2020 NFL: Offseason News and Notes

Average Game James

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I';m not sure why NFL experience as a player means much, but I'd be interested to see a comparison to other professional leagues in the US with all these factors.
For MLB, all but 4 managers in 2019 had MLB playing experience and all played professionally at some level. As the linked list shows, it’s pretty rare in baseball history to have a manger with no professional playing experience.

https://www.baseball-almanac.com/mgrnon.shtml
9 current NBA coaches played in the league. 3/8 black head coaches are former players, so slightly higher percentage of former players.
 
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Cotillion

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Also easy for him to say when no games are on so there is no opportunity to see how the NFL would react to new protests by the players and the pressure that caused the NFL to cave last time.
 

bankshot1

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With corporate America increasingly speaking in one voice over the the Floyd death and the protests and trying to deal with America's racial inequality and its brutal consequences, even the tone deaf Goodell understood the shift. Any attempt to undermine players right to take a knee risks rebuke from his partners.
 

richgedman'sghost

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That’s a charitable read given he couldn’t say Kaep’s name.
Do you think a team signs Kapernick as a goodwill gesture? Just think if the Pats signed him. He can provide veteran leadership and allow the team to bring Jaret along slowly.
 

Marciano490

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SemperFidelisSox

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Christine Brennan makes a good point on CNN that there are at least ten owners who are Trump campaign donors and Goodell likely made these statements on his own without unanimous support from the owners.
 

Kliq

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Meh, billionaires typically donate to both presidential candidates.
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

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Christine Brennan makes a good point on CNN that there are at least ten owners who are Trump campaign donors and Goodell likely made these statements on his own without unanimous support from the owners.
It looks as though Goodell might have been responding to a powerful video that players had put out just a couple hours earlier, which suggests that Brennan is right. Not enough time.

I don’t know if we have hit critical mass this time or whether this will just go the way it always goes. But this feels different. You don’t want to be the Drew Brees out there who looks before he leaps and thinks he can wrap up in the flag or offer whatabout platitudes like it is business as usual. Maybe the Laura Ingrahams with their trusty dog whistles that always worked before will get away with it but Goodell is not a complete idiot and can read a room. It is maybe the one talent he has.

Anyone who doesn’t at least view this as possibly the moment in time where history will remember which side of the line you were on is risking making a very big mistake.

View: https://twitter.com/NFL/status/1269026096034398208?s=20
 

djbayko

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Do you think a team signs Kapernick as a goodwill gesture? Just think if the Pats signed him. He can provide veteran leadership and allow the team to bring Jaret along slowly.
I doubt anyone will sign him, as that would be a tacit admission that he's been blackballed this entire time (I realize the lawsuit is settled, so I'm not talking about admission of guilt from a legal standpoint). Yes, most people think that anyways, but they have some plausible deniability. On top of that, he hasn't played professional football for 4 years. He may be able to find some sort of non-player role now though.
 

Trlicek's Whip

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That’s a charitable read given he couldn’t say Kaep’s name.
And after a week's worth of seismic, history-making of protests in all 50 states. Someone remarked that Goodell knows how to "read a room," but this says otherwise. Because 1) he doesn't and 2) he's the owners mouthpiece, and *they* don't know how to read rooms.

Funny how when the money-making part of professional sports really starts punishing the owners' wallets in an industry where white supremacy is baked into the foundations, that they suddenly get uncomfortable and scrabble to "see" color.
 
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Trlicek's Whip

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And after a week's worth of seismic, history-making of protests in all 50 states. Someone remarked that Goodell knows how to "read a room," but this says otherwise.

Funny how when the money-making part of professional sports really starts long-term affecting the owners' wallets in a complex where white supremacy is baked into the foundations that they suddenly scrabble to "see" color.
And how Sosh's oldest saw and the tried-and-true mantra "keep politics out of my sports" was always a false belief that only the more privileged (white males) had the luxury to afford.
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

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And after a week's worth of seismic, history-making of protests in all 50 states. Someone remarked that Goodell knows how to "read a room," but this says otherwise. Because 1) he doesn't and 2) he's the owners mouthpiece, and *they* don't know how to read rooms.

