Category Archives: Bill Polian

Bill Polian, Denver Broncos, Indianapolis Colts, Jim Irsay, NFL, Peyton Manning

The Book on Manning

On Sunday night, Peyton Manning returns to Indianapolis to play professional football in a state-of-the-art football stadium he played a large role in getting built.
Perhaps you have heard of this little fact. If not, let me know once you’re out from underneath that rock and I’ll fill you in on government shutdowns, Miley Cyrus and this new thing called the iPhone.
In all seriousness, Peyton’s return to Indy as the quarterback of the Denver Broncos continues to grow in significance with each passing day. This is due largely to the fact that the Broncos are undefeated, that Peyton Manning is doing Peyton Manning like things, you know, generally embarrassing defenses with an offense so cutting and precise, it would make a slew of surgeons, architects and engineers jealous.
But Peyton has always done this, or at least it has felt like he has. Now there’s that undertone flowing into this Sunday’s game with the Colts, that imagine what he could do if he were still there and that the Colts might have given up on him.
So of course, the normally quiet and reserved owner of the Colts, Jim Irsay, spoke up about this after a litany of questions this week.
Actually, again, unless you living Patrick Starfish-style under a rock, you know that it was the exact opposite – Irsay talks constantly, about anything and everything under the sun, without prompting. His comments about wishing the Colts would have won more Super Bowls weren’t really controversial; it was the truth.
The media has latched on to the story this week, but that’s what the media does.
If you’ve seen the “Book of Manning” documentary, then you can get the background needed to write the book on Peyton Manning. He’s prepared, flawless, exceptional, born to play quarterback and thrives by knowing every possible situation and outcome – like a mathematical genius that sees every possible outcome before it happens.
But being built in such a way does not leave room for randomness, spontaneity, surprise. What happens when things go wrong and something does not go as planned. This is where, as we learned from that documentary, where Peyton’s father, Archie thrived.
And by watching old footage of Archie – even that crazy scrimmage game in the late 1980s at Ole Miss – you can see it: Archie just kind of made things up.
You know which one of Archie’s sons does that now? Eli – not Peyton. Just look at the New York Giants Super Bowl wins, the playoff runs, the regular season games where they look out of it. Eli scrambles, chucks and pulls rabbits out of his hat.
Peyton’s act is no magician; he’s a professional quarterback. As such, the book on Peyton has always been that he’s exceptional in the regular season, but come playoff time, he’s not very good. It happened at Tennessee and it definitely happened with the Colts.
Now, that’s not meant to place the blame of first-round exits and humiliating defeats in the playoffs at the hands of Peyton Manning. Football is more nuanced than that. But just look at the key interception of the Super Bowl loss to the Saints. Is Reggie Wayne to blame for that costly pick? Or, could it be that Peyton is such a tactician, he threw it to the pre-programmed spot on the field where Reggie was supposed to be? Who’s actually at fault, Wayne for not being there, for a variety of reasons – or Peyton for not adjusting his read and throwing it anyway?
This could obviously spiral off into a multi-layered conversation if we actually rehashed even just that one play.
The overall point: nothing Irsay said about Peyton was inaccurate, and frankly, not that controversial. How can you not have wished to have won more than one ring with perhaps the greatest quarterback of all-time taking you to the playoffs 11 years? The same has been said about the Atlanta Braves of the 1990s with their incredible pitching staff of Glavine, Smoltz and Maddux.
As I heard earlier this week, the real and hidden swipe might have been at Bill Polian, with Irsay essentially saying Polian could bring the horse to the water, but couldn’t make it drink. While slightly unfair – and kind of uncalled for, considering what Polian did, it also might be just inaccurate.
Polian had a tough task of building an entire franchise around Peyton, and accordingly, he put together a team that could play from ahead defensively, since that was the goal: Peyton gets you a lead, pin your ears back and go after the other team aggressively on the defensive front.
It did work. Polian cannot perform on the field, any more than any other sports executive. He assembled the team and accomplished a great deal during his tenure, the likes of which had not been seen either in the NFL or in Indianapolis from a consistency standpoint.
If it was indeed a swipe, it was unfair and needless.
But let the good fans in Indy not waste any time thinking about what could be currently. It was time to change direction, switch things up and try a new approach. And clearly, we didn’t know if Peyton would return to form like this. We still don’t know if it will last for more than a year or two.
The Broncos were simply a better fit last season. They looked a lot like Manning’s 2000s Colts. Still do, just more dangerous weapons and a better overall defense. We shall see if this translates to another 13-3 season and a bitter playoff failure, or, perhaps a Super Bowl.
For the Colts, Andrew Luck couldn’t be a better fit. It could not have worked out better.
Is it going to be awkward Sunday night? Of course. These things always are. Without Manning, the city may not even have a pro football team, let alone a new stadium. It certainly wouldn’t have the Super Bowl banner it has.
But every legend leaves with a little gas left in the tank. The Colts just didn’t want to be left holding the keys when it went empty. They saw a chance for another once-in-a-generation quarterback who fit their city and style perfectly and they took it.
Its sports. It is how these things work. Would the Colts be better off with Peyton right now? There’s no real way to know for sure. We’re not in an alternate world where he is with the Colts, we just have what we see.
And for all that he did accomplish, for basically saving football in Indiana, the fans will give him a standing ovation, Peyton will be humble, gracious and appreciative. The game will start and aside from the crowd not giving him the benefit of pin-drop quiet he’s used to in Lucas Oil Stadium, it will be fine.
While it will be easy to look back at the end of the season or in five years and point out what happened as evidence either way, just remember this: it seemed right and natural at the time. Because as crazy as Jim Irsay is, he was not necessarily incorrect (this time).
The book on this Manning may not be complete, but the preceding chapters to this one have told a story, and not every page was perfect.
We did want more.

