Category: NFL (Page 921 of 1282)

Mike Golic comments on “Lionsgate”

So, according to Golic, it’s okay for Favre to answer questions about the Packers’ tendencies as long as he didn’t initiate the call. Golic compared the situation to players that were signed for a week by a team just to give their new team info about their old team. But Favre wasn’t signed by the Lions.

Is Golic saying that it’s not okay if Favre called the Lions to BS about something else, and then they asked him about the Packers? Or is he saying that as long as Favre didn’t initiate the discussion about the Packers, that he’s in the clear.

I don’t know why whether or not Favre initiated the call even matters. As soon as the Lions asked him about the Packers, he should have ended the call.

For his part, Favre has denied that he called the Lions and helped them game plan.

Five biggest traitors in sports

Nina Mandell of FanNation ranks the five biggest traitors in sports.

Nick Saban1. Nick Saban: We all know that sports figures, and public figures for that matter, are capable of denying the truth at any given time. But none did it quite as brazenly as then-Dolphins coach Saban before jumping to a multi-million dollar offer at ‘Bama, after five weeks of repeated denials. “I guess I have to say it. I’m not going to be the Alabama coach. … I don’t control what people say. I don’t control what people put on dot-com or anything else. So I’m just telling you there’s no significance, in my opinion, about this, about me, about any interest that I have in anything other than being the coach here,” he said on Dec. 21, 2006. Less than three weeks later, came this statement: “What I realized in the last two years is that we love college coaching because of the ability that it gives you to affect people, young people. … If I knew that my heart was someplace else in what I wanted to do, I don’t think it would be fair to the [Dolphins] organization if I stayed.” Thus proving, Nick Saban’s heart = his wallet.

2. Bobby Petrino: When the going got tough, this former Atlanta Falcons head coach got going. Coming off a blowout loss and strapped with a team that was reeling from the Michael Vick dogfighting scandal, Petrino took off to become the head coach at Arkansas, piling onto the Falcons’ woes. “He preached team and he preached family and then he quit on us. That’s not what a man does. He lied to us,” said then-quarterback Joey Harrington.

5. Carlos Boozer: Looking for a raise? Try what’s been deemed the Carlos Boozer negotiating tactics. After two years in Cleveland, Boozer was about to move up to the penthouse after reportedly making a verbal agreement to a $40 million deal. That’s when the Utah Jazz suddenly announced they’d locked up Boozer for six years at $68 million. “We are both very surprised and very disappointed by what is now being reported,” said the Cavaliers in a statement. Apparently the hatred spread worldwide. When one Cleveland Plain-Dealer reporter decided to revisit the betrayal at the Beijing Olympics, she found that Boozer was known as “Fan Gu Zai,” which, loosely translated, means “Betrayal Skull Dude” in China.

And now Nick Saban is a hero in Alabama. Guess he got what he deserved.

College football coaches might be the greediest men in sports. They’ll sell their souls to the highest bidder and then lie through their teeth any chance they get. As it turns out though, Petrino did the Falcons a favor. Mike Smith has done a great job in Atlanta so far and Petrino was overmatched in the NFL from the start.

Is the end in sight for Winslow and Browns?

The Browns suspended tight end Kellen Winslow Jr. for one-game following his verbal bashing of GM Phil Savage and head coach Romeo Crennel in the wake of what he felt was the team’s mishandling of a staph infection. And as Patrick McManamon of the Akron Beacon Journal writes, this could be the beginning of the end for Winslow in Cleveland.

Kellen WinslowThis comes from nothing anyone said privately or publicly, but from the occurrences of the past few days and from the statement released by General Manager Phil Savage that was so cold it had icicles dripping from it.

This clearly is one angry GM.

Savage has always been restrained with announcements and news. That he was blunt and direct in the statement about Winslow speaks volumes.

Savage called Winslow’s comments ”unwarranted, inappropriate, and unnecessarily disparaging to our organization.” He said the comments ”brought unjustified negative attention to our organization, and violated the team-first concept of our football squad.”

…But Winslow undercut Crennel twice — first after the game on Sunday, then Monday morning when he had more to say after meeting with Crennel on the team plane Sunday night.

Winslow cares about the team. But he also believes that he is better than most anyone and that is why he expects the ball.

This time, though, he put himself ahead of the team. After a tough loss, he made it about himself. If his coach is not on board with the suspension — and does anyone expect Crennel to say anything today except ”we’ve moved on”? — Winslow need only realize he is the one who put his coach in this position.

