RedRamage

I not sure I 100% agree with this. I think you're saying that because black college players are more likely to become players in the NFL that white college players have to look at other options, which includes coaches, and therefore are more likely to end up coaches. While I see some logic in that thinking the assumption is that aren't more black players in college as well. What I mean is if, to make the math easy, we say there are 500 black college players and 400 white college players and 100 "other" players... Black do better over all, so we'll say 20% of black players make it to the pros. White players don't do as well, so we'll say only 10% of them make it to the pros. That means 360 white players aren't NFL bound and may choose to go into coaching. But that also means that 400 black players are also not NFL bound and may go into coaching, so (obviously depending on where the actual numbers end up) there still might be more blacks who played in college but didn't make the pros than there are whites. All this said I DO think that it's wrong to point to the 70% of black players and say the pool of potential coaches is therefore 70% black because it assumes that all players equally want to be coaches and would make good coaches and that ONLY former players are NFL coaches.

At this point I'm rooting for Stafford. There's not really much difference between 31 and 32. Hope he wins.

Point 9 is interesting. It points out that the NFL used race-norms when determining if retirees suffered from various brain injuries and paid out accordingly. This is bring brought up, I'm sure, to show that the NFL has long standing policy of racism. The problem here is both sides of the original suit that instituted this money for retires agreed to this (one could argue a couple of different ways on why hurts of doesn't hurt Flores' claims) but more importantly is that as of Oct '21 the NFL has agreed to stop doing this and allow past minority retirees to get retested. Point 11 argues that less successful white coaches are often retained while black coaches are quickly fired. Again here I'd argue that the sample size is just too small to draw large conclusions from this. For example, Campbell was clearly less successful on the field this year than Flores was, but the circumstances surrounding these two teams is vastly different. Point 13 says the Rooney rules isn't working... which I agree with, but it again wrongly points to the percentage of black players vs. black coaches as proof. Points 14 and 15 talk about why Flores was fired by Ross... but the claim isn't that Flores was fired because he was a minority, rather that Flores wouldn't cooperate with Ross's directives that were against league rules. Assuming this is true that's very bad for Ross, but NOT proof of racism.

I haven't been able to find any details on that. Do you have a source?

I'm reading through the lawsuit... Now I'm not a lawyer so I might misunderstand a lot of things here, but FWIW, here's my thoughts: Points 5 and 6 I see an a glaring issue. Point 5 makes the claim that many players desire to coach or get into management level positions in the NFL and then cites the relatively low number of black executives, HCs, and coordinators. The first problem here is the "many players." I'd expect that court would want evidence of this. Point 6 though makes the claim that these low numbers come from a player pool that's 70% Black. This is a glaring issue in my opinion because it assumes that former players are the only source of coaches and executives. This is patently untrue. Points 7 and 8 (NFL execs admitting to issues with diversity) are some good points, but seem weak on facts. Particularly pt 7 referencing three fired Black Coaches... way too small of a sample size to draw conclusions imho.

MLB.com's story on MLBPA's response to MLB's latest offer. Shockingly the story seems to favor MLB. https://www.mlb.com/news/mlb-mlbpa-continue-negotiations?partnerId=zh-20220202-538318-mlb-1-A&qid=1026&utm_id=zh-20220202-538318-mlb-1-A&bt_ee=yNjfECJvGxkGTTxnKrPglOydemIP%2Bcz9iFljK1j%2B533wyRUyDvrGNZ380pWpM4cA&bt_ts=1643811597614 To their credit the story does mention that MLB's offer was a $10 million pool, but I like how they didn't phrase that as minimal movement... going from 0 to $10M. A few other tidbits: I like that personally. I hate the draft lottery myself, but I do understand a need to prevent tanking. I'm just not sure it really works. Plus MLB's proposal of only three teams in the lottery means if you tank as worst you're picking 3rd. That's not much of an incentive to not tank. I do like one aspect of MLB's proposal here: "teams [will be] ineligible to receive lottery selections in three consecutive years." I hate the expansion of the postseason. I'm sure it's gonna happen because $$$$$, but I hate it. I think it cheapens the regular season when more and more and more teams get in the post season. I like the universal DH. I'm sure some will hate it and I understand why, but in the game today pitchers are treated differently and there's no going back. With IL a thing now teams in both leagues should be playing on equal terms.

