Sisyphean Bills
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Posts posted by Sisyphean Bills
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His mop up in Detriot can best be summarized as a "having your team get ripped a new orifice on a weekly basis."
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A friend of a guy who once walked his dog by a house designed by the same architect that designed TD's house told me ...
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no, gg is not talking about "middle managers at some dot com." he's talking about what happens in corporate america and in particular the lower half of manhattan every day, where people are making more than mularkey (and trust me, gg actually knows what he's talking about in this regard).
Again, nobody is disputing that people change jobs. But, that's not really the point of this debate (Mularkey quitting on the Bills). I'm sorry I wasn't as clear and precise as perhaps I needed to be in an earlier posting.
The difference here is that Mularkey was a very public figure in a very public job and at a very high level of authority. Applying general rules such as "people change jobs every day" is not a good argument. (It's known as the fallacy of the general rule.) My earlier point was that it is not everyday that one sees well-known headknockers of high profile corporations just up and quit and then give an excuse such as "I didn't like the direction."
Imagine if Bill Gates (or Steven Ballmer) just quit today at Microsoft because, "It was going in the wrong direction." People might be a bit surprised by such a move; and, since Gates (or Ballmer) are part of the upper-most levels of Microsoft's management team, they set the direction, so, the explanation would sound hollow and strange. As is often the case with euphemisms, this "don't like the direction" statement really reveals nothing to us; we are simply left with the impression -- right or wrong -- that there most have been a power struggle. In the case of Mike Mularkey, this seems all the more odd if one believes that Wilson and Levy were truly blind sided by all this, as they said they were. Who was Mularkey having this power struggle with?
It's possible that Mularkey can explain his actions behind closed doors and that he'll once again rise to the top of his profession, coaching pro football. But, and to agree with eball, I'm not expecting that to happen any time real soon. Good luck to him all the same.
Anyway, we'll just have to agree to disagree.
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What? You believe in time travel?
It is impossible for an event that occurs later in time to cause an event that happened before it in time. Impossible. Disagree completely all you want, it doesn't change the laws of physics.
Marv may or may not be a walking "toxic situation". Has Mularkey come out and said that? Has anyone? Until someone does, it is speculation by definition.
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Hunh? I saw Slay playing in the Shrine Bowl.
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Your timeline here is botched. ML failing to emphatically deny he was a candidate to replace MM as head coach, immediately after RW had just emphatically denied the same, cannot possibly have caused the purely speculated and so-called "toxic environment" that further caused MM to decide to quit in the days before that very press conference.
Actually, Marv cleared up any confusion with the media very quickly -- that he wasn't going to be HC of the Buffalo Bills. Much ado about nothing.
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Funny me, I thought that MM works in an industry where wins are the most prized characteristics.
Everyone is using their own value judgements to guess what MM did. But unless you are his wife or best friend, you have absolutey no idea what drove his decision. Neither do I, but I'm not willing to impart judgement that he's a quitter because he left a toxic situation for him.
Here's a question for the gallery, did Ralph Wilson do the right thing because he didn't hire John "the quitter" Fox in '01?
Sure, wins are highly prized. But, this suggests that MM either did not know this or did not have the confidence that the team was capable of wins. The former case seems a little too Pollyanna -- in the real world, adults should be able to communicate and work with one another to achieve a common goal even if they are not best buds and do not always agree about everything. In the latter case, it is often said that in today's NFL, with free agency and the physical training of the athletes, that the difference between two teams physically is not really that much. The big difference maker in the modern NFL is coaching. So, why would MM not believe he could achieve wins? Did he lack self-confidence? Was he in over his head? Did he feel that the rest of the organization had a different agenda -- what is it? -- they just wanted to lose and play bad football?
We don't know why he left, so why do we assume there was a "toxic situation"? Maybe he just realized he did not want to be a head coach and couldn't take it any longer.
John Fox quit from the Raiders staff (Al Davis has had a few issues with coaches in the past -- Jon Gruden and Mike Shanahan left under bitter circumstances, but both had other jobs lined up) about 10 years ago. It also took him 5 years to win back his reputation.
Or maybe Marv Levy is just another Al Davis, working for him for a week causes people to run for their lives.
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Gotta disagree with you, GG. Mularkey quit, in an industry where mental toughness and grit are the most prized characteristics. Do you think an owner is going to give the keys to the organization to MM any time soon? Hell freaking no. He's not moving up any ladder. The truth is that he WANTS to be OC or QB coach, where he can be under the radar and avoid the most heated scrutiny that apparently caused him so much disdain in Buffalo. What happened here is damning evidence that MM is not mentally tough -- something we certainly witnessed with the team itself in 2005.
