Fire Wade Phillips

Jerry Jones needs to fire Wade Phillips.  Today.  The Dallas Cowboys are undisciplined and lackluster, a perfect reflection of their head coach.

Phillips doesn’t mind losing. Lord knows, he’s had a lot of practice. He’s 0-for-career in winning playoff games as a head coach. When a 13 win team with 15 Pro Bowlers loses at home to a team it beat twice in the regular season, it’s fine. After all, they made it to the second round of the playoffs after a bye week. That counts as 14 wins!

When the team loses at home to a Washington Redskins squad with a depleted secondary, getting thoroughly outcoached along the way, it’s no biggee. Lots of season left! When the team nearly loses to the 0-5 Cincinnati Bengals, whose quarterback is playing hurt, “Everybody’s happy!”

This team is too talented to play this sloppy so often. They seem to be going through the motions. And relying on owner Jones to give them pep talks! Jean-Jacques Taylor says the Cowboys “need more fire from their head coach.” But Phillips simply doesn’t have any fire. And it’s not like he’s liable to get any at this point in his career.

[Phillips is] too defensive to go into detail about any of this team’s few flaws.

You don’t last 32 years in the NFL living off your daddy’s name. Phillips is a good coach, but you can’t deny this team has lost some of its edge under his leadership.

Championship teams are driven to perfection, though they understand it’s impossible to achieve. They bury bad teams like Cincinnati instead of nearly blowing a 17-0 lead at home.

Indeed.  You can bet Jimmy Johnson would be going nuts right now were he the coach.  Some poor performers would be turning in their playbook and he’d have had the team fired up.

That’s not Wades’ style.  It never was and never will be.

It’s time to replace him as head coach.  Jason Garrett’s young but he’s a motivator and disciplinarian.  Go ahead and move him up rather than waiting until after another disappointing playoff performance.

Make Wade the assistant head coach and put him in charge of fixing the underperforming defense.  That, we know he can do.

And, hey, we might as well get rid of Bruce Read and bring back Joe Avezzano while we’re at it.  The special teams need some fire, too.

College Football Rankings Stink

The USA Today Top 25 College Coaches’ Poll is out.  Here are the rankings for September 28:

1.	Oklahoma (57)	4-0	1,520	2
2.	LSU (1)	4-0	1,399	6
3.	Missouri	4-0	1,398	5
4.	Alabama (2)	5-0	1,350	10
5.	Texas (1)	4-0	1,310	7
6.	Penn State	5-0	1,146	12
7.	Brigham Young	4-0	1,054	11
8.	Texas Tech	4-0	1,047	9
9.	Southern California	2-1	990	1
10. (tie)	South Florida	5-0	888	14
10. (tie)	Georgia	4-1	888	3
12.	Ohio State	4-1	854	13
13.	Florida	3-1	832	4
14.	Auburn	4-1	776	16
15.	Utah	5-0	684	17
16.	Kansas	3-1	555	18
17.	Wisconsin	3-1	521	8
18.	Boise State	3-0	446	20
19.	Vanderbilt	4-0	351	25
20.	Oregon	4-1	286	22
21.	Fresno State	3-1	280	24
22.	Oklahoma State	4-0	229	NR
23.	Connecticut	5-0	180	NR
24.	Virginia Tech	4-1	161	NR
25.	Wake Forest	3-1	148	15

Explain to me how Missouri, who hasn’t played anybody of note, is ranked #3 and ahead of Alabama, Penn State, and Texas?

Missouri has beaten, in succession, Illinois, Missouri Southeastern, Nevada, and Buffalo.  Frankly, if they cancelled the football programs at those last three schools, nobody would notice.  It’s been a complete joke of a schedule thus far and Missouri’s not exactly a storied program.

Alabama, on the other hand, opened the season in a neutral site game against Clemson, then ranked in the top 10, and just went in to Athens and destroyed then-3rd ranked Georgia on their home field.  I can understand putting Oklahoma, also a storied program who plays against tough competition, ahead of Alabama, who has come off a bad season.  But Missouri?!