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Bill Polian, DeMarcus Cousins, Jon Gruden, Mike Krzyzewski, NBA, NFL, Paul Westphal, Raheem Morris, Tom Coughlin, Tony Sparano

Face the Firing Squad

I have to pose the question, in light of current events, why would anyone want to coach in professional sports? You have the shortest leash of perhaps any job in America with the most unrealistic expectations combined with the most volatile conditions.
Perhaps it is the pay. Or maybe it is the power. It certainly would be the pinnacle of the profession.
On Monday, a day after the conclusion of the NFL season, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers fired head coach Raheem Morris. The St. Louis Rams also parted ways with Steve Spagnuolo, the Chicago Bears fired general manager Jerry Angelo and ended the services of Mike Martz as offensive coordinator. The Indianapolis Colts let go of Bill Polian and his son, Chris. The Miami Dolphins also fired Tony Sparano. And that’s just what I could think of off the top of my head, there could have been more.
But then today the Sacramento Kings fired Paul Westphal, just seven games into the season – just 11 days after the season began on Christmas Day.
Even with the NBA’s reduced 66-game schedule, that’s the equivalent of an NFL team firing a coach after one game.
Were these firings justified? In the proper context, perhaps.
With a bigger picture outlook, what exactly do we require from coaches? Better yet, why do we keep rehiring the same ones who failed so miserably prior to their current position?
Because it is not a “what do we want” from them issue. That much is clear: championships. Owners and fans want coaches who bring gold back at the end of a season.
But realistically, 31 coaches will not win a championship each year in the NFL. Roughly the same number of losers exists each year in the NBA and Major League Baseball.
We somehow operate under the premise that every team should be good or make the playoffs in every sport. They can’t.

No, really, they can’t.

Some teams are just bad and will remain that way until a coach has enough time to put his practices and methodologies in place and the players respond accordingly.

But the instant a team doesn’t make a miraculous worst-to-first turnaround we get jealous, demand our favorite teams get the same and grab the pitchforks, banners and start shouting, “Fire him. Fire him now!”

We certainly love teams that click and quickly succeed after recent failures, but in reality, they fuel the cycle. In turn, it ends up shortening the lease for the coach who did it.

