VikingLord wrote:
Hey, I'm not the guy who drafted Ponder at #12 and who allowed the team to basically anoint him the de-facto starter going into the season. *Everything* Spielman has said about Ponder suggested he was 100% behind him.
As he should have been, considering how the season ended anyway and at least when it comes to the public. Behind closed doors he may have been having doubts sooner.
he gets a lot of credit from you for managing that 4 games in to the season after plenty of average fans already knew it last year? Kudos to him.
Who knows when he knew it. He spent a good chunk of money upgrading his back up with a guy who was fairly over qualified for the job.
Yeah, it's unprecedented for a leader to acknowledge shortcomings and delegate decision-making to experts. That *NEVER* happens in successful organizations.
I guess I've just never heard of it in football so I'm a little skeptical. The only thing I can even remotely think of was teams talking with Bill Parcels but that was more to just be the GM rather than signing on to be some kind of guru.
Look, the man of the hour here, Spielman, is the same guy who inked Cassel to a healthy 2 year deal. Cassel was here in training camp and preseason. He knows the offense. He may not be the future, but he's a heck of a better option right now and for the next half of the season than an admittedly talented slacker like Freeman.
I actually agree with you here, but a lot of that has to do with his above average performance against the Steelers being the only thing we've seen so far.
Look, I'm going to back off here. I can't prove to anyone that Freeman is going to bust here and bust spectacularly, so there really is no point. There seem to be a lot of people who want to focus on Freeman Past, and that's fine I guess. To each their own. And I admit I could be wrong. But I see this whole thing as further evidence the Vikings have a much more fundamental problem and aren't likely to solve it without significant changes in the decision making structure. In addition to everything Freeman brings to this equation, we're hearing Frazier didn't want to make this move. Now Frazier, a guy who needs to win to keep his job, is going to have to force Freeman into the starting rotation so everyone can see what they need to see. If I was Frazier, I'd be hopping mad right now. Ponder might have flamed, but Cassel had a chance to get things righted and with a few more solid bounces over the next few weeks maybe the Vikes could have clawed back into the picture. But now he's got to get Freeman up to speed and out there so Spielman can see for himself that Freeman is done. That's what I really think is about to happen here and all I can say is that if this costs Frazier, I really hope it costs Spielman as well, because he's the one forcing this.
I get what you're saying, but I don't think he'll have to force freeman into the starting line up. They'll likely play Cassel as long as he's winning so in that sense this is Cassel's shot. If they bench him while he's playing well AND the team is winning then count me as pissed off with you.
You're right that you can't prove freeman will bust just like no one can prove he'll succeed but you're also projecting what you think will happen as the basis for a lot of your argument as if it's already happened. I appreciate the concept of you "backing off" but at the same time I know where you're coming from as like I said I agree with some of what you're saying.
Ideally I would hope coach and GM would both be considered, according to the plan. As in, if the plan is to forget about trying to salvage the season via stop gap cassel and to evaluate freeman as a possible long term answer, that they would take that into account when evaluating Frazier should the Freeman experiment go awry. Perhaps that is how they're doing it and Frazier will be extended anyway? He seems like the type of coach Freeman would need to succeed with. On the other hand, maybe they already know they want to go in a different coaching direction and the rest of this year isn't all that important for evaluating Frazier.
While you may be right, for now we just have to wait and see how it plays out.