Alabama Whips Georgia 41-30

Alabama went into Athens a decided underdog against #3 ranked Georgia and stunned everyone with a 31-0 blowout in the first half.  The defense took the second half off, giving up 30 points — it would have been 31 had Georgia not gone for and missed a 2-point conversion.  Thankfully, the offense managed to add another 10 and hold on.

The AP’s Paul Newberry, who either didn’t watch the game or only cared about the outcome rather than the process, saw it much differently than this Alabama fan.

Forget the blackout. This was an early knockout. Backed by a dominant defense and John Parker Wilson’s accurate passing, No. 8 Alabama raced to a stunning 31-point lead by halftime against self-destructing Georgia and held on to beat the third-ranked Bulldogs 41-30 Saturday night, establishing Nick Saban’s team as a national championship contender in his second season.

[...]

Alabama (5-0, 2-0) is poised to move up at least three or four spots when the new poll comes out Sunday, and the Tide certainly looked as impressive as anyone all year in winning decisively on the road against a team that started the season at the top of the heap.

Wilson went 13-of-16 passing for 205 yards and a touchdown, while Glenn Coffee ran for two scores in a game that wasn’t nearly as close as the final score. Georgia scored two touchdowns in the waning minutes.

Not even the most optimistic Alabama fan could have expected Saban, who won a national championship at LSU, to turn the Tide so quickly. This again looks like a program more in keeping with the tradition of Bear Bryant, not Saban predecessor Mike Shula.

Looking for a motivational edge, Georgia came out wearing black jerseys, and most of its fans at 92,000-seat Sanford Stadium also took part in the “blackout.” But the biggest cheers came from the white-clad Alabamians sprinkled throughout the massive stands.

Georgia showed some disturbing tendencies even while winning its first four games, and those sure came back to bite the Bulldogs. They were flagged twice in the opening half for roughing the passer, crucial but familiar mistakes for a team that already was the most penalized in the SEC. Also, an offensive line featuring two freshman and two sophomores was no match for Alabama’s massive front led by 365-pound Terrence Cody.

Knowshon Moreno got only nine carries for 34 yards, and quarterback Matthew Stafford spent much of the game running for his life as Georgia’s 11-game winning streak ended.

The Bulldogs actually made Alabama a little nervous in the opening minute of the fourth quarter, closing to 31-17 on Prince Miller’s 92-yard punt return. But the Tide calmly wrapped it up on the next possession, driving 51 yards in eight plays for Leigh Tiffin’s second field goal.

Oddly, both Newberry and the ESPN game announcers repeatedly refer to an early pass interference call on Georgia as a critical play in the game.  In reality, that “mistake” was absolutely the right move on the part of the Georgia defender, saving a sure touchdown and forcing Alabama to drive fifteen yards to achieve a result they would otherwise have had easily.

I’m obviously thrilled by the outcome.  After the season opening win, also in Georgia, against then-highly ranked Clemson, I thought this team had a chance to knock off the Bulldogs.  I had no idea, though, that they’d dominate them so thoroughly in the first half.

My only fear is that the second half letdown bodes ill for the team’s ability to focus against some of their lesser opponents in upcoming weeks.  In college, which lacks a playoff system, you can’t have a bad week if you want a shot at a national championship.

Dallas ‘Final’ 2008 Roster

The Dallas Cowboys cut 21 players at the 5 pm deadline Saturday to get their roster down to the mandatory 53: QB Richard Bartel, WR Mark Bradford, WR Todd Lowber, WR Danny Amendola, WR Mike Jefferson, TE Rodney Hannah, TE Drew Atchison, RB Alonzo Coleman, RB Keon Lattimore, FB Julius Crosslin, C Ryan Gibbons, OT Cory Lekkerkerker, DE Marcus Smith, DE Marcus Dixon, NT Junior Siavii, NT Remi Ayodele, LB Darrell Robertson, LB Erik Walden, LB Tyson Smith, LB Tearrius George, S Dowayne Davis.
The “final” roster, then, looks like this:

