Tag Archives: NFL

Sports news

First things first: fire the GM

OK, here comes an admission: I know little about the sport that is the subject of this blog post … that is to say I don’t about the nuts and bolts of it.

Here’s what I do know. I know that the owner of the Dallas Cowboys thinks he’s an expert on the sport his team competes in, except that he doesn’t.

The Cowboys opened their training camp in Oxnard, Calif. and have begun preparing for the 2026-2027 NFL season. Some pundits, who think they know enough about the sport of pro football, think this “might be the year ” for the Cowboys to break their three-decade drought since their latest Super Bowl victory.

I just have one piece of advice for the owner of the Cowboys, Jerry Jones. He needs a new general manager.

Oh, wait! I damn near forgot! Jones is the GM. He’s the owner and the top executive.

I am aware of one pro football owner who’s doubled as GM and been successful at it. Al Davis — the owner and GM of the Oakland Raiders — comes to mind. Davis ran the show in Oakland just as Jones does in Texas; I can’t refer to them routinely as the Dallas Cowboys because they quit playing tackle football in Dallas since they left the Cotton Bowl in the 1970s.

Well, anyway …

If Jones really thinks he knows how to draft players, negotiate contracts with his star players, hire head coaches and stay out of their way while they coach the team, then I will eat my words.

I don’t think that will happen.

Jerry Jones is a brilliant man. He made a fortune in business. He then spent part of it to buy the Cowboys. I just figure that someone who is as smart as Jones is would know what he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know pro football the way a seasoned general manager knows the sport.

The owner of the team just should step aside, hire a seasoned general manager, then sit back, count your money and let the GM and the head coach take all the credit for whatever success they earn. And sure, the owner can share in it … just not hog all of it.

Sports news

FIFA World Cup? Not for me

We”re a couple of weeks now into the World Cup matches spread across the United States of America and try as I might, I have to admit that I cannot join the rest of the world in embracing this activity.

Soccer just isn’t my bag, man. Full stop.

Before you accuse me of being provincialist, or of resisting a worldwide phenomenon, just understand that I am approaching my 77th birthday. I am long in the tooth and I understand fully the saying about how hard it is to change one’s habits and desires at an advanced age. So, there you go.

I remain a dedicated baseball fan, although even that has been trying for this old guy who just doesn’t quite grasp the kind of money these athletes make. I remember when icons like Mickey Mantle, Stan Musial, Willie Mays and Hank Aaron all thought they had died and gone to heaven when they were offered contracts that reached $100,000 for a season. The same can be said for professional basketball and football athletes.

They went through a lot to get AT&T Stadium in Arlington, home for the Cowboys of the NFL, ready to play host to the World Cup matches. They had to remove artificial turn that covers the ground and replace it with grass, they had to remove all the corporate logos and teams have to rely solely on national pride to lift them to victory.

I have one earlier experience with the World Cup. In 2006, my bride and I were in Copenhagen, Denmark to attend a conference. We looked for dinner one night with some friends from Amarillo. That night we walked for blocks and blocks looking for a place to eat. The problem was that Denmark was playing Germany in a World Cup match and every eatery and watering hole was packed with soccer fans cheering themselves hoarse. The Danes and Germans simply adore their national soccer teams. That’s their call.

It’s not mine.

Sports news

You go, Philip Rivers!

Philip Rivers’s story has captivated me in a way I never expected and to be honest, I am not sure I want it to end.

Rivers is a quarterback who retired after the 2020 season after many stellar seasons with the San Diego Chargers. Being a staunch fan of the Oakland Raiders, Rivers didn’t really capture my attention even as he ran up magnificent stats while QB’ing the Chargers. I certainly knew of Rivers and figured long ago he would be a first-ballot lock for the Pro Football Hall of Fame when he became eligible for induction.

This would have been the year when the Hall of Fame would call his name. Except that the Indianapolis Colts needed a quarteback. So, the Colts called the 44-year-old father of 10 and grandpa to one baby. He was living quietly in his native Alabama coaching high school football. The Colts tendered him an offer he couldn’t turn down, so Rivers said, “Yeah, I’ll do it.”

Here’s what makes this story — in my view — so compelling. Rivers’s Hall of Fame eligibility has been pushed back at least another five years. He’ll get the call from the HoF when the time comes. He hasn’t said that he’s done playing tackle football for keeps. You see, he found out while playing for the Colts that he can still play this young man’s game.

