The Sports Rumors

Time for a Change

I don’t know if it’s just me, how I was brought up, or how I think. Whatever it may be, I have a hard time accepting or respecting quitters. I understand that there are times when things get so tough that it’s almost better to cut your losses. In those rare situations, I can understand the reason that one quits. I still don’t agree with it, but at least I can see where they’re coming from. But rarely can a scenario like that apply in sports. Rarely, if ever, is there a reason for quitting that is universally “okay”. Sports is a dynamic that is centralized around extreme competitiveness. It’s survival of the fittest, literally. For players, you have to not only have it physically; you have got to be at the top of your game mentally to succeed. For coaches, you have got to be 100% committed at all times to be successful at leading your team. And most importantly, players and coaches are never allowed to quit midway through a game, season, or contract. It’s inexcusable.

This leads me to Bobby Petrino. He was an offensive mastermind at Louisville and I had great respect for how he put that school on the national map of relevancy. Today however, I have absolutely zero respect for the man and the coach. I have zero respect for him because he is a quitter. He quit on not only the 70 or so players on his team, not only on the owner and his staff, but on the entire city of Atlanta. Yeah he was having a lousy season. Yes, Michael Vick basically ended the season before it began. Yes, he had to go through three quarterbacks in the same season because of it, basically derailing his gameplan from the get go. But you know what? That’s coaching. Making adjustments. Learning on the fly. Adapting to adversity. You cannot quit, especially with three games left. The thing that makes this even worse is that he was already in talks with Arkansas to be their next coach. And what’s even WORSE than that, which I didn’t think would be possible, is the fact that he didn’t even look his players in the eye. They found out about this the same way you and I did. Sportscenter or some news station. That has nothing to do with being a weak coach. That has to do with being a weak and cowardly man.

I know things don’t always work out the way we want them to but if you give up at whatever it may be, you are a quitter. Whether you want to believe it or not, you are a quitter. The next head football coach at Arkansas is a known quitter. If I were a recruit, there is no way I’d even pay attention to Arkansas based on the characteristics of the new head coach.

It’s time for the NFL to realize that these college coaches have a greater chance of being a flop than a top 3 draft pick. It’s time to quit, ironically enough, on hiring these guys who have a couple of years of success at the collegiate level. Look at the young stud coaches we have in the ranks, waiting for a chance to move up. Give me Jason Garrett of the Cowboys over Nick Saban or Bobby Petrino any day of the week. Give me Mike Tomlin (assistant last year) over Butch Davis. Give me that kid from New England, whose name escapes me at this moment, over the next big name college coach who tries to make the move. The NFL is producing some quality assistant coaches and teams should start paying attention to them rather than trying to make a big splash by signing some big fish from college. The adjustment is just too great for most of them to make. You can’t go from dealing with 18 and 19 year old kids to 25 year old egomaniac players who make double your salary.

I’m eager to see what Arthur Blank, and a handful of other owners do this offseason in regards to filling their head coaching position. One of them is bound to make the same mistake again. Sucks to be them.