Seems like only yesterday New Orleans head coach Sean Payton was an American Hero...
Quarterback Drew Brees, and Payton’s Saints had just won the Super Bowl upsetting Peyton Manning and the Colts. More importantly the nearly destroyed city of New Orleans got a much needed shot of hope and pride. Even the President saluted their incredible efforts.
It was the feel good story of the year, but what a difference a year makes.
Today Payton has been destroyed.
He didn’t stop the BOUNTY PATROLS – players who pool money before games to promote INJURING a player on the other team. Money paid to lay out guys and cart them off on stretchers. Yes, the head coach knew about it and didn’t stop it and it went on for years. Other teams participated, but thus far only the Saints have been hit and hit HARD.
Now Payton is OUT FOR THE YEAR with fines up to $7 million just for him.
Saints defensive coach Greg Williams is out maybe forever and asst. coach Joe Vitt is out for six games and has been fined. Meanwhile the Saints owner pays just $500,000 and the Saints lose two years worth of No. 2 draft picks.
In other words, it’s a mess.
According the the Associated Press Brees said, " I’m speechless, the man is like a father to me."
Former NFL star Warren Sapp – now an analyst for NFL Network – says the snitch was Jeromy Shockey, the former Saints tight end. Shockey denies it and is a free agent. Even the Saints G.M. Mickey Loomis got an eight game suspension. Damn.
This is the biggest NFL scandal of all time, so it seems.
Or is it?
In December the Feds busted a huge drug ring in Chicago led by an NFL player. Remember that one? But not one word on that one since. So how do we read this one?
Apparently all NFL teams did this, or so we hear from Jim Rome and his guests. New Orleans was just the example team. Pretty harsh. But so are mean spirited hits in a tough game to begin with.
I see it this way, players can use dope, roids, not finish college or have any real education and that’s okay. And for the most part the NFL doesn’t check much for weed or roid usage because they know almost every player uses them.
Remember, in baseball roids’ are cheating, in the NFL they’re just strong vitamins.
You can do all those things, but…DON’T MESS WITH OUR QUARTERBACKS. WE NEED THEM HEALTHY…THEY COST TOO MUCH MONEY….THAT’S NOT OK.
According to sources it was Brett Favre who was targeted in the 2009 NFC title game for 10 grand by linebacker Jonathan Vilma. He’ll soon also be dealt with. As you recall Favre was badly hurt in that contest.
I think its unfair to single out one team and one coaching staff when most teams did the same thing.
I know life ain’t fair. You know that too. And I do feel badly for Sean Payton, as long as he didn’t participate in the bounty hunting.
P.S.: Drew Brees we have a job waiting for you in Kansas City – PLEASE COME – five years $125 million dollar deal….WE NEED YOU DREW…
Well…
Glazer = Moron (yet again)
Seriously, Tiad?
Glazer may suck, but you’re not far behind. Seriously, dude, do you fucking do anything but bitch? For real, I’ve never seen you add one iota of intelligence to anything. What kind of greased-dildo sits around all day mindlessly typing “you suck. This sucks. Everything is sucky”? For fuck’s sake, man, come up with something new or shut the fuck up. You’re depressing the shit out of everyone.
A Few Good Coaches
Payton:You want answers?
Goodell:I think I’m entitled to them.
Payton: You want answers?
Goodell: I want the truth!
Payton: You can’t handle the truth! Son, we play a violent game. And that game has to be played by men with balls! Who’s gonna do it? You? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep faux tears for injured players and you curse the Coaches. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that the bounty program while tragic, probably won games And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, wins games…You don’t want the truth. Because deep down, in places you don’t talk about at parties, you want me on that field. You need me on that field.
We use words like honor, code, loyalty…we use these words as the backbone to a life spent defending the goal line. You use ’em as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very success I and my fellow coaches provide, then questions the manner in which we provide it! I’d rather you just said thank you and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a helmet and get on the fiield. Either way, I don’t give a damn what you think you’re entitled to!
Goodell: Did you order the bounty program?
Payton: (quietly) I did the job you sent me to do.
Goodell: Did you order the bounty program?
Payton: You’re goddamn right I did!!
As someone who played college FB, Smartman is an idiot. It is one thing to encourage big hits and aggressiveness, it is another to reward injuries and cheap shots. It was wrong, and the Saints were rightfully punished.
As for calling him a scapegoat, this may have a wee bit of truth. However, as Glazer would know, sometimes people get sentences that are there to deter others from committing the crime. Some people do 10 years for cocaine, while others roll over on their buddies and get nothing but house arrest.
Payton was pushing his luck. He should have actually been fired already, but for a different incident. A few years back he was caught stealing narcotic painkillers from players and trainers, a felony. He avoided being fired mainly because the Saints were the feel good story after Katrina, and he was only stealing them to support his own drug habit.
Here is a story about the FBI investigation and subsequent 2 mil civil suit against the Saints by their director of security:
http://articles.nydailynews.com/2010-05-04/sports/27063396_1_vicodin-pills-trainer-prescription
Goodell “Rogers” the Fleur de lis,
while lawyers scream with glee.
