DENVER BRONCOS AT THE END: “Some people see things that are and ask, Why? Some people dream of things that never were and ask, Why not? Some people have to go to work and don’t have time for all that.”

“Pffft, what a gyp.”
— Muttered while exhaling a butt drag by Vincent Vega to sweet sweet Mia Wallace when Mia wouldn’t divulge some gossip in the film Pulp Fiction (Uma Thurman, dang, easily one of the top 10 hottest most ridiculously gorgeous females ever created (it’s all about the bubble))

The Dude: We dropped off the damn money—
The Big Lebowski: —We?
The Dude: I! The Royal “we” … you know, the editorial…
— Jeffery Lebowski (another top 10 but in the category of icons, Jeff Bridges is elite) to the “other Jeffrey Lebowski, the millionaire” in the film (der) The Big Labowski. As such, I’m dropping the “we” in these pieces, as it’s really just a function of getting used to using the first person … plus it’s a ripoff of Mike Florio’s Profootballtalk.com

In Errol Morris’ documentary The Fog of War about the life of worldly executive and Vietnam-era Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara, McNamara explains how, after receiving an MBA at Harvard Business School then becoming it’s highest paid and youngest assistant professor, the institution was contracted to procure a new officers candidate school. This was of course the early part of World War II. The new program was called the Army Air Force’s Statistical Control. Basically teaching analytical approaches used in business to the military. McNamara was an undergraduate Army ROTC (would eventually take a defining role in the wartime application of the program) and was charged with defining admission standards. Of the many tests, judgment was critical: “We were looking for the best and the brightest. The best brains. The greatest capacity to lead. The best judgment.”

The super-genius who polarized a nation

Were Josh McDaniels to be given a similar judgment test amongst other talented 33-year-olds from other elite American professions, I believe he would easily arrive in the 90th percentile. He’s basically a prodigy. Were he to be tested on judgment amongst his professional peers—NFL head coaches of any age, the average is 47—I bet he would fall to the 50th or 40th percentile.

Let’s face it, Pincers is relatively underdeveloped. Not relative to his age group, but to his professional peers. Just as we must wait for he and his staff to develop and accumulate elite players en route to a dominate roster, so too must we wait for Pincers to become a bona fide NFL coach. His foundation is sound, about as sound as any individual that ever took to building an NFL coaching skill set. In Denver, he will learn more at a faster rate (and early stage of career) than any young coach could ever dream of. But at the dawn of 2010, with just over 20 years of true, mature, football study under his belt—and I’m counting his adolescence—he’s simply not equipped for success at this level. Not yet. Any math major could tell you that.

A week removed from the meltdown finale against Kansas City, blame would be bizarre at this point. And it would be futile to dump it all on Pincers. His team simply isn’t good. They don’t even look like a contender. And that’s not entirely his fault … yet. The existing Denver talent quotient lends credence to the one firm conclusion I’ve shaped about Pincers here at the unnecessary, sloppy, blundered ending: It’s love/hate with Pincers. I love some things about him, strenuously dislike others. By extension, Pincers did some great things this year, as well as awful. It doesn’t take an industry pro to see that. Since this blog is dedicated the man himself, here is my opinion-based Pincers Love/Hate List 2009:

THE LOVE

The team he wants to build. As excited as I am for Mike Shanahan and his new gig in mega-market DC, and as grateful as I am for all he did in Denver, the look and tone of his teams wore on me. In Denver, he always ran a finesse zone running attack. On defense, he believed in a lateral, light, budget approach. Each of these tactics produced notable levels of success but at the end of the schedule, they could never intimidate. John Elway was Shanny’s intimidation factor. Once Elway was gone, they always suffered late-season or playoffs.

