tk13
01-07-2006, 02:12 AM
http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/sports/13569922.htm
NOW IT’S HERM’S TURN
What’s all the fighting about?
JOE POSNANSKI
Kansas City Star
The question is: Why was this so hard? We’ve finally reached the predictable end of Herm Warfare Week. The Chiefs got Herman Edwards. The Jets got a draft pick. It really could not have ended any other way. But it was so much harder than necessary.
This was one ugly trip. There are battered carcasses and bloody New York tabloid back pages scattered along the road. Everybody took a beating this week, Jets, Chiefs, media types, Herm himself. Especially Herm. I thought at some point unnamed Jets sources were going to blame him for the Bird Flu.
What a week. It was like a John le Carre novel (I’m bluffing here; I’ve never read a John le Carre novel. He writes about espionage, right?). There were broken promises, spilled secrets, fantastic threats, car chases and unnamed sources galore. Herman Edwards probably had no idea that he has so many sources “close to him.” He should take half of his new salary and buy them all a drink.
Look, three things seemed pretty obvious at the start of this crazy week:
A. Herman Edwards wanted out of New York.
B. The New York Jets and their fans weren’t too crazy about him either.
C. Chiefs President/CEO/general manager/makeup artist Carl Peterson wanted very much to hire Edwards, an old friend and protégé.
Now, I was never much good at logic, but it seems to me that you take A+B+C and you’ve got a simple answer: The Jets trade Edwards to the Chiefs, right? Be honest, cut a quiet deal and move on.
Instead: Everybody denied everything.
A. Herman Edwards denied that he wanted out of New York. No, he loved New York. He was spotted ice skating at Rockefeller Center. “I’m happy to be coach here and I’m going to be coach here,” he told the New York Post. He told the other papers more or less the same thing. I’m guessing nobody believed him.
B. New York announced it loved Herman Edwards. No named person said this, of course — call the Jets the “No-Name Front Office” — but unnamed sources close to the situation wanted everyone to know they were dying to have Edwards back. They announced he was some cross between Lombardi and Landry. They would not give him up for anything (short of a third-round draft pick, of course).
C. Carl Peterson did not say anything at all. Give him that. He was quieter than western Kansas. Still, he went around interviewing perfectly fine candidates he had absolutely no intention of hiring — Ron Meeks, anyone? — and he gave every impression that he might not want Herman Edwards, that he had, in fact, never heard of Herman Edwards.
So it went. People were so busy denying truth and changing positions, that after a while everybody got confused, and Carl Peterson thought he was the Jets coach, two New York front-office people mistakenly gave their names out, and Herm Edwards briefly accepted the first-base coaching job with the New York Mets. It was mayhem.
Reporters in New York and Kansas City and across the Internet did not know which way to turn, so they turned inside out. They reported that Herm Edwards wanted a contract extension. They reported that the Jets were furious with Edwards and wanted him out. They reported the deal was done. They reported the deal was dead. They reported that Herm would get fired, he would come back, he would back into a fire. They reported he had cleaned out his office, they reported his office was already clean, they reported a maid service arrived, they reported he would be the Chiefs coach, the Jets coach, a stagecoach, the coach of a team with no name and that he would play Robert Langdon in the movie version of The Da Vinci Code.
Well, hey, it’s awfully hard to get at the truth in these confusing times. It is hard for me to understand why grown men couldn’t have just worked this deal out when the Chiefs, Jets and Edwards all wanted, more or less, the same thing.
It all comes back to one of my favorite sports lines, one I’ve written before, from Cincinnati Bengals president Mike Brown. He and an agent tangled for months over quarterback David Klingler (let’s hope Herm turns out a little better than that). It got nasty at times, and for a while it looked as if a deal might not get done. In the end, of course, the Bengals and Klingler worked it out. They signed a deal exactly in the middle.
When Brown was asked, “Couldn’t you guys have saved all this time and just met in the middle months ago?” he shrugged.
“It’s unfortunate,” Brown said. “But it’s the fact.”
And that’s the deal here. Unfortunate. And a fact. It’s done now. How did the Chiefs do? Well, that’s a mixed bag, too. Herman Edwards seems like a genuinely decent guy and fine coach. And Jets fans more or less were ready for him to go. He took the Jets to the playoffs three times in five years. He also coached the Jets to an injury-splattered 4-12 record last season. Players love playing for him. He has struggled at times with game management. He has a big heart. He’s thin-skinned. He’s won two playoff games. He hired Paul Hackett to be offensive coordinator. He built a good defense. He coaches conservatively enough that he should wear pinstriped suits on the sideline.
In other words: He’s got good and bad. He’s not a thrilling choice, but have you looked out there? It’s like Coaches of the Living Dead. There are a bunch of coaching openings and few good candidates. Bad combination. General managers are interviewing all the same coaching shlubs, and they’re all named Jim. Jim Haslett. Jim Fassel. Jim Hanifan. Jim Mora. Jim Belushi. Yeesh, it’s scary out there.
And so, in that environment, you can see why the Chiefs hired Edwards. He’s solid. Sure, a lot of us would have liked for Peterson to hire Al Saunders, a good man who has spent, altogether, 15 years in Kansas City. Saunders did coach the best offense in the NFL the last four years. He has been a head coach. But Peterson obviously wants to go in a different direction, a more defensive direction, and Edwards is his pride and joy.
I don’t know whether after this crazy week, the Chiefs are any closer to the Super Bowl. We’ll have to see how Herm coaches here, what kind of staff he hires, if Will Shields come back, etc. But I think the Chiefs are probably in pretty good hands. They should be a playoff team next year, anyway. And as for the Jets, well, they look to face a new future, probably with some coach named Jim. At least he will have a name.
