Why did Mike Mullarkey resign as HC of Buffalo

[pkwwjd]

When I call him a QB killer I'm not even talking about his ability to design an offense - I'm talking about the team atmosphere that got JP a broken leg but worse was throwing JP into a end of season game where the Pats were killing us with almost zero practice (just came back from the broken leg). Am I saying the JP was going to be great NO but there are ways of bringing a QB up and ways of ruining them and Mularkey seem to do the latter.

 

I really still believe that Mularky ruined JP, too ... When he was thrown into the Patsies game, with no practice while being suited up as the third QB, when the first and second string weren't hurt on the spur of the moment without time to warm up ... As a 22 year old kid, that can end any confidence that you may have had ... And all that against one of the more dominant teams of the last 12 years.

 

Plus he quoted Yoda at press conferences ...

[ganesh]

because of a lucky 6 game winning streak, they finished 9-7, woooooo haha...but you are correct, only winning season in 10 years lol....

 

and then the next year???? oh yea....5-11...solidddddddd

That was because Donahoe was mad at Bledsoe for losing to the Steelers and cut him after the season leaving Mularkey to play Losman and hence the 5-11 season.

[Rico]

He was recently quoted as saying -“That’s personal and I have not discussed that with anybody and I probably won’t ever,” Mularkey said. “I’ll say this,family was very much a part of it and I just felt like I made the right decision then and I still do now. Nothing’s personal, please don’t make it out to be that way because it’s not. I’ve never said I regret it, I felt it was the right decision then, I still do, and again it has a lot to do with my family and my family will always come first in my profession, in my life, in anything I do, and I’ll leave it at that.” Does anyone know whatthis all means ?

Even his family knew that bringing Marv back as GM would be a disaster of epic proportions.

 

That was because Donahoe was mad at Bledsoe for losing to the Steelers and cut him after the season leaving Mularkey to play Losman and hence the 5-11 season.

Absolutely correct move by TD to get rid of the Brain Dead One then. He never, ever should have given him an extension before the season started.

[justnzane]

Even his family knew that bringing Marv back as GM would be a disaster of epic proportions.

 

Absolutely correct move by TD to get rid of the Brain Dead One then. He never, ever should have given him an extension before the season started.

Agree with the contract extension, but I would have rather made Losman win the starting job from Drew over handing it to him. It allowed for Losman to never earn a damn thing before putting on some of the most miserable performances in his first year as starter

[Rico]

Agree with the contract extension, but I would have rather made Losman win the starting job from Drew over handing it to him. It allowed for Losman to never earn a damn thing before putting on some of the most miserable performances in his first year as starter

I agree that JP should not have been just handed the starting job, he was brutal. But Kelly Holcomb > Drew Bledsoe. Hell, Shane Matthews > Drew Bledsoe. No doubt TD should have gotten better and true competition, but Bledsoe absolutely positively had to go. especially after the Steelers debacle.

[2003Contenders]

The talk at the time was that after Marv/Ralph forced him to fire his coordinators (Jerry Gray and Tom Clement) that he was having trouble finding any serious candidates willing to interview for the vacancies. Thus, he tendered his resignation.

 

There was also a story at the time also that when a teacher was calling roll and noticed the last name of one of the students was Mularkey, she joked "As in the soon-to-be ex-coach Mike Mularkey?" without realizing that the kid was indeed the child of the coach. IIRC, Mularkey supposedly shared this story with his buddy Jim Mora.

[ganesh]

Let's not over sell that huh? They went 9-7 and lost to the Steelers BACKUPS when a win would have sent us to the playoffs...

 

Don't forget we actually had a somewhat serviceable QB in Drew Bledsoe, the only other NFL worthy QB on the Bills roster since Jim Kelly.

 

I think Flutie was better than Bledsoe. He won games for us.

[BillsVet]

People in WNY just expect to lose and be mediocre every year so no need to hassle the coach and his family.

 

It's easier to accept bad to mediocre football now because the roster is so much better.

[Charles Romes]

Um maybe its because they hired someone out of football for 10 years in his 80s with no fo experience as the gm.

[Delete This Account]

a couple of potential reasons are referred to lower in this AP story.

 

http://ca.sports.yahoo.com/news/losing-frustrating-tie-binds-jaguars-lb-posluszny-return-213035286--nfl.html?two-bills-drive

 

jw

[GG]

a couple of potential reasons are referred to lower in this AP story.

 

http://ca.sports.yah...two-bills-drive

 

jw

 

He was hoping to work for an energetic new owner?

[Turbosrrgood]

Seems more like selective endpoints than "fair" if you're also not including 2000 or 2006 when he lost his job but even so...

Dallas lost 17-10 and 35-7 games to the Giants/Redskins with the playoffs on the line late in the '05 season (with Sean Payton on the staff) and I'm sure I don't have to tell you about his "2011 Fitzpatrick-like" stark 1st/2nd half split from 2002.

