Splinters: Redskin Rants, Yankee Warnings and some Unlikely Heros

As a note of warning, I’m going to be hitting quite a few topics this week, since someone seems to have slipped something into my coffee this morning and I can’t focus for the life of me. Buckle up, we’re going to be jumping around like a jack rabbit on a pogo stick.

Let’s start with our home town football team, eh? How bad are the Redskins? I mean honestly, Sunday they had the ball first and goal in the fourth quarter and were in position to possibly tie the game with a touchdown and a two-point conversion. But, then the inane ’Skins gene kicks in where everyone on the offense simultaneously forgets that they’re football players trying to win the game and they head backwards faster than the Marty McFly and his DeLorean. Several penalties and two dropped passes later, the only decent shot Washington had to get back in the game is snuffed out and the Eagles go on to cruise. Well done, well done indeed.

It’s clear that no one on the team is focuses. Portis is dropping dump off passes out of the back field, wide receivers are dropping screens and the offensive line is penalized about as frequently as Bobby Brown appears in court. With the exception of the defense, which has to feel like a water pump on the Titanic, there is nothing good about this team. Now, the next question is where to place the blame. So far this season it seems like people have placed it on the displaced quarterback Mark Brunell. Well, Ramsey seems to be just as ineffective at the helm, scoring only 16 points in a game and a half. So when does someone, sorry George Michael, start talking that maybe the blame should get directed towards ::drops voice to a whisper:: Joe Gibbs.

Now I know that it’s heresy to even suggest that Gibbs could be at fault, but as you’re binding my hands to the stake and stoking the fire consider this: Last season the New York Giants offense stagnated despite an abundance of weapons and the offensive line repeatedly committed stupid penalties such as holding and moving before the snap. In the Giants’ case the man who took the blame was Head Coach Jim Fassel. All the papers and the radio shows spouted off about how if a head coach can’t get his team to focus, then he needs to go. Thus, Jim Fassel was canned just a few years after winning the NFC Championship.

I’m not saying that Gibbs needs to go, but if everyone keeps misdiagnosing a problem, it won’t get addressed and that’s just not going to help.

Moving on so I can stay ahead of the lynch mob, the media is reporting that George Steinbrenner is eager to bring in Red Sox pitcher Pedro Martinez and has already met with him to discuss putting Petey in pinstripes.

If this is the case then it is beyond evident that Steinbrenner has learned nothing from the 2001 World Series up to the present. During that time, the best collection of players has never won the World Series. If that were the case, the Yankees would be celebrating their seventh straight championship instead of choking against their most- hated rival like one of Dr. Heimlich’s early test subjects. The Diamondbacks, Angels, Marlins and Red Sox all won because they were the best team in the playoffs. They had players that could suck it up, play through pain and under pressure. Their relievers weren’t vomiting in the bullpen as Tom Gordon was reported to have done. Their starters gutted through every pitch, unlike Javier Vazquez, Kevin Brown and Esteban Loiza, who seemed to take every third batter off.

There’s a term that players and coaches throw around for players that step it up beyond what they ought to be able to do: gamers. Paul O’Neil was a gamer. Curt Schilling might be the ultimate gamer. If the Yankees want to recapture the team chemistry that led to three consecutive World Series rings from 1998 to 2000, they should pursue more of those types of players and leave players like Pedro alone. And with a hop, skip and a jump, we’re on to …

I watched an interview of Brett Favre this weekend and regardless of his past Brett Favre is a role model. Brett Favre is a role model for the same reason that Mickey Mantle was a role model. Both had spotted pasts and bouts with substance abuse that would turn my stomach if it was one of my friends or family in that position. But both men, recognized their problems and addressed them. Favre said in the interview that he’d never go back to his high-flying days before he dropped drinking and drugs six years ago. Shortly before his death in 1995 Mickey Mantle sat behind a microphone and told the millions of people that worshipped his as a god: “Don’t be like me.”

How much character does it take to work your whole life for something and then admit that all those years are worthless because of the way you behaved? There’s a wonderful lesson there. Favre acknowledged his in time to save his career and possibly his life. Mickey’s mistake with alcohol abuse cost him his life. We all make mistakes, be it drugs, alcohol, time management, financial management, whatever … there’s almost always a chance to correct those mistakes and Favre is a shining example of someone who confronted those demons, painful as they were, and emerged from it. We should all have such resolve.

P.S. This last point has nothing to do with whatever the Starbucks lady slipped in my grande coffee.

Mike Hume may be emailed at mhume@fcnp.com