Funny how when the money-making part of professional sports really starts punishing the owners' wallets in an industry where white supremacy is baked into the foundations, that they suddenly get uncomfortable and scrabble to "see" color.
Yeah, read the room is not right. I simply meant that I suspected Christine Brennan was probably right that Goodell knew enough to know he didn’t have to call Jerry to get permission to publicly say “black lives matter” many years too late. He‘s a coward and even at best a follower so maybe the better way to say it is that he has very good cockroach instincts — he knows enough to stay alive, even if it is far too little too late and mostly cynical.
 

johnmd20

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And how Sosh's oldest saw and the tried-and-true mantra "keep politics out of my sports" was always a false belief that only the more privileged (white males) had the luxury to afford.
Are you alleging this site is apolitical? I have no idea what you're going for other than to sit back and just take an unprovoked shot at people.
 

Trlicek's Whip

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Yeah, read the room is not right. I simply meant that I suspected Christine Brennan was probably right that Goodell knew enough to know he didn’t have to call Jerry to get permission to publicly say “black lives matter” many years too late. He‘s a coward and even at best a follower so maybe the better way to say it is that he has very good cockroach instincts — he knows enough to stay alive, even if it is far too little too late and mostly cynical.
I think we both probably agree that Goodell knows he's the messenger delivering the message that the owners dictate to him. But possibly had a bit of input in this moment and the overwhelming common sense to nod along and say "welp we do have to say something at this point."

The Black Lives Matter movement often employs #saytheirnames as a point of emphasis. Not saying George Floyd's name specifically still clings to empty promises and hedges towards "all lives matter" takes. And leaving out Kaepernick is obviously a significant and willful omission, since it's Kaepernick's activism and peaceful protest four years ago that forced their hands now.

The NFL took reactionary baby steps too little too late, but they are still trying to keep their white bread buttered by not taking full agency or even hinting at possible policies past "the Rooney Rule tho."

Imagine if the NFL "tried to do better" in 2016 and started evolving into being a better organization then, even if it started as an opportunistic, superficial flex. But I think as presently constituted with its current owners and operators that structural change in the NFL *and* keeping their revenue streams healthy are mutually exclusive.

On a sidenote: Jay Z has shown solidarity in support of the George Floyd protests and even chartered his private plane for Ahmaud Arbery's attorneys to be able to attend a court hearing in Brunswick, GA. But last fall's splashy new partnership with the NFL is even weaker sauce now, especially since the statement of solidarity only came about after Drew Brees got dragged, and not because of the actual inequities of the league.

If the NFL was serious, this could actually become meaningful for both parties and not just be the cynical "capitalism saves the day" PR merger it appeared to be.
 

Trlicek's Whip

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Are you alleging this site is apolitical? I have no idea what you're going for other than to sit back and just take an unprovoked shot at people.
I'm stating that people that claim that there was and is no politics in sports are wholly incorrect and willfully ignoring that the two are inexorably linked. Whether or not said fans admit it while they watch and root for their guys. NFL, NBA, MLB. College. Tee-ball. The Cornhole League. Virtually any sport and any organization has no division between its sport and its politics.

That's both "in a society" abstract sports fans and some in the immediate Sosh population too. Including mods that enforce keeping politics out of the sports thread with the same levels of vigor and absurdity as "no fighting in the war room."

Area Sports Twitter right now is traumatized raw with this collision of "my sports" with "all this political stuff that's going on." This site sees contentious threads where people want to continue to compartmentalize the player from their politics all the time (Kobe Bryant, the Pats new 3-percenter tattooed placekicker, Kaepernick). Reconciling it is messy and it's necessary but to continue to say they don't intersect in any way, shape, or form is ostritchness of the highest order.
 
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johnmd20

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I'm stating that people that claim that there was and is no politics in sports are wholly incorrect and willfully ignoring that the two are inexorably linked. Whether or not said fans admit it while they watch and root for their guys. NFL, NBA, MLB. College. Tee-ball. The Cornhole League. Virtually any sport and any organization has no division between its sport and its politics.

That's both "in a society" abstract sports fans and some in the immediate Sosh population too. Including mods that enforce keeping politics out of the sports thread with the same levels of vigor and absurdity as "no fighting in the war room."

Area Sports Twitter right now is traumatized raw with this collision of "my sports" with "all this political stuff that's going on." This site sees contentious threads where people want to continue to compartmentalize the player from their politics all the time (Kobe Bryant, the Pats new 3-percenter tattooed placekicker, Kaepernick). Reconciling it is messy and it's necessary but to continue to say they don't intersect in any way, shape, or form is ostritchness of the highest order.
Fine. Sounds good to me. I just don't know who you are yelling at.
 