Pincers, however, came in and immediately transformed the linebacking corps into a bigger, angrier unit that functioned as the beating heart of his roster. Here this group would enforce defense, special teams, and an overall tone. I like that he believes in leaving an elite secondary on an island so that any number of players, and their respective levels of talent, can operate the front seven. Mike Lombardi always points out that one can see if a front office has focus during warm-ups: the position groups are the same shape and size. This is true of the Denver linebacking corps. It worked half the time in 09 and as Pincers said: “We were in damn near every game.” (All but two, to be exact.)

Offensively, I like that Pincers is shifting to a gap-blocking scheme. Again, he doesn’t want finesse, he wants to bully. It’s obvious Pincers’ guard-to-guard personnel (is Chris Kuper good?) needs an upgrade to bigger, angrier, younger players to win toe-to-toe late in the season. But he has an outstanding tackle tandem already in place. Ryan Clady and Harris can brawl. (Note: knowing Clady was drafted for Shanny’s zone scheme, the fact that Clady executes both Pincers’ style and Shanny’s at an elite level … kinda speaks volumes for that gigantic badass.) See the first Oakland game this year, when Pincers pulled the guards AND tackles and they ran all over a fresh, talented, physical Oakland front. Fast forward to the second Oakland game, with Tyler Polumbus in for Ryan Harris and the guard-to-guard trio in shambles, and, well, we all know how that went. Also, while Richard Quinn’s draft position is ludicrously baffling—Pincers traded UP to get him at the bottom of the SECOND ROUND—I like the emphasis on a another big tight end to go with The Boss that already patrols Denver’s edge: big ole DG, Daniel Graham … Denver’s own.

(Auxiliary point to The team he wants to build: Pincers’ was raised by a high school coach, Pincers is physically a lil fella that starred on his dad’s teams, Pincers matriculated professionally under Bill Belichick. Heart will always be foremost to Pincers. Indeed to a fault, he has said repeatedly: “We are building a team.” We all know how the latter Shanny teams tended to operate by moving in different directions. Furthermore, considering the self-inflicted shit storm that consumed Dove Valley preceding 09, Pincers had to rally his unit. And indeed he did. Looking back, he did so with unreal results. 6-0 was an aberration, but he did this with a team approach. Not only is his rhetoric based upon the team concept, but he brings in veteran thumpers to enforce it: Brian Dawkins and Andra Davis. Once he gets his guys, once he gets more talent, once he’s run off all the Shanny prima donnas, it will be interesting to see what he can do with a slightly ABOVE average team. Moreover, it will be interesting to see just how much he can do with a team that’s expected, and able, to perform late-season and contend.)

The pure emotion. Dropping the MF-bomb on national television was great. Unloading on Kyle Orton while miced-up is fun. Love the rumors he calls out and lays into players in team meetings. Even the fist pumps—though for the most part dorky—worked for me. Pincers is just under a year younger than me, he’s a millionaire, he’s at the helm of an NFL franchise, he obviously loves the game of football. How could you not be psyched out of your mind every freaking day? There is no time-clock on jobs like these. I’ve had jobs like these. When days just blend into each other. You work so much and so hard and you don’t even notice and you don’t spend your paycheck and you love every second of it. Plus, Pincers has been given carte blanche, he’s the anointed man, Pat Bowlen has made it clear he’s untouchable … for a bit. So he’s stoked to the gills! Who wouldn’t be? Perhaps some of his athletes take his cue and appreciate things and get fired up and just engage and WIN because what the fuck else is there to do?

His foundation, his legacy. Pincers was born for this. He won the ovarian lottery, as Warren Buffet would say. Also has the right wiring, as Buffet would say again. By the time he entered John Carroll University he was already miles down the road. He must’ve had to bite his tongue with some of those coaches. Add a brief Nick Saban mentorship, then a freaking recommendation from Saban to Belichick, and Pincers landed smack dab in the genesis of a New England dynasty. You really have to respect that kind of referral. Pincers must’ve made an impression. I wonder what Saban said were his most impressive qualities. His experience at such a young age, his passion, his work ethic, his pure intellect? You gotta bring this guy in, Billy. He’s smarter than both our conceited asses put together! From there he sat at the feet of masters. Well, at least one master and his successful lieutenants. Ground Zero of significant NFL history, of which he is clearly a part and, at least as a line item, has already landed him in the Hall of Fame he knows all too well. No question, Pincers is currently poised.

