Four Downs with Dang & Doc
by Brian Davis and Paul Hopkins
4/2/2010
This week Dang and Doc reflect on whether Matt Leinart is ready to step into Kurt Warner’s shoes in Arizona and whether the Pro Bowl is now of so little value that it should be scrapped. Meanwhile Mike Vick is probably scouting the league to see if he’s got a chance to start somewhere and our pundits offer their thoughts on where that might be. Finally, Chan Gailey is the new Head Coach in Buffalo; is that the worst job in the NFL?
 With Kurt Warner retiring, Matt Leinart is ready to step into his shoes in Arizona.
DANG – FICTION ! - Leinart is a rabbit in the headlights. Another product of the USC Quarter Back club who isn’t actually that great and isn’t worth the hype. Alex Smith never got an easy ride like Leinart gets and Leinart had it all when he had the chance; A nice O line, Larry Fitzgerald, Anquan Boldin and he still couldn’t get the job done, yet here we are, Warner (a Hall of famer) retires and Leinart’s getting another easy ride, “they’ll still win the division” yadda yadda yadda. What did Alex Smith have? A woeful Offensive line that were more like turn-styles and a bunch of guys who couldn’t catch swine flu if they hung out with a bunch of pigs, naked in arctic conditions, and yet he’s STILL slated to this day. Granted, he’s not great, but he’s better than Leinart. Leinart didn’t get it done before, what makes people think he’s going to get it done now? He’s already failed when given a chance and lost his job back to Warner. If he hasn’t learnt anything now then we can start chucking the BUST word around. This year is MASSIVE for him and the Cardinals. He’s had his 3 years sitting and learning, he’s sat behind one of the greatest of modern times, now’s his time to step up to the plate in the same mould that Aaron Rodgers did behind Brett Favre. Can Leinart do it? No. Will I be eating these words in December? No. Leinart. B.U.S.T.
DOC – FICTION ! – If he isn’t now then he never will be. And I am someone who doesn’t buy into the Leinart hype and never has. His arm strength is suspect and always has been after shoulder surgery when at USC. Furthermore, I think that saying as that we are now entering his fourth season in Arizona that he has barely made an impact when other QBs taken in 2006 – Vince Young, Jay Cutler have now established themselves as starters despite having setbacks themselves, speaks volumes. I understand that it is usual convention in the NFL that rookies sit and learn for two and three years and this has become increasingly less prevalent in recent years due to the expectation and the money usually involved in acquiring these players. But we have seen QBs come into the league and win Super Bowls in the amount of time Leinart has had. I just remain to be convinced it’s there and will emerge. To go from a future Hall of Famer to an unknown commodity is a threat to what has become the Cardinals dominance in the West. If I was Ken Wisenhunt I’d be considering watching Leinart very closely with one eye, and keeping another on the list of free agents and who might be available for a trade. I’m not in the least bit surprised that rumours are already gathering momentum that they’re looking for some veteran help.
 Should the Pro Bowl be scrapped altogether?
DANG – FICTION !. We need to re-evaluate the whole process of it though. Miami was a farce, we can almost asterisk* anybody who made it in 2009/2010 season, it became an absolute circus. If Roger Goodell thinks otherwise then he’s whack. A few ways to improve it for the better:
1 – Move it back to Hawaii
2 – Move it back to the Week after the Super Bowl
3 – Forfeit the fan vote actually counting
4 – If you “opt out” or miss it through non football reasons then you lose your cheque and your Pro Bowl status for that year.
5 – Get the sports writers more involved in the selection process instead of the fans
6 – Players to receive no money for playing/appearing/being on the roster. Re-allocate the money to a charity of choice of the winning coach/captain/MVP.
It’s sad, when you look back on history, you see these guys who are “10 time Pro Bowlers” and it means something, now it means the square root of FA. I’m sure if Tim Tebow wasn’t actually at the Senior Bowl last weekend he’d have been playing in the bloody Pro Bowl! Vince Young, David Garrard were decent enough, but Pro Bowl? Pro Bowl? Come on, let’s actually have it mean something again. There’s too much favouritism from fans voting in their favourite players every year and it needs to stop, we need to make it a special event again. We need to make it so it actually means something again. We should see the best players turning out every year because they deserve it, not because a bunch of spotty geeks with nothing better to do with their squalid lives sit and vote them in repeatedly.
Here’s a thought, how about the Pro Bowl in London????
