undertook all season to prove themselves the best. For players, coaches, and fans it’s a cruel joke.

The critics of the playoff proposals all have legitimate gripes. Plus One is simply a cosmetic extension of the current system and its foibles. Eight or sixteen teams would still rely on dubious rankings and could potentially undermine the conference structure by excluding conference champions. Anything more than sixteen teams would add too many games to the season.

The answer lies in the defense of the current system, namely, that the regular season is the best thing the college game has going for it.

I say formalize the regular season as a playoff. Transform the entirety of the season into a recognized playoff that funnels into an elimination-style postseason freed from controversy as much as humanly possible.

It’s a notion I’ve been toying with for much of the past couple months. There are distinct difficulties to constructing a season-long tournament.

First, there are 118 Division 1-A football teams. Second, eleven separate conferences functioning as unique entities award their own eleven champions, to say nothing of the four independent schools. Third, a season long one-and-done elimination is an impossible sell because each team must be allowed a full season schedule to support and maintain their programs.

(For the moment, let’s put aside the political concerns inherent in prying the football postseason from the moneyed interests surrounding the game, like the bowl commissions and corporate sponsorships. With a true fix to the college postseason, the NCAA should be able to make more money while preserving some façade of the status quo, like using the current bowl sites for the biggest year-end games.)

The conference issue is perhaps the biggest and thorniest. First, Notre Dame, Army, Navy, and Western Kentucky would need to relinquish independent status and join conferences, a difficult but necessary step. Second, the end of season playoff would need to include each conference’s champion to ensure each conference participation in the college postseason.

But a conference championship wouldn’t be a team’s only potential ticket to the postseason. This is where it gets tricky, but bear with me. Cap the conference schedule at six games. Why? Because the remaining non-conference schedule of five regular season games will comprise a round-robin tournament between groups of six teams vying for one of twenty automatic bids to a 32 team elimination playoff.

That’s right, the college football season will include not one, not two, but three playoffs: the conference level, the round robin level, then the final one-and-done true playoff running from December through early January. The “regular” season would revert to eleven games, six conference games and five as part of a round robin. The postseason instead of being four weeks of staggered contests and bitching would be a five week elimination producing an undisputed champion

Now, you may quibble with some of my math. Eleven plus twenty doesn’t equal 32. The most logical yet least likely solution is for the NCAA to promote a twelfth conference to Division 1-A while including only two more teams, funneling current independents into this conference, and encouraging a redistribution of teams an overloaded conference like the Mid-American with its thirteen teams or Conference-USA with its twelve.

However, in light of that unlikely scenario, I’ll propose a minor bit of controversy: nominating one at-large bid for the playoff. Thirty-one of the 32 teams would be undeniably deserving of their playoff spots. An oversight committee modeled on basketball’s selection committee could determine the seeding for a playoff while also selecting the one at-large team.

I think it’s important to note that college basketball is not without its controversy. But it sidesteps grave concerns about the legitimacy of its champions by including as many worthy teams as possible and allowing them ample opportunity to prove themselves on the court. This is where the NCAA has failed with college football thus far.

I’ll be the first to admit that my plan is not without its drawbacks. With only six conference games to determine a champion, large conferences like the SEC and ACC would need to rearrange their methods for determining a champion. Less affected would be the smaller conferences like the Big East and Sun Belt with eight teams apiece.

Also, the determination of the groupings for the round-robin in-season tournament would probably rely heavily on the prior season’s performance if not generated randomly. I’ve intentionally not filled out too many details about the round-robin tournament because its mechanisms provide area of compromise for the several sides of the playoff debate.

The conference play and round-robin play would necessarily rely on tiebreakers in the likely event of teams finishing with similar records. Such is sport at any level. As long as the tiebreakers are agreed upon, the hope would be for minimal gnashing of teeth, perhaps a far-flung hope considering college football.

Though my proposal increases the overall games of the season to sixteen, only four teams would play more than the fourteen teams currently play. For the sake of clear and undisputed champion, it is a minor sacrifice.

Again, I’ve left some parts of my proposal intentionally vague. The five games of the round-robin tournament and six games of the conference “regular” season play could be intertwined over the course of eleven or twelve weeks from August to November. Or the round-robin stage could follow the conference schedule.

Consider too that a team that wins its conference as well its group-stage opens the door for another bid. That bid could be determined several ways, likely by the next best team in a conference or round-robin group. Again, ample room to create compromise for varying sides of the playoff debate.

Given that the BCS recently re-upped several television contracts, it's unlikely change is on the near horizon. In the meantime, the madness of college football will remain in the frustration with the system and, not like its fellow sport basketball, in the excitement of its play on the field.

If you have any suggestions or tweaks or extreme reactions, I'd love to hear them in the comments.

Friday Walkthrough, Future Past Tense

An expansion of the regular season. Continued campus workouts for pro prospects. Michael Vick's looming, potentially expanding, legal troubles. Roll call at voluntary team workouts. Delineations on rules new and old designed to protect vulnerable players on the field.

Some topics discussed this week in the NFL. But not a lot actually done.

I've got my own reactions to an expansion to the regular season. In theory, I'm against it, given the increasing speed and power of the game and thereby the increasing wear and tear on players' bodies. And I would address expansion in detail if I felt it was truly going to happen.

But this one smells like a rat. With the coming negotiations over the CBA - and this purely conjecture on my part - the commissioner and the owners are positioning regular season expansion as leverage, a bargaining chip they can dispense, in the coming negotiations.

Consider that more regular season games would require an increased roster for each team which means an expanded payroll. Consider too the teams struggling to sell out stadiums for eight home games, like Jacksonville or Detroit, where there must be some resistance to expansion.

Instead, out of the owners meeting, Goodell painted a picture of unanimity on the issue of expansion. I'm skeptical.

Anyway, in the time-honored tradition of going light before the weekend, here's your Friday Walkthrough, links to can't miss reads of the week.


Speaking of the wear and tear of the game on players' bodies, a very good article about researchers determining some of the reasons why NFL players have a dramatically lower life expectancy than average US males. The numbers are staggering. Based on position, some players face a life expectancy over twenty years shorter than their non-football playing peers. Tie this in with recent research about the danger of repeated concussions and the picture of post-football aging for pros can be a pretty bleak one. (Dan Raley, Seattle Post-Intelligencer)


On the other end of the spectrum, Smart Football speculates on Tim Tebow's new quarterback coach, Scot Loeffler, and what he indicates for Florida's upcoming season and Tebow's pro potential. There's definitely some insight on why Tebow returned for a senior season when he already "has achieved all that is humanly possible in college." There's little doubting Tebow is one of the college game's greatest players. And, I get a lot of mileage out of the "projects as an NFL tight end" joke. But I think we're all curious whether Tebow will adapt to the NFL or the NFL will adapt to Tebow. (Chris, Smart Football)


Finally, here's the Football Outsiders mock draft. I've like what they've done here, mainly thinking about how different GM's and front offices tend to draft. This mock will be a good warm-up for my Know Your War Room series which attacks much the same ground but in greater detail. I don't agree with all of the Outsiders's assessments, but as always, they provide good food for thought. (Bill Barnwell, Football Outsiders)

On that note, have a great weekend everyone.

To the Concerns Of Many

Dear Michael Vick,

I haven’t a clue what it’s like to spend time in prison. And you’ve been in serious prison no less! Not like Club Fed down in Florida. We’re talking Leavenworth. Real Federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison. I hope that trademark elusiveness has served you well.

I imagine you’ve had a lot of time on your hands. Maybe the facilities have enough in the way of resources to help alleviate the long stretches of boredom.

I know some prisons offer courses in different trades like personal fitness training or landscaping. Some places can even give you training as a paralegal. With all your recent experience in the justice system, you might have a jump on that career track.

With your future in the NFL in doubt, I suppose it doesn’t hurt to explore some other options.


Even with all that time on your hands, I’ll confess surprise when I learned you were writing a book.