His general demeanor. You have to admit the guy is ice cold. When he speaks, he has some ticks—hand to the face and neck, the hech-ums—but he appears to be in control. He appears to be unintimidated. He speaks clearly, concisely, thoughtfully, and will not divulge any more than he wants with the world in his face demanding info. He can even aw-shucks a point across. One can only conclude this confidence also exists in one-on-ones with players, coaches, scouts, agents, and executives with more experience than he. The man comes across as pure. That’s really the best way to put it. Throw in some eloquence, maybe some sophisticated jargon, some comments about the wife and kids, and you can see how he made such a good impression on Joe Ellis (then Ellis had to nudge Bowlen awake to check this guy out).

The man who inspired his very own psychological classification

THE HATE

The team he wants to build. Is an immobile, tentative, average, albeit loyal and hardworking and disciplined quarterback, Pincers’ ideal form? Does Pincers want elite players that inevitably come with elite egos or just the scrappy type that will do his bidding? Again borrowing from Lombardi’s comments of body type, is Pincers serious with his preferred running back, the Bucky/Moreno type? Does he honestly think, as he said in his press conference following the Indy game, 215 pounds is big? His entire approach to the running back roster spot is simply confusing and, while I’m all for shunning conventional wisdom, there no sense in shunning wisdom itself. Pincers is just as much a spaz in this regard as Knowshon “Crazy Legs” Moreno is with the ball in his hands: flailing, several directions at once, ungathered, hits the brakes sporadically, altogether akimbo.

Pertaining to the leadership of the team he’s trying to build, it appears it’s helmed by an individual lacking A+ personal skills. Not sure if Pincers can work well and play with others just yet. Especially those that may not like him, i.e., the elite egos that Shanny left in the cupboard. My take is the assumed take: Pincers came to town doing two-handed shooters in the halls of Dove Valley to Cutty and Sheff and B-Marsh, doing his “Hey guys!” along with some high-five attempts. The trio, having just had their NFL father shipped out, their offensive coordinator fired by Pincers himself, the two guys who authored each of their monster stats since 2006 and, well, safe to say they were not exactly hook-line-and-sinker from the jump. This plus the hard-line 33-year-old coach platitudes Pincers probably shilled their way and all three were like: “Fuck you, dude.” Pincers, sensing a snub and lacking the ability—and inclination—to smooth things over like the rest of us have to do in the workplace, would soon choose to go even more hard-line. It never had a chance.

It has been written that Pincers wants to get rid of the Shanny remnants ASAP simply for the sake constructing his very own roster. Only partially true, I say. Pincers plays guys like Josh Barrett, Mario Haggan, Marcus Thomas, Ryan McBean, Spencer Larsen, and stuck with Ben Hamilton as long as he could. It’s Shanny’s “boys” that gotta go and gotta go now. Only two left. Shanny’s prized 2008 draft picks didn’t have enough time to get pedestaled and therefore rotted: see Ryan Clady and Eddie Royal. At this rate, Clady’s here for good (duh). And from one Napoleon to another small fella, Pincers obviously loves Royal. The only reason Royal didn’t produce on offense this year is because Pincers BUSTED on Alphonso Smith and Kenny McKinley is beta so 19 had to catch almost every ball kicked to Denver this year.

Of course, the wild card here is Peyton Hillis. For sure, a guy with great roots, not about to go rogue, toed the company line all season long even though Pincers decided to ignore his tape, ignore his ability, and more or less marginalize the poor bastard. Honestly, trade the guy. Get something for him, he’s too good. What’s really confusing, what really defines the Pincers enigma, were Pincers’ season-ending press conference comments when asked about Hillis:

“Again, it’s hard to give everybody a bunch of carries in a game. As a running back, you feel like you try to get somebody going into a little bit of a rhythm, and we did quite a few times this year. There were other times we didn’t, but the answer isn’t necessarily always to just yank the back out of the game and throw the next back in because that would be shallow on our part in terms of identifying what the problem is. Certainly, the backs can do better. Everybody can, but I don’t think that the answer is just to jerk them out of the game and say ‘Well, you know, it’s all his fault.’ It would be really shallow for me to do that and our team knows better. Our team knows that our success is as a group and our failures are usually as a group, also.”