DOC – FACT ! A millions times yes! They’ve tried to give it more meaning or something; I’m not quite sure what, this season by moving it to the location of the Super bowl and holding it a week before the big game as opposed to a week after. And it’s left us with David Garrard and Vince Young joining Matt Schaub for the AFC for crying out loud! Nothing against them but we’re not even getting to see the players people selected in the first place. Add in Random Roger’s dictat from the mount that the Saints and Colts players have to be in Miami ahead of the rest of their team for a pointless meet and greet, rather than stay with their teams and in some cases like Dwight Freeney, get treatment for injuries. It is absolutely farcical. And then there’s the issue we all have with the voting procedures, which give almost a pass to some players on an annual basis regardless of performance. I am sure that the players enjoy their week in the sun and all that, but seriously what is the point of the prestige and focus given to this game? Rid us of this nonsense please!
 Give me a place where Mike Vick could end up starting next season:
DANG – Buffalo. Oakland. St Louis. Seattle, Washington. How many do you want? All of the mentioned could do with a quick fix at Quarterback. The draft this year, which previously looked pretty good, now looks a little bare and other than Clausen or Bradford (even though he’s fragile) I don’t see much starting material out there, at least not immediately. Vick will give any of these teams an upgrade. I’m not sure whether Shanahan takes him at Washington in all reality. Jason Campbell is serviceable for another season, he needs more weapons to throw too though as what he currently has, isn’t that great. Oakland, the capital of misfits, crazy goings on and Al Davis could well be tempted; they can then move JaMarcus to Right Tackle and get some value for money. St Louis will be interested, Bulger looks done for, they can take Suh with the #1 pick who should be a can’t miss guy and not worry about what’s left at the top of Round 2 or trying to project a Colt McCoy or Tony Pike who aren’t likely going to be good enough to start immediately. Buffalo, rumoured to possibly be sniffing around, could that prompt T.O into staying another year or signing a new deal with them? I doubt it, but Ryan Fitzpatrick and Trent Edwards do not look the future or the kind of guys you can rebuild your franchise with. Seattle, similar situation to St Louis really, struggling franchise, beat up quarterback in his 30’s, no notable backup, rebuilding, two first round picks in April that they can look at fixing greater needs and then they might well look to local boy Jake Locker in the 2011 draft.
DOC – Oakland – Not the most likely destination for the world’s most famous dog fighter. But when you add everything up it makes sense. The Raiders do need a QB. Even they’ve got to the point where they’ve had enough of JaMarcus Russell, but is Bruce Gradkowski the answer? Hardly. So they have to be looking around the league to try and find someone somewhere that is an upgrade. Vick would fit the bill. He’d also fit the bill in terms of the stereotypical Al Davis football player – he’s a great athlete with great speed. And as a QB he can throw a deep ball. I’d be surprised, given the likely low price tag for Vick – as little as a conditional sixth or seventh rounder according to rumours, if a host of teams don’t look at him. Buffalo seem to have acknowledged that they’re in the market for a trigger man. Carolina’s QB position doesn’t look too secure although you suspect that job is Matt Moore’s to win. The Rams remain awful on offence, and Vick could potentially offer an upgrade – and his mobility would help behind that offensive line. Whatever happens, I think we’ll be seeing a lot more of Vick in 2010.
 Is being Head Coach in Buffalo the worst job in football?
DANG – FICTION !. I think that “pleasure” must surely lie at the current mess that is Oakland. Buffalo are not far behind but there’s light at the end of the tunnel for them, it’s not a guy coming the other way with a torch. Bill Cowher was never going to take it. The consensus seems to be that he’ll patiently wait for the Carolina job if and when it comes up. Chan Gailey isn’t a bad appointment. The news didn’t set Buffalo alight, but the guy has a decent record as an Offensive Coordinator at Pittsburgh and Miami whilst also having a good record at Georgia Tech as Head coach and then totally tore up the playbook in Kansas City to actually turn them into a team that despite finishing 2-14 actually started to get it together, with Tyler Thigpen! I fancy Gailey to bring some of that spread offense to Buffalo and will turn them around from a 3-13 team to head towards a .500 season in a tough AFC East division. I know the Bills fans have had a hard time in the last 10 years or so, but give it another 2 seasons and we’ll see the Bills back and troubling the Patriots, Dolphins and Jets for top dogs in the East.
DOC – FACT ! Probably. The Bills are stuck between a rock and a hard place at present. It seemed like they tried ever so hard to catch one of the big name fish in the coaching pool – Mike Shanahan and Bill Cowher were both linked, to varying degrees with the job. But realistically what would possess either of them to take this job? As a franchise year on year it limps along under the radar and continually underperforms. Ralph Wilson as an owner is not getting any older and the rumours about the franchise upping sticks to Toronto permanently rather than once a year just won’t go away and will likely only get bigger over time. So it’s an incredibly tough job and a very tough sell to try and get someone in and that’s probably highlighted in the appointment they just made. Gailey can run offences pretty well but he’s not exactly a top drawer Head Coach. It’s a tough job, albeit one that any coach aspiring to become a Head Coach would take, but given the chance I believe there’s 31 other better jobs out there.
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