It’s not that I doubt your tutors at Virginia Tech didn’t do their absolute best to keep you academically eligible; rather, I pegged you for the quiet type that might shun the spotlight for awhile considering your time within it these past two years.

People have speculated the book might simply be an attempt to raise some quick cash. Your recent financial troubles are well documented. It’s a long hard fall from 130 Million Dollar Man to hounded by every federal, state, and local justice agency for every cent you’ve made.

(Oh, sorry about that “hounded” analogy, I suppose you’re sick of those.)

However, if your book project is a sincere attempt to help rehabilitate yourself, not just your image, then let me make you an offer: I will help you write your book.



You may be asking yourself why you should even consider a writer such as myself with minimal exposure who as of yet has not published a book on any subject.

A completely valid question.

Here me out though first.

Some people have come to your defense, noting, among other details, that you never physically harmed another human being in the course of your crimes.

Your defenders point to the hypocrisy inherent in the justice system vigorously pursuing your crimes when more violent and dangerous crimes run rampant in southern Virginia. It’s the value of an animal’s life over a human’s life, they say.

Let me make this clear: I am not one of your defenders.

A few years in prison and other detentional facilities seems fitting to me for leading an illegal interstate operation, an operation built upon depraved practices inconsistent with the moral progress of society.

Some arbitrary balance of an animal’s life versus a human’s life is irrelevant to your crimes. The weight of one crime has no bearing on another. Knowingly breaking a law then attempting to cover it up doesn't exist in shades of gray.

(The balance is perhaps not irrelevant to the fervor with which you were dogged – oops, sorry, did it again – by the media and protesters, but irrelevant to the hard time you are doing and the hard work you must yet do to become a productive member of society.)

Facts are the public is split down the middle on you and the weight of your crimes. I imagine not many who feel as I do will reach out to you as you attempt to piece your life back together.

But for some reason, maybe because I’d like to believe we can all change if we’re honest and sincere enough in our attempts, I am offering you my services as one disgusted and deeply unsympathetic to your crimes.

I don’t doubt your abilities, watching you singlehandedly destroy the Lambeau mystique leaves me incapable of such. But your path to recovering your abilities and your good standing in society is a long and difficult one and won’t be affected by preaching to the choir or making excuses.



If you want your book to really address your fans as well as your detractors, you need to confront hard truths from all sides of your story. I can help you do that. No questions can be left off the table. I would expect your full cooperation with delving into your past, the good and the bad.

And, if I find you sincere in your attempts to atone for your crimes, you have my word as a man to paint your actions as sympathetically as my powers allow. Some ugly facts you may not want to see light may surface, but absolute truth is your only path to convincing doubters to give you a second chance.

So please, consider my proposal. I have extensive training as a researcher and have written enough material these past few years to fill two books. As for my objective and impartial nature, I can give you recommendations from several ex-girlfriends who can attest to my patience and thoughtfulness.


Only the truth will set you free, truth you can only approach from all sides of your story.

(Unless of course you don't feel a stitch of remorse for your actions and/or haven't learned from your mistakes. Then you may want to go the sensationalist "My Side Of the Story" route. And in that case you can go to hell for all I care.)

Sincerely,
Cian O'Day

Kings Of the Urban Jungle

Today's discussion chances to be a dangerous one. For a franchise whose only consistency results from consistently deflating hopes, stoking any dreams, however measured or qualified, runs the risk of colluding with the captors at worst or extending a slow numbing of the extremities at best.

With that in mind, I promise to proceed with caution, Detroit Lions fans.

A common refrain for NFL teams toiling at the bottom is some variant on “things can't get any worse,” “there's nowhere to go but up,” etc, etc.

I would suspect eight years under Matt Millen would inspire a distinct disbelief in such cliches for Lions fans. And, while 0-16 might represent a historical low, vast improvements by no means follow logically.

While there have been big splashes on the NFL's free agency calendar thus far - Haynesworth to Washington, Houshmandzadeh to Seattle, TO to Buffalo - there's a lot to like in new coach Jim Schwartz's roster turnover. The Lions were terrible almost everywhere, from the game plans to the pass defense, from the blocking schemes to the d-line. Drastic upgrades required just about everywhere.

Outside of Calvin Johnson, not a single Lions player is untouchable. But Schwartz and GM Martin Mayhew have still identified the players that can help the team while they upgrade the talent behind and around them. Daunte Culpepper at quarterback, Jeff Backus at tackle, Dominic Raiola at center, Kevin Smith at running back, Ernie Sims at linebacker, Cliff Avril at defensive end.

It's not much of a nucleus, but it's a starting point. More important are the cuts, ridding the team of as many memories of 0-16 as possible. Jon Kitna, Leigh Bodden, Edwin Mulitalo, Cory Redding, Shaun Cody, and Mike Furrey all gone, all players supposed to perform at a high level that failed to do so for one reason or another.

In place of bloated contracts on veterans threatening to sink the team's payroll down the line, the Lions have bargain shopped through free agency. Solid corner Phillip Buchanon from Tampa is joined by Anthony Henry from Dallas in trade. Mercenary defensive tackle Grady Jackson provides an enormous stop gap in the defensive interior. Bryant Johnson from San Fran lines up some size opposite Calvin Johnson. And Maurice Morris from Seattle backs up Kevin Smith with experience.

These moves have created a bigger team, inside and at the corners on defense, in the backfield and at the wideouts on offense. Furthermore, all these moves represent solid if not spectacular upgrades over their departed counterparts. But, of course, the trade for Julian Peterson is a big leap forward on the depth chart surrounded by a bunch of careful steps.

Last week, I pondered the Julian Peterson trade from the Seahawks perspective, what Peterson's departure means for a defense that never quite lived up to its billing. Peterson certainly wasn't the problem, perhaps a glut of riches at linebacker and breakdown in front and behind him more to blame for Seattle's underachieving ways.

Facts are, Peterson's the all around kind of playmaker that should remind Schwartz of Keith Bulluck in Tennessee, not just with his range and strength, but also with his fiery play. The Lions defensive personality has been no more compelling than a houseplant these last few seasons. Peterson will do everything in his power to transform that. Where Peterson supplanted youth in Seattle, he will be asked to unburden it from unrealistic expectations in Detroit, giving Ernie Sims a more than capable mentor to follow.

I've been reluctant to call Detroit in 2009 or 2010. And before the Draft it's impossible to know what direction the Lions are heading in. It's not so much a question of Stafford or Jason Smith. It's everything that happens after. The Tennessee team Schwartz apprenticed under valued physical play, speed, and top measurables over unquantifiable notions like "heart" and "character." It may have saddled the Titans with Pacman Jones drama, but it also netted them Chris Johnson and a beastly offensive line.

Perhaps the Lions need to take a cue from crosstown neighbors, the Pistons. Despite playing up in Auburn Hills some twenty miles outside of Detroit, the Pistons embrace the rough and tumble identity of the city.

I'm not pushing for a Malice-at-the-Palace type incident, rather a team identity that emphasizes physical play and dangerous athleticism despite any loss of humility. Goodness, if anyone desperately needs swagger, it's the Lions and their fans.

Easier said than done. But Schwartz looks so far to understand that. There's something potentially very prescient when Zac at Throwing Into Traffic says of Detroit, "It's a 2008 Dolphins world." With one offseason, Bill Parcells turned Miami into a bigger and meaner team, a team that looked more lost in 2007 than Detroit did in 2008.

I don't want to sound the horns too loudly, but so far Jim Schwartz appears to get it. And we'll be keeping close tabs on it.

Forget the Remainder

The soap opera surrounding Jay Cutler – admit it, during the offseason lull some part of you loves it – casts a long shadow but it shouldn’t obscure the comparatively muted drama of Julius Peppers.

If Cutler represents potential, the promise to fulfill lofty yet familiar narratives, Peppers is further along that trajectory and at the same time something else entirely. He’s achieved that familiar greatness yet still brims with more to give the game.

