Football and Infidelity

I commented in another place why I have had so much trouble following football lately, but here's yet another reason why I am giving up on the sport.

Football owners and GMs are perhaps the most fickle people on the planet. Take the Phildelphia Eagles, for example. There was a report earlier today that head coach Andy Reid was going to be fired after 14 years with the team. Did the Eagles have a rough year? Yes, they went 4-12, one of the worst records in the NFL. They have been struggling for a while, in fact. But I fail to see how that is one man's fault. Michael Vick and the faith the team had placed in him is also a big reason for this failure. It was known that Vick was a high risk player before he was even signed with the Eagles in 2009. He took over the starting position in 2010 and had a 10-6 record.

2011 was a bit worse at 8-8 and Reid received a lot of pressure then. He knew that if he wanted to keep his job he needed to do better. 4-12 is not better. So did he expect his firing to come? Probably.

But look at Reid's entire record over the last 14 years. The Eagles made the postseason 9 times in those 14 years and had one Super Bowl appearance in 2004 which they barely lost.

The NFL is notorious for having ridiculous standards for their coaches. Reid has shown us though that he has a talent for motivating his players. One mediocre season (2011) and one bad season (2012) before getting the ax basically shows how short sighted NFL owners and GMs are.

Success is important, and if a coach is not successful they don't deserve to have a position in the NFL. But the NFL has such a high amount of variance associated with it, one or two bad seasons should not be used as a definite litmus test, especially with a coach that has shown his worth in the past.

There's no easy solution here, however. Bad coaches need to be weeded out as quickly as possible in order to give teams as good of a chance as possible. Good coaches need to be given the right settings to capitalize on their strengths, though. Relying on a high risk player like Vick can have good rewards, but obviously it can have bad results, too.

Is it Reid's fault that Vick had so much playing time? Partly. It needs to be noted that this is not only Reid's fault. Other participants in management play a huge role too. If owner Jeffrey Lurie didn't want Vick to play, he could have easily made this happen.

Reid had a tough year. His son died early on and this must have had a huge impact upon him.

The point I'm trying to make is that owners are so quick to make managerial changes and it shouldn't be like this. As a fan, it really makes me mad to see things like this happen. I like watching football, but moves like this make me furious and I have absolutely no interest in watching the postseason this year. Good job, NFL.