Any way you want to slice it the first half of '02 & the 4-5 good games he had in Dallas were clearly the outlier at that stage of his career, not '04 under Mularkey.

 

Yeah it's nice that you pointed out the obvious, but you seemed to miss the point. The poster I responded to used the stats from what was by far the single worst year of Bledsoe's career to make a point that Bledsoe "sucked" and that Mularkey was somehow good because he got Bledsoe to have slightly better stats than the worst season of his career.

 

My point was that getting Bledsoe to throw for 2900 yards was no "accomplishment" for Mularkey when Bledsoe had far better results with his coaching staffs from before and after.

 

Just for the record, I am no Bledsoe fan. He was a good guy, and had a strong arm, but never had good football instincts.

[Homey D. Clown]

Thats typical around here

 

While they are here, run them out of town, then cry about how you want them back cause they guy that they wanted to replace them can't do any better. The grass is always greener.....

 

For what it's worth, I wanted the guy to stay, but this is a very true statement. The current state of this team ALMOST makes me miss skeletor too LOL

[BuffOrange]

Yeah it's nice that you pointed out the obvious, but you seemed to miss the point. The poster I responded to used the stats from what was by far the single worst year of Bledsoe's career to make a point that Bledsoe "sucked" and that Mularkey was somehow good because he got Bledsoe to have slightly better stats than the worst season of his career.

 

My point was that getting Bledsoe to throw for 2900 yards was no "accomplishment" for Mularkey when Bledsoe had far better results with his coaching staffs from before and after.

 

Just for the record, I am no Bledsoe fan. He was a good guy, and had a strong arm, but never had good football instincts.

 

You were reading what you wanted to read just to argue then. Nobody was saying MM brought the very best out of Drew; there just isn't any basis to the idea that the coach was the reason he had a subpar year. I'm not sure what you're arguing about if you agree it's obvious he sucked in those years.

[JohnC]

Mike Mularkey left for the same reasons why a lot of high quality prospective coaches wouldn't even bother to interview for HC openings in Buffalo. There was a great awareness by outsiders at how oddly the operation functioned. There was a of interference by the Detroit street boys on roster moves (salary costs) and on staffing decisions that should have been the sole domain of the GM and HC.

 

Can you imagine having to regularly be on the receiving end of a phone call of a clueless owner fomenting at the mouth about what is he getting for his money? It didn't take Mularkey long that with the departure of Donahoe and the introduction of Levy into his ill-defined role that the organizational dysfunction was too zany and irrational to work in. How would you like to hear reports from a number of sources that the person you are supposed to report to was sending out trial balloons attempting to get your job?

 

There are a lot of obvious reasons why you wouldn't want an aged clueless owner meddling into your job as a HC. There are also advantages to an aged owner getting even older. The owner is too mentally and physically infirm to be capable of interfering with the football operation. The major benefit is that the football operation is being run by the football people without much interference as long as it is being run in a fiscally prudent manner. That in itself is progress.

Edited November 30, 2012 by JohnC

[Sisyphean Bills]

There are a lot of obvious reasons why you wouldn't want an aged clueless owner meddling into your job as a HC. There are also advantages to an aged owner getting even older. The owner is too mentally and physically infirm to be capable of interfering with the football operation. The major benefit is that the football operation is being run by the football people without much interference as long as it is being run in a fiscally prudent manner. That in itself is progress.

 

Not too sure about that. Both Gailey and Nix have nonchalantly mentioned that Ralph is still very involved and that they talk quite often about the team with the owner by phone. Furthermore, it follows that someone that's managed his business for most of 50+ years a particular way (save for the Tom Donahoe experiment that left a foul taste in his mouth) would continue to do things his way. Those head coaching candidates that wouldn't even bother with an interview didn't think they'd have full authority to take the measures to build a competitive team and said as much.

[RkFast]

From what i recall, after the Steelers loss (to their 2nd stringers) that cost Buffalo a playoff berth, the fans in B-Lo went nuts. They showed up around his home, harrassed his wife and kids...just showing no class whatsover by adults. I'm sure his kids were harrassed at school too. It really sounded ugly and i think he actually feared for their safety. He probably figured at the time, being an NFL coach just wasn't worth it to his family.

Now people are much more reserved. People in WNY just expect to lose and be mediocre every year so no need to hassle the coach and his family.

 

You just implied that in certain situations, harrassment is OK.

 

Was that your intention?

[Buftex]

He lived not too far from me in OP and directly accross from some good family friends in the neighborhood and they talked pretty fequently and they said that his wife hated the weather in Buffalo. I think they were originally from south Florida. The weather thing was a big deal for her and she was miserable. My buddy said they were also very nice people. So anyway- there is my bit of gossip for the fire.

 

I know someone who has worked in the Bills front office since the mid-80's...this person said that, other than Marv, Mularkey was, by far, the most liked head coach by Bills staff...if that means anything. They were all very excited when Marv came back as GM, but were really sad to see Mularkey leave.