Already established as the game’s most fearsome end, already racking up gaudy statistics, this is Peppers still not playing at the level he could play. This is Peppers confined by a system sapping his talents without maximizing them.

I’m of a few minds about Peppers, his ability, and his demands. On the surface, what Peppers wants is ridiculous. It’s not the trade demands. It’s not the short list of contenders.

Wanting out of the Carolina death trap is in some sense understandable. Malaise ruined Kris Jenkins's best years with the Panthers. Jon Beason and Chris Harris are some of the scary best at their positions, making for a hard hitting backcourt up the middle of the field. But Carolina manages to isolate those defensive talents, leaving them cast adrift in a sea of underachievement.

Wanting clear of such frustrating dysfunction is understandable for a player like Peppers, in his 29th year, at the peak of his athletic powers. What is strange is his desire to play the rush linebacker in a 3-4 system, like James Harrison, like Terrell Suggs, like Shawne Merriman. In some sense, the desire to switch systems is an acknowledgement by Peppers that he can offer the game even greater impact.

The price point aside – outside linebackers are often compensated less than defensive ends in any scheme – is the position change going to affect what Peppers is looking for? Namely, the maximization of his considerable talents?

When Bill Belichick fielded the question of Peppers translation to a 3-4, he dodged it by saying Julius would be successful in any system. For a player of Peppers’s size, 6’7” with a considerable wingspan, 285 sleek pounds, he could truly be a terror rushing at the quarterback hand off the ground, free to roam before the snap of the ball.

But, in run defense, Peppers size and strength make him an almost waste for the outside linebacker position. With the body and strength to fight off tackle/tight end double teams, flowing to the ball behind linemen is a redundancy.

Consider Peppers's main suitor mentioned in flirtatous whispers, that is New England. Belichick’s defense rests on discipline in its front seven. Lineman control two gaps upfront, linebackers respond to gap assignment based on the unfolding play, flowing to the ball, rushing the quarterback, or dropping back in coverage, according to predetermined reads.

Of course, we all know that Belichick’s success has stemmed from getting the most out of his players, whether Troy Brown or Randy Moss, Tedy Bruschi or Vince Wilfork. Belichick would adjust, sensing the possibilities in the larger game outside of his gameplans.

In that sense, the only way Peppers can truly be free is if he can be fortunate enough to find a coach who won’t contain his talent by a system. The list of such defensive geniuses in the NFL is short. Belichick, Rex Ryan at the Jets, Dick LeBeau at the Steelers, Steve Spagnuolo at the Rams, Jim Johnson at the Eagles… and potentially, here’s a curveball, Jim Bates now at the Buccaneers.

(Bates presided over Jason Taylor’s best years in Miami, letting Taylor freelance in his 4-3 system, in effect turning it into a hybrid 4-3/3-4 scheme. Bates has had a rough tumble around the league the last couple seasons, but with a defensive minded franchise like Tampa could be a good fit for Bates. And a piece like Peppers could provide a terrifying identity for a team in flux at the moment.)

Part of the problem is that the NFL isn’t about innovation, it’s about the best players playing each other. The structure of repeated battles are slow to change. In college, where talent varies wildly, innovation can render a significant strategic advantage. The returns are less, the risks greater in the pros.

A player like Peppers presents ability that can thrive in the NFL’s status quo. But that in turn masks reasons to alter the status quo to harness still uptapped abilities. Innovation in football often arises to disguise a deficiency like lack of size or speed. In this case, the inverse could reap great rewards, however counterintuitive to conventional football logic.

The local media paints Peppers as a quiet, keep-to-himself teammate. While the trade demand didn’t materialize out of thin air, it’s a bit out of character for a player that’s steered clear of making waves. My first reaction was a shaken head, worried that this discontent would turn out badly for both parties, Julius and the Panthers.

And it still might turn out badly, especially if Peppers doesn’t budge from his short list of trading partners. Peppers shouldn’t make the same mistake, painting himself into a corner with a new team or new position on the field, placing different but ultimately similar restrictions on his talent that led to this frustration in the first place.

Friday Walkthrough, Draft Buzz

In a little over a month, the 32 NFL teams will send their representatives to Radio City Music Hall here in New York to pick through the next crop of NFL talent.

In the meantime, we speculate and dream, poke and prod, sift through the explosion of Draft-centric websites, hoping to glimpse any idea of what our teams may do the last weekend of April.

Yes, we're thinking Draft.

Today, I mail in my post in typical Friday fashion with links to what you should have already read this week. I call it the Friday Walkthrough, in the time-honored tradition of going light before the weekend.

Forget those cobbled together scouting reports available all over the web. Get yourself over to Throwing Into Traffic for Zac's What Dreams May Come series. I'll remind you that Zac threw the spotlight on Chris Johnson well before the jackals were tearing apart Tennessee for selecting him in the first round. In short, listen up, kiddies.


Despite his inexperience, Zac enumerates Mark Sanchez's cool demeanor, his blatant disregard for pressure, as the why Sanchez in part can break the recent string of former USC starting quarterback struggles.




We all know of Aaron Curry's immense talent, but Zac takes it one step further in musing on why Curry could change the game, becoming a force unstoppable only a byproduct of his impact.





Finally, the case for Pat White staying under center. Plain and simple. If it doesn't happen, a little part of all of us dies.

Have a great weekend everyone. We'll be drinking like a viking and watching basketball every waking moment. We suggest much the same. Fuck Utah State!

The Misfits

There are a lot of angles to the Jay Cutler-Josh McDaniels dust up. And, because it's the offseason lull between free agency's big money days and the Draft, many are covered.

Rookie head coach McDaniels has been lauded for a tough line stance with his new team's established star.

McDaniels's also been chided for his tactless overreaching, a cautionary tale proving the old "a bird in the hand..." adage.

Cutler, the pouty face of the franchise, has caught hell for being overly sensitive to the cold machinations of the game. Others have pointed out the circular logic of Cutler demanding a trade because he was the subject of trade talk.

Even Cutler's agent Bus Cook has warranted suspicion for his amorphous role at the center of significant quarterback controversies in successive seasons, lest anyone forget his client Brett Favre and the tense standoff with the Packers.

But by far my favorite analysis comes from Zac at Throwing Into Traffic who without venom or malice presses the "Fire Josh McDaniels" button for all the right reasons.

(Honestly, if you're not getting your day-late, thought-heavy NFL analysis between Throwing Into Traffic and here, where are you getting it?)

Teams are not the manifestation of one person's identity. This is McDaniels's first mistake. In tacitly accusing Cutler of such, he has in turn drawn himself into that fallacy. I'm not saying both sides are blameless. But Cutler's job is to perform on the field. McDaniels's job is ready his team as whole for their job. So far, he's stumbling out of the gate.

Plenty of people doubt Cutler's worth. He's presided over a mediocre 17-20 record in his two-and-a-half years as a starter. And despite Cutler's impressive numbers last year, the Broncos folded miserably down the stretch.

Blame should be thrown on Denver's atrocious defense (rushing yards of 158 to Oakland, 147 to Carolina, and 289 to San Diego, all in loss). But inevitably fingers will always point to Cutler's play which also slipped, throwing 7 of his 18 interceptions in the last six games while accounting for only 8 touchdowns (6 passing, 2 rushing).

Consider, however, Cutler's accomplishments and potential relative to his development. In 2006, Cutler was the third quarterback taken in the first round. Both those selected before him sit the bench behind capable veteran starters simply because they've lacked the mental acuity - to say nothing of the complete skill set Cutler with which outshines his peers - to handle the starting role. Phase one, perhaps.

In fact, no quarterback of the 2006 class comes close to Cutler. Kellen Clemens. Tarvaris Jackson. Brodie Croyle. Bruce Gradkowski. And those are just the illustrious names!

