Valentine’s Day, love is in the air, and there is a special someone out there for everybody. Everyone has someone on Valentine’s Day, or at least it seems that way to those that will spend Valentine’s Day alone wondering how you ended up alone. I mean, weren’t you just dating that girl from marketing class ? oh, that’s right, you dumped her because you thought you were going to hook up with her slightly prettier friend. So how did that ever turn out for you?
What’s that, you say. You two never hooked up, and now you are all alone and feeling like a chump? That sucks, she was a great girl, let you drink and didn’t even mind your friends, but you thought the grass was greener on the other side. Now look at you.
That happens more than you’d think; you don’t have to be watching the Soap Network to find a saga like that. Heck, you can find one in the sports pages. A prime example is the beautiful mess that the Glazer brothers have made of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coaching position.
The Bucs had a good coach in Tony Dungy ? more than that, he was the saint that had saved a team that was a perpetual loser and turned it into one of the most respected teams in the league. Dungy had an impressive record as an assistant in Minnesota and has turned the Buccaneers into a playoff-caliber team.
Of course, whether you’re getting rid of a pretty girl or firing one of the game’s most respected coaches, it is the sort of move you generally make when you think you already have a new deal with someone better inked.
Everyone, including Tampa, believed that they had a deal done with the biggest fish of them all in Bill Parcells. It was a foregone conclusion, even before the playoffs last season, that if Dungy was out, Parcells was in.
However, much to the chagrin of the Buccaneers, Parcells proved unpredictable and backed out of the deal that was apparently all but signed, leaving the Bucs feeling rather sheepish after getting rid of a good coach for apparently no coach. Boy, she was pretty, but once you dump her you can’t just ask her back out, no matter how much it sucks to be alone. You’ve got to find someone new.
From there, things haven’t gotten any better for the Buccaneers. In an attempt to save face and land a marquee coach after the Parcells deal fell through, the Bucs tried to entice Jon Gruden from the Raiders, but he and Raiders owner Al Davis weren’t quite ready to part ways despite their reported squabbling.
So with head hung low and all the available prom queens apparently not as ready and willing as originally believed, the general manager began looking at candidates that were actually available. One such candidate was Ravens defensive coordinator Marvin Lewis, and while he was not as flashy as Parcells or Gruden, he would have at least been someone with a strong NFL resume.
The deal was ready to be made, but Buccaneer ownership reared its ugly head again. After being responsible for starting Tampa’s problems in firing Dungy, they came forward and told their general manager that Marvin Lewis wasn’t the right man for the job.
Who could really blame them for not wanting to hire Lewis? He’s a good coach, but firing one defensive guru and then hiring another to replace him would surely expose their ineptitude. After all, when you break up with your girlfriend because her looks don’t do it for you anymore, you wouldn’t ask out her twin sister. Neither did Tampa Bay.
So now what to do. Tampa Bay is desperate to land the coach of its dreams, only it has quickly moved from a search of a select group of coaches to just about anyone. It seems that two times a week a new frontrunner emerges and then tells the Buccaneers that he has no interest in the position.
Take Ralph Friedgen, the latest coach to spurn Tampa Bay. Friedgen has been a life-long assistant and is now a hot commodity after taking the usually dormant Maryland Terrapins to the Orange Bowl last season. Friedgen withdrew his name from consideration for the position shortly after speaking with Tampa Bay ownership.
Dungy is living large. What head coach wouldn’t love to trade in quarterback Brad Johnson for Peyton Manning? That’s like trading a Volkswagen for a Ferrari.
Clearly Tampa Bay overestimated the attractiveness of their organization. The owners thought they had good things coming to the team when they let go of Dungy, but it’s a move they probably wouldn’t make again if they knew they would become the laughing stock of the NFL before they found a new coach.
Poor Buccaneers, all alone on Valentine’s Day.