QB (2) – Tony Romo, Brad Johnson
RB (4) – Marion Barber, Felix Jones, Tashard Choice, Deon Anderson
WR (5) – Terrell Owens, Patrick Crayton, Sam Hurd, Miles Austin, Isaiah Stanback
TE (3) – Jason Witten, Martellus Bennett, Tony Curtis [UPDATE 2 - Forgot tight ends, too. My bad. Again]
OL (11) – LT Flozell Adams, LG Kyle Kosier, C Andre Gurode, RG Leonard Davis, RT Marc Colombo, G Montrae Holland, T Pat McQuistan, G Joe Berger, C Cory Procter, OG James Marten, OT Doug Free [UPDATE - I forgot Free on the first run through. My bad.]
DL (6) – Chris Canty, Jay Ratliff, Marcus Spears, Tank Johnson, Jason Hatcher, Stephen Bowen
LB (8) – Greg Ellis, Bradie James, Zach Thomas, DeMarcus Ware, Kevin Burnett, Bobby Carpenter, Anthony Spencer, Justin Rogers
DB (11) – CB Terence Newman, CB Anthony Henry, S Roy Williams, S Ken Hamlin, CB Adam Jones, CB Mike Jenkins, CB Orlando Scandrick, S Pat Watkins, S Courtney Brown, CB Alan Ball, CB Evan Oglesby
Sp (3) – P Mat McBriar, K Nick Folk, LS L.P. Ladouceur

I put scare quotes around “final,” of course, because the other 31 teams are having to make similar moves and, inevitably, all teams will sign at least one player for someone else and churn the bottom of the roster.

It looks, for sure, that the Cowboys will bring back Keith Davis, a special teams ace who’s been a very mediocre safety.

Tampa Bay has cut QB Chris Simms, who the Cowboys have long rumored being interested in.  Will the Cowboys bring him in as their number 3, hoping to displace Brad Johnson as the backup at some point?  Will Simms be willing to do that, rather than trying to go to a team less solid at the QB1 slot than Dallas?

Jamaica Rector, a former backup receiver for the Cowboys, has been cut by the Arizona Cardinals.  Do the Cowboys re-sign him, at least on a short-term basis, given all the injuries at wide receiver?  He knows the system, you’d think, but is having insurance at WR worth cutting a developmental player?

Alabama Rolls Over Clemson, 34-10

The Alabama Crimson Tide came in as heavy underdogs against the #9 ranked Clemson Tigers but surprised everyone by dominating the game from start to finish.

AP:

Nick Saban may face his toughest task yet: Holding down runaway expectations for his inexperienced Alabama team. Crimson Tide’s $4 million-per-year coach gave Alabama backers a reason to think big Saturday night, leading ‘Bama to a thorough 34-10 beating of No. 9 Clemson 34-10 at the Georgia Dome.

“Nobody can be satisfied with a one-game performance,” Saban said. “This will be a challenge for our team and it’ll be interesting to see how they respond.”

Still, as the Alabama band broke into Queen’s “We Are The Champions,” at the end, you had to wonder if they were honoring the Crimson Tide’s past, with 12 national titles and years of dominance in the Southeastern Conference under Bear Bryant, or gazing into the near future.

“It’s still early. We still got a long way to go,” cautioned quarterback John Parker Wilson, who threw for two touchdowns and ran for a third. “But we’ve got a good group of guys here who can do it.”

The statistical comparison was overwhelming:

Team Stat Comparison
1st Downs	25	11
Total Yards	419	188
Passing	180	188
Rushing	239	0
Penalties	6-40	6-43
3rd Down Conversions	11-17	1-9
4th Down Conversions	0-0	1-2
Turnovers	0	2
Possession	41:13	18:47

It’s worth pointing out that Clemson’s vaunted offense was held to a measly field goal, with 7 of the 10 Tiger points coming on a kickoff return.

