Rex Ryan: Salad Antagonist (Now with Author Commentary!)

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m0ckduck

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Now THIS is a great feature on Rex— Rex's last stand by Matt Taibbi:
 
Unlike his frumpy predecessor Eric Mangini (or, more to the point, unlike Bill Belichick, whose name will come up a lot in this story — the smallish, moribund, clam-faced, Giants-pedigreed Patriots coach is paradoxically both Rex’s alter ego and his perfect Dostoyevskian opposite), Ryan was a massive physical presence. At his intro he seemed to be at least 900 pounds of resplendent manhood crammed into a shiny jacket-and-striped-tie ensemble that featured an amazing, unapologetically booger-green color. He looked like the Incredible Hulk come to work at a Baskin-Robbins.
 
EDIT: Thread title.
 
M

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Wow, that is a spectacularly written article.
 
I enjoyed footnote 2, which reminded me of this moment I'd forgotten:
 
"Ironically, the last time an assistant called timeout from the sideline to take back a game-changing play had come in 2007, when then–Ravens defensive coordinator Rex Ryan called timeout just before a botched fourth-down play by the Patriots that would have ruined their 16-0 season. With Rex and the Jets, it always seemed to come back to the Pats."
 

Koufax

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That's a fabuouls read. Thanks for posting it.
 

Ed Hillel

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Here
In this case, the Pats eked out a 17-16 win in typically heartbreaking/insane fashion, thanks in part to an almost mystical officiating decision in which New England was awarded a first down despite the whole world seeing a ball on X-treme TV close-up that clearly sat several links short of the sticks.
 
Ohhh, the mystical angle camera shot that not one Jet on the field complained about.
 


Here’s his last game coaching against the rival who most confounded him both on and off the field for six long years, and Belichick’s farewell is a monotonal dive into the mysteries of special teams formations. If you speak 21st-century New England Patriot, it’s a giant middle finger, every bit as tall and proud as the one Rex laid on that crowd of Dolphins fans back in the day.
 
Uhhh, yeah!
 
I can't stand Grantland. They are all Simmons-inspired and write the same way. Simmons was an innovator and I don't have the hate for him that many here seem to, but reading however many authors write over and over again in his style is nauseating.
 

GeorgeCostanza

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When the hell did Matt Taibi start writing for Grantland? I thought for sure he would go back to Rolling Stone for a 6 month or so rebound gig after the disaster at Racket.

I generally like reading his work and listening to him when he goes on Maher but that article was subpar to say the least. Maybe it's the stink of Grantland rubbing off? The Simmons stank!
 

soxfan121

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I tried right tackle Sebastian Vollmer, figuring a foreigner might slip and actually answer a question about whether he was going to miss these Rex-Belichick rivalry games. The enormous German paused, remembered his coaching, and deadpanned, “As far as I know, we’re still playing him next year,” then shot me an expert fuck you look before turning back to his locker to get dressed.
 
 

GeorgeCostanza

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soxfan121 said:
I tried right tackle Sebastian Vollmer, figuring a foreigner might slip and actually answer a question about whether he was going to miss these Rex-Belichick rivalry games. The enormous German paused, remembered his coaching, and deadpanned, “As far as I know, we’re still playing him next year,” then shot me an expert [/size]fuck you look before turning back to his locker to get dressed.[/size]
He was once a "part time" sports writer/columnist and shit like that is the product. I really like this guy, home town guy made it big, by journalism standards. But Christ, write about what you know Matt. One would think that a guy raised in the Boston area wouldn't go all Borges on us but here you have it.
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

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All that terrible prose about how Rex gave the Pats a hard time, and not a single mention that Rex went 4-9 against the Pats over 6 years. Ryan should hire Taibbi as his press agent. Hell, he's already his fluffer.
 

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Smiling Joe Hesketh said:
That article was hot garbage. Ooh, Rex is so refreshing! How novel. A sloppy blowjob in print. Overwritten and turgid.
 
Your nuts. He compares Ryan to frickin' Chernobyl and General Hospital. This?
 
