2011 NFL Season

[BBTV]

Walter Camp* was going to call it a night at 3:00 AM, but decided to stay up 10 more minutes and ended up inventing the forward pass. Maybe there's some merit to it.

(*I have no idea who invented the forward pass.)

[The_Admiral]

I thought it was Knute Rockne.

Maybe Andy Reid stays at the office till 3 in the morning because he's just snarfing cheeseburgers deep into the night. That explains why he's fat, why his family is neglected, and why the Eagles aren't playing very well.

[Sport]

He doesn't have to spend 16 hours a day on the job seven days a week. We treat these coaches like they're surgeons or doing something really important - what are they possibly innovating or inventing that forces them to spend that many hours on the job?

16 hours a day? Is that all? What, is Reid some sort of pansy? Real football coaches spend at least 18 to 20 hours a day on the job.

Seriously though, I agree 100% with what you're saying. I've always wondered why football coaches have to work 20 hour days. You hear announcers and talking heads blabbering on about how "Coach X shows up at the team facility at 4am and he doesn't leave until 3am" as if it's a good thing. It takes 8 coaches (or however many each team has) 120 hours each to prepare for a sixty minute football game?

Not to mention, how in the hell can anyone be effective at anything when they're operating on three hours of sleep per night? It's no wonder football coaches behave like idiots during games. Either someone is lying about the hours these guys put in, or these coaches are are spending a good deal of those 20 hours a day taking naps in their offices. No way can a human being go 20 weeks (more if you make the playoffs) on 20-25 hours of sleep per week.

I've always said that it takes a special kind of idiot to be a football coach.

This is how I've always felt and it's why I've always liked Bud Grant. The guy worked 9-5, had a family life, kept everything in perspective, and look at that - went to 4 super bowls and the Hall of Fame.

They'd always go on about how John Gruden used to come in at like 3:45 am and I always thought how stupid that was. It seemed like nothing more than "look how hard I work". My current boss does the same thing. He'll create unnecessary projects and (subconsciously) create problems so he can tell people he works 100 hours a week.

And like you said, at a certain point, you know everything there is to know about your team and the team you're playing and I doubt that requires 100 hours or preparation per week.

It's like when I was in college and I'd be up late studying and I'd get to the point where continuing to study any more was actually detrimental to my usefulness as a test-taker. The law of diminishing returns, if you will. It'd get to be 3, 4 in the morning, I was tired, and I'd just stopped retaining information. I could've continued to stay at the library so I could get to class the next day and brag about how hard I study, or I could've gone home, gotten sleep, and actually be in the right mindset to take a test. I always chose the latter and they let me graduate.

[Lights Out]

(*I have no idea who invented the forward pass.)

It was Eddie Cochems, head coach of Saint Louis University, back in 1906.

http://www.livescience.com/7129-100-years-football-pass.html

[BBTV]

I thought it was Knute Rockne.

Maybe Andy Reid stays at the office till 3 in the morning because he's just snarfing cheeseburgers deep into the night. That explains why he's fat, why his family is neglected, and why the Eagles aren't playing very well.

Really though, "inventing the forward pass" is like saying that someone "discovered breathing".

"OH MY GOD! I had no idea that the ball would move that direction if I flung it like that! I thought some mystical force always sent it backwards!"

[The_Admiral]

I suppose it was more a matter of "this shouldn't be against the rules, what were we thinking" like the way hockey "invented" the forward pass.

[BBTV]

Oh I get that - "inventing the forward pass" just sounds funny.

[The_Admiral]

I wonder if George Halas invented the handoff.

[Saintsfan]

He doesn't have to spend 16 hours a day on the job seven days a week. We treat these coaches like they're surgeons or doing something really important - what are they possibly innovating or inventing that forces them to spend that many hours on the job?

16 hours a day? Is that all? What, is Reid some sort of pansy? Real football coaches spend at least 18 to 20 hours a day on the job.

Seriously though, I agree 100% with what you're saying. I've always wondered why football coaches have to work 20 hour days. You hear announcers and talking heads blabbering on about how "Coach X shows up at the team facility at 4am and he doesn't leave until 3am" as if it's a good thing. It takes 8 coaches (or however many each team has) 120 hours each to prepare for a sixty minute football game?

Not to mention, how in the hell can anyone be effective at anything when they're operating on three hours of sleep per night? It's no wonder football coaches behave like idiots during games. Either someone is lying about the hours these guys put in, or these coaches are are spending a good deal of those 20 hours a day taking naps in their offices. No way can a human being go 20 weeks (more if you make the playoffs) on 20-25 hours of sleep per week.

