Rex Ryan - The Right Guy !

Woody Johnson mentioned things like “straightforward”, “expertise” and “instincts”. He could have added honest, aggressive, confident, smart and tough. Rex Ryan! I’m impressed! After Ryan’s hard-hitting opening press conference in beautiful Florham Park this morning, I’m ready for some football. And so is he!

What a difference from Mangini! Rex imparted more information in ten minutes than you’d extract from Mangini in a year. That’s for openers. Anybody interested in following the team and the league has to be happy about that alone. Ryan didn’t say “process” once. What he said was “full speed”, “aggressive”. “team”, “physical”, “run the football”, “opportunity”, “challenge”, and “take a swipe at one of ours, we’ll take a swipe at two of yours”.

Oh BABY!!

But he’s not an animal either. He showed his style and class. He opened his remarks with a reference to maybe meeting the new President, breaking the ice nicely, then showed some humility by expressing his thanks to the ownership and management. Best of all, he thanked his wife and cracked everyone up with his observation that there are only two kinds of coaches wives, ex-wives and great wives. Then he totally ad-libbed that he had probably “outkicked his coverage”.

The overwhelming feeling I get is that he’s Buddy Ryan’s son, but he’s a little more conscious of style, those rough edges honed down to glass. Everything he said made sense, and he used words that painted pictures in your mind. Much as a teacher would.

He laid out his immediate plans, emphasizing that he’d first surround himself with good people. Before he does anything else, he’s going to decide on a coaching staff. He mentioned Callahan and Mike Pettine, who’s joining the team from the Ravens.

Then he talked about providing his players with all the tools they’d need for success, and “KILL” or keep it likeable and learnable. He stressed that everything would be full speed, that they’d be aggressive and they’d play as a team.

He talked about the importance of preparation, and how it all starts on the practice field; they’d play “physical” and hit things head on. They’d let opponents know “The Jets are comin’” . His team would have pride and all three units would be involved.

But he likes Favre. Rex was very impressed by a thrashing Favre had given his Ravens back in 2001, and wouldn’t mind having him back at all. But when asked when he’ll talk with Brett, he said he’d be talking to all his players, and that “when we get around to the “f’s”, I’ll talk with Brett”.

When asked specifically about the 2 TD’s and 9 interceptions Favre produced to end 2008, he said he hadn’t reviewed the tapes of those games, and after he did, he and his coaches would take appropriate action then.

If his team does show pride, it’ll be a reflection of the coach. Rex is justifiably proud of his “consistent” personal coaching record and laid out the success he has had all along the way, in Cincinnati, then in Oklahoma for a year before he moved along to Baltimore, where his defense finished 1st or 2nd every year for about ten years. What could say it better than his parting shot on that topic, “you got the right guy”!

On the subject of Brian Schottenheimer, Ryan once again showed his humanity by empathizing with the Jets existing offensive coordinator, relating his feelings last year when he was bypassed by John Harbaugh for the Ravens top job, saying he “knows the sting”. But he “got over himself” and recognized it as an opportunity to become better prepared for the head coaching job himself.

Upon being asked about the “same old Jets”, he stressed that he’s taking over a good football team that had won nine games. But the style of play will be different, with an emphasis on defense, and that “that read and react stuff is for somebody else”. His players would play through the whistle.

If he likes his style, he seems to honestly like his content too, mentioning his “edge rushers”, guy in the middle, his linebackers and his “best cornerback in football” (Revis).
On Jets #1 pick Vernon Gholston, he related that situation to that of his Ravens Terrell Suggs, and how he changed perceptions from being a bust to being Rookie of the Year.

Ryan was sure to mention the fans too, and how he can’t wait for those home games with those great Jets fans out there, and that it’d be “rough on people”. And he’s legitimately proud that his Ravens hadn’t allowed more than 13 points in any home game all of last year.

He seemed a little Parcells-like when replying to a question about Mangini and the possibility that he’d irritate players with a ‘gee, I hope I don’t irritate ‘em’ kind of response, but then softened it by saying he wouldn’t last long if he irritated his players.

For a guy who maintains he doesn’t have a silver tongue, he surely did a nice job of parrying the questions he got this morning, and they weren’t softballs either. He honestly and intelligently handled all the questions on Favre, Schottenheimer, Mangini and the “say” he’d have in the organization with aplomb, saying not too much or too little. He honestly appreciates his new job and team and appreciates the limits of his place in it.

Ryan did make it clear that personnel is Tannenbaum’s job but that that function too would be a joint effort among coaches and scouts, but that he has never had pressure from above to hire a coach and that any speculation to that effect was not true.

Woody Johnson by all accounts wanted somebody who could fire guys up. He would seem to, as Ryan says, “have the right guy”. I know I’m fired up already, waddaya kiddin’ me? A fiery guy with a good record, a guy with brains, a guy who’ll answer your questions? What’s not to like?