“It’s weird,” says Newsday’s Bob Glauber, who has covered the team for years. “The players have always loved Rex. Even after the last four years, after all the losing, after this horrible year, they still love him.” He laughs. “It’s almost wrong.”
This year something was wrong, for sure. Finding bizarre ways to lose games has been a Ryan-Jets trait since he arrived in the Meadowlands, but not until 2014 did it become a mathematical constant. Each week of this season seemed more horrible than the last.
 
That is an evisceration. By a rabid and self-avowed Patriots fan.
 
He's framing him as a classic American showman huckster. And frankly, I think that's a cool angle.
 
It's basically your argument that he's a fraud, but fleshed out as to why the American media loves him with an eye to historical context. I think you're missing this--you should be reveling in it.
 

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“When I first came up here, he greeted me and told me I was part of the family, that’s what I remember,” says tight end Zach Sudfeld, a former New England Patriot who, one guesses, didn’t get a similar welcome-to-the-family bear hug as an undrafted rookie up in Foxborough.
 
 
Oh boo hoo.
 
Yeah Rex--take the players that this shit matters to.
 
 
And this:
 “After that Chargers game,” he (Pace) says, “nobody thought we had a chance. And there we were.”
 
 
You LOST the next game AFTER the Chargers game.
 
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Rev, I'm surprised you haven't pointed out Matt's flawed assessment of this scene:
 


Ryan, forced at the postgame podium to answer the inevitable presumptuous questions about his last Jets home game, bragged in defeat for old times’ sake, talking about how “we’re the team that always gives [Brady] the biggest challenge, whether he admits it or not.”
 
Belichick, meanwhile, showed up for his postgame presser wearing his trademark Autopsy Table Face. And the only time his heart rate rose above 19 was when someone asked about the formation on their fourth-quarter field goal rush. Brightening, the Hoodie went on and on about it, to the point where reporters were glancing at each other in confusion — Belichick’s description of how Vince Wilfork got through the A gap was not quite a Thomas Pynchon novel, but close.
 
“We changed our alignment a little bit … It was a long kick, like the one in New England … ”
 
It’s subtle, but hilarious. Here’s his last game coaching against the rival who most confounded him both on and off the field for six long years, and Belichick’s farewell is a monotonal dive into the mysteries of special teams formations. If you speak 21st-century New England Patriot, it’s a giant middle finger, every bit as tall and proud as the one Rex laid on that crowd of Dolphins fans back in the day.
 
I'll forgive this because he doesn't really follow the Patriots, but... Belichick answered that question thoroughly and enthusiastically because it was a question about actual football, rather than the hoopla and soap-opera surrounding football.  Anyone who's ever watched a BB press conference could tell you that while he was answering it, Belichick almost certainly had no intention of a metaphorical middle finger.  He will talk the ear off of any man, woman, child or animal who asks him a serious question about advanced football tactics.  It's like asking Manny about hitting, or Ross Perot about sales, or Bill Gates about malaria.  It was no more about Rex Ryan in that moment than it was about flying to the moon.
 
Smiling Joe Hesketh said:
All that terrible prose about how Rex gave the Pats a hard time, and not a single mention that Rex went 4-9 against the Pats over 6 years. Ryan should hire Taibbi as his press agent. Hell, he's already his fluffer.
 
You're missing a few obvious references to Rex's inability to consistently get the better of Belichick.  Much was made of his 2010 playoff victory in Foxboro.  But immediately after the bit I quoted above, you get:
 


As for these two coaches, who will likely be linked together forever in a bitter, mostly one-sided rivalry along the lines of Sampras-Agassi or pre-2004 Woods-Mickelson, here’s the thing...
 
I mean, he spends like 500 words dissecting the Buttfumble and what made it so zeitgeist-level significant in its incompetence on national TV.  Taibbi contrasts Rex to Belichick in many ways, some of them even coherent, but I don't think he ever suggests Rex was Belichick's equal or fought BB to a draw.  He merely says that Rex's first act could prove analogous to Belichick's run in Cleveland, and that Rex might learn some parallel lessons that would make him a force to be reckoned with in his second act.  Seems like a reasonable conclusion, and one that Belichick might easily agree with even in private.
 