Morris’ Tampa Bay team clearly underachieved this season. A promising team with talent that won 10 games in 2010, they won just four games this season. In three years, Morris went 17-31 after replacing Jon Gruden, who was in turn let go by the Buccaneers in 2008, after he went 57-55 with the team over seven seasons.
Gruden’s tenure included three division championships and a Super Bowl win.
I suppose if Gruden wasn’t doing a good enough job for his boss, Morris certainly was not, either. But Morris wasn’t coaching Gruden’s players; the Bucs has a ton of young talent come in through the draft, playing in a division against the likes of Atlanta and New Orleans, two teams who have been perennial playoff teams in recent years.
The Colts firings seem most justified, as they poor draft selections over the past five years were radically and violently exposed to the fan base and to the rest of the league once Peyton Manning sat out the season following a series of neck surgeries. A team that finished 14-2 and lost a tight Super Bowl to New Orleans just two seasons ago – and went 10-6 and made the playoffs last year with nearly the exact same roster – managed to start out 0-13 in 2011 and finished 2-14 with the rights to the No. 1 pick in April’s draft.
As I wrote in the fall – someone has to lose their job over this in Indy, and someone did. Perhaps Jim Caldwell is safe because it has been evaluated that the coaching is acceptable, but the talent is poor.
Look, I’m all for change if something’s not working. I advocated for Polian’s firing, as well as Caldwell’s, earlier this season. I questioned Caldwell’s methods and his credentials and the man responsible for hiring him and picking the players in Indianapolis.
But I’m also in favor of a good stew, which takes time to cook and requires patience and the right ingredients.

And here’s where we have to start really analyzing everything.

Why didn’t the Dolphins just fire Sparano after the 0-7 start? Why do it after the team rallies around him and wins six of its final nine games? Isn’t it humiliating and emasculating to continue to coach a team knowing what’s floating out in the media?
Why fire Westphal a few days after the season begins? How did his job approval amongst his employers drop so drastically in 11 days that he was canned? Why not just fire him during the offseason, you know, the one with the lockout that saw the NBA not play a game for six (!) months? Did this have something to do with DeMarcus Cousins and the trade demand?
There’s goals, aspirations and then there are realistic (and in many cases, unrealistic) expectations.
I read a recent interview with Duke head men’s basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski. Coach K’s third season at Duke was abysmal. In 1982-83, Duke was 11-17 and 7th in the ACC. He said if he had began his career 20 years later, he would have been fired. But in a time where people were allowed to truly build a program and had ownership support, or in this case, school support, Coach K got Duke on the right track shortly thereafter. In the roughly 30 years since that 1982-93 season, Duke has won four national champions, made the NCAA Tournament 28 times in 29 years and advanced to the Sweet 16 or better 22 times.
Look at it this way: who are these NFL teams going to hire? Most likely a former NFL coach who had his own ups and downs in the past.
Ironically, Gruden is one of the hottest coaching prospects despite his intentions to stay on as a member of the ESPN “Monday Night Football” broadcast team. The same guy who was barely .500 in seven seasons with Tampa Bay.
Coaches are getting hired and they turn right around and start a game of Russian roulette with job security.
What were the Kings goals for Westphal when he took the job? I can’t imagine the Kings told Westphal, “We’ll have to let you go if you enter Year 3 with a 2-5 record 11 days into the season.” Never mind the incredibly raw talent Westphal has to work with in Tyreke Evans and DeMarcus Cousins (a head case).
What we need are more specific boundaries and performance plans for professional coaches. Maybe they should be unionizing in professional sports coaching like players do. Because this little game we play makes it awfully difficult to believe coaches have any real authority over their players.
They have little time to follow through on the ideas and plans that probably got them hired in the first place.
Yet we’re up and down on coaches all the time. Tom Coughlin went from the “This Seat Is So Hot My Pants Are On Fire” back in 2006 to winning the Super Bowl and receiving a lucrative contract extension in about 12 months.

How does that happen? Was Coughlin really that bad or really that good? Or was it somewhere in the middle?

There is something to be said for longevity. Not just in a coach sustaining it, but being given it.