Cutler is well ahead of the curve considering quarterbacks from the previous draft class. From 2005, only Jason Campbell, Aaron Rodgers, and ironically Matt Cassel come close. Campbell in Washington has never bore the burden of the offense quite like Cutler in Denver. Rodgers lacks Cutler's in-game experience. And Cassel was swaddled with a top-rate supporting cast and coaching staff in his maiden season in New England last year.

Is he Peyton Manning or Tom Brady? No. But he's also an immense rarity in the league, a promising talent with production and valuable experience heading into potentially his best years.

So why the drama? Shouldn't McDaniels recognize this with much greater depth and understanding than we outsiders ever can?

The simple answer to all this strife is that McDaniels is following in the footsteps of his mentor Bill Belichick, chasing the illustrious Patriots Way, ripping the "I" out of "Team," playing hero to a thousand high school football coaches scattered across the country.

But more important to note is that McDaniels is following more closely the path of Belichick in less ideal ways.

Cleveland fans know what I'm talking about. Before the Evil Genius was winning Super Bowls with discarded veterans and pluck, he was catalyzing the downfall of a once-illustrious franchise with his callous mismanagement of its biggest star.

Belichick divided a city and team with his ouster of Bernie Kosar, the face of the Browns franchise, a move that helped hasten the team's departure for Baltimore. Had fans not fought so hard to keep their team, there might not be a revived Cleveland franchise today.

The facts are Belichick's grave missteps in Cleveland are consigned to the dusty volumes of history because his inordinate success in New England. Belichick should be lauded for running with a good thing when he sees it (in Tom Brady) and using it as a foundation for future success.

That's the real Patriots Way, truly learning from the past's mistakes while sticking steadfast to one's principles, however ruthless.

Perhaps Belichick's greatest lesson, the only way to sell anything in the NFL, hokey "teamwork first" mantras or anything else, is with sustained success. As much as Belichick prepared for Drew Bledsoe's departure in New England, he didn't force the issue. As much as, Belichick developed contingency plans in case of the worst for Brady, he continues to stand by one of the main reasons for his success.

In one sense, McDaniels's has misinterpreted his former boss's stoicism for inflexibility, not that he's alone among Bill Belichick's former pupils. Eric Mangini seems to be pulling the same act in Cleveland, and one could argue Charlie Weis is guilty of the same at Notre Dame.

If McDaniels is not careful, he will be follow in the footsteps of his former boss, ousted from his first head coaching shot in this league.

Feint! Parry! Riposte!

We could talk the drama unfolding around Jay Cutler.

We could talk Nature versus Nurture when considering the sundry paths of Alex Smith and Aaron Rodgers.

We could talk the little moves of the NFL offseason like Jon Kitna to Dallas and what that could mean for Roy Williams whose best seasons came with Kitna.

But a less sexy news item arguably is more important to the league than anything else on or off the field. That is, Sunday the 32 player representatives elected DeMaurice Smith as the next NFLPA chief.

Smith election comes as somewhat of a surprise. An attorney with minimal NFL connections, certainly no playing experience, no labor experience, and a job history of defending those accused of white collar crime, Smith in some sense is a typical dark horse candidate.

The rancorous battle between favorites Troy Vincent and Trace Armstrong, both former NFLPA player presidents, opened the door for a third way. Smith’s election allayed concerns of a union divided before its most important battle, the Collective Bargaining Agreement’s looming end and potential 2011 lockout.

Smith by all accounts secured his election with a strong presentation and detailed plan about the NFLPA’s immediate future. Beyond strategy to employ in coming negotiations with Commissioner Goodell and the owners, Smith has highlighted better care for NFL veterans, an issue controversial and divisive under previous union chief Gene Upshaw.

Upshaw casts a large shadow over the new union head’s tenure… but Smith might represent a few more departures from Upshaw, a few new directions the union was interested in heading in this next round of negotiations.

When Kevin Mawae was elected player president of the NFLPA last year, he expressed strong interest in a rookie payscale, something Upshaw flat out dismissed. There were other grumblings by NFLPA representatives that a rookie payscale would be a solid compromise in the coming labor negotiations, a way to keep football revenue in the hands of veterans while loosening up some cost for the NFL owners.

The two frontrunners, Troy Vincent and Trace Armstrong, represented parts of the Upshaw tenure. Vincent was presumably Upshaw’s successor before falling out with the former chief. The exact reason has never been fully enumerated. Some link Vincent to an attempt to force Upshaw out. What truth is in that, I don’t know. Vincent and Upshaw diverged at some point yet Vincent still represented Upshaw’s hardline about refusing to roll back the portion of the player’s pie.

Armstrong was likely more tied to the Upshaw line than Vincent, representing an incumbent candidate of sorts.

In the end, the player representatives rejected the two likely candidates and some reach of Upshaw’s direction for an unknown commodity with an attractive vision.

While Smith was a typical dark horse candidate in one sense, he wasn’t in another. Smith won on the first ballot. Divided among four candidates, the process portended to be drawn out with several rounds of voting to winnow down the field to two. Instead, after each candidate’s presentation and 90 minutes of deliberation, Smith emerged the clear winner from the field. (Claims of an unanimous vote might be a fabrication but a simple majority out of four candidates is nothing to sneeze at.)

So far Smith has said all the right things about wanting to ensure football in 2011 and beyond while also motioning to a hardline stance in preserving the NFLPA’s gains.

Whatever plan Smith used to wow the player representatives will only become clear to us over the course of the coming year as the owners and union try to first preserve the salary cap before the 2010 NFL year. But in some sense it’s clear that the issues at hand won’t necessarily be influenced by the shadow of Upshaw’s tenure.

It Never Rains In Seattle

How to write a eulogy for a dream never fully realized?

It’s one thing to ruminate on the end of Montana/Young to Rice. Or Ray Lewis out of Baltimore as it looked just a couple weeks ago.

Those accomplishments are identifiable, potential made concrete in championships, echoed in the reverential tones of adversaries past.

Sometimes that which makes the most sense, however, seems destined to never work out. We express surprise from the outside looking in when a combination so complete on paper never coalesces into a force unstoppable. But it’s a potent reminder that the game unfolds not according to one logical progression, rather manifests from myriad destinies colliding and the resulting chaos.

So it was with the Seattle linebackers for much of the last three seasons.

Julian Peterson is leaving Seattle after three mostly great seasons for Detroit, traded by the Seahawks, breaking up what could have been the best starting linebacking corps, one to three, in the league.

Pro Bowlers Peterson and Lofa Tatupu along with the insanely athletic Leroy Hill fueled high expectations for a defense often undersized along the front and thin in depth.

After a Super Bowl run in 2005 with Tatupu and Hill, Peterson was to be the final piece, propelling an overachieving defense into a consistent playmaking unit.

The Seahawks defense of the last three years has been anything but consistent, however.

There were flashes of brilliance. Tatupu's three interceptions against Philly in 2007. Peterson's dominant mid-season stretch in 2006. Hill's campaign of terror against the Redskins in the Wild Card round a season ago.

It's not that Tatupu-Peterson-Hill were ever bad. They simply never seemed to propel each other to greater heights. The 2007 season appeared to be a turning point, if they couldn’t exactly synch up, each could take his turn dominating for stretches. But in 2008 as the rest of the defense backslid, the trio couldn’t halt the regression or stop opponents from racking up yards especially on crucial third downs.

Part of the problem may have been Peterson’s acquisition in 2006 bounced the promising Hill to the strongside linebacking position, a spot often devoid of playmaking potential. While Peterson more than capably ran in the weakside spot, he might have hindered Hill’s development, Hill who often played like he busting at the seams the few chances he had to rush and react.

I don’t know if it’s addition by subtraction, a concept I tend to find shortsided. It certainly makes sense from a payroll standpoint after franchising Hill this year in the wake of GM Tim Ruskell’s big contracts to both Tatupu and Peterson. (Is it just me or does Ruskell have a fetish for bloated contracts? Shaun Alexander. Marcus Truffant. Patrick Kerney. Tatupu. Peterson.)