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GeorgeCostanza said:
When the hell did Matt Taibi start writing for Grantland? I thought for sure he would go back to Rolling Stone for a 6 month or so rebound gig after the disaster at Racket.

I generally like reading his work and listening to him when he goes on Maher but that article was subpar to say the least. Maybe it's the stink of Grantland rubbing off? The Simmons stank!
He is back at RS, which makes this odder/cooler. I know his wheelhouse is righteous anger at financial malfeasance, but he's always written some sports. Even during his RS heyday he was writing a sports column in the Phoenix (albeit one focused on athlete's acting badly).
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

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There is no Rev said:
 
Your nuts. He compares Ryan to frickin' Chernobyl and General Hospital. This?
 
 
That is an evisceration. By a rabid and self-avowed Patriots fan.
 
He's framing him as a classic American showman huckster. And frankly, I think that's a cool angle.
 
It's basically your argument that he's a fraud, but fleshed out as to why the American media loves him with an eye to historical context. I think you're missing this--you should be reveling in it.
 
No. We part ways here. He revels in the fact that Rex was new and a showman and his players loved him and isn't it a shame that he can't stay in NY, etc. If he's pointing out why the media loves him he's NOT pointing out that Rex is wholly undeserving of such praise. He's much too much too forgiving of Rex' football sins.
 
Nowhere in the article does he accuse Rex of being a fraud, or a failure as a HC. If anything he trots out the litany of excuses that Rex' fluffers have used over the years. The Buttfumble bit was used as an attack on Sanchez, not Rex.
 
The definitive article on Rex should begin, and conclude and have the middle all say he was nothing but a fraud.
 

RFDA2000

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Smiling Joe Hesketh said:
All that terrible prose about how Rex gave the Pats a hard time, and not a single mention that Rex went 4-9 against the Pats over 6 years. Ryan should hire Taibbi as his press agent. Hell, he's already his fluffer.
 
Well, 4-9 is good for a .308 winning percentage, while the NFL in general has gone 23-73 (.315) against the Pats over that same span.  Figure a couple of those wins were end of season throw-aways, and Rex has basically been league average against the Pats.  Not worthy of the high praise he gets, but not like he has gotten shellacked any worse than everyone else over that time period.
 

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RFDA2000 said:
 
Well, 4-9 is good for a .308 winning percentage, while the NFL in general has gone 23-73 (.315) against the Pats over that same span.  Figure a couple of those wins were end of season throw-aways, and Rex has basically been league average against the Pats.  Not worthy of the high praise he gets, but not like he has gotten shellacked any worse than everyone else over that time period.
 
I believe your math is slightly off. I have the Pats as 77-28 total since 2009:
 
2014: 12-4
2013: 13-5
2012: 13-5
2011: 15-4
2010: 14-3
2009: 10-7
 
Take out the Jets, and the record becomes 68-24, which is a 26.1 opponents win %, vs. 30.8% for the Jets. So he has been slightly better than league average vs. the Pats. It comes to about 3/4 of a win over a 16 game schedule: Pats have averaged 11.8-4.2 vs. the rest of the league, and 11.1-4.9 vs. Rex.
 

DJnVa

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Smiling Joe Hesketh said:
 
No. We part ways here. He revels in the fact that Rex was new and a showman and his players loved him and isn't it a shame that he can't stay in NY, etc. If he's pointing out why the media loves him he's NOT pointing out that Rex is wholly undeserving of such praise. He's much too much too forgiving of Rex' football sins.
 
Nowhere in the article does he accuse Rex of being a fraud, or a failure as a HC. If anything he trots out the litany of excuses that Rex' fluffers have used over the years. The Buttfumble bit was used as an attack on Sanchez, not Rex.
 
The definitive article on Rex should begin, and conclude and have the middle all say he was nothing but a fraud.
 