In December 2008, I wrote a similar column about this topic, when six NBA head coaches had already been fired in the first month and a half of that season.

Reggie Theus was fired in Sacramento after the Kings’ 6-18 start. Bad? Absolutely. Indefensible? Not entirely.
In 2007 the Kings traded away their best player and most valuable commodity, guard Mike Bibby. At the time of Theus’ firing, Kevin Martin, Brad Miller and Francisco Garcia, the Kings’ best players, had missed significant time.

So the question I posed three years ago was this: who are the Kings going to bring in to coach this team and make them that much better for the duration of the season?

And, if you’re going to fire a coach, why not do it during the offseason? Unless, his name is Isiah Thomas, you’re basically wasting your time.

Nowadays, it would take a coach six or seven teams (or more) over 15 years (or more) to accomplish what they have.

It’s a merry-go-round of professional coaching. No new ideas, but the same astonished reactions when these coaches fail all over again. At what point do coaches just stop interviewing when these jobs open up, since they know they will be fired sooner rather than later?

For once, I’m glad I’m not involved in professional sports.

There’s more stability in the current job market.
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Andrew Luck, Bill Polian, Indianapolis Colts, Jim Caldwell, Jim Irsay, NFL, Peyton Manning

What Goes Around…

The Indianapolis Colts are 0-10. They have lost their last four games by a combined 110 points. Coincidentally, they lost their fans about four games ago, too, when they were beaten 62-7 on national television by the New Orleans Saints.
And last Monday, their head coach, Jim Caldwell, said this: “You can see that they [the players] are going to fight you until the end.”

