1. I think the fact that Puka Nacua was the 20th wide receiver selected in the '23 draft and Amon-Ra St. Brown The 17th pick of 2021 shows me that people who draft need to accumulate multiple picks in the middle of the round and take risks on players with certain traits – players who may not run fast or are weak, but who may be incredible Having determination or superior hands or both.
2. I find I don't know exactly what it means that the NFL is negotiating to buy a large stake in ESPN (h/t, Andrew Marchand), but one thing I can predict if it happens: It won't be good for journalism at ESPN .
3. I find Jay Glazer's column reporting on the frosty atmosphere between the Giants coaches this season deserves a W point Brian Daboll and defensive coordinator Wink Martindale. For the review:
- Glazer on Fox November 26: Glazer said before the Patriots-Giants game: “There could be a separation between the two sides. When I talk to people within this organization, they say the tension between these two – you can feel it. It’s only going to get worse.”
- Daboll with a non-denial denial postgame on November 26th: The biggest argument between Wink and I was who had the last slice of pizza. Have a lot of respect for Wink.”
- The New York Post's report on the story from November 27th: Quotes a senior team official calling the report “absolute nonsense—-.”
- The Post reported on personnel changes on January 9: Martindale, the paper said, cursed Daboll when he was told that two of his closest defense aides were being fired.
- Martindale was released by the Giants on January 10: Martindale and the Giants “have parted ways,” the team said.
As it turns out, Glazer was so right that he even got the terminology right (the proverbial “parting of the ways”).
Bills must demonstrate a “championship mentality” toward PIT
The Football Night in America team looks ahead to the Bills vs. Steelers on Super Wild Card Weekend and discusses why Buffalo needs to prove itself by dominating Pittsburgh.
4. I find It's so beautiful to see Aaron Rodgers He follows his mantra in his daily life of eliminating the distractions surrounding the Jets. “Kick the cop out,” he said Monday, and eliminate things “that we do individually or collectively that have nothing to do with real winning.” Now there's a man leading the way, right on the ground speaks.
5. I find I was surprised that the Titans couldn't make peace with them Mike Vrabel, who is a top 10 NFL coach in every way. I think getting rid of him would be a mistake and I would be surprised at their long-term commitment to building a great team. There was some interesting information regarding: Mike Vrabel, who was fired by the owner Amy Adams Strunk in a Dianna Russini/Joe Rexrode story in The Athletic. Like this one:
Vrabel spent the Titans' farewell week in Foxboro, Massachusetts, as a guest of owner Robert Kraft to be inducted into the Patriots Hall of Fame. Vrabel had won three Super Bowls as a player with New England, and in a speech to the crowd before a Patriots win over the Bills on Oct. 23, Vrabel said, “I don't want you to take this organization for granted.” I was in many places, this is a special place with great leadership, great fans, great leadership and great coaching. Enjoy it. That’s not the case everywhere.”
The speech caused a stir in Tennessee. When he returned to Nashville, Vrabel was asked by reporters during a press conference if his comments were directed at the Titans organization. He said: “(The Patriots) have won six Super Bowls in 20 years, that’s what I alluded to. I don't know what to tell you. It's just a huge success. … The big success they had there, the whole message was, just for me and the former players and everything, just don't take things for granted.”
The whole event didn't sit well with Strunk, a team source said.
6. I find I don't blame the Titans for giving Vrabel the side eye after that. In addition to his years as a player in New England, he played four seasons in Pittsburgh and two in Kansas City, including four years as an assistant in Houston. That's not the case everywhere. Let's see: Pittsburgh, Kansas City, Houston, Tennessee. The Steelers win every year, Kansas City is a well-run organization, Houston has struggled. And Tennessee. I wouldn't have been happy if I was Strunk either. However, the Titans deserve some heat here too. Once they have acted AJ Brown instead of paying him – even though the team has signed defensive players Jeffery Simmons And Harold Landry– Vrabel knew he would face a firearm offense. And with Derrick Henry still capable, but GM is under a lot of pressure on the way out Ran Carthon to build a strong offense through the draft and free agency, and quickly.
7. I find I wonder why Jameis Winston is a winning hero of sorts because he changed a decision last week against Atlanta and made a play from the winning formation. And I wonder how Jamaal Williams will feel years from now when he looks at the “1” in his 2023 rushing touchdown statistic and knows he ran against a defense that isn’t ready for a normal game. Here, Jamaal. In a very unsportsmanlike manner, score a touchdown against a half-hearted defense by a 24-point lead to increase the opposing team's score! Congratulations!