Yeah, I'm kind of with SJH. The article calls Ryan's first 2 years in NY the following:
 
The first two years of the Rex Ryan era surely rank with the greatest stretches of coaching in the history of the league
 

tims4wins

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As far as Rex giving Brady a harder time than league average, I calculated Brady's passer rating against the rest of the league and against the Jets (regular season only) since 2009 and came up with:
 
Completion %: 64.6 RoL; 59.9% Rex
YPA: 7.71 RoL; 7.07 Rex
TD%: 5.68% RoL; 4.66% Rex
INT%: 1.66% RoL; 1.33% Rex
Rating: 100.1 RoL; 91.4 Rex
 
So Brady has definitely had a harder time against Rex than the other defenses in the NFL by these metrics. Interestingly the only area where Rex is worse than the rest of the league is INT %. But if you add the playoff game the INT goes up to 1.41% which I'm not sure is a statistically significant difference.
 

riboflav

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tims4wins said:
As far as Rex giving Brady a harder time than league average, I calculated Brady's passer rating against the rest of the league and against the Jets (regular season only) since 2009 and came up with:
 
Completion %: 64.6 RoL; 59.9% Rex
YPA: 7.71 RoL; 7.07 Rex
TD%: 5.68% RoL; 4.66% Rex
INT%: 1.66% RoL; 1.33% Rex
Rating: 100.1 RoL; 91.4 Rex
 
So Brady has definitely had a harder time against Rex than the other defenses in the NFL by these metrics. Interestingly the only area where Rex is worse than the rest of the league is INT %. But if you add the playoff game the INT goes up to 1.41% which I'm not sure is a statistically significant difference.
 
Tims - I'm wondering if you could do the same but use the Dolphins instead. I think one of the reasons Patriots' fans have a hard time accepting the narrative that Rex was the Patriots' most formidable opponent is because of the Dolphins. Heck, Manning (either one) might also be ahead of Rex.
 

RFDA2000

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tims4wins said:
 
I believe your math is slightly off. I have the Pats as 77-28 total since 2009:
 
2014: 12-4
2013: 13-5
2012: 13-5
2011: 15-4
2010: 14-3
2009: 10-7
 
Take out the Jets, and the record becomes 68-24, which is a 26.1 opponents win %, vs. 30.8% for the Jets. So he has been slightly better than league average vs. the Pats. It comes to about 3/4 of a win over a 16 game schedule: Pats have averaged 11.8-4.2 vs. the rest of the league, and 11.1-4.9 vs. Rex.
 
I used regular season only, but yeah, you covered it better than I.
 

tims4wins

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riboflav said:
 
Tims - I'm wondering if you could do the same but use the Dolphins instead. I think one of the reasons Patriots' fans have a hard time accepting the narrative that Rex was the Patriots' most formidable opponent is because of the Dolphins. Heck, Manning (either one) might also be ahead of Rex.
 
Pats are 9-3 vs. Miami since 2009, and 9-4 against Rex (9-3 regular season). I will dig up Brady's #s in a bit.
 
Edit: since 2009, Brady against Miami:
 
Completion %: 61.9%
YPA: 7.64
TD %: 4.50%
INT: 1.80%
Rating: 93.1
 
So better completion % and YPA than against Rex, worse TD % and INT % than against Rex, slightly better passer rating. Miami has given him some issues. I think a lot of us think of Miami as particularly tough because of some bad losses earlier in the decade - they got curbstomped in 2001 and 2002 in Miami IIRC, lost to a 2 win Dolphin team in 2004, lost 21-0 down there in 2005 or 2006 I believe.
 

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tims4wins said:
 
I believe your math is slightly off. I have the Pats as 77-28 total since 2009:
 
2014: 12-4
2013: 13-5
2012: 13-5
2011: 15-4
2010: 14-3
2009: 10-7
 
Take out the Jets, and the record becomes 68-24, which is a 26.1 opponents win %, vs. 30.8% for the Jets. So he has been slightly better than league average vs. the Pats. It comes to about 3/4 of a win over a 16 game schedule: Pats have averaged 11.8-4.2 vs. the rest of the league, and 11.1-4.9 vs. Rex.
 