See, we’re just so used to, I dunno, someone getting yanked when they don’t perform. Like at our job. See, we watch other NFL football games, too, and we know that when a back fumbles, or can’t get a first down, or is generally ineffective, he sits. Even Adrian Petersen, the most ree-dick, fearsome and physical but fumble-prone back in the NFL … even he sits when he can’t hang onto his Pez. Shallow?! Giant strobing neon lights with concentric blinking patterns leading the eye to the elephant standing in the room: Pincers features Moreno to justify his draft pick. A 12th overall investment that cost the Broncos $13 million in guarantees.

What will be interesting is to see is how Pincers handles a massive incoming ego to which he is the NFL father. 27 and Robert Ayers? Too young and unproductive. They are scratching and clawing to get away from “overrated” if not “bust” status. If and when Pincers drafts an elite player, will Pincers try to throw high fives in the halls then once he reads a snub subsequently discard the player? Or by that time will he have developed enough personal skills to not interpret every single professional situation or general human interaction as an affirmation of his manhood? (Full circle: An elite ego will most likely never set foot in Dove Valley on Pincers’ watch because Pincers will shake out that ego in a draft interview then promptly pass on the player should he fall to Pincers.)

The pure emotion. We are all products of our experience. The past shapes the future, as they say. Unfortunately, what shapes a large part of our early personal development, and how we interpret ourselves, is social stratification via an individual’s physical attributes. For example, I’ve heard ESPN radio host Colin Cowherd talk about quarterbacks, and why they are all generally well endowed in the looks department. He suggests this began on the playground, and that the big pretty boys always got the ball because of some kind of instinctual social stratification we as children naturally adhere to. While I cannot vouch for this phenomenon, I can definitely vouch for one of its relatives: the Napoleon Complex. The little guys grow up angry and mean and we assume people count us out (they do in athletics anyway) based on our unimposing physical first impressions. If you’ve happened to read “Where Men Win Glory” by John Krakauer, about the life of Pat Tillman, Tillman too had the ole “Naplex” until he physically grew out of it preceding his senior year in high school. Krakauer writes: “As a matter of principal, he fought only with kids that were bigger than he was …” (For us small kids, this may have only been a matter of percentages, as you are only small when those around you are larger.)

The point is, Pincers is pure Napoleon. (So is Shanny, by the way.) Add to this his relatively young age and rookie status, perhaps Pincers lack of gray hairs doesn’t provide him the ability to shake things off. He’s left with too much to prove when it comes to relatively trivial items that would normally bead off gray hairs. With Pincers it soaks in, and he appears abrasive, stubborn, and downright foolish at times when trying to make his point—both verbally to the press and symbolically in how he operates his team. (See Lamont Jordan in the second Raiders game following a week of heavy Hillis questions.)