The Colts didn’t make the playoffs and their season is about to end. Rivers will suit up but won’t play Indy’s final game. My quandary as a fan is whether to suggest Rivers should call it quits for keeps or keep the phone nearby in case some other team needs a QB in a pinch.

It’s an enthralling story and I was delighted to see an old football warhorse called back to active duty.

I’m proud of Philip Rivers.

Sports news

Hall of Fame will have to wait

You simply have to love the story that played out over the weekend in Seattle involving a 44-year-old grandfather who is headed for the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Philip Rivers came out of retirement Sunday to suit up for the Indianapolis Colts. Rivers retired from the NFL in 2020 and was due to be considered for the Hall of Fame this year. I believe he would have been inducted on his first year of eligibilty, as he starred for many years as quarterback for the San Diego (and now Los Angeles) Chargers.

Rivers, though, now has to wait another five years to be eligible for HOF induction, as the NFL requires players to sit out that long after retirement.

Rivers performed nicely for the Colts, completing most of his passes and throwing for a touchdown against the Seattle Seahawks.

But …

The Colts lost the game 18-16. So, Grandpa Phil will have to wait a week to notch the latest victory in his comeback. Rivers recently welcomed his first grandchild, becoming the rarest individual of all … playing professional tackle football as he enters grandparenthood.

Well done, Philip Rivers. I am pulling hard for your success.

media news

Football gives me relief

It’s time for another admission, which is that I am avid TV watcher, or perhaps I should say I am addicted to the TV screen.

Is there a TV Watchers Anonymous chapter nearby?

Whatever. I am happy to report that football season commenced this weekend, enabling me to turn on the boob tube (one of Dad’s expressions for the device) and watch young men play tackle football.

This avenue enables me to continue my boycott of TV news. I am no longer watching TV news/opinion channels, relying instead on the Internet and — drum roll, please — the Sunday edition of the Dallas Morning News. I recently resubscribed to the paper, vowing to the nice lady who sold me the subscription that I would take the time to read it. I told her how hard it was to give up the newspaper, given my nearly 37 years writing for them in Texas and in Oregon.

Football, though, is going to help me get through the weekend for the next several months, until early February when the NCAA crowns its collegiate champion and the NFL crowns the Super Bowl champ.

I cannot begin to predict when my news boycott will end. One factor could be the absence of Donald Trump from the national political scene. I am sickened by his ongoing presence, by the sound of his voice and by the idiocy he continues to spout from that overfed pie hole of his. I’ve got three more years of it. Then he’ll be gone, at least from public office.

In the meantime, the student-athletes and the millionaires who play football professionally are kicking it off. I’ll be watching them and putting politics on the back shelf.

Sports news

End the all-star games!

Here’s a thought, and I admit it’s not an original one … but the National Basketball Association needs to end the annual all-star game.

The same for the National Football League and the National Hockey League. End ’em! Don’t bother putting on these charades where the athletes play zero defense.

The NBA’s latest disaster this past weekend had one of the teams scoring 211 points. 211 points! What the hell?

This is preposterous! I get that the athletes don’t want to get hurt. I don’t blame them for that. I do believe that the NBA is doing a disservice to them and to the fans who show up to watch these guys perform. Same for the NFL, which too often has players going through the blocking and tackling motions. Oh, and the NHL, which often produces all-star games with scores like 12-10.

OK, that all said, Major League Baseball should continue its all-star contests, which because of the nature of the sport can produce actual competition featuring players working hard to win the game.

Perhaps the most famous — or infamous — MLB all-star moment came in 1970 when Cincinnati’s Pete Rose sought to score a run and crashed into Cleveland catcher Ray Fosse who was guarding the plate. Rose was running full tilt down the third base line. The crash injured Fosse so seriously that he never was able to play the game at a high level; the event essentially ended his playing career.

The rest of the major pro sports leagues, though, need not bother to stage these idiotic exhibitions. They aren’t worth watching.

local news, Sports news

Try someone new … Jerry

Jerry Jones, the egomaniacal owner of the Dallas Cowboys, won’t accept any advice from someone who in truth doesn’t really give a crap about the organization he calls “America’s Team.”

But I’m going to offer it anyway.