On Eagles, Giants and Johnsons

It’s really easy to hate the Eagles. No running game to speak of….there’s Brian Westbrook of course, but somehow he’s just not that inspirational. Yesterday, he scored on a screen, typical of the kind of garbage offense on which Westbrook and McNabb seem to thrive.

Their passing game looked a little better yesterday than I am used to seeing from them. DeSean Jackson was fun to watch and Kevin Curtis looked good too. McNabb was his old self, eluding a fierce rush more often than not and firing darts at the last moment to a bunch of receivers that had maybe a foot of separation from their defender.

Then there’s their vaunted defense, featuring cheap-shot artist Brian Dawkins. I’m sorry, I know he’s a great player but his hit on Adrian Peterson while he was down (some will say he was on his way down but Peterson was down) really ticked me off. Like the NBA, I guess, the longer you’ve been doing it, the better the calls.

Then there’s Andy Reid, the epitome of boring, that is, until you compare him to Brad Childress, the Vikings head coach. What a poor excuse for a head coach is Childress. I would have won that game as the head coach. I’ll just pick two situations in which Childress showed his lack of intellect, his utter lack of a feel for the game.

The first was his decision to refuse a holding penalty in the first quarter, thus leaving David Akers well within his field goal range and give the Eagles the lead. The lead is an important thing to have in any endeavor, of course, but in football, it’s especially nice. It changes the whole game a bit in favor of the guys with the lead.

Then in the second quarter, Adrian Peterson had just run on first down for six yards through that supposedly tough Eagles run defense. He came back to the huddle exuding confidence and ready for more pounding. You could see he was thinking it would be easy. But he would never get the opportunity.

Childress called a pass on 2nd and 4! With the best running back in football rearing to go, chomping at the bit for another chance. With an inexperienced QB in his first playoff game. The pass was incomplete, of course. Childress still had a chance on 3rd and 4 but he eschewed the run again for still another ill-advised pass.

But this one wasn’t just ill-advised, it was reckless, a pass to the flat. And, of course, Asante Samuel picked it off and ran for 40 yards or so and it was all over but the shoutin’. It was the key play of the game, changing the momentum and putting the offensively-challenged Birds into the end zone for the first time.

Peterson wouldn’t get that many more opportunities. Maybe it was because of Dawkins’s cheap shot on Peterson earlier. We certainly saw a lot of Chester Taylor yesterday, no slouch himself, but incapable of wreaking the havoc of a Peterson.

Oh well, it’s over. One more ridiculous coach and his team bites the dust, at home in front of all of its fans. The Vikings had the best offense, they had the best defense and they had the better team all around but they would go home with that empty feeling, wondering perhaps what could have happened if they had a real head coach on the sidelines.

I should probably be happy. The weaker team advanced, and as there’s still a chance for our G-Men, they’ll simply have to put a pounding on the Eagles rather than having to face the Vikings somewhere down the road. Of course, the Eagles don’t give games away, which might be a bit of a problem.

Why are all the tough guys in Philadelphia? There’s Dawkins, of course, but there was also Jimmy Rollins. And that pain in the butt at 2nd base. And that guy in the outfield who only hit against the Mets. And that other guy who only hit in the clutch.

Giants fans can only hope the G-Men will change up their defensive gameplan this time around. Otherwise, they’ll lose. The G-Men got just one sack vs. Philly in Week 14 and they lost 20-14. I’m hoping they have some stuff up their sleeves as they did against the Pats in the Super Bowl, after having lost to them in Week 17 of last year.

There were also some extenuating circumstances in that Week 14 game, the first after Plax’s suspension and after Antonio Pierce’s grilling by the police. But, more than that, Jacobs hurt his knee in the third quarter and didn’t return. And Hixon dropped a sure touchdown that hit him in the hands.

I wish I could feel better about this upcoming Eagles contest. You don’t feel the same magic with this Giants team as you did with last year’s team. There is no Osi and no Strahan. There is no Plaxico. Hixon is not Plax. And Sinorice Moss doesn’t adequately spell Hixon as a return man.

That doesn’t mean they can’t beat the Eagles but one can’t expect too much. They’ll be at home, but that doesn’t make me feel that much better. They’re just not as versatile as last year’s version that could run the ball, pass the ball and play great on specials too. This version seems more like Brandon Jacobs and a cloud of dust.

Meanwhile, the Jets coaching search allegedly continues and the list of potential candidates grows longer and longer. But it’s a sham, I think. The winner will be whoever Jets owner Woody Johnson likes, and his mouthpiece Mr. Tannenbaum. I can’t root for a team that, literally, thinks with its Johnson.