His foundation, his legacy. Here we have a clear diametric to the preceding positives on this point. And something that informs the essence of Pincers’ performance. Pincers is extremely intelligent, and I can say this by virtue of his diploma, what and how he says it, and the bullet points on his CV. But he is also strictly a product of professional football. And by that I mean, a product of the football industry. He was raised in a small town in Ohio. Sure, it’s Canton, but not exactly an explosion of culture or diversity taking place there. I bet it’s a bubble, like most small towns. In fact, the state of Ohio in general seems to be a world unto itself. Second, he was raised in a football coach’s household, a legendary one at that. Pincers pursued nothing but football in his formative years and most likely graduated high school with the same kind of small mindedness all of us do. He then attends John Carroll University which is located in the town of University Heights, Ohio; the suburbs of Cleveland and an hour from Canton. 3,200 undergraduates attend John Carroll. After college he gets a gig as an assistant under (as of Thursday, two-time national champ) Nick Saban at Michigan State University in East Lansing. Though East Lansing is in the sticks, here he’s probably getting a taste of bright-lights big-city in the Big 10. Saban departs for LSU the next year and Pincers joins the real world and sells plastics for a year. I have no idea if he was soul searching or simply out of work or what town he was based in. Nonetheless, the next year, as per a recommendation from his dad’s buddy Saban, he’s hired in New England. Between here and the Broncos he gets married, wins some Super Bowls, and more or less leaves a vapor trail between the titles of special assistant and offensive coordinator. Quite impressive, and the titans who molded his development, despite poor careers as head coaches, are beyond reproach. One couldn’t script a more advantageous career path. However, herein lies the point: Pincers is sheltered. In terms of a life outside of football, he’s had none. This is probably professionally acceptable as he only deals with other individuals who’ve had nothing but a life inside football. (Though imagine how advantageous diversity would be in an in an industry as esoteric as the NFL.) And I no doubt imagine Pincers has met a TON of people, all shapes and sizes, that inform his experience daily. But where’s the rest of it? That’s it, that’s your life, Pincers? Pincers is 9 months younger than me. He’s made more money this year than I have to date. He’s rapped with the best athletes and probably some seriously powerful people. But I betya $100 I could teach him more than a handful of things about life, about relationships, about the world, about judgment and ego and how to get along. Here’s the conclusion: What we have here is basically a young, small-town Ohio kid who doesn’t know anything other than specific brands of football. The same things that have made him great, limit him.

(Auxiliary point to His foundation, his legacy: I also think pincers is beholden to his legacy. Not in the sense of expectations, but in Xs and Os. He is limited by a lack of exposure to the pro-style application of scheme. He only knows New England and what he’s seen on tape. Is that all you need to know if such a database comes with as high a quality-quotient as New England’s? Perhaps. But I also think one could make a point regarding the concept of departure. When exactly did Pincers start running his own offense? It couldn’t have been New England simply because he wasn’t the head coach. He ran versions of his predecessor’s in New England and even if or when it attempted to be distinctly Pincers it was always tempered by The Hoody. I’m sure Pincers was fine with all of this however when the time came in 2009 to go All Pincers with the Broncos, I think that’s a critical junction. As my Dad, the political science major, would say: There are the known knowns, the known unknowns; the unknown knowns, and the unknown unknowns. It seems logical that Pincers’ legacy creates a complication in this process. And, well, judging by the 2009 offensive stats, it has. Here’s my problem: I’m willing to accept certain flaws for certain skills. Meaning, I’m willing to accept all the sloppiness that comes with being a rookie Napoleon coach if the Napoleon’s Xs and Os are All-World. Yet, his Xs and Os seem to be the least of his talents.)

His general demeanor. In a desperate attempt to eliminate doubt in his ability, Pincers took the indigent approach: no one knows anything, they are just cameras, they merely serve the public, I am going to stay the course, and I am going to visibly display this to you. As I’ve said previously, it takes some age to pull this off. When Bill Parcells does it, it’s awesome. Tuna’s entire demeanor toward anyone who has the audacity to direct a question at him, the football leader, is just pure gold. However Pincers can’t get away with it. One, he’s not really that cool. And that’s something that head football coaches just HAVE to be, at least on SOME level. Two, there s no brilliant sense of humor at work that can make even the slimiest of press maggot chuckle. Pincers hears crickets. And three, he’s just too young, even if it’s only symbolic. He comes off as punk … well, let me rephrase. To me, he just comes off as a rookie toddler; stumbling between the knees of mom and dad. However, to an older generation, and I’ve heard this from my Dad and some of my buddy’s dads, he reeks of punk. The snotty, glib, conceited, new-guy kind of punk. And you know what? I know the feeling. You know that Noog at work who acts like he’s just come from an MTV etiquette class? Perhaps he’s in his 20’s and he’s just dumb enough to, when you hassle him, make a crack about how old you are. Sure he’s bright but he’s got no respect. Furthermore, he just doesn’t seem to give you, his elder, the kind of respect you remembered giving your elders, regardless of rank, when you were his age. Of course you know this guy, know why? Because all of us were, are, or will be this guy. It’s the circle of life. It’s like that line John C. McGinley’s character says to Keanu Reeves in Point Break: “You don’t know shit. You don’t even know that you don’t know shit. If you knew that you didn’t know shit you’d at least know something. But you don’t even know that.”