8. I think It was 2006, or maybe very late in the 2005 season, and I was working on a Seahawks story for Sports Illustrated and went to dinner with them Matt Hasselbeck Family on a weekday in Seattle. Wife Sarah, young girls Mallory and Annabelle and months-old son Henry. Well, imagine my surprise when I was browsing the Internet on Saturday and saw one of the Athletes of the Year in the Boston Globe's fall All-Star awards for local athletes:
Interesting backstory here. Henry Hasselbeck wasn't recruited for football as a junior in high school in Massachusetts. However, he was recruited for lacrosse and signed with Maryland to play lacrosse. He told the Maryland coach his dream was to play college football. It turns out Chip Kelly lost a quarterback to the transfer portal, flew to Boston to see Henry and offered him a scholarship. So Henry Hasselbeck will now be a UCLA Bruin. Another cool thing: Matt Hasselbeck was an assistant coach at Henry's school, but pursued many avenues in 2022 while working at ESPN. Last June, Matt got caught up in the layoffs at ESPN, which was initially discouraging. But then Matt thought he could now be a full-time assistant, working at Xaverian Brothers High School in Westwood, Massachusetts, where he coached his son. Amazingly, his father, a former NFL tight end Don Hasselbeck, coached the tight ends at Xaverian. So the QB, the QB coach and the TE coach were son, father and grandfather – and Xaverian won the state championship. “Getting fired from ESPN was a real blessing,” Matt Hasselbeck told me. Man, this is the coolest thing.
9. I find The NFL can and does talk about its DEI efforts. But no team can interview a highly qualified GM candidate Dawn Aponte— the league's chief football administrative officer, the Dolphins' former senior VP of football operations, the Browns' former VP of football administration, the Jets' former capologist — is absurd.
10. I find These are my other thoughts of the week:
A. Story of the Week: The Athletic's Katie Strang, with a great look at how ESPN received at least 30 Emmy statuettes for on-air talent from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS) with fake names in 2010.
B. Many things in the sports world surprise me. This is another level of it. Someone at ESPN actually thought: Let's give the organization that oversees the Emmys a bunch of fake names so we can collect more Emmys every year to give to our people who aren't supposed to get Emmys.
C. It is so ridiculously dishonest and immoral that frankly critical words for the people who did this – who are not named in the story – are far from enough.
D. Strang wrote:
…Until 2023, NATAS guidelines prohibited on-air talent from being included in a credit list in this category. “College GameDay” hosts, analysts and reporters could win individual awards, such as outstanding host, studio analyst or emerging on-air talent, and they could win for a single post. But they weren't eligible to take home a trophy for an exhibition win. This rule was intended to prevent outstanding talent from winning two awards for the same work (referred to as “double-dipping” in the NATAS rulebook).
ESPN got around the rule by including fake names in the credit list it submitted to NATAS for “College GameDay.” The Athletic reviewed the credit lists for the years the show won: 2010, 2011, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018. In each of those seven years, there were names that were similar to the names of on-air personalities – and with identical initials – were all listed under the title “Associated Producers”.
e. The way the scheme worked, Emmys were given the names “Dirk Howard” and “Chris Fulton” and many others with names similar to those of the on-air people, and then someone at ESPN had the nameplates re-engraved with “Desmond Howard.” . and “Chris Fowler” and others, according to Strang. There is no evidence that any of the on-air talent knew they were receiving ill-gotten statuettes. Great reporting from Strang.
Q. I don't like the sound of this story of the week: NPR's James Doubek on researchers who found large numbers of plastic particles in your water bottles:
There are microscopic pieces of plastic lying around everywhere. Now they have been found in bottled water at concentrations 10 to 100 times higher than previously thought. Researchers at Columbia University and Rutgers University found about 240,000 detectable plastic fragments in a typical liter of bottled water
… About 10% of the plastic particles detected were microplastics, the other 90% were nanoplastics. Microplastics are between 5 millimeters and 1 micrometer in size; Nanoplastics are particles less than 1 micrometer in size. For comparison: a human hair is around 70 micrometers thick.
A 2018 study found that one liter of bottled water contains an average of 325 parts of microplastics.
G. There is a bottle of “Pure Life” water next to me right now. Do you drink it or go to the faucet in my hotel room in Houston and drink it?
H. Help. Luckily for me, the hotel provided a refillable bottle of water with a cork in it. This allowed me to drain and refill the water from the faucet in my bathroom. (Is that too much information?)
I. Good luck to the Strahan family in their battle against cancer Michael Strahan's daughter Isabella. She seems brave and determined, two great qualities in a fight like this.