ESPN’s Ivan Maisel thinks Alabama is ahead of schedule after a disappointing first year for head coach Nick Saban:

Alabama coach Nick Saban wanted to play No. 9 Clemson in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Classic for a lot of reasons. He wanted the national prime-time exposure of the opening Saturday night. He wanted his No. 24 Crimson Tide to have a presence in this recruiting hotbed. He wanted his young team — 14 freshmen on the two-deep — to play in a bowl-like atmosphere.

Saban, in sum, wanted this game in order to prepare his team for a future when they would be ready to contend for championships. In the wake of Alabama’s 34-10 victory, that may have been Saban’s only miscalculation.

Future? The future is now. If Alabama continues to play as well as it played Saturday night, the Crimson Tide will play in the Georgia Dome again this season — in the Southeastern Conference Championship Game.

It’s an exciting start to the season. Clearly, Saban has done wonders in recruiting. But Alabama faces an absolutely brutal schedule, playing at Arkansas, at #1 Georgia, at #18 Tennessee, at #7 LSU, and closing the regular season at home against #10 Auburn. If they can even win three of those games, it would be a spectacular year. Even that, though, wouldn’t be enough to guarantee them a spot in the SEC title game, let alone the BCS championship game.

Frank Cornish, Cowboys Super Bowl Lineman, Dies at 40

Former Dallas Cowboys offensive lineman Frank Cornish died in his sleep Friday night.  He was only 40.

Cornish, an offensive lineman, played for five NFL teams during a six-year career that started in 1990 when he was a sixth-round pick out of UCLA by the San Diego Chargers. He played with the Cowboys on Super Bowl-winning teams in 1992 and 1993, starting five games.

[...]

“The Bruin family sends our deepest, heartfelt sympathy to the Cornish family,” said UCLA head coach Rick Neuheisel, a Bruin assistant for most of Cornish’s college career. “I was a coach when he was a player, and he was just a gifted guy. Frank was a great guy in the locker room and a huge personality and a fun guy to be around.”

Cornish’s father, Frank played in the NFL in the late ’60s and ’70s.

Frank Cornish IV is survived by his wife, Robin, three daughters and two sons.

Truly sad.

Phelps: 8 Golds and 8 World Records?

Alice Park believes that Michael Phelps might have a bigger ambition than topping Mark Spitz’ longstanding record of seven gold medals in a single Olympics.

Phelps collected his third win in the Water Cube in the 200m freestyle on Aug. 12 — and his third world record. “Being in lane six, I was out of the middle of the pool. I knew that if I jumped first, the guys in the middle of the pool wouldn’t be able to see me, and by the time they did, hopefully I had enough ground where I could hold them off,” he said of his record-breaking win.

Could he and Bowman have set an astoundingly high bar of not only winning eight gold medals, but of earning eight new world records in the process? With any other swimmer, the very thought would be ridiculous. But with Phelps …

Of course, Phelps won’t admit to it. But if you’re as gifted as he is in the water, and you shrug off world records as easily as a coat, no mere clocks will keep you feeling challenged — you need something to motivate you. Setting eight new marks in a single meet might do it — Phelps has already broken five world records in a meet at last year’s World championships.

He could do it, certainly.  This pool seems to be exceptionally fast and Phelps is the best swimmer in history.  Still, one would hate to win eight gold medals — or even six — and come away from the Games disappointed in one’s performance.

Brett Favre Traded to New York Jets

Our long national nightmare is over: Brett Favre is a New York Jet.

The Brett Favre era in Green Bay officially came to an end late Wednesday night as the legendary longtime Packers quarterback was traded to the New York Jets, the Packers announced.

The exact compensation wasn’t immediately available, but it is believed to be a fourth-round draft pick that increases in value depending on how the Jets perform in the 2008 season.

According to the NFL Network, if Favre takes 50 percent of total snaps with the Jets in 2008, the fourth-rounder becomes a third-round pick. If he gets 70 percent of the snaps and the Jets make the playoffs, it becomes a second-round pick; and if he gets 80 percent of snaps and the Jets make the Super Bowl, it becomes a first-round pick.