They dumbest and radest movie of all time

Pappas: Don’t ride him in with the black and whites like some punk, let me ride him in.
Harp: Yeah sure, Angelo, why not? That is why I put you 2 screw-ups together to begin with. You deserve each other, don’t you? You’re just as bad as he is. Though you’re a little fatter, a little slower and a little more pathetic. For Chrissake, it’s like the blind leading the blind with you two.
Pappas: Harp, I want to tell you something. I was in this bureau when you were still popping zits on your funny face and jerking off to the lingerie section of the sears catalog.
Harp: Is that right?
Pappas: That is right, Harp. And out of all these years, I have learned something that you haven’t got.
Harp: Yeah? Why don’t you astonish me, shitface?
Pappas: [punch, drop, close-up] Respect for my elders.

Aaaaaaaaaand inhale.

Welp, no matter how much opinion I spray all over the binary place, the fact remains it’s all done. Yeah, I worry the Broncos franchise is in shambles and that—and Woody (freaking Woody) pointed out last week—there was a Bowl in the 70s, three in the 80s, and two in the 90s, but zero in the Zeros. (As Happy Gilmore muttered between clenched teeth: “God I hate that Bob Barker.”) The most difficult part of the 09 debacle is that the Broncos represent my hometown, my state, my region, my zone. (My shit-talking ability to my out-of-state friends!) I’m from and live in Denver, and with the exception of about 2 years combined, have been based in the mountain west region. So when the Broncos become Donkeys and they go down like chumps and fools and dummies, I find it annoying. Furthermore, football, in general, is in a state of decline in Colorado (save the Air Force Academy). Yet it flourishes in other mountain west states like Utah and Idaho. So we’re even more dependent in Colorado for the Broncos to be our paragon of the sport. I love the sport, loved it my whole life whether I aspired to play it, was playing it, or was playing other sports. It’s pretty freaking cool on so many levels: team, intangibles, heart, athleticism, strategy, tactics, discipline, human drama, achievement, adversity, ambition, leadership, business, bright lights, grass, et al. Lest we forget, it’s also an awesome social catalyst. In as far as socializing around the Broncos is concerned, the gameday magic is dormant for the time being. Unfortunately it lies dormant in the GAG category again. Nonetheless, whomever you are, remember football is a special thing, an American thing, something that so clearly marks our entire culture. It really is the most remarkable sport ever invented. Even better than skiing. Or golf. Or bikes. Or gasoline. As football pertains to the NFL—a style of football, one of many leagues of football, an expression unique unto itself, one that pays—remember that tonight, a guy like Brandon Marshal doesn’t have to worry about eating or paying his bills or reading a classified ad. Remember that a guy like Jay Cutler is probably the wealthiest dummy on planet earth. Remember that Pincers himself made, and will continue to escalate in salary, millions of freaking dollars a year. Plural. Don’t feel sorry for them, nor scorn negative words hurled at them. They accept this risk, accept it gladly, and will always have their gated communities in which to find well-endowed refuge. This isn’t the high school squad or your college alma mater. On the pro level, it’s 100% give and take: we both built that stadium, we continue to fill it, a responsibility exists to provide a compelling product. We both bankroll each other. In the end, for people like us, all is fair in fun and games.

Before the fall