Cellar-Door

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It looks as though Goodell might have been responding to a powerful video that players had put out just a couple hours earlier, which suggests that Brennan is right. Not enough time.

I don’t know if we have hit critical mass this time or whether this will just go the way it always goes. But this feels different. You don’t want to be the Drew Brees out there who looks before he leaps and thinks he can wrap up in the flag or offer whatabout platitudes like it is business as usual. Maybe the Laura Ingrahams with their trusty dog whistles that always worked before will get away with it but Goodell is not a complete idiot and can read a room. It is maybe the one talent he has.

Anyone who doesn’t at least view this as possibly the moment in time where history will remember which side of the line you were on is risking making a very big mistake.

View: https://twitter.com/NFL/status/1269026096034398208?s=20
https://sports.yahoo.com/nfl-video-roger-goodell-racism-black-lives-matter-players-employees-110927703.htmlStory behind that video is amazing, basically a fairly low level employee got it started without permission from anyone, expecting he might get fired for it, got buyin from his immediate bosses, and by the time it made it up to the top there were so many famous players involved that they basically had to run it.
 

Cotillion

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Fine. Sounds good to me. I just don't know who you are yelling at.
You are being very obtuse here.


There have been more than enough times people have said “keep politics out of sports” “I just want to watch the games” “I watch sports to escape” or some variation on this board.

It is also a very common refrain in the broader sports world.
 

johnmd20

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You are being very obtuse here.


There have been more than enough times people have said “keep politics out of sports” “I just want to watch the games” “I watch sports to escape” or some variation on this board.

It is also a very common refrain in the broader sports world.
Obtuse? The fact that i agree isn’t enough. Ok.
 

BaseballJones

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John Harbaugh upset at the NFL's covid19 rules:

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/29299786/ravens-john-harbaugh-says-nfl-current-virus-guidelines-impossible
"Harbaugh guaranteed the Ravens will do as good a job as or better than any other team in adhering to the NFL's rules. He just hopes everyone else complies as well.

"As a coach, you don't want to hear that you're limiting your operations as far as preparing your team and then you hear 10 other teams aren't paying attention to the rules and then there's no consequence for that," he said. "Then they have an advantage on you. That's what I don't want to see. I just think it needs to be fair and it needs to be reasonable, and I think they'll find a way to do that.""


Um, ok John. You're the same guy who's been caught three times now violating the NFL's practice rules:

https://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2018/6/6/17435774/ravens-penalized-violating-nfl-ota-rules-time-to-get-way-better
"For the second time in three seasons and third time since 2010, the Baltimore Ravens have been punished by the NFL for violating offseason practice rules....The NFL docked the Ravens their final two official team activity (OTA) practices this week for an undisclosed violation. Head coach John Harbaugh and team owner Steve Bisciotti each got served pricy fines as well — $50,000 for Harbaugh and $100,000 for Bisciotti.

Harbaugh and the Ravens blamed the infractions on the habits of young players who just can’t keep from hitting their teammates during passing drills."

Oh and this too:

https://www.cbssports.com/nfl/news/ravens-hit-with-monstrous-200000-fine-for-violating-nfl-policy-during-preseason/
"The Ravens announced on Wednesday that they've been fined $200,000 for violating the league's coach-to-player communications policy during the 2018 preseason. Under NFL rules, only one player on the field is allowed to have coach-to-player capabilities in their helmet, and during the preseason there were apparently several instances where the Ravens had multiple players with coach-to-player communication technology installed in their helmets.

According to the Ravens, the team only broke the rule because they didn't know that it was actually a rule during the preseason."


So yeah, Harbaugh, tell me more about how you're a rule follower and how you're all concerned about others (read: Belichick) not following the rules.
 

OurF'ingCity

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So yeah, Harbaugh, tell me more about how you're a rule follower and how you're all concerned about others (read: Belichick) not following the rules.
Was about to say it seems like Harbaugh is trying to set the stage for after-the-fact complaints about the Patriots. Certainly wouldn't be the first time.
 