McManamon goes on to note that the Browns were in no hurry to re-do Winslow’s contract this offseason and they even went as far to draft a tight end (Martin Rucker) in this year’s draft.

If the Browns do part was with Winslow, it would be another first rounder from the 2004 draft that a team has sent packing. The Lions recently traded WR Roy Williams to the Cowboys and released RB Kevin Jones, the Falcons dealt CB DeAngelo Hall to the Raiders this offseason and the Jets sent LB Jonathan Vilma to the Saints before the start o of the year. Interesting.

NFL News & Notes: Larry Johnson to sit again

– Chiefs’ RB Larry Johnson is likely to be suspended or inactive for Sunday’s game following an investigation that he recently spat in a woman’s face at a Kansas City nightclub. (ESPN.com)

– Broncos’ CB Champ Bailey will miss 4-6 weeks after suffering a torn groin in Denver’s loss to the Patriots on Monday night. (ESPN.com)

– Tony Romo will not play in the Cowboys’ game this Sunday against Tampa Bay and could be out at least two more weeks with a broke pinkie finger. (Dallas Morning News)

– The Cleveland Browns have suspended Kellen Winslow one game for his rant Monday against GM Phil Savage and coach Romeo Crennel. Winslow questioned the team’s handling of his staph infection. (Rotoworld.com)

– Patriots’ safety Rodney Harrison’s season is over. He tore a quad muscle Monday in New England’s win over Denver and the injury likely will end his 15-year NFL career. (NFL.com)

More on Brett Favre, Jay Glazer and “Lionsgate”

SportsByBrooks chimes in with an interesting post about Brett Favre, the Detroit Lions and Jay Glazer.

And now Mike Florio at PRO FOOTBALL TALK is reporting that ESPN is not allowing on-air staffers to report the story – claiming that the tip by Glazer isn’t true.

Well that, as you might expect, didn’t sit well with Glazer. So he went on ESPNer Dan Le Batard’s radio show in Miami (on 790 The Ticket) to address the situation.

Glazer during the interview was passionate in defending the story and his credibility. He also noted that Detroit Coach Rod Marinelli refuses to deny the report. More interesting though was the reaction to the story – and ESPN’s subsequent embargo – by PTI fill-in host Le Batard.

Before Glazer came on the show, Le Batard weighed why ESPN wasn’t reporting the story, saying, “ESPN is ignoring the story entirely. It’s not their story. Their guy didn’t make that story. Or they haven’t been able to confirm it. Or maybe the story is wrong. ”

While talking to Glazer, Le Batard said, “I would think what ESPN is doing there is prideful. You know how this stuff works, you get beat on a story and then you don’t want to acknowledge that the story exists.

And after the interview, Le Batard remarked, “I’m siding with Jay on this one.”

Clearly, Le Batard believes the story and surprised ESPN is not reporting it.

All right, in the interests of full disclosure…

For 15 or so years, Brett Favre has been my favorite player. I want to believe the best about the man, but in recent months he has proven to be a little spiteful. I’m not having a problem believing the story. I think it’s sad and fairly pathetic – that he’d actively spend time helping another team beat his old team – but given the way things went down this summer, it wouldn’t surprise me if Favre still held a major grudge against Ted Thompson and would love to see him fail. After all, it was Thompson that made the final call on Favre. It was Thompson that said “no more.” And it was Thompson that shipped him off to New York.

Now to the story itself. No source (thus far) will go on the record, but Glazer stands by the truthfulness of the sources. In this case, I look to Occam’s razor…“All other things being equal, the simplest solution is the best.”

What are the odds that Glazer (or a bad source) would come up with this scenario…that a Hall of Fame QB would risk his legacy to help a team or two beat the team that decided to let him go? Nobody would believe it. In fact, a lot of people refuse to believe it, like our regular reader and fellow Packer diehard, Jeff. (I feel your pain, man. I do.)

So there are two choices: 1) Brett Favre feels so spiteful towards the team that traded him away that he is willing to help opposing teams game plan for the Packers or 2) Glazer/source(s) made up a story about Brett Favre helping teams game plan against Green Bay.

To me, it’s such a crazy idea that I doubt anyone could be creative enough to make it up. So, according to Occam’s razor, the first choice is more plausible and is probably the correct answer…

Crap.

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