Everyone smiled happily and nodded. Unicorns danced about the room and Colts owner Jim Irsay sang a song about Caldwell’s lucrative contract extension while playing his acoustic guitar.
Fine, I made those last two sentences up. In fact, it was the total opposite. I was waiting for the next question to be from someone called “Reality” who asked if Caldwell had ever visited him or if he just sent postcards from Fantasyland.
Caldwell says the Colts are just going to keep playing and playing extremely hard. Odd, as most of us are wondering if the Colts knew that the season started two months ago. Perhaps the lockout threw off their internal clocks and they think it’s still preseason, because I can’t come up with any rational explanation for why the Indianapolis Colts are 0-10 and by far and away the worst team in professional football.
As I wrote last month, someone’s got to get fired over this. But that’s not the issue to me anymore. You don’t get to 0-10 and it’s just the coach.
It’s pathetic to watch the effort, or in this case, the lack thereof, the Colts display on weekly basis. And I can’t help but wonder what sports karma has to do with all this? If, possibly, past sporting sins are catching up to the Colts.
The thought process is simple, if even by my own admission somewhat silly: what you do as an organization, what your players do, how your owner acts, how you win and lose plays into future results.
For example, I’ve long believed that Jerry Jones is the reason the Dallas Cowboys haven’t won a playoff game in 12 years. He’s a smothering figure over that franchise and their drama over the years is comeuppance for that.
Likewise, I think sports karma can work for and against you at the same time. The New England Patriots openly declared they were chasing perfection in 2008 and were rewarded with a perfect regular season. However, they ran up the score and illegally taped some opponents, so sports karma put velco on David Tyree’s helmet in the Super Bowl, leaving the Patriots with the moniker of greatest regular season team to not win a Super Bowl.
Perhaps what the Colts are experiencing now are ramifications from all the years where they didn’t go for it, when they didn’t rest their players. Everyone should be trying to win every game, because, in essence, that is the backbone of sports. You are giving your full effort against an opponent who’s giving his best effort. Someone wins, someone looses. But the common thread is the integrity with which the game was played.
Maybe karma decided it broke the integrity of the game by not playing all their games to the best of their ability and always setting their sights on the playoffs.
Why teams rest players, I’ll never fully understand. You play to win the game! (copyright, Herm Edwards). How many sports do you see rest your best players? How often does it work out well and the team that does the resting does the winning of a championship? More often than not, it’s the hot team that fought and kept working that wins the title (the Green Bay Packers last year, St. Louis Cardinals last month).
But wait, you say, what about teams that don’t fall behind and are good like the Colts were? Well, did you see the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls take their foot of the gas? How about the 1998 New York Yankees? It’s often fun to prove how much better you are – in both the regular season and the postseason.
The minute you start getting ahead of yourself and eyeballing the playoffs or setting your lineup or protecting your players, karma seems to get irritated.
And I’m only half-serious. I don’t widely suspect this is the case. I don’t really, deeply believe in karma. I’m Catholic for crying out loud. But I can’t say that I’m mildly curious and wondering if all this epic Colts sucktitude isn’t the hair of the dog that bit them.
All those years resting their stars when they were 13-0 or 13-1 or 14-0; all the seasons they took the last couple weeks off to be fresh for a first round drubbing at home at the hands of Bill Volek and the Chargers or Mark Sanchez and the Jets – that has to account for something.
At the time, we probably thought the loss in that year’s playoffs was to a byproduct of the resting players. But Dungy, Caldwell, Polian and the Colts just kept on doing it. Year after year after year. After. Year.
You know, they say insanity is defined as doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different result. Maybe sports karma got pissed off the Colts didn’t ever learn their lesson?