A Dallas man submitted a letter to the editor of the Dallas Morning News, which published it in this morning’s paper. The fan writes that the team has gone “28 long years” since it last played for an NFL championship; the team has burned through 1,484 players, six head coaches and one general manager. “Can you guess the common denominator for all these … failures?” he writes.

Sure. That’s Jones, who doubles as GM as well as the guy who signs the ample paychecks.

Jones’s ego compels him to pretend he knows something about pro football. He won’t give up the GM post to a real football pro. But he damn sure should.

The Cowboys choked this past weekend against a team described as “upstart.” The Green Bay Packers came to play tackle football. The Cowboys didn’t. There likely should be a coaching change in the Cowboys’ immediate future.

As for the GM matter, that’s up to the owner … who must decide whether to “fire” himself and then hire someone who knows how to build and maintain a professional football team.

That won’t happen. It certainly should, if only the owner’s ego would allow it.

Sports news

COVID vaccine: political weapon

Damar Hamlin’s collapse on the football field during the Buffalo Bills-Cincinnati Bengals contest the other evening has prompted a disgusting and disgraceful display of politicization I didn’t believe was possible.

Hamlin is now released from the hospital and is home in Buffalo continuing his recovery from the frightening moment when he suffered a heart attack after tackling a Bengals player in the first quarter of a game that was suspended and eventually canceled by the National Football League.

Now comes word from some right-wing commentators and a Republican U.S. senator from Texas that Hamlin’s collapse might have been spurred by the COVID-19 virus vaccine.

What an utterly disgraceful turn!

The senator was Ted Cruz, who retweeted a message that came from actor Kevin Sorbo questioning the circumstance surrounding Hamlin’s collapse. Cruz took the tweet down. U.S. Rep. Collin Allred, a Dallas Democrat — and a former pro football player — called Cruz’s politicization of the Hamlin incident a “new low, even for Ted Cruz.”

This kind of second-guessing, grandstanding and hideous conjecture from the cheap seats simply illustrates the coarsening of our society.

It has no place … except in the gutter.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news, media news, Sports news

Hey, media! Where’s the outrage?

Well now, it appears we have a fascinating discussion brewing about the way the media treat athletes caught doing illegal acts or making public demonstrations about serious policy matters.

If you’re Black, the media are going to climb all over you. If you’re white … not so much.

Consider the cases of two Black football players, Michael Vick and Colin Kaepernick. Vick was convicted of sending pit bulls to their death in dog fights. Kaepernick was vilified because he chose to take a knee during the National Anthem to protest police conduct against Black citizens. Vick and Kaepernick are Black.

You with me so far?

Now we have Brett Favre, another former pro football quarterback, who’s accused of stealing money intended to help poor Black residents of Alabama and Mississippi. Where’s the outcry? Where is the condemnation?

Oh, wait. Favre is white.

Brett Favre got caught red handed and nobody cares (deadspin.com)

I want to make another point. None of us wants to see dogs tortured, but … they aren’t human beings. No physical harm was done to anyone when Kaepernick launched his star-spangled protest.

In the case of Favre, people are suffering because someone — allegedly it’s Favre — stole money from accounts set aside to help those individuals.

Is that how you cover the news fairly? Hardly.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Sports news

Transfers give me pause

I remain steadfast in my athletic fuddy-duddyhood, in that I don’t much like some of the trends I see occurring in college and pro sports.

For example, the designated hitter rule in baseball is for the birds. Nor do I like playing football or baseball under a roof. I dislike “artificial turf” and I believe baseball players need not suit up with body armor befitting a combat soldier when they are hitting. Instant replay? Let the refs and umps call the game and stop the endless “reviews” on the field! They get damn near all the calls right as it is.

There. Now let’s turn to these “transfers” I keep reading about in college football. They generally are young men who have graduated already from one university, but with “football eligibility” remaining, they transfer through some sort of “portal” to another school.

Again, call me old-fashioned but I prefer to see a college football player play for the school where he enrolls, then after four years he is done; he either can turn pro or pursue another line of work, presumably in a profession related to the degree he is supposed to have earned at the college of his choice.

These “transfer athletes” seem to carry a bit of a mercenary aura about them. I guess they want to burnish their college career stats enough to make a pro team want to draft them higher and presumably offer them more money.

Sheesh!

This stuff makes my head hurt.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com