 
In other words, they're still getting their fucking asses kicked pretty hard by the Pats under Rex. It's not like they went .500 against NE, or even say .450.
 
It's all garbage. The slobbery praise is entirely founded on his first two years, where 1) he had the same record in his first year that for Mangini fired in his last, 2) they were gifted into the AFCCG by the Colts and pals and 5 straight missed opponent FGs, only to lose, 3) made it to the same level the next year (his only real accomplishment) because the much maligned Tanny loaded up for that one year and ensured cap hell going forward, 4) lost the AFCCG anyway, and 5) promptly went into the shitter for the next 4 years, achieving absolutely nothing. Do I have that right?
 
Oh yeah, he was great with the press. That's about it.
 

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Smiling Joe Hesketh said:
 
 
In other words, they're still getting their fucking asses kicked pretty hard by the Pats under Rex. It's not like they went .500 against NE, or even say .450.
 
It's all garbage. The slobbery praise is entirely founded on his first two years, where 1) he had the same record in his first year that for Mangini fired in his last, 2) they were gifted into the AFCCG by the Colts and pals and 5 straight missed opponent FGs, only to lose, 3) made it to the same level the next year (his only real accomplishment) because the much maligned Tanny loaded up for that one year and ensured cap hell going forward, 4) lost the AFCCG anyway, and 5) promptly went into the shitter for the next 4 years, achieving absolutely nothing. Do I have that right?
 
Oh yeah, he was great with the press. That's about it.
 
Right, and removing the playoff game, Rex won 25% of his regular season games vs. the Pats. The rest of the NFL won 24% of their regular season games vs. the Pats in this time frame. It comes out to 1/6 of a win over a 16 game schedule. 12-4 vs. Rex, 12.17-3.83 vs. the rest of the league. Congrats Rex on making life tougher on the Pats!
 

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tims4wins said:
 
Right, and removing the playoff game, Rex won 25% of his regular season games vs. the Pats. The rest of the NFL won 24% of their regular season games vs. the Pats in this time frame. It comes out to 1/6 of a win over a 16 game schedule. 12-4 vs. Rex, 12.17-3.83 vs. the rest of the league. Congrats Rex on making life tougher on the Pats!
 
Yup, and Miami's 3-9 against NE in the same time frame. Buffalo's 2-10. Baltimore's 3-4. Etc.
 

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tims4wins said:
 
Right, and removing the playoff game, Rex won 25% of his regular season games vs. the Pats. The rest of the NFL won 24% of their regular season games vs. the Pats in this time frame. It comes out to 1/6 of a win over a 16 game schedule. 12-4 vs. Rex, 12.17-3.83 vs. the rest of the league. Congrats Rex on making life tougher on the Pats!
 
What was the win % of the teams that won the other 24%?  How does that compare to Rex's Jets?  
 
Edit: I'm guessing Rex's teams were slightly worse than the typical opponent to beat the Pats.
 

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I just re-read the article and I have to completely agree with SJH that it is a steaming pile of shit. A few choice excerpts:
 


No, the only people at this moment who genuinely want Johnson to fire Ryan are the fans of opposing AFC East teams who are tired of ugly surprise losses like this final-week 37-24 beating of the Dolphins, people like the security guard who wolf-whistles at Johnson as he tries to slither down the tunnel.
 
So it begins with this. "Ugly surprise losses". If the Jets were any good, no one would be surprised to lose to them.
 


Ryan was also poking a stick at the pusillanimous conventional wisdom of the modern NFL (and especially of coaches like Mangini and Belichick), which says you should always tremble before the Football Gods, never take anything for granted, never look past the next game, never give even the weakest opponent bulletin-board material. In his first few minutes, Rex dropped trou on all of that as so much old-fashioned superstition.
 
Except this philosophy or strategy or whatever you want to call it DID NOT WORK. The Jets looked past opponents and lost games they should have never lost! That is 100% on Ryan!
 


Things peaked when they lost a crucial late-season game to the already-eliminated Atlanta Falcons on a play in which Ryan correctly predicted a pass to Tony Gonzalez but watched as the Hall of Famer beat a triple-team anyway for a winning TD.
 