Forget the theories of how resting players prevents injuries. Athletes get hurt all the time, doing any number of things. That’s not the point. Why keep doing it if it never worked? I mean at some point, doesn’t someone suggest doing it the other way? Why did that light bulb never go off? Why didn’t someone say, “I think, I don’t know for sure…now call me crazy…but possibly…we should play our starters the entire game.”
(Cut to gasping sounds of disbelief and most likely a shattered coffee cup. I really see the whole thing in playing out in slow motion as Polian was the one who dropped the cup and screamed “Nnnnnnoooooo!”.)
For a team that never approached anything from the standpoint of being “in the moment”, the Colts, somewhat oddly, also seemed wildly unprepared. From the playoff loses to mediocre teams – again, Billy Volek? – to this whole YWP (Year Without Peyton), to their draft strategy, the Colts always seem frantic, confused and out of sorts.
You’ve been trying to build and sustain a franchise around a quarterback like Manning, that has 12-15 years to win a championship and you waste prime seasons on underwhelming talent in the draft the past five years? You proclaim to be a small market team that can’t spend money in free agency to bring in a big name or marquee talent, but then you don’t draft good talent? It seems, I don’t know, contradictory.
And Jim Sorgi is fine as a backup when a young, vibrant Peyton Manning is between the ages of 25-30. But at some point, around the time your franchise quarterback hits 32 and starts wearing down after 250 consecutive starts, you might want to spend a pick on a decent quarterback. Not even to be Manning’s replacement – just to have a decent backup quarterback.
But all of this seemed to shock the Colts, especially when it was revealed that Peyton wasn’t recovering quickly after having a second offseason neck procedure this summer. And even if the Colts believed that it would only be 4-6 weeks, they could have signed someone who was passable at the quarterback position to keep the team in the hunt.
Yet what did they do? They went and signed one of Polian’s old favorites from his days with Carolina, Kerry Collins. The same Kerry Collins who six weeks before he signed with the Colts, retired because he didn’t want to put in the work. No, really, he said that. Here’s his retirement statement:
“The past several months have brought on much introspection, and I have decided that while my desire to compete on Sundays is still and always will be there, my willingness to commit to the preparation necessary to play another season has waned to a level that I feel is no longer adequate to meet the demands of the position.” – Kerry Collins, July 7, 2011
And the Colts signed him anyway! How do you read that statement and think Collins is a guy who can lead the Colts offense in Peyton Manning’s place, coming off a lockout, with the season opener two and a half weeks away?
If this were a movie, it would be a comedy.
Except no one is laughing. And even worse, and somewhat indefensible, no one is questioning the logic and rationale of the Colts brain trust on how they arrived at this point.
Now, why is that? Why is no one questioning Polian, his son, Irsay or Caldwell? Is it because Andrew Luck is coming to town? All is saved, right? The Colts will just lose their way to the No. 1 pick next April, draft Luck and enter another 12-15 years of competing for championships? I mean, Peyton Manning gave Polian his blessing to look for a quarterback just the other day. Everyone wins!
I don’t know about you, but I have a hard time believing fate will allow that to happen.
For one thing, we have every right at this point to question the heart and integrity of this team and management for how they’ve played out this season. And on some level, I could totally see Luck not panning out. And I’ve got no other reason to say that than this: fate. If Luck went to Miami or some other team, I bet he’d have a fabulous career. But part of me wonders if because of how the Colts operate, how they’ve played (or not in some cases), if Luck wouldn’t get hurt or become Ryan Leaf 2.0 and set the Colts back five years.
And if that happens, they’d be $%# out of luck.
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Bill Polian, Indianapolis Colts, Jim Caldwell, Peyton Manning