The offseason is often flush with optimism. Veterans seem easier to replace in March than they do in August. Hill steps over to Peterson’s weakside spot, his athleticism and experience softening that blow of Peterson's loss. But the Seahawks likely won’t have nearly the same talent on the strongside in coverage of tight ends and fighting through double teams on running plays.

In some sense it’s a vote to let the young Hill and Tatupu continue to develop together. And for Peterson it’s a chance to be Jim Schwartz’s rangy weakside backer a la Keith Bulluck in Tennessee as well as a vocal professional leader the Lions so desperately need.

What was supposed to be a perfect balance of youth and experience, was instead an up-and-down seesaw between brilliance and disappointment. The line that connected Tatupu and Hill to Peterson is broken down the middle, youth goes one way, experience another, each allowed to write their story from here on out.

When Sisyphus Took a Breather

The NFL’s season of hope marches on. The biggest names of free agency may have signed those names to bloated contracts. But the draft is still a month and a half away allowing fans of each team to continue to dream big or small.

The Combine’s forty times and vertical leaps are posted and in the books. Scouts now crisscross the country evaluating prospects at pro days, arraying every last measureable to arm themselves for war room debates during the last weekend of April.

Prospects are rising. Jason Smith, the tackle from Baylor, Darius Heyward-Bey, the receiver from Maryland, and Everette Brown, the pass rusher from Florida State, to name a few.

Questions surround the top quarterbacks. Can Stafford or Sanchez save your franchise? What of Josh Freeman, the live arm from Kansas State?

Possibilities abound. Could Michael Crabtree end up on the same NFL roster as Darren McFadden? Will Detroit select a quarterback and elite left tackle with their two first rounders a la Atlanta a year ago? Which USC linebacker – Rey Maualuga, Brian Cushing, or Clay Matthews – will storm the league? Which will flame out?

Perhaps the significant promise and uncertainty of the season underscores any impending tragedy all that much more.

If it’s not clear, I’m talking specifically about Andre Smith this year.

The big tackle from Alabama, the elite talent in large part responsible for the Crimson Tide’s National title contention until the final weeks of last season, is in the midst of a tumble down many draft boards. While unfortunate given his talent, Smith’s fall is certainly not unprecedented.

In 2008, Malcolm Kelly and Brian Brohm both dropped out of the first round into the later half of the second. Kelly, the Oklahoma playmaking receiver, fought injury in the scouting season, then ran an unimpressive forty at his pro day while immaturely blaming coaches and trainers for his poor results. Brohm, the Louisville quarterback once considered a number one overall pick, struggled to disprove critics about his arm strength and down senior season.

In 2007, Brady Quinn and Alan Branch toppled from top programs to first round afterthoughts. Quinn, the Notre Dame quarterback, waited painfully for his name to be called under the glaring lights of Radio City Music Hall. Branch, the Michigan defensive tackle, faced questions about his health and conditioning, unable to regain elite status in scouts’ eyes.

In 2006, Matt Leinart and LenDale White slid in different measure. USC’s quarterback and running back, respectively, a team that competed for the National Championship just months before, Leinart fell to ten because of a loaded draft class while White fell to the second round because of poor conditioning and a pissy attitude.

In 2005, Aaron Rodgers and Luis Castillo lasted until the end of the first round despite top talent. Rodgers, the quarterback from Cal, confronted a dearth of quarterback needy teams. Castillo, the defensive tackle from Northwestern, owned up to steroid use that scared many teams away.

Scouts are complaining about Andre’s flabby body, suspect strength, and lack of motivation. The only thing keeping in the conversation is his excellent play on film and obvious talent.

The hesitations are enough to knock Smith down millions in the payscale. But at some point the risk of his talent will match up with a more modest contract and a team will take a chance on him.

Only draft weekend will tell how far Smith will fall. And only Smith’s reponse to his tumble will give us any indication if he’ll end more like Castillo and Rodgers (playing to promise) or like Branch and Leinart (benchwarming).

One of the surprising aspects of a trainwreck, like Smith’s extended NFL interview, is how difficult it is for outsiders to fathom his underwhelming, at time bizarre, effort. Whether that’s going AWOL form the Combine or ditching his in-season training regimen in the most important months of his football life. But like any trainwreck, no matter how incomprehensible, we find it hard to look away.

We think of football players as living large lives because they occupy so much of the public eye, not just in terms of how much of the camera’s frame they take up. But often these players exist in a bubble from high school to college, from college to the pros.

Small circles form. Talent dictates desires. Shared dreams run roughshod. Preset plans envelope telling signs. Dreams feed more dreams.

Then the bubble pops, suddenly, at the moment these dreams should be taking form.

Maybe it comes down to the truth that Andre is blowing our dreams, the ones we’ve had for him, not his.

The Mild Promise Of Wild Dreams

Monday, in a slow NFL news day that featured a couple mid-level free agent signings, Matt Jones's jail sentence received top billing.

Jones was busted last year for possession of cocaine, found cutting up the stuff with a Foot Locker credit card in the backseat of a parked car. This year he failed a random substance test, per the terms of his rehab, because he was drinking beer with buddies while golfing.

Given the choice between a brief cool off in the pokey or another shot at rehab, Jones chose – at the urging of the judge and his mother – jail time.

After three mostly disappointing years, the cocaine bust threatened an end to Jones’s considerable on field promise. Slapped with a three game suspension, Jones responded with the best year of his career. While not fulfilling his promise, his play at least acknowledged that it’s still there.

Drinking a beer or three is no great crime. But in Roger Goodell’s NFL perception is everything. The Personal Conduct Policy outlines a series of guidelines which players are expected to follow. And any breach of that conduct leaves a fine line for the player to toe.

In all likelihood, Jones will receive another shot. But perhaps one that affords him little to no room for mistakes.

I couldn’t help thinking of another professional football news item from Monday buried by Jones’s jail sentence. While the talented if heartbreaking Jones continues to jeopardize his pro dreams, another set of dreamers is trying their own run on professional football, albeit in an unconventional manner.

Monday, the United Football League (UFL) announced a broadcast deal with the Versus channel for its “premiere” season beginning this October. Today, the UFL officially announced the head coaches for its four inaugural teams.

Jim Fassel will coach the team playing in Las Vegas. Denny Green the team in San Francisco. Ted Cottrell the team in New York. And Jim Haslett the team in Orlando.

A late infusion of investment saved the fledgling league. Prospective owners of teams in respective cities dropped out of the venture over the course of the last year. The most recognizable sports name Mark Cuban backed out, among others, claiming to be “too busy.”

All four teams are owned by the UFL. Whether the UFL looks to investors to buy teams or plans on selling interest publicly in the teams is unclear. In commissioner Michael Huyghue’s January blog entry on the UFL site he writes:

We will be offering an IPO structure where fans get to own a piece of their team. This isn't a cosmetic stock certificate but real shareholder equity. Our fans will be instrumental in selecting our team nicknames. On controversial decisions, like whether or not to bring Michael Vick into the UFL, we will rely on online fan-voting on our official website.

Letting fans pick the nicknames? There’s no way this could go wrong. (I already submitted “Bridge & Tunnel Crowd” for the New York team and “LOLcats” for the San Francisco team... I thought maybe “Zombie Hookers” for Las Vegas was a bit much.)

Consequently, the UFL is treating 2009 as an exhibition season of sorts, a trial run. The four teams will play each other twice in a six game schedule. Probing markets still considered for UFL teams, the Las Vegas is slated to play one home game in Los Angeles while the New York team one home game in Hartford, Connecticut. A championship game is tentatively scheduled for Thanksgiving weekend in Las Vegas.

What, I wonder, does the UFL hope to accomplish? And how does it expect to do so?

All prospective new professional leagues start from the basis that football is insanely popular in America and that the market can bear more competition because of this high-pitched popularity.