NOW IT’S HERM’S TURN
What’s all the fighting about?
JOE POSNANSKI
Kansas City Star
The question is: Why was this so hard? We’ve finally reached the predictable end of Herm Warfare Week. The Chiefs got Herman Edwards. The Jets got a draft pick. It really could not have ended any other way. But it was so much harder than necessary.
This was one ugly trip. There are battered carcasses and bloody New York tabloid back pages scattered along the road. Everybody took a beating this week, Jets, Chiefs, media types, Herm himself. Especially Herm. I thought at some point unnamed Jets sources were going to blame him for the Bird Flu.
What a week. It was like a John le Carre novel (I’m bluffing here; I’ve never read a John le Carre novel. He writes about espionage, right?). There were broken promises, spilled secrets, fantastic threats, car chases and unnamed sources galore. Herman Edwards probably had no idea that he has so many sources “close to him.” He should take half of his new salary and buy them all a drink.
Look, three things seemed pretty obvious at the start of this crazy week:
A. Herman Edwards wanted out of New York.
B. The New York Jets and their fans weren’t too crazy about him either.
C. Chiefs President/CEO/general manager/makeup artist Carl Peterson wanted very much to hire Edwards, an old friend and protégé.
Now, I was never much good at logic, but it seems to me that you take A+B+C and you’ve got a simple answer: The Jets trade Edwards to the Chiefs, right? Be honest, cut a quiet deal and move on.
Instead: Everybody denied everything.
A. Herman Edwards denied that he wanted out of New York. No, he loved New York. He was spotted ice skating at Rockefeller Center. “I’m happy to be coach here and I’m going to be coach here,” he told the New York Post. He told the other papers more or less the same thing. I’m guessing nobody believed him.
B. New York announced it loved Herman Edwards. No named person said this, of course — call the Jets the “No-Name Front Office” — but unnamed sources close to the situation wanted everyone to know they were dying to have Edwards back. They announced he was some cross between Lombardi and Landry. They would not give him up for anything (short of a third-round draft pick, of course).
C. Carl Peterson did not say anything at all. Give him that. He was quieter than western Kansas. Still, he went around interviewing perfectly fine candidates he had absolutely no intention of hiring — Ron Meeks, anyone? — and he gave every impression that he might not want Herman Edwards, that he had, in fact, never heard of Herman Edwards.
So it went. People were so busy denying truth and changing positions, that after a while everybody got confused, and Carl Peterson thought he was the Jets coach, two New York front-office people mistakenly gave their names out, and Herm Edwards briefly accepted the first-base coaching job with the New York Mets. It was mayhem.
Reporters in New York and Kansas City and across the Internet did not know which way to turn, so they turned inside out. They reported that Herm Edwards wanted a contract extension. They reported that the Jets were furious with Edwards and wanted him out. They reported the deal was done. They reported the deal was dead. They reported that Herm would get fired, he would come back, he would back into a fire. They reported he had cleaned out his office, they reported his office was already clean, they reported a maid service arrived, they reported he would be the Chiefs coach, the Jets coach, a stagecoach, the coach of a team with no name and that he would play Robert Langdon in the movie version of The Da Vinci Code.
Well, hey, it’s awfully hard to get at the truth in these confusing times. It is hard for me to understand why grown men couldn’t have just worked this deal out when the Chiefs, Jets and Edwards all wanted, more or less, the same thing.
It all comes back to one of my favorite sports lines, one I’ve written before, from Cincinnati Bengals president Mike Brown. He and an agent tangled for months over quarterback David Klingler (let’s hope Herm turns out a little better than that). It got nasty at times, and for a while it looked as if a deal might not get done. In the end, of course, the Bengals and Klingler worked it out. They signed a deal exactly in the middle.
When Brown was asked, “Couldn’t you guys have saved all this time and just met in the middle months ago?” he shrugged.
“It’s unfortunate,” Brown said. “But it’s the fact.”
And that’s the deal here. Unfortunate. And a fact. It’s done now. How did the Chiefs do? Well, that’s a mixed bag, too. Herman Edwards seems like a genuinely decent guy and fine coach. And Jets fans more or less were ready for him to go. He took the Jets to the playoffs three times in five years. He also coached the Jets to an injury-splattered 4-12 record last season. Players love playing for him. He has struggled at times with game management. He has a big heart. He’s thin-skinned. He’s won two playoff games. He hired Paul Hackett to be offensive coordinator. He built a good defense. He coaches conservatively enough that he should wear pinstriped suits on the sideline.
In other words: He’s got good and bad. He’s not a thrilling choice, but have you looked out there? It’s like Coaches of the Living Dead. There are a bunch of coaching openings and few good candidates. Bad combination. General managers are interviewing all the same coaching shlubs, and they’re all named Jim. Jim Haslett. Jim Fassel. Jim Hanifan. Jim Mora. Jim Belushi. Yeesh, it’s scary out there.
And so, in that environment, you can see why the Chiefs hired Edwards. He’s solid. Sure, a lot of us would have liked for Peterson to hire Al Saunders, a good man who has spent, altogether, 15 years in Kansas City. Saunders did coach the best offense in the NFL the last four years. He has been a head coach. But Peterson obviously wants to go in a different direction, a more defensive direction, and Edwards is his pride and joy.
I don’t know whether after this crazy week, the Chiefs are any closer to the Super Bowl. We’ll have to see how Herm coaches here, what kind of staff he hires, if Will Shields come back, etc. But I think the Chiefs are probably in pretty good hands. They should be a playoff team next year, anyway. And as for the Jets, well, they look to face a new future, probably with some coach named Jim. At least he will have a name.