The whole process kinda reminds me of that old joke, the punchline of which is “the one with the big”, um, oh never mind. Oh well, Jets fans, “if it works out, it works out, if it doesn’t, it doesn’t”.

Of Real Men and Weakness

Shawn Merriman had some big trouble with his knees. ACL, MCL, whatever….it was serious. Merriman had been feeling pain in his knees since 2006. Yet the man still wanted to play. He was panned far and wide for his decision, by players, coaches, former coaches, TV analysts, doctors….the whole gamut of people and professions who’d have anything to say on the matter. I say “Good for you, Shawn”. At least you tried to keep playing.

Billy Wagner, upon being questioned as to how his son Will felt about his Dad not playing ball anymore, broke down a bit, trying to hold back the tears for not being able to provide that same cool Dad he had always been, at least not for a while.

Jerry Manuel confronted Jose Reyes in his coaching debut, he changes ineffective pitchers, he threatens established players with “rest”, he plays the guys who produce while giving everybody every opportunity that he can to do just that.

Carlos Delgado refused another curtain call for another two homer day, saying it’s not the right time, this after smacking about a bazillion home runs since the middle of July, not to mention the singles and doubles he’s had with the game on the line.

Carlos Beltran worried about his knee but still played on in centerfield. David Wright worked with his batting coach when his production fell off and went 2 for 4. Ryan Church shook off his concussion and his slow start after his return by smacking a home run.

LaDainian Tomlinson had the nerve in last year’s playoffs to sit when he knew his knee would not allow him to be an effective player in the biggest game of the year, this despite knowing the heat he’d take for sitting.

Jake Delhomme came back from his injury to throw a dart for a TD pass with zero seconds on the clock. Willie Parker came back from his injury to wipe out the Texans in his first game back. Larry Fitzgerald practiced his blocking to make way for his running backs.

Okay…enough. But these are real men. They try as hard as they can. They try to get better. They have the courage to take the big hit. They have the humility to turn down any unseemly adulation. They use their brains to the fullest. They maximize their resources. They motivate. They have human feelings. They also have human failings but overcome them.

What they don’t do is whine. What they don’t do is say, “look at me, please look at me some more, let every camera be focused on me”. They either don’t brag or, in very few cases, they back up a brag. They play hurt if they think they can be effective, or they sit if they know they can’t produce, damn the consequences. They have the confidence through practice to produce when the game is on the line.

Then there are the weaknesses in men and organizations, only too easy to pick out.

Chad Johnson is a perfect example, a borderline lunatic…. I don’t really care that he changed his name, but the reason was bad. Muhammad Ali had his reason. Anthony Dorsett had a reason too, even if it was specious reasoning. Any reason other than focusing all eyes on himself would have suited me. And yes, I know the team ignored his contract demands.

Then there are group weaknesses, specifically team weaknesses, that persist year after year. It’s frustrating as a fan of football to watch the Detroit Lions fail year after year to do anything to improve their situation, and not just the Lions, but also the Oakland Raiders, the Houston Texans, and those Chad-full Cincinnati Bengals.

It has to be assumed that for these teams that consistently fail, there is a group lack of character, and it is easy to infer from this that the weakness is right at the top of the organization.

In the Lions’ case, it’s the Ford family, stubbornly refusing to change an obviously blundering joke of a General Manager, who for years drafted only wide receivers, then changed coaches on both sides of the ball. Never though has he thought to pick up any offensive linemen.

Then of course there is Al Davis, who drafts skill players year after year and has a penchant for glitz, more glitz and cornerbacks. Lately they’ve drafted the best quarterback and then the best halfback in the draft. But Al’s team has been an embarrassment for a few years now. This team couldn’t block the Rutgers Newark boys choir. (I don’t know that there is one. If there is, there may be some tough singers on it).

They say the game has passed Al by. I’d have to agree. Gene Upshaw’s death reminded me that the Raiduhs used to have a GREAT offensive line. Former long-time Raider coach and current TV personality John Madden has consistently expounded on the significance of the offensive line in books and on the air. C’mon Al, take a hint.

Then there are the Houston Texans. They made a veritable basket case out of David Carr. Only now as the Giants backup QB are we able to see what Carr could have been if he hadn’t developed the happiest feet since Fred Astaire. A number of prognosticators actually like their chances this year. But after their frightfully inept performance against the Steelers, it’s hard to see them contending for anything. Ever.

All may not be lost though. I mean, look at the Chicago Cubs. They haven’t won the pennant since 1945! But now, led by sweet Lou Piniella, they’ve got some real men of their own. Derrek Lee, Aramis Ramirez, Alfonso Soriano and others almost too numerous to mention. All that and pitching too.

I think we’ll all be seeing the Chicago real men meet the Mets real men in October. These are two teams that shucked the obstacles standing in their way. If they can just get there, they’ll both be ready to go.