The thing is that I think coaches who have a track record of some level of success are given longer to make it happen. This probably leans towards white coaches getting a bit more leeway as white coaches have traditionally been hired more frequently... that's shifting somewhat now, but still heavily favors whites. This isn't due to current racism necessarily but past racism, and as such makes a good argument for programs that the NFL could use to try to combat these left over effects of past racism, ie Institutional Racism. This is just my opinion of course... I haven't done any research to back this up so I might be talking out of my backside, but I think it makes sense. As for Flores... I think he kinda has the track record now. He didn't have amazing success in Miami, but he did have some success there and I think that would earn him a bit more leeway in his next job. Of course this could be countered by the rumor that he was difficult to work with (if true).

'manders?? Comms??

I guess I don't consider it dumb if Flores really feels he's been discriminated against. I do think he's got a very uphill battle to prove that he was so you could argue that it's dumb in that regard... that even if he was discriminated against he has a low shot of winning and sacrificing his career on principle could be considered dumb. But if he truly feels he was held back because of racism then I can't fault the guy for standing up for his convictions. He may feel that his career is all be killed anyway because he feels the NFL is racist and he'd never amount to much. Maybe the USFL will need a new coach next year?

Dan Snyder: "Okay people... I've got it... I've got the new team name... everyone ready for this? This is it folks, it's genius: The Washington... wait for it... COMANCHES!" Staffer 1: "Uh... um... ah, Mr. Snyder... ah, I...I don't think that's a good choice." Staffer 2: "Yeah... that might be seen as a bit... um... tone deaf." Snyder: "What? Why? I don't get what you mean..." Staffer 2: "Well, ya know we dropped the old name 'cause Native Americans didn't like it and now you're using a tribe name..." Snyder: "No, you don't get it... it's named after the helicopter." Staffer 1: "Okay, but see that was named after the tribe so it's still referencing a Native American tribe right after we sort were using a racial slur and... I just don't kn--" Snyder: "Oh come one... no one is going to think that!" Staffer 2: "Eh... I kinda think they will." Snyder: "Well damn it... that took me three months to come up with and I really like the way it sounds. WASHINGTON COMANCHES! It's got a good strong sound to it." Staffer 1: "Yeah, well, I still think it reeeeeally won't work." Snyder: "Fine screw it... I give up. What sounds close to that? Washington Commies? No, even I'm not that dumb... um... Fuck it... Washington Commanders. Good enough. I'm going to get a drink and going to bed."

I still want it to be the groundhogs... why else announce it on an otherwise meaningless Wednesday?

In case you didn't see my post after yours, I think it shows that the Giants had all but hired a white guy as their coach BEFORE interviewing a minority, which is a violation of the Rooney Rule. One could argue that the Giant played by the letter of the law instead of the spirit of the law and thereby skirted rules intended to provide opportunities for minorities. One could also argue that the NFL is aware that their rule is easily skirted and therefore is lip service only in attempting to provide opportunities for minorities. However, I don't think that either of those things proves racism.

So if I'm understanding the proof correctly it's that the Giants picked their guy, unofficially, BEFORE they interviewed the minority candidate. A few thoughts on that: 1. This highlights what many of us have thought about the Rooney Rule: It's kinda dumb and often followed only to the letter of the law instead of the spirit of the laws. 2. If the idea of the Rooney rule is to give a candidate a chance, one could argue that he had his chance to change their minds... that's a pretty weak argument, but I've been involved in a few hiring situations and I do recall one where I was pretty convinced that one candidate was going to be the answer until another came in changed my mind. Of course, this assumes that the Giants were open to their minds being changed, which they very well might not have. 3. I don't think this proves racism. It potentially proves that the Giants violated NFL rules, but the reason for the violation was not necessarily racism. Take, for example, when "He Who Shall Not be Named" hired Steve Mariucci. The Lions didn't interview any minority candidates because they all knew the Lions fired 'Weg just to hire Mooch. It wasn't that HWSNbN was necessarily racist, just that he had in mind the guy he thought was the perfect fit. This just isn't a smoking gun for racism to me. Please understand that I'm not saying racism wasn't involved, just that this isn't proof of it imho.