J. Cool TV Story of the Week: WCCO News' Caroline Cummings in Minneapolis on the new city council in St. Paul, Minnesota. It is believed to be the first major city council in America composed entirely of women. In this case, seven of them.
k. What's impressive is that the average age of a person in St. Paul is 32.5 years old, according to the Associated Press, and each of these women is under 40.
l. Advice of the week: Nick Saban, asked on his Alabama radio show by a caller who identified himself as a young basketball player for advice on how to improve, gave a thoughtful answer. (H/T to personal brand builder Teddy Mitrosilis for bringing it to light.) Saban said:
“I think it’s the same for every athlete. What is your goal? What is your claim? What do you want to achieve? That's the first thing. Second, we need to define what it takes. What does it mean to you to be the basketball player you want to be?
“Then you have to make the decision. Are you ready for this? Are you willing to go to work every day and do the things you need to do and take 500 shots a day like Kobe Bryant did so you can be the type of player you want to be? And then do you have enough discipline to do it every day, whether you feel like it or not? You have to choose to stand up. You have to decide on a course of study. You have to choose to take the shots. You have to choose to train. People who can do this can develop their full potential.
“If you choose to commit yourself like that, you can do the same thing, but it won't just come to you. It will not be easy. And you have to overcome a lot of adversity to persevere and persevere and achieve your goal.”
M. Could apply to pretty much anything in life.
N. Great line from veteran Newsday writer Neil Best: “Listening to Aaron Rodger’s talk for an hour inspired me to finally sign up for the Covid-19 vaccination. Goes on Thursday afternoon.
I love the Packers win: “The boys played”
Quarterback Jordan Love praises the Green Bay Packers' team effort after their victory over the Dallas Cowboys on Super Wild Card Weekend, becoming the first No. 7 seed to win an NFL playoff game.
O. Crime Story of the Week: Los Angeles Times' Harriet Ryan on the life and times and very strange death of a television journalist of Los Angeles Times fame OJ Simpson Case.
Fr. Kristin Jeannette-Meyers, reporting for Court TV and CBS News, was found dead in L.A.'s Larchmont Village neighborhood last summer, according to the Times: “A coroner arrived in June at a dilapidated Spanish villa behind a high hedge and within sight of Hollywood Noting the decomposed state of her remains, the letterer wrote, “It is not known when the deceased was last alive.”
Q. Ryan reported that Jeannette-Meyers hired a caregiver late in her life when it was clear she was extremely troubled. Ryan wrote:
“She was terrified of leaving the house,” said Beatriz Sanchez, a professional caregiver who took the job about a year and a half ago. Sometimes she worked her entire shift without glancing at the woman, who spent the day in her bedroom in a routine Sanchez described as “pace, sleep, panic.”
“Don’t think you’re here for no reason,” the woman said as they communicated by phone and text message. “You help me emotionally.”
The house, on a corner lot in a desirable area, was stately and had a striking balcony, but it had fallen into disrepair. Garbage bags filled the rooms and closets, and the yard looked “worse than the highway,” Sanchez recalled. The woman's cats relieved themselves inside, and a broken toilet spilled waste onto the first floor.
“I couldn’t be in there without opening the window because I felt like I was going to throw up,” Sanchez said.
Still, the woman was “kind, encouraging, and grateful” and had an intelligence that could overcome the side effects of her many psychiatric medications… The woman mentioned that she was a lawyer who had done some radio broadcasts. Sanchez googled her. The face staring back from the screen was unrecognizable.
R. Sad reality of the week: Grace Benninghoff of the Portland Press Herald in Maine on the trial of a homeless woman in Maine who can't find a way out of her life.
S. This is not a happy story. It's tragic. But it's part of the country's reality and good for Benninghoff to shine a light on 35-year-old Desirae Rowe. (Thanks to The Sunday Long Read for pointing out the story.)
T. Benninghoff wrote:
35-year-old Desirae was placed in a foster family at the age of 12. At 19, she married a man who she says was abusive, which landed her in the hospital several times. When she left him, she ended up on the streets for a while – until she got a job at a traveling carnival, setting up and dismantling rides throughout Maine and Massachusetts. She was pregnant at 21, but the father was gone before her daughter turned one.
She named her daughter Kasen, which, according to baby name lists, means “pure.”
She tried to keep them and raise them, but it wasn't easy.
Her second marriage was more stable, but her husband used drugs and died of a fentanyl overdose shortly after they moved to Arizona for a fresh start.
Back in Maine… When her mother could no longer care for Kasen, Desirae took her daughter back for a while. She rented an apartment in Portland for $2,000 a month and worked 80 hours a week in the kitchen at Andy's Old Port Pub. With little time to see her daughter, she asked Kasen's other grandparents for help. But she says they were abusive and Kasen ended up in foster care — around the age Desirae was when she entered the system.
Desirae's third husband introduced her to meth three years ago, and she hasn't been able to get off it.
and Mr. Excellent reporting from Benninghoff. The reporting is also depressing.