SMU_Sox

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All competitive head coaches look for edges and push the envelope. None of this bothers me at all. It’s all more or less par for the course and Harbaugh is actually a legitimately great HC. Put it this way if BB retires and something crazy happens and they don’t go with someone in-house Harbaugh is one of 5-10 guys I’d be incredibly happy with if we somehow got him. He’d be our asshole. Is he a hypocritical little fuck? Sure. But he’d be OUR hypocritical little fuck. Also, look how he built the offense around Lamar? It’s a god damn work of art and I’m not just saying that because it’s half day Friday and I started drinking early around my family. Also, I’m not responding to or against any of you and I’m not looking for conflict here either unless you think Harbaugh isn’t a good coach in which case I don’t know what to say other than you’re wrong?
 

SMU_Sox

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Part of this is on Texas for opening up early and part of it is probably but not definitely on the players. Right now Dallas county is spiking for increases in COVID rates. I know a few of us live around here. Stay safe folx.

edit: I did not catch the news about the players partying during COVID. I can understand and support protesting during COVID but partying? Yeesh. :(
 

DJnVa

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Part of this is on Texas for opening up early and part of it is probably but not definitely on the players. Right now Dallas county is spiking for increases in COVID rates. I know a few of us live around here. Stay safe folx.
Until we actually know how he caught it (if we ever do) seems odd to parcel out blame as to who's fault it is.
 

SMU_Sox

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Until we actually know how he caught it (if we ever do) seems odd to parcel out blame as to who's fault it is.
I don't think pointing out that Texas reduced restrictions earlier than other states and is now seeing a huge spike in COVID cases is odd. Can I blame it for his individual case to your point? No. Houston is considering locking down again. I would think though that either directly or indirectly Texas decision (I live here if I didn't make that clear) contributed to more players getting COVID. Is that violating a causality fallacy? I don't know. I'll leave that up to those smarter than me to debate.

How about this: I don't know if it had anything to do with it but for some background information Texas is one of the states that opened up earlier and that could have had an impact on people catching COVID here at higher rates presently.
 

Pesky Pole

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Part of this is on Texas for opening up early and part of it is probably but not definitely on the players. Right now Dallas county is spiking for increases in COVID rates. I know a few of us live around here. Stay safe folx.

edit: I did not catch the news about the players partying during COVID. I can understand and support protesting during COVID but partying? Yeesh. :(
Cowboys speak to players about dangers of partying
 

Oppo

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Part of this is on Texas for opening up early and part of it is probably but not definitely on the players. Right now Dallas county is spiking for increases in COVID rates. I know a few of us live around here. Stay safe folx.

edit: I did not catch the news about the players partying during COVID. I can understand and support protesting during COVID but partying? Yeesh. :(
What public areas or commercial venues are you suggesting these players going to that are closed in other states? If they picked up COVID at a house party, it’s doubtful any state orders would prevent that, short of arresting everyone who walks out their front door.
 

SMU_Sox

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You know what, it ain't worth it. I know who Oppo is and what his beliefs are and I would rather ignore him than engage with him on anything. Remember, the ignore button is your friend.

Maybe I live in a liberal echo chamber? Didn't think correlating Texas opening up, a spike in cases, and members of teams who play and live here would be that controversial but here we are. I'll stick to football. Sorry for the distraction. You can have the last word.
 
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DJnVa

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You know what, it ain't worth it. I know who Oppo is and what his beliefs are and I would rather ignore him than engage with him on anything. Remember, the ignore button is your friend.

Maybe I live in a liberal echo chamber? Didn't think correlating Texas opening up, a spike in cases, and members of teams who play and live here would be that controversial but here we are. I'll stick to football. Sorry for the distraction. You can have the last word.
There's no need to martyr here. It's one thing to note Texas and their reopening and another to say that's a reason Elliot was positive, or, as you said "played a part". We simply don't know that yet. He's asymptomatic--it's possible this isn't a story without increased testing that's come online.
 

SMU_Sox

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There's no need to martyr here. It's one thing to note Texas and their reopening and another to say that's a reason Elliot was positive, or, as you said "played a part". We simply don't know that yet. He's asymptomatic--it's possible this isn't a story without increased testing that's come online.
You're right. I overreacted. Apologies. No beef with you - and again apologies for getting too worked up.
 

axx

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Bet he ran because he knew he would have tested positive for something. 8:30 in the morning though?