I'm a little surprised any NFL coach is fired after one year unless there's some scandal and I didn't hear anything re: Culley. But as Motown Bombers said Houston doesn't get a pick for hiring Culley, Baltimore would get that pick. (On a side note, I wouldn't mind seeing a team get a lower round pick for hiring a minority if said team kept the coach for x-number of years. If the complaint is that minorities don't get hired as much because they don't have experience then this is one way to lean towards them getting that experience.) For Flores it's hard to make the case that he was bounced because of race if you also are saying he was bounced because he didn't get along with the QB "star" who's also a minority. Wilks doesn't look like he lit up the world but again it seems odd that a coach would get canned after only one year. Part of the problem, imho, of trying to draw too many conclusions re: NFL head coaches or GMs is that the sample size is very, very small. 32 teams just doesn't mean a whole lot of available jobs and it doesn't take much to shift things around. I'd be far more interested in seeing what the stats are for HC, OC, DC, maybe even though it special teams coordinator as well. I also think it's unfair to say that because the NFL has x-percentage of minority players than if it doesn't have close to x-percentage of minority HCs it's because of racism. We don't know what percentage of players are interested in becoming coaches and why they are or aren't hired.

Not that I want to defend the Rooney Rule cause I think it has some serious problems, but the rule is only that a minority needs to be interviewed, not that a minority needs to be hired. The narrative when the Rule was put in place was that minorities could get hired if given a fair shot but NFL only interviewed white guys (mostly retreads) so they never had a shot to showcase themselves. Now, my opinion at that the time is that forcing a minority interviewee doesn't make much sense HCs are usually hired from OCs and DCs (or assistant HCs) so I'd rather see the Rooney Rule applied there. Personally I think the rules that rewarding teams for developing minority coaches and executives is a better solution, though also somewhat imperfect.

Thanks for that info @Tiger337.

I think the a problem with XFL 1.0 was that it was marketed to WWF fans, not football fans. It was flashy, it was sexy, it was taking the NFL head on and boasting about it's victory before the fight even started. It was going to get rid of all the things that football fans hated in the game and replace it with better! But I think they sorta forgot to actually check with football fans and see what they wanted.

IIRC he even ... well, encouraged is too strong of a word ... but certainly didn't seem to be actively upset by the fouls. He seem to accept them as a consequence of playing aggressively.

I don't think there is anyway that the USFL will ever be as big as the NFL. I think the NFL of today is just way too big of a juggernaut. I don't think the USFL will be able to come close to paying the players what the NFL can and so any decent talent will go to the NFL. Now obviously 20 years is a long time and things may shift during that time but I'd be shocked if it happened.

I'm reading a book on Mickey Cochrane and the '35 Tigers and there was a reference to a tie game, which really surprised me so I thought it would be an interesting trivia question to see when the last time the Tigers had a tie. I was blown away that it was 1980. I'm was like @Jim Cowan in thinking it must have been way back in the past. What's even more shocking is that the most recent tie in MLB is less than two decades old: 2005 between Houston and Cincy: https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CIN/CIN200506300.shtml

Not including exhibition games, do you know in what year the Tiger had their last official game end in a tie?

I'm not saying only hire from good teams, I'm saying that I want to see more from a guy that one seemingly successful year as a DC. Vrabel obviously was successful, I'm sure there are other examples of one-year coordinators who became successful HCs. But I suspect that over all there are a higher percentage of multi-year coordinators who became successful HCs vs. one-year coordinators.

That's a good point... Maybe that's why he's retiring... Campbell must of have the real brains and drive behind the success they had in NOLA and now that he's gone it's too much work on Payton.

Not sure if anyone mentioned this or not, but I think the coach has to have been with the team for at least two years in order for compensation to be given.

Not to be a debbie downer, but if I was a Front Office guy I'd be wary of hiring a guy who only have one year of DC experience, especially on a 3-13-1 team. Don't get me wrong: I've very happy with the job that Glenn has done and I want him to stick around. I just think looking at it from outside that I'm not sure there's enough evidence that Glenn will be a long term good guy. But the NFL is a very "what have you done lately" sorta place so it wouldn't surprise me if Glenn is hired.