The demand for more pro football is the basis for the success of former professional leagues rivaling the NFL. But the game’s popularity has also played a seductive temptress to upstart leagues, beckoning them to grand ventures and collosal failures.

The AAFC in the 40s set up the first west coast team in San Francisco. The AAFC’s most popular and best team, the Browns, chased an NFL team out of town fleeing for the coast, the Rams from Cleveland to Los Angeles, specifically. After four contentious years, the AAFC and NFL merged in part, three of the AAFC’s seven teams were absorbed by the 10 NFL teams in 1950.

The AFL in the 60s arrived on the heels of the football boom ushered in by television. Television allowed easier access to the sport, creating greater demand in markets not served the the NFL’s 13 teams (expanded to 16 by the time of the merger). The eight original AFL teams (eventually 10) also benefited from a glut of professional-ready talent produced at the college level, allowing them to present a similar level, if in a more open-ended style, of competition as the NFL.

What worked for the AAFC and AFL didn’t for the USFL in the 80s and XFL in 01.

The USFL originally predicated its venture on year-round interest in pro football, starting as a spring league. Fluctuating attendance and decent television viewership led the league to attempt direct competition with the NFL in fall. That combined with sky-rocketing player contracts to secure the precious few top prospects led to the league’s demise.

The XFL’s failure resulted from straddling too many audiences while pleasing none. Owner Vince McMahon’s WWF approach irked staid football fans. The rule changes geared towards a more physical game led to low-scoring affairs, often tagged boring by mainstream audiences. And the risque trappings including stripper-like cheerleaders allowed sports commentators to dismiss the league’s credibility out of hand.

The UFL banks on too much talent crowding the sidelines in the pros, billing themselves as the place “where future stars come to play.” They envision themselves as a development league of sorts. It’s a current void once occupied by NFL Europe. But a void that could either be a financial boon or a blackhole.

With the UFL’s modest financial payscale, they won’t be able to spark a bidding war with the NFL like the AFL and USFL did. But they’ll need talent the NFL can’t or won’t play.

Enter the NFL’s crackdown on lawbreakers and misfits reflecting poorly on the league’s image. If the UFL is to make it, they might have to reap the discarded fruits of Roger Goodell's stringent Personal Conduct Policy.

The UFL is already opening its arms publicly to employing Michael Vick should he make it out of the halfway house. And with other talented players courting infamy like Pacman Jones and Matt Jones, UFL could provide a haven for players with considerable skill yet flamed out of the NFL not because they lack talent but because they ran afoul of the league’s high personal standards.

It begs the question if a few controversial stars and a collection of practice squad players and broken-down veterans will work toward the UFL’s long term success. The XFL crashed in part due to a perceived gleeful sidestepping of morality.

Will the UFL chase big, controversial names to build intrigue at the expense of providing that place where the future stars come out to play? Is the goal of an independent development league really a strong enough mission statement to weather the fluctations of a fledgling league is bound to encounter?

Should the UFL make it to its “premiere” season – a worthy question in these economic times – they could possibly face competition from a couple other nascent professional leagues. The AAFL potentially dead in the water is still scheduled to start play in Spring 2010. That’s the same target date for the New USFL.

Both leagues are furthering their competition from the NFL by placing themselves in Spring. But will likely target at the same level of talent that the UFL intends to mine.

Given the economics, it’s unlikely all three nascent leagues will even see the field. Perhaps even unlikely that one launches. But like every big venture before them, these leagues will have to toe a fine line of their own if they want a shot at being off and running.

A Matt Jones or Michael Vick might find moderate redemption in a league like the UFL... but it's worth asking what kind of future would they give the UFL?

Catching Hell

Regular readers know that I don't often muse on matters outside the dimensions of the football field. But sometimes these boundaries are challenged by certain individuals, by certain situations, lines blurred between the professional and the personal.

Deadspin and With Leather and their ilk expose the tabloid aspects of pro football, among other sports, with aplomb. Kissing Suzy Kolber ruthlessly tweaks the establishment and its self-importance. Pro Football Talk churns the league insider rumor mill at a breakneck pace. The Football Outsiders crunch the numbers with humor and insight.

I’d like to think here (and at spiritual sibling site Throwing Into Traffic) you glean another facet of the game. Call it aesthetics. Call it artistry. Call it the reason a football sticks to a last-string wide receiver’s helmet in the biggest game of his life and why we care.

I don’t care what you call it, all I know is that the explanations and analysis of sports writers and commentators often ring hollow when discussing this game that I love. Vapid quotes pulled from postgame pressers. Moralizing tirades. Lame stereotypes and self serving generalizations. It's kneejerk reactions in place of insight.

So I draw up boundaries to focus on what I am qualified to write about: the game as we witness it.

Unfortunately, the distinctions are not always clear. Take, for instance, Terrell Owens.

Owens, along with Randy Moss and Marvin Harrison, has long been the top receiver of his generation. It’s a fiery group that’s set to flame out over the coming seasons. Harrison is likely already reduced to ashes. Perhaps Moss torches defenders for a couple more seasons.

Owens smolders somewhere in-between.

His numbers are still great if not otherworldly any more. But it’s not his play on the field that defines Owens as a football player anymore.

No, it’s Terrell Owens as TO the primadonna. TO has questioned the leadership of his quarterbacks. He’s attempted suicide… or he hasn’t, depending on which report you believe. He’s insinuated homosexuality among his teammates. He’s demanded raises, threatened holdouts, arranged media circuses, criticized coaches, incurred fines, slept through team meetings, and ultimately divided locker rooms.

But on the field, Owens has played through pain, posted incredible numbers, run amazing routes, scored with machine-like efficiency, made lesser defenders look like fools, driven opposing defensive coordinators crazy, and been a central reason for the best seasons among three different teams and their respective quarterbacks in this league.

In the bluster since TO’s release from Dallas until his signing to Buffalo, we’ve been told that his greatest crime is fracturing a team’s psyche in pursuit of his own selfish ends.

A half truth at best. Owens’s greatest crime is something else… related but equally incriminating of competitive sports as a whole as it is of Owens.

Owens's crime is not that he's a jerk. Rather, it’s that Owens is an insanely gifted, incredibly hard working, compulsively productive jerk. And that, in the wake of tantrums and vicious insinuations, he may just be right more often than not.

Jerry Jones was lauded in many corners for finally ridding his Cowboys of the TO headache. An impressive assemblage of talent like the Dallas Cowboys had no business being held back by a primadonna wide receiver that questions the temerity of his team when the chips are down.

And if you believe the Cowboys are finally on the cusp of the Super Bowl, you haven't been watching the same Cowboys that, in concert, as a team, dropped three of their last four games this season and a clear shot at the playoffs.

The Dallas Cowboys are in their current predicament because they operate at all levels with desperation, without an identifiable plan. Owens was never the answer, but desperation opened up Jones's checkbook in 2006, $25 million wide.

Playing with an urgency and focused desperation on the field is one thing. Using it as a business and roster building model is something else entirely.

TO claims he was the fall guy for Dallas's shortcomings. Not a surprising claim, considering Owens's penchant for self aggrandizement, but in a sense not terribly far from the mark. First, Bill Parcells was forced out after directing the team's only marked improvement in the past decade. Then Wade Phillips assumed the playcalling duties from, before firing, defensive coordinator Brian Stewart.

Now Owens is run out of town.

Do you think Dan Reeves, hired in the offseason to troubleshoot Dallas's problems, quit before the end of his first day because Jones wouldn't fire Terrell Owens? No, Dallas's problems are manifold and deeply rooted.

And that's to say nothing of Tony Romo's horrendous play in games which have counted the most. At one point, Romo was poised to be the next Brett Favre, Favre of the MVP years. Best when the play breaks down, constantly creating something spontaneous and vital.