I've always said that it takes a special kind of idiot to be a football coach.

Right. Other extreme statements aside, I'm serious about the 16-hour thing. They used to talk about how Dick Vermiel slept at the Vet and saw his wife once or twice a week. That's an indication of a social or mental problem, not job dedication. I understand loving your job and wanting to figure things out, but we seriously put coaches up on a ridiculously-high pedestal.

I think that owners expect that dedication, I think players do, I think that actually fans do. Because it takes that dedication to plan and develop an NFL game plan. I think that's part of why the likes of Gruden, Billick, Cowher etc spend their weekends in TV studios and commentary booths. Eventually you just don't want to do the job anymore, especially when you get big bucks for doing a lot less.

[BBTV]

Offensive guard Arthur Bryant invented the pulling guard, but it was only because he decided to race toward the sideline to take a smash the second the ball was snapped. On his way, he clipped a rushing defensive end, allowing the fullback to run for a touchdown.

[Lee.]

Offensive guard Arthur Bryant invented the pulling guard, but it was only because he decided to race toward the sideline to take a smash the second the ball was snapped. On his way, he clipped a rushing defensive end, allowing the fullback to run for a touchdown.

If we could get Steve Sabol to read this aloud, we'd be in for a heap of cash.

[infrared41]

No way can a human being go 20 weeks (more if you make the playoffs) on 20-25 hours of sleep per week.

I've been doing that for 5 year now (well closer to 30 hours, although I'm rocking 12 hours from Friday-today this week).

My point exactly. Look what it's done to you.

[infrared41]

I think that owners expect that dedication, I think players do, I think that actually fans do. Because it takes that dedication to plan and develop an NFL game plan. I think that's part of why the likes of Gruden, Billick, Cowher etc spend their weekends in TV studios and commentary booths. Eventually you just don't want to do the job anymore, especially when you get big bucks for doing a lot less.

And you know this based on what exactly? As McCarthy already pointed out, Bud Grant took his team to four Super Bowls working normal hours. Steve Spurrier has done a pretty solid job working normal hours. When he was hired by the Redskins, Spurrier made fun of the 20 hour work day coaches are known for. Sure, you can say Spurrier didn't work like the other coaches and it showed in his results with the Redskins, but doing so means you also need to explain why so many other coaches who do work the insane hours still end up with the same, or worse results than Spurrier.

These coaches may actually spend 20 hours a day at their facilities but you'd be hard pressed to convince me that they're "developing an NFL game plan" the entire time. There's only so much that can happen in a football game. It doesn't take 12 people 120 hours of work each to figure it out. Borrowing from McCarthy again, coaches do this as some sort of masochistic display to show how dedicated they are to their "craft." Some people call it "coaching genius." I call it insane bull- .

[Mings]

No way can a human being go 20 weeks (more if you make the playoffs) on 20-25 hours of sleep per week.

I've been doing that for 5 year now (well closer to 30 hours, although I'm rocking 12 hours from Friday-today this week).

My point exactly. Look what it's done to you.

Touché my friend.

[rams80]

Maybe Andy Reid stays at the office till 3 in the morning because he's just snarfing cheeseburgers deep into the night. That explains why he's fat, why his family is neglected, and why the Eagles aren't playing very well.

I was about to say. The coaches may be at the workplace for these hours but they may not be doing film study. I mean, Linehan allegedly spent major chunks of his work days at Rams Park morosely roaming the hallways eating cold cereal and generally acting as if somebody just shot his dog.

[The Six]

I love it. SF vs. Philly isn't on here, but Philly vs. Wash is. And somehow the entire Western US through Wyoming, including San Diego, does get the Niners. Unbelievable.

[DCDuck]

It's not even that I care so much because I'm not a "rah rah" fan, but his arrogance and belittlement of the media is frustrating to listen to week-in and week-out.

Incidentally, other Eagles fans I've talked to point to that quality as exactly why they'd love a coach like Sean Payton or Rex Ryan.

Like I said, I just don't get the vitriol many Eagles fans have for Andy Reid.

[njmeadowlanders]

Jets trade Derrick Mason to Houston for a conditional pick.

[Cujo]

Jets trade Derrick Mason to Houston for a conditional pick.

That experiment sucked. Can Jerricho Cotchery come back now?

[Dexter Morgan]

Surprised the Jets got a draft pick out of him, I figured they were just going to release him. The rookie out TCU Jeremy Kerley has out played him. Plus Mason has a big mouth.