That strikes me as a fair deal.  A high draft pick is a lot to pay for a player, even a future first ballot Hall of Fame quarterback, on his last legs.  Then again, it only becomes a first day pick if the Jets, who were 4-12 last season, make it to the playoffs.  Like ESPN’s John Clayton, I’m skeptical that Favre can do that much by himself.

Favre alone isn’t going to cut the gap between the Jets and the New England Patriots. The Patriots have Tom Brady, Randy Moss, Bill Belichick, a great team and the easiest schedule in the league. Favre has only the satisfaction that he’s out of Green Bay.

Still, the Jets have upgraded themselves, for a season at least, at the most important position in team sports.  Matt Williamson of Scouts, Inc. thinks they  “should make a very strong push for a wild-card spot with Favre at the helm.” And they’ll sell more season tickets and a bunch of merchandise.  (You can order your Brett Favre Jets replica jersey here.  Demand is apparently rather high, or the Jets’ server is really poor, as the page isn’t loading even though it’s just 7:30 in the morning.)

And, no, the Jets can’t trade Favre to the Vikings.

The NFL Network also is reporting that the Packers took great pains to ensure that Favre would not be traded to the Vikings by inserting a “poison pill” in the deal. If Favre were to be traded to Minnesota, New York would have to surrender three first-round picks to Green Bay.

No player, let alone an old one, is worth three first rounders.

Skip Caray, Voice of the Braves, Dies

Longtime Atlanta Braves announcer Skip Caray died in his sleep Sunday. He had been suffering from myriad health problems the last couple of years. Tim Tucker eulogizes him for the AJC:

Skip Caray made the call when the Atlanta Braves won the World Series in 1995: “Yes! Yes! Yes! The Atlanta Braves have given you a championship! Listen to this crowd!”

He made the call when Sid Bream scored on Francisco Cabrera’s pinch-hit to win the National League Championship Series for the Braves in 1992: “Here comes Bream! Here’s the throw to the plate! He iiiiiiiisssssssss … safe! Braves win! Braves win! Braves win! Braves win! … Braves win!”
And he made the call in the late innings of a lousy game in the lost season of 1979: “You have our permission to turn off the TV and go to bed now … as long as you promise to patronize our sponsors.”

Harry Christopher “Skip” Caray Jr. moved from St. Louis to Atlanta in the 1960s partly to escape the professional shadow of his father, the iconic and inimitable baseball broadcaster Harry Caray. Over the next four decades, with a style very much his own, Skip Caray became as much the voice of baseball in the Southeast as his father had been in the Midwest.

Caray died in his sleep Sunday at his Atlanta home, the Braves announced. He was 68.

“I got to talk to him yesterday and I told him I loved him and he started laughing because I was stuck in New York,” said Chip Caray, who flew from New York to Atlanta after he got the news on Sunday, rather than joining the Braves in San Francisco. “It was our own private little joke. I at least got to tell him I loved him which was the last thing I said to him, so I’m grateful for that.”

Owing to the combination of having moved outside the Deep South just as the Braves went from a national team to a regional one and having gotten married, I watch hardly any Braves games these days. For about a decade, though, I had Caray and the rest of the TBS crew in my living room for two to three hours 150-odd nights a year during a great era for the Braves. Even though I never met the man, I felt like I knew him well.

Caray was the most controversial of the Braves announcers, as he was the most opinionated and stylized. You either loved Skip or you hated him. I was firmly in the former camp.

Carroll Rogers reports on the reactions of the Braves:

News of Skip Caray’s passing hit the Braves family hard — his longtime broadcast partner, and players who identified this organization with Caray long before they ever became a part of it, even the most veteran of players, Tom Glavine, Chipper Jones and John Smoltz.

Smoltz and Caray’s broadcast partner Pete Van Wieren were on the Braves’ charter flight to San Francisco when they learned of Caray’s death. “It’s a sad day,” Smoltz said. “There are no words. Sad doesn’t do it justice. I will always remember Skip for his humor and his ability to go about life the way he did. I gained so much respect for what he did and how long he did and how he did.”