One More Chance

You can’t beat the Olympics for poignancy, for pathos, for drama. One chance. That’s all you get for gold. A body of work means nothing. As opposed to professional baseball, a sport for which it’s all in the body of work, and individual failures can and usually are overlooked, especially if your team manages to be successful.

Never were these truths more evident than last night, when strange mishaps befell favorites in the 100-meter hurdles and 400 meter run while a decision on a start value in the balance beam saved gold for one of my favorites in these Beijing Games. And, thousands of miles away, the Mets won another with an assist from one of their formerly vilified relievers who got still one more chance.

I almost cried for Shawn Johnson as it became evident that the little pixie would win her first gold. For a few minutes there, I thought that the beautiful Nastia Liukin would edge Shawn out again in the balance beam competition.

To be honest, Liukin’s performance looked better to me. But it didn’t carry the difficulty value of Shawn’s. So Shawn finally took gold after winning three silvers. With gold for both U.S. roommates, they can now draw lots for who gets to use the shower first. Now there’s a picture.

But even if Shawn had fallen right on her pretty little head, her failure wouldn’t compare to that of the favorite in the 100-meter hurdles, Loli Jones, whose heel clipped the penultimate hurdle hard enough to make her stumble, thus enabling the other young women to pass her by.

She said later that she knew she had the lead, and she was going hard, and the hurdles were coming back to her so fast. One can only imagine how quickly those hurdles were coming to her as she sped over them like Mercury on mescaline.

There was the 400 meter, and a great start for Sanya Richards that may have brought on a fateful cramp. Whatever the cause, it spelled gold and silver for two others but just bronze for Sanya. And weeping in the wings as the full realization of her misfortune overwhelmed her.

There was the renowned Chinese hurdler who had been regaled by his countrymen for months before straining his Achilles so badly that he couldn’t make it much past the starting blocks, producing still another poignant moment for the world and NBC.

One chance every four years. Most competitors get a chance at two Olympics, three at the most if they are lucky enough to catch that first one at an early age. Or if they happen to be named Dara Torres, who at 41 has defied all the rules for some time now.

For most of the athletes in track and field, gymnastics, swimming and many of the other sports contested at the Games, they get one shot at fame, and, if they’re lucky, fortune.

I’m quite sure we’ll be seeing quite a lot of all the gold medal winners in the years to come, not just Mr. Phelps, Ms. Liukin and Ms. Johnson. They’ll peer at us from newspapers, the sides of buses and in TV ads hawking everything from slippers to perfume. (In fact, for the roommates at least, I’m quite looking forward to it).

But we shouldn’t get too overwrought about the losers’misfortunes either. They’ve enjoyed the process of getting to these Olympic Games, I’m quite sure. They haven’t enjoyed every single practice maybe, but in the aggregate, through all the time and money and injuries, they’ve had the time of their life. In fact, for almost all of them, it is their life.

And it’s a pretty good life. It’s most certainly a clean life and usually a simple, uncluttered life, one in which money becomes secondary. Most of the good ones hold a job, of course, but they never let it occupy their thoughts too much. It never becomes an obsession. If an employer asks for overtime, they soon find something else. Or, if nothing else presents itself, they can always become personal trainers.

Of course, they’ll never become millionaires, as they would have if their specialty had been baseball. In baseball, athletes are judged on their body of work. Through 162 games, year after year, they get the opportunity to either excel or fall flat on their faces.

For my favorite team, the Mets, their relief pitchers are the perfect examples for the multitude of opportunities athletes can truly get. For Aaron Heilman, Scott Schoeneweis, Duaner Sanchez, Pedro Feliciano and Joe Smith, the opportunities keep coming.

More often than not, they fail. But, through a curious mixture of management and luck, each one of them isn’t allowed to fail long enough to lose the game. So, in a most curious way, I guess they have been successful. After all, the Mets are still in first place in the NL East, even if Jerry Manuel is looking a little grayer every time I see him.

Last night we got to see still another reliever the Mets added to their game of musical chairs in the person of Luis Ayala. Luis was magnificent last night, which means he’ll be terrible next time out if the Mets fortunes hold to the same pattern.

Scot Schoeneweis was Manuel’s closer of choice last night. And he provided a most uneventful ninth inning. Whether he’ll get to see another ninth inning soon is questionable, of course, but he’ll undoubtedly get some more opportunities, for better or for worse. As will each of the other Mets downtrodden relievers.

But as long as the book of charms Manuel is consulting seems to be working, I hesitate to complain. If form holds, this relief corps will fail as often as they succeed in their mission, but when they do fail, it won’t be a long-lasting failure. Jerry won’t have it.

One thing is sure though. Unlike these Olympians, they’ll get at least one more chance, and probably one more than we’d like.