Tony Kornheiser predicted this the day the ‘scandal’ broke. The American public didn’t care whenMike Webster keeled over dead, nor will they miss lunch if Troy Aikman dies during his next broadcast of an concussion related aneurysm. The American “Roman Mob” wants its fuckin bread and circus, and that folks, is the sorry truth. Violence in sports plays successfully to those atavistic instincts which get us boys the hottest chicks and puts bacon on the table.
Full disclosure, I an an inveterate gambler on the NFL and study the sport to that end. Were I to suddenly hit my OWN head, and decide that I hated gambling, I would never look at another football game in my life.
This brouhaha, covered in a patina of superficial concern over NFL employees shortening their lives in the arena, has a great deal more to do with litigation and lawsuits than altruistic concern for the game, the fans and those same players.
Goodell’s draconian and hypocritical measures against the Saints are self serving (They should be.) and lay the groundwork for the future defense, in court, against those same players who will bring action against the NFL in the future for injuries recieved in our American Thunderdome.
Dr. Dealgood: Listen all! This is the truth of it. Fighting leads to killing, and killing gets to warring. And that was damn near the death of us all. Look at us now! Busted up, and everyone talking about hard rain! But we’ve learned, by the dust of them all… Bartertown learned. Now, when men get to fighting, it happens here! And it finishes here!
Maybe Sam Peckinpah’s theories on violence viewed as catharsis, are the hopes of our betters at ESPN and throughout the sports world. I kinda fuckin dobt it. They are just makin a buck.
Watch Your Back, Smartman…
…I’m pretty sure Lurch is working on a set of really harsh syllables aimed at you – and boy, they are really going to sting when you receive them!
You’ve been warned.
No sense of humor
Obviously Mr. Balboni has no sense of humor and cannot see the bittersweet irony played out in the juxtaposition of roles between Payton and Goodell and Danny Caffee/Tom Cruise and Col. Nathan Jessup/Jack Nicholson from the CLASSIC movie, A Few Good Men.
Mr. Balboni might want to consider some writing lessons as his opening sentence could potentially lead someone to believe that, “I” played football in college. I did not. But props to Mister Balboni for doing so and hopefully surviving that experience with mind, body and soul intact.
BOUNTYGATE DETAILS…
Gary Gibbs…current chiefs defensive coach was the defensive coordinator bfore being fired by payton.
Gibbs got a sour deal (according to his family) and should not have been fired. Aparetnly payton felt
gibbs was too soft..so he brought in williams who initiated this program…and who would win the
super bowl with gary gibbs’s defensive talent and plays.
Also…miami investigation coming to a quick conclusion..probably after tourney…my sources say
it will be bad for current local college coach…and the university is ready to ante up to 3.5-4 million
dollars for a new coach. I wrote that the sec was so flush with millions of dollars in new contracts
and rights that they would attempt to become the #1 bbal legaue to match their #1 standing in
football… major money being offered..but will the university screw this thing up too? we hope not…
Also…i ‘ve been reading the stories about mu thru the year…and i’ve never heard any type of
qoute or reaction from the players about haith. he did a great job but he had great talent…
ALSO…SMARTMAN DOES IT AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
He doesn’t know Jack
Smartman’s take was entertaining, but I have a hard time seeing little Sean Payton as a Jessup/Nicholson character.
Payton’s punishment is Karma for his decision 25 years ago to become a scab…excuse me, a replacement player, for the Chicago Bears during the 1987 strike.
Meanwhile, people see “The Hunger Games” as a grim futuristic fantasy that is only a movie and don’t see that NFL Football, just like Boxing, is a close cousin that is a brutal reality.
big shocker, the person defending bounties never even played football. Probably topped out at Pop Warner but cheers loudest for all the cheap shot artists after his 8th macro-brew on sundays
balbonis, must be referring To Something You Did
If you are brave and maybe one out of 100 is, you stand up…like I always did, the truth will set you free or in my case give me 7 years on one case in LA and none in a frame up in KC in 01…if you did it you face the music….course sometimes its still not fair..when I got the seven I felt it unfair on money laundering in 84…later it was a samll price to pay for things I had done before…in 01 I did nothing, NEVER sold or did anything with coke but snort some..didn’t deserve an indictment some guys the Vaca’s lied and I was the bigger name, simple as that, later feds found out I was innocent but too late, had the case, so I got probation, but it still cost me over a hundred grand, tons of bad press, which is mentioned to this day…none of it true and the gov said in public they fucked up, I just did some blow nothing more…didn’t matter, I became the ‘blow poster boy’ unfair yeah….p.s. they never asked me to give up anyone, one I wouldn’t…two they knew I was not a dealer and really only knew a couple shmucks…no big guys….I was already a success didn’t need to deal..bad break, but life’s not always fair, huh.
Hey Cliffy…
…Glazer just gave us the “cliff notes” to “King of Sting.” No need to buy the book now!
pr
“Tons of bad press, which is mentioned to this day”. Press is press good or bad. Right…………..