Jones was at home with his family on Sunday evening when he was informed. “I figured Skip Caray is as much a part of Atlanta Braves baseball as any of us,” said Jones, who will rejoin the team in Arizona later this week. “We all grew up listening to Skip, whether it be on TV or radio. Any time the guys on ESPN imitate [you] calling the highlights, you’re pretty much a legend. From a fan’s standpoint, he’s going to be a huge loss for them because he relayed the games to fans for so long.”

The loss transcends the game for players. Jones said his friendship with Caray was formed over long charter flights and daily visits in the clubhouse. “He always made a note to come by my locker and shake my hand, ask me how I was doing, how the family was, how my kids were,” Jones said. “Personally over the last 15, 16, 17 years, I haven’t gotten his play-by-play on the radio or TV, but I had a lot of plane flight conversations with him. I really respected him, as well as the whole Caray family. They have a pretty good legacy working over there. It’s a sad day for Braves baseball.”

Said manager Bobby Cox: “This was completely unexpected and is a complete loss. I had just spoken with Skip this week when we did the radio show and I didn’t know he wasn’t feeling well. He seemed in his normal good spirits. We’ve all lost a very good friend. For me, he was a good buddy — at the park and away from the park. We always had a lot of great laughs. He will be very sorely missed.”

Fans related so well to Caray, Van Wieren said, because he told it like it was, even if he couched it in humor. “But behind the humor there was an honesty and a commitment to telling it like he believed it to be that never, ever varied,” Van Wieren said. “If he didn’t like it that a game was two minutes late getting started, everybody knew about it. If he had an opinion on a player, he said it. And he had a way of saying it that was sometimes humorous. The way he could take a bad ball game, in some of those bad years especially, and turn it into a fun broadcast, whether it was by talking about something in the game or whether it was talking about something that didn’t have anything to do with the game, maybe it was a movie that was coming up after the game or maybe it was a restaurant that he’d gone to. It could have been anything. He was just a very entertaining broadcaster and a very good one. The game was still the most important thing, but if game was decided by the fourth or fifth inning, people would still watch the rest of the game just to hear what he had to say about things. That’s a very, very unique ability.”

AJC staff writers compiled other reactions, including the star of the 1980s Braves.

“I knew that he had been battling some health issues, but I was just really shocked and saddened when I got the e-mail,” former Braves star Dale Murphy said upon receiving the news that longtime Braves broadcaster Skip Caray died Sunday at his Atlanta home. “And I was grateful for the many years I was able to be with Skip from 1976 until 1990. Skip saw the funny side of things and enjoyed making people laugh when we weren’t giving them too much to smile about during some of those years that I was with the Braves.”

Mark Bradley:

Skip Caray was to Atlanta professional sports what Larry Munson is to the Georgia Bulldogs — the voice and the conscience, the history and the hilarity. Skip told us what was happening, yes, but Skip also told us what Skip made of what was happening, and over the course of four decades Skip’s prism became ours.

He came here with the Hawks, and he became part of our extended family — a crusty uncle, if you will — through his work with the Braves. The SuperStation beamed his imperfect voice from sea to shining sea, and though there were always others alongside — the Professor and Ernie at the beginning, Don and Joe later on — Skip was the one we thought we knew best. He was the funny one, the snarky one. He was Harry Caray’s son and Chip Caray’s dad, but somehow he was always just Skip.

As Munson is to worry, Skip was to grousing. He wasn’t from the neo-announcer’s school of happy talk. Skip hated the Wave and the Infield-Fly Rule and said as much at every opportunity. When he did a call-in show on WSB in the ’80s, he suffered clever callers only grudgingly and the bozos not at all. But because he was Skip, we didn’t much mind.

Indeed, that was the beauty (and the incongruity) of Skip Caray: In an industry predicated on likeability, he really didn’t care if you liked him or not. He said what he thought — near the end of a lopsided game, he famously intoned: “If you promise to patronize our sponsors, you have permission to go walk the dog” — and if he happened to ruffle the tender sensibilities of listeners or management … well, tough.

It’s cliche but true: We’ll never see his like again.

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