 

Honestly, I think Mularkey had been our best HC of this century..not saying much I realize...his hands were a little cuffed by the Losman thing. JP was kind of forced on him. From the sounds of it, he realized Bledsoe's better days were behind him, but wanted to keep him around another season (or pick up another vetran FA), and work Losman in more gradually... nobody really felt like Losman was ready to start. It was just the begining of a tough season for Mularkey. Then, when TD was fired, the whole franchise seemed pretty unstable...he was probably wise to move on.

[Maybe Someday]

Perhaps you are right, he didn't fail everywhere, so maybe I should have said that he hasn't succeeded anywhere.

 

Both PIT and Atlanta's offense improved dramatically after he left, you left out the mess in Miami. The hype from PIT I never understood. The offense was medicore at best, but that team was very good due to having one of the best D's in the league...When he left the offense improved, and they won the SB.

I don’t want this to come off as me defending MM as that is not my intent. I really haven’t thought about him in years and don’t think he was anything really special but I think that saying both Pittsburgh and Atlanta’s offenses improved “dramatically” after MM left is a bit misleading. You make it sound like they got better because he left. Pittsburgh’s offense did get a little better but mainly because they drafted Roethlisberger the next year. MM got a few pretty good seasons out of Tommy Maddox while he was there, remember the shootout in the playoffs against the Browns in I think 2002? He went 13-3 with Kordell Stewart as his QB in 2001, although I’ll give you that a lot of that was due to their defense. Also, Ken Whisenhunt kept a lot of the same system in place when he was promoted to OC after MM left to be our coach, including all those trick plays, although it was scaled back to run the ball more due to having a young QB. MM wasn’t holding that team back. Atlanta’s offense isn’t any better this year than they have been the past few years, certainly not dramatically better. Their defense certainly is. The mess in Miami is what it is. It probably had more to do with what was going on with that team (Saban quitting then Cam Cameron being a terrible head coach) than MM but all coaches do share some of the blame. No excuses but it had to be hard to game plan when you’re starting QBs were the likes of Joey Harrington & Cleo Lemon.

 

 

As far as Bledsoe, say what you want but I think his failings in Buffalo had more to do with the crap offensive line we put in front of him than his overall lack of talent. Yes, he was on the down swing of his career but was still serviceable, certainly better than Holcomb or Shane Matthews. Everyone knew he was a statue but if you protect him, he could still pick you apart. Problem was we never really protected him in the last 2 ½ years he was here. Once teams realized that all you needed to do was blitz us right up the middle because our line couldn’t do anything about it and Drew wasn’t athletic enough to get out of the way, he was toast. Defenses adjusted and we never did anything about it. We needed a stud interior line so he could step up in the pocket but didn’t have it and never really tried to get it until we drafted Wood & Levitre. TD was all about drafting skill players, not the guys in the trenches. So instead of drafting solid linemen, we just draft a mobile QB and think that will fix the problem. Except that mobile QB wasn’t anywhere near ready to start and lost all confidence as he was constantly running for his life. Our crap o-line has ruined more of our potential QBs than our coaches have.

[BuffBill]

If I remember correctly, the front office was forcing him and trying to make the decisions of what coaches he was keeping and which ones he was firing, so he bolted. Don't blame him. I really thought when he came here we finally found a good HC, a feeling I never had with Chan Gailey from the git-go.

 

I think Flutie was better than Bledsoe. He won games for us.

Apples and oranges. We haven't had a QB half as good as either of them since Bledsoe got dumped after finally having a winning season (and the only winning season since Moby Dick was a minnow), because Losman was the savior.

[JohnC]

 

 

Not too sure about that. Both Gailey and Nix have nonchalantly mentioned that Ralph is still very involved and that they talk quite often about the team with the owner by phone. Furthermore, it follows that someone that's managed his business for most of 50+ years a particular way (save for the Tom Donahoe experiment that left a foul taste in his mouth) would continue to do things his way. Those head coaching candidates that wouldn't even bother with an interview didn't think they'd have full authority to take the measures to build a competitive team and said as much.

 

There is no doubt that RW is in constant phone contact, if not daily contact, with Nix and sometimes Gailey. I'm sure he frequently talks to Brandon. But maintaining constant communication with someone who is at his ripe age and who doesn't even travel to the games anymore is different from an owner who is constatnly meddling into the football operations.

 

I have little regard for RW. From a football standpoint he is stupendously inept. The long term record of his chaotic organization is a reflection of his foolishness. But as an owner he has a right to communicate with whomever he wants to communicate with respect to his team. Is he offering useful insights and advice? Of course not. Are those people taking or receiving his calls being distracted from doing their jobs? At this stage I doubt it.

 

As the owner has said on a few occasions this team is what keeps him going. If that's the case, then so be it. Sometimes pacifying the boss is a requirement for job retention. Tom Donahoe got tired of his curmudgeon bosses' incessant phone calls. He put the boss man on hold or was unavailable to take the call. Tom Donahoe was fired.

Edited November 30, 2012 by JohnC