Breaking Bad

The Indianapolis Colts are going to fire Jim Caldwell at the end of the season, right?
They have to, don’t they?
Rhetorical questions aside, I’m not sure how they can’t fire him. Although as of right now, Colts team president Bill Polian doesn’t seem to think it’s Caldwell’s fault the Colts are 0-7.
“How you evaluate [Caldwell] is what you do with what he has,” Polian said. “You can’t hold him responsible for injuries. You can’t hold him responsible for an unforeseen surgery [to Peyton Manning] that no one anticipated would happen. The things that he can control, I think he’s done a terrific job of, given where we are from a standpoint of personnel.”
There are a million and one ways to rip that comment to shreds, but we’ll just start here: Caldwell’s done a terrific job? Is Polian watching the games? Coming off a 62-7 loss to the New Orleans Saints? That was a terrific job? If it is, how is bad game planning and a porous defense described? Stupendous?
These aren’t the Detroit Lions that went 0-16 a few years ago – the Colts are just two short seasons removed from a Super Bowl and have made the playoffs for a decade. They can’t be this bad without Manning, can they?
Peyton Manning is invaluable, to be sure. He’s worth many more wins than any replacement player, obviously. But the New England Patriots lost Tom Brady in 2008 for the season in the opening game and still went 11-5. Was his backup better than Manning’s? Turns out, Matt Cassel was better. But we didn’t know that at the time – Cassel had not started a game since high school.
Maybe all this does prove Manning is better than Brady and that even in a season where Manning missed the entire year, he’s still league MVP. We can argue about that at another time.
But maybe the Patriots “system” and head coach are vastly superior. Maybe the Colts problem isn’t injuries to front line, but the incompetence of the front office and coaching staff.
The Colts have the worst defense in the NFL. That’s not a statement or a claim – it’s a fact. They have allowed the most points in the NFL. Does Peyton Manning affect the defense? In some ways, perhaps he does – it was always a defense built upon the notion of playing ahead and rushing the passer. But even with that, did Manning affect the defensive side of the ball that much? Can the defense be this bad?
Call me crazy, but I think it’s perfectly acceptable hold the head coach responsible for the complete failure of the entire team to win a game against a schedule that’s included Cincinnati, Kansas City, Cleveland and an underachieving Tampa Bay team through the first seven weeks.
Some, including me, think that you can hold a coach responsible for lackluster effort and poor game planning. Some nut jobs out there think you can hold a coach responsible for mismanaging his timeouts (last year’s playoff game against the Jets, anyone?). What did Caldwell have on Tony Dungy and Polian anyway to secure the job a year before Dungy retired?
Much like his stoic demeanor and his blank expression in any situation – he’s very Art Shell-ish that way – Caldwell’s resume includes a head coaching stint at Wake Forest where he went 26-63 in eight seasons. The highlight of his tenure with the Deamon Deacons was a 7-5 record and a trip to the prestigious Aloha Bowl in 1999. It was also his only season with a winning record. And for those that may not know, the ACC was pretty weak in the 1990s. Those are the makings of an elite NFL head coach? That and a stint coaching the quarterbacks for Tampa Bay under Dungy?
One would imagine that after Manning’s injury, Polian and owner Jim Irsay would have talked to Caldwell about expectations.
“Look, Jim, we know it’s going to be awfully tough without Peyton this season. As you might expect, reasonable outcomes of the season have been altered. We’re not expecting a Super Bowl or even the playoffs. We’d be thrilled with a winning record, but it’s not like we’d fire you for a losing record. However, just to be clear, you know you have to win a couple games, right? I mean, we can’t rightfully face the fans and media come January and tell them we’re keeping you after a 2-14, 1-15 or 0-16 season, without or without Manning. I mean, Jim, we can’t keep you if don’t squeeze out a few wins.”
But apparently, that didn’t happen.
It’s obvious the Colts have been held together by Peyton’s abilities over the past decade and little else. Reggie Wayne isn’t elite. If he were, he wouldn’t have completely disappeared. Apparently, Austin Collie won’t even be in the league if it weren’t for Manning. Dallas Clark was once among the best tight ends in the league and some sort of hybrid slot receiver-slash-tight end. Now he has stone hand. Freeney and Mathis apparently are only good in a certain defensive scheme where they can pin their ears back and take some risks after Manning’s given them a 21-10 lead.
The other night, during the Sunday Night Football telecast, Dungy defended Caldwell. Of course he did. Caldwell is a Dungy man. But perhaps it was more than that. Perhaps Dungy realized what the rest of us are just coming to realize: that without Peyton Manning, the Colts would have been a dumpster fire the past 12 seasons.
So he has to protect Caldwell because doing so masks the fact that he also benefited from being the head coach of the team Manning played for. Without Manning, Dungy doesn’t win a Super Bowl and his faith and leadership abilities aren’t quite as lauded. His books aren’t best sellers without Peyton Manning.
Dungy is a good man, without question. I’m sure Jim Caldwell is a good man, too. But that’s not the point. The question is, were and are they good coaches without Peyton Manning under center and shredding defenses?
I’ve been highly critical of the Colts for not winning more Super Bowls with Manning. I’ve said they are akin to 1990s Atlanta Braves. But that’s not really accurate. Manning masked the fact that the Colts shouldn’t have been in position to win one title, let alone contend for a decade.
Look, someone has to be the fall guy if this continues and the Colts finish with less than four wins. It’s the way things work.
For example, if Apple sales drop to record lows not seen in over a decade and people revolt on the product, the company can’t just say it’s because they lost Steve Jobs. They can’t afford to just sit on their hands.
It’s the same with Indianapolis. The Colts can’t afford to do it. The fan base, as I predicted, is already cracking.
I’ve eavesdropped on many conversations – at my son’s football practices and games, at work, at the grocery store, at restaurants – and heard the same thing: fans are turning off games. And to my surprise, it’s not all because No. 18 isn’t on the field, it’s because of what else isn’t on the field – effort, desire, heart, and some semblance of football talent.
People are fed up. After seven weeks of the season, they’ve moved on from Manning’s injury for the time being and just want to support the team and see it compete. They too, have little expectations of a Super Bowl or a playoff run. But what they see is a team using Manning as an excuse, not in their words, but on the field. They see a team that embarrassed a city on national television and got beat 62-7 – giving up three touchdowns after the Saints pulled most of their star skill players and stopped throwing the ball.
Someone has to pay. Those are the rules.
And if it isn’t Jim Caldwell, then maybe it should be Bill Polian.
Because maybe you can’t anticipate injuries, but you kind of have to plan for them. It’s the NFL. Injuries happen to every team, every year. This one happened to be a big one, to the Franchise (large “F”). And Manning, clearly after all this, is the entire Franchise.
So perhaps the guy who put the franchise (small “f”) together for the last decade is the fall guy. Perhaps the guy who, by all accounts, has whiffed in the draft and free agent market for the past four years should take some responsibility. He’s been duct-taping the franchise around Manning for several years in an effort to save money, no doubt. Well, now the waiter has brought to check to the table.
And someone has to pay the price.
Because someone always has to take the blame for something this bad. 
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