Just because the guy will still be able to make a very good living doesn't mean he did anything noble or "smart."
I also think that MM intentionally took a demotion here, and not as a noble gesture. If it was a noble gesture, why did he agree to stay on when he knew his pal Teflon Tom was going/gone and why did he agree to clean house on his coaching staff and fire some of his good friends? It simply doesn't add up.
Mularkey did not seem exceptionally well suited to be a head coach in the NFL this past season. And, through his actions, he has agreed with that assessment.
Of course, I wish him and his family the best and hope he finds a coordinator or position coach job where he can be more comfortable.
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Of course, nobody is disputing that people quit jobs.
The more money and better jobs thing doesn't fly in this case. He didn't jump ship for more money and a better organization. He just quit for the unknown.
People are also comparing this to a hostile take over. Ralph Wilson was already involved -- people say he was calling everyone every day when he "wasn't involved". Modrak and Brandon were already with the Bills too.
The new management consisted of ... Marv Levy. I guess Marv has a lot of vinegar left in him.
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You couldn't be more wrong in your assessment. Guys at the top of the career ladder have far more flexibility to walk away than a fry cook, as the fry cook is probably there because he absolutely has to. The fry cook also knows that Burger King won't hire him if they know that he simply up and walked out on McDonalds across the street.
Mularkey was the No. 3 guy in the Bills organization, maybe #4 depending on Brandon's new status. It's obvious he didn't like that position as much as the prospect of being No. 6 guy in another organization, with a better shot to move up the ranks.
Happens with executives all the time. How often do managers of acquired companies stick around with new bosses, even if they aren't fired by the new regime?
BUt, we're not talking about middle managers at some dot com.
How many other head coaches in the NFL have walked away from their jobs?
Belichick? Not really, he already had the Patriots job lined up.
NFL teams have plenty of front office shake-ups and coaching shake-ups and it is simply not true that one always goes hand in hand with the other.
If Mularkey thinks he has a better upwards career path in the coaching profession as the QB coach in Atlanta than actually being an NFL head coach (which is the top job for a coach, btw -- his aspirations to be an owner notwithstanding
) are, well, a little bit tortured in their logic. -
The Bills will not have their coaching staff settled before the opening kick-off of the senior bowl!
(Kick-off was about half an hour ago.)
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once a quitter, always a quitter? have you ever quit a job before because you didn't like the job anymore and/or didn't have any faith in the organization you worked for? also, factor in that he knew he'd land a good job somewhere else. even if you haven't, you probably know that most people have and that it's not considered a bad thing. far from it, in fact -- most people consider it mentally healthy.
I think this isn't really a good comparison. Sure, people quit jobs everyday. People from the deep fry operator at McDonald's to investment brokers on Wall Street. However, in this case, we're talking about someone at the pinnacle of their chosen profession in a testosterone filled, ultimate tough guy business. As Tom Jackson said, "At the end of the day, you're a professional and football is your business. What are you going to do at the end of the season? Cry and throw in the towel? No. You're a competitor. You're where you are because you are a great competitor. Disappointed? Sure. Give up? Forget it. You re-tool, move forward and try again next year."
Mularkey was in one of the key positions of authority within the Bills organization. In some ways, he was the Buffalo Bills, at least the figurehead of the team on the field. For him to tuck tail and run because of the "organization's direction" is a fine example of the pot calling the kettle black. Perhaps Mularkey was not going to be involved in the decision making process any longer and if that is the case, then, yes, he was implicitly forced out. Only Mularkey truly knows why he decided to leave, and even if he was going public with the details, that would only be his perception of what happened.
Still, I suspect that a large part of his decision to leave was simply the cumulative effects of his past decisions, such as, the QB yo-yo, the OC yo-yo, having veterans dis him, firing about half his staff, being TD's puppet, etc. That is, the "toxic environment" swirling around the team was one he helped to create.
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You may be mistaking pity, charity, or an aggressive agent knocking down doors for sincere, serious interest, here.
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After the "great" year Clements had, it might make sense to roll the dice and see what he is worth on the market. Who knows? But, there is a very real possibilty that Nate's big money contract isn't out there -- not after he got completely schooled by "stud" receivers like Eric Parker week after week.
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Huge Mistake Levy!
in The Stadium Wall Archives
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Damn. We could've had Rich Kotite for even cheaper.