Now, Romo's poised to be Favre of the Jets, teetering on the edge of damaged goods. He did come to rely on Jason Witten too much late in the season, as TO charged, heaving the ball into the seam despite double coverage, often resulting in incompletes or, worse, interceptions (a pick-six against the Steelers in particular). In the Cowboys' three late season losses, Romo threw six interceptions versus three touchdowns, completing about 53% of his passes, all while losing three fumbles.

(It should be noted that those three losses were to three of the four teams making the conference championship games. Add in Dallas's loss to the Cardinals earlier in the season, and the Cowboys faltered against every team in or a game away from the Super Bowl. So much for preseason favorites.)

Owens wasted little time in gnashing his teeth over the Cowboys pathetic play late in the season. While breaking from the dull script nearly every player in the league reads from when frustrations run high, something was lost in Owens's bitching. He was telling the truth.

Rick Gosselin, the Dallas Morning News writer, might be right in saying Owens faces a sharp decline in his skills, now nearing 36, a tender age in receiver years.

Gosselin has forgotten more about the sport than I will possibly ever now, but I think he's wrong on this one, simply drawing obvious parallels to other great receivers reaching the same age while forgetting the particular receiver in question. TO now possesses a potent reason, in addition to his insane drive, to prove himself.

Hall-of-Fame linebacker Joe Schmidt once said you have to be a son-of-a-bitch to play this game. Owens's problem is that in a league of son-of-a-bitches he's the biggest and best one. He absolutely is a distraction. But the league doesn't lack for them. What of Ben Roethlisberger's motorcycle accident? Or his comments critical of former coaches, Bill Cowher and Ken Whisenhunt? Great teams don't avoid distractions... they overcome them.

We pin these failings on Owens and they stick because he plays the part so well... and because his words often approach truths that are more difficult to address or solve.

I haven't a clue if Owens will work out in Buffalo. He'll work hard. He'll demand the ball when things are tough. (And more often than not, he'll be right in demanding it.) My friend, the Counselor, has a fantastic quote of his father's concerning Dick Jauron, namely, that Jauron has "a bicep for a brain."

But Jauron's also an Ivy grad whose unyielding bicep-brained approach could play well with Owens and his distaste for the moral equivocations inherent in so much of the game. If nothing else, entertainment aside, Owens holds himself to a high standard and consequently everyone else around him.

For a team that's so often underachieved, Owens might deliver just the kind of harsh truth they need to hear.

The Receiver Who Wasn't There

The offseason, especially during the heady days of free agency and the draft, is the time to drastically re-imagine our teams.

New faces come. Familiar faces leave. Hope vacillates somewhere in-between.

Sure, the list of re-upped players lengthens. Ray Lewis in Baltimore. Kurt Warner in Arizona. Kerry Collins in Tennessee. Jon Stinchcomb and Jonathan Vilma in New Orleans. Jeff Saturday and Kelvin Hayden in Indianapolis. Tony Richardson and Brandon Moore in New Jersey.

More often, however, teams start the subtle and not-so-subtle shifts which will shape the story of their 2009 season as distinct from 2008.

Take the Jets, for instance. On paper thus far their offseason has reflected the words of new coach Rex Ryan, namely a commitment to physical (even “violent” according to Bart Scott) football. Trading for corner Lito Sheppard and signing linebacker Scott and safety Jim Leonard places the focus on defense, especially defense as Ryan imagines it.

Ryan in his time at Baltimore ran a defense as fluid as it was vicious. In stark contrast to the rest of the league, Ryan taught his system tailored to his players then allowed them to run as they saw fit on the field. He imparted his vision, one that included his players, and made them see the field through his eyes.

Of course, having talent like Ed Reed and knowledge like Ray Lewis makes football that fluid possible. It remains to be seen whether the talk and the signings will add up to such visionary football at the Jets.

Will Ryan’s tenure shape up like his father Buddy’s in Philly (good but not great)? Or in Arizona (miserable)? Or will he write a different story?

Take the Lions. No team needed a roster purge more than Detroit. Not a single splashy move among Jim Schwartz’s myriad moves, but a bunch of short contracts on reliable veterans.

Exeunt Jon Kitna at quarterback, Leigh Bodden at corner, Dwight Smith at safety, Mike Furrey at receiver, Edwin Mulitalo at guard, and Dan Campbell at tight end.

Enter Bryant Johnson at receiver, Grady Jackson at defensive tackle, Maurice Morris at running back, and Anthony Henry and Phillip Buchanon at corner.

Do those names look interchangeable to you? Perhaps if you stare at stat columns for too long. But the most important part is the jerseys that the incoming players wore last year, namely not silver and Hononlulu blue.

Also, several of these new Lions inked short contracts of two or three years which will theoretically give Schwartz time to draft and groom better talent. In the meantime, he’s nabbed some players that have no vivid memories of 0-16.

Or take the Buccaneers and their big purge. Jeff Garcia, Derrick Brooks, and nearly everyone over thirty gone. Some young talent in Kellen Winslow and Derrick Ward. And a looming identity crisis for a franchise that lost nearly all its veteran leadership in a few short weeks.

So then what to make of the biggest free agency move thus far besides Albert Haynesworth to the Redskins? What to make of TJ Houshmandzadeh to the Seahawks?

If this is the time to let our imaginations run wild about new combinations as great players leave old teams and join new ones, why am I in the midst of a creative block about Houshmandzadeh packing up for the gray shores of Seattle?

Because it’s Cincinnati, somehow, magically, their best and most consistent receiver hits the free market still in his prime. TJ’s big and strong. He’s quick enough though not blazingly fast. He plucks every pass and secures it, rarely fumbling. He worked his own way into being an elite receiver, never catching fewer than 90 passes in the last three seasons, never fewer than 900 yards in the past five.

The newly released Terrell Owens might possess more natural talent, but Houshmandzadeh is the kind of receiver that never takes what talents he has, which are considerable, for granted. He’s the kind of player you don’t mind paying big – $40 million, $15 million guaranteed big – in his early 30s because of the respect that he has for his conditioning. Three or four great years on the contract and TJ is easily worth it.

But what do those potentially great years portend to look like? And what effect will this have on Seattle as a whole, a team struggling between the team that they were and the team that they think they are.

Houshmandzadeh’s game is all stealth. His routes are so crisp that the resulting production tends toward machine-like consistency. Working underneath and often inside, TJ chips away at defense often running to its heart and snagging pieces of it, little by little. By the end of game, the spectator turns around and without any spectacular dashes or circus catches realizes Houshmandzadeh just put together a helluva game.

There aren't any interesting pictures of Houshmandzadeh on Flickr. I usually scroll through Flickr to find a photo real, something funny, something taken by a fan, something without sticky copyright issues. For this post, I pulled a screen grab from an MTV Cribs episode. The only interesting photo of Houshmandzadeh on Flickr is also a screen grab, one I ran on here midseason, showing TJ cleaning the mud off his cleats with a Terrible Towel.

There’s no silly fan event photos. No weird banquent guest photos. No goofing around in training camp photos. No sideline emotion photos.

It’s as if outside of the dimensions of the football field, Houshmandzadeh ceases to exist.

And I’m not so sure on the field he doesn’t also take on similar ghost-like qualities. He just disappears. He just makes a defense pay. It’s not art as Larry Fitzgerald creates, one distinct moment from the next. It’s a body of work that builds up over time, piece by piece, a mosaic of sorts.

Obviously, a West Coast Offense like Seattle's thrives on receivers with TJ’s skill set. Yet it’s still difficult to gauge his impact.

What room have they sealed Matt Hasselbeck in? Will he ever return to form as the best quarterback no one ever thinks about? Does Jim Mora plan on turning Seneca Wallace into a little Michael Vick? How much cap room can the linebackers eat up before it sinks the team’s ability to rebuild its offensive and defensive lines?

These are not questions Houshmandzadeh is asked to answer. In some sense, he will just be free to be, to do his job in a more sane environment than Cincinnati and let the Seahawks’ chips fall where they may, perhaps much like the rest of the team that remains nearly invisible until the second round of the playoffs most years.

The Good Soldier

I spent much of this past weekend screaming. Perhaps not the best of ideas as the lingering cold assaulting my cigarette scarred lungs rendered my voice already raspy and rusty.

But I couldn’t help it. The whirlwind first weekend of free agency stuffed in too many head scratchers for my excitable head.

Who the fuck is Jason Brown? Why did he nab that larger-than-life contract with the Rams? How the hell did the Bills fuck it up so badly with Derrick Dockery, letting him walk away for no compensation whatsoever? Why did the Giants sign two defensive linemen when they already have five or six starting caliber ones?

But something gave me pause above all else... and, yes, it's concerning the Lieutenant.

Kellen Winslow Jr is both undoubtedly a talent and undoubtedly difficult to work with. He hails from fine NFL stock inheriting both otherworldly skills and healthy skepticism to the league's machinations.

The NFL is not kind to its players on any other day than the one on which they ink a sizable contract or two... a day that doesn't come for most who don that jersey with the NFL logo stitched into the collar's base. Certainly not a truth that escaped Kellen Winslow Sr during his brilliant but injury-shortened Hall of Fame career.

Winslow Jr's first two seasons were lost to injury, one a byproduct of the game's violence, one his immaturity. (Interesting to note that Winslow's motorcycle accident, for all the high expectations surrounding him, didn't affect nearly the response that Ben Roethlisberger's accident a year later did... and I'm not talking public outcry but language in pro contracts.) He matched those two lost seasons with two brilliant ones, helping bring the Browns to the brink of the playoffs in 2007.

Last year, however, was a disaster in Cleveland. Injuries and indifference pervaded the club. Fellow pass catcher Braylon Edwards struggled with drops resulting from a lack of focus. After a decent start, teams keyed on Winslow and sunk what was one year prior a nearly unstoppable offense.

Midseason Winslow was hospitalized with a staph infection. It was the seventh incident of staph for the Browns in the past few years. Staph infection probably went a long way to ending center LeCharles Bentley's career and helped end Joe Jurevicius's season if not his career.

Let me repeat that. Seven players. Several of whom the franchise paid millions of dollars for to play. Over the course of two to three years. Staph infections.

Winslow spoke out about it when the Browns were remaining hush-hush on publicly and didn't address his concerns internally.

And this outspoken critique in part gets Winslow tabbed as a locker room cancer. For speaking out about what in NFL terms has become an epidemic.

Now, I'm not naive to Winslow's failings. He talks a big game. He's accomplished some good things, but nothing truly great yet. And he's gone to the media about lesser concerns.

But the team justified moving perhaps their pass catcher with best intersection of pure talent and accomplishment because he became a headache... and the media bought it hook, line, and sinker.

The ESPN article running down Winslow's trade to Tampa characterizes as Winslow as giving Cleveland "too many" headaches. It must be hard attempting a cover up of a team-wide health epidemic as opposed to actually fixing said epidemic.

I love the NFL but sometimes I feel like it's a world populated with high school principals, steadfast in their belief that the institution can do no wrong, that any honest open dialogue amounts to a punishable offense, whether that's a stint in detention or cutting short of a promising career.

And it's not just the teams, the media brandishes their finger-wagging disdain whenever there's a stereotype to pile on. Stereotype in this case, a big talking, big play receiver.

I'm not saying the Lieutenant is a saint. Rather, this notion that Winslow is a "troublemaker" given his resume on and off the field the past three seasons, from the time he's returned from his first two lost seasons, is short-sided moralization on the part of media allowing the Browns to absolve themselves of any blame by pushing it on Winslow.

Ask LeCharles Bentley about staph. Ask Joe Jurevicius. Hell, ask Winslow, I'd love to hear his side of the story again.

For their troubles, Cleveland is getting a second round pick this year and a fifth in 2010. For Tampa's troubles, they're getting an elite tight end now with a reason to prove himself. Stay classy, Cleveland.

Know Thy Family

“Leave the gun. Take the cannoli.”

In some twisted modern NFL appellation, Bill Belichick is the Godfather.

Or, at least, the trade that sent Matt Cassel and Mike Vrabel to Kansas City, Scott Pioli’s new project, for a mere second round draft pick highlights that Belichick ascribes to a similar honor code as the Don Corleone.

I mistakenly clicked on Jay Mariotti’s column where in tones venomous and paranoid he accused the New England-Kansas City trade of amounting to collusion. (I refuse to link the column here and don't recommend seeking it out.)

Perhaps, though it seems a stretch. Pro football is a world of honor codes and backroom deals. That fact may anger the more nebbish among the press corps, but it is a reality nonetheless… certain teams simply won’t work with one another – can you imagine a trade between the Raiders and Broncos? – and the moves transacted away from the football field play into the larger game among and between the league’s 32 teams.

I guess the question is really what game is Belichick playing?

I hesitate to call Belichick’s regime at the Patriots “ethical” for obvious reasons. Spygate dismisses that term out of hand.

But Belichick’s tour around the league from the Giants to the Browns to the Patriots displays a distinct and consistent character. My man Zac at Throwing Into Traffic hit the nail on the head when he referred to the Belichick Mafia. Belichick adheres to an almost tribal sense of what’s right, loyalty foremost, whether or not the substance of those actions fall within the pale of rightness.

David Halberstam’s Education Of a Coach goes to great lengths to portray Belichick as a man of principle and the Patriots success as a reflection of those commitments. It’s an old school repose netting a new school boon.

Halberstram’s book was published a full two years before Spygate broke to the general public, the repeated references to the mountains of tape Belichick and cohort Ernie Adams wade through taking on a sinister meaning in retrospect.

Where Halberstam tried to sell Belichick as a principled free thinker, drawing on the lessons of the past to avoid the mistakes of the present, through a glass darkly we now see Belichick as possessing a complex relationship with morality but still a strict code with responsibilities and rewards.

Eric Mangini’s departure to the AFC East rival Jets is painted as defection. Perhaps Josh Daniels’s move to the Broncos is desertion as well. Not so with Pioli and Romeo Crennel who moved on with Belichick’s blessing.

Of course, the real problem is assigning higher morality to professional sports. Outside of sportsmanship, morality becomes murky when coaches and players are saddled with the singular commandment to win and win often. No doubt, we do invest professional sports with our ideals as we look to athletic grace and strict rules to reinforce some notion of how the world ought to be. But then of course is the matter of men as they are versus how they ought to be.

It should be noted in this mini drama played out that Belichick is not only doing right by Pioli, his long time second-in-command, but also his young now former quarterback.

Instead of following Cassel's coming out season with more toil behind the Golden Boy Tom Brady or exile to some backwater like Detroit, Belichick sends Cassel to a familiar newness, surrounded by Belichick people. That truth is lost in a bit of this back-and-forth bluster.

What does the move mean in football terms? The skinny on Cassel and his skills translating to other non-Patriots teams involved the system he flourished in, his discomfort with the five-step drop, and the quality of players and coaches that surrounded his maiden season.

With the Chiefs, a few of those concerns are taken care of. Coach Todd Haley will likely keep Cassel working out of a shotgun in a pass-first dink and dunk system that threatens vertical and burns with draws often enough to allow Cassel ample space to work in the intermidiate portion of the passing tree.

And, of course, before Cassel was appended to the trade, commentators praised the acquisition of Vrabel, an experienced defender to add cache to a very young roster that in all likelihood will become younger over the course of this offseason.

Either way, Belichick continues to remake the NFL to his liking, or impose his preferences where they can imposed. In some sense, it's not the petty squabbling of Packers and Vikings or Broncos and Raiders.

I'm not trying to paint the transaction as heroic or even ethical. It's not. Despite the Patriots PR department trying to spin the trade as simply bad timing on the part of Tampa and Denver, there is however a familiar method to the gesture.

It's a more a question of when do we start sympathizing again with the bad guys. Or rather realize the distance between ourselves and our enemies may not be that great.