So Ryan gets praised for knowing the play and not being able to defend it? Um ok.
 


Nobody could believe it when Rex’s Jets were surprisingly whipping Manning 17-6 at halftime of the AFC Championship Game. But they faded down the stretch, thanks in large part to the atrocious play of his rookie quarterback, Sanchez. (Along with shocker-underdog wins and absurd act-of-God losses, the quarterback-ghoulishly-crapping-himself game would become a staple of the Rex era.)
 
This basically absolves Ryan of any blame - it was all Sanchize's fault. No mention of the fact that it was Ryan who GAVE him the nickname Sanchize, wanted to draft him, hitched his wagon to him, had his wife get a tattoo of him, etc. etc.
 


But because it was Ryan, who surely would have held a pregame parade with a city-block-length papier-mâché foot float if Footgate had been Bill Belichick’s scandal to bear, Welker violated the Patriot Prime Directive, forcing Belichick back into a Punji trap of his own rules. The Hoodie blinked, benching Welker to queer the start of a divisional-round debacle that to this day ranks with the greatest victories in Jets history.
 
So Ryan got into the Patriots heads by having a foot fetish video, which cause Welker to make fun of him, which caused BB to bench him? Yeah I'm sure that was all part of his master plan when he shot the foot video. Cuz REX!!!11!1!!! Also, Welker being benched the first series had precisely 0.00000001% impact on the outcome of that playoff game. But Rex was probably in Alge Crumpler's head when he dropped an early TD and he was surely in Patrick Chung's head when he called for the fake punt.
 

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Part 2:
 
 
 
If Belichick can have his ring kissed by national pundits for just missing the playoffs in 2008 with Matt Cassel and a supporting roster a season removed from a 16-0 record, then Ryan deserves at least equivalent praise for twice just missing the Super Bowl with Darrelle Revis, a nice blitz package, and the horrifying blooper-reel fixture Sanchez under center.
 
Another reference to Sanchize as a dumpster fire. Also, I'm not sure how relevant the BB reference is here. All people say with regard to 2008 was that it was proof BB can win without Brady, and even at that everyone acknowledges how easy of a schedule the Pats had. Also, the Pats have continued to win since 2008, whereas the Jets continue to lean on "back to back AFC Championship games!!!111!!1!" I don't hear anyone in New England proudly walking around saying "Pats kick ass, 3 straight AFC Championship Games baby!"
 
 
 
Players all over the NFL were dying to come play for the franchise. Rex was on top of the world.
 
Castoffs like Santonio Holmes, Plexico Burress, and LDT? Ok.
 
 
 
But it was the Giants who won yet another title in Ryan’s third year, while the Jets began a long slide downward. The two teams passed like ships in the night toward the end of the 2011 season, when they met in an infamous Christmas Eve battle that somehow changed everything. Ryan spent all week before that game bragging about how much better the Jets were, and then on the field the Jets folded like a cheap tent, the backbreaking play being a 99-yard Victor Cruz touchdown with the Jints backed up third-and-10 from the 1.4 Sanchez tossed his usual two picks and Big Blue won running away.
 
Another blaming of Sanchize.
 
 
 
And on the field, Rex is known to send the house on defense and dare opponents to hit the big one, while Belichick, for years equally hailed as a defensive genius, is known for keeping everything in front and daring opponents to execute yawn-inducing 15-play drives.
 
But Rex has a better record... wait that's not it. More head to head wins... no. More rings... not that either. So what is the fucking point?
 
 
 
The major real difference is that they have opposing philosophies about how to manage players. Belichick is the overprotective dad who stays up all night worrying about the trouble his kids might get into, while Ryan, whose own wife, Michelle, described his leadership style as the “fun parent,” is the indulgent one who lets his kids make their own mistakes.
 
Again, described as the "fun parent"... how the fuck did that work out for you, Rex?
 
 
 
And that might be the final similarity to Belichick, that it will only all come together for Rex in his second chance. Of course it would be the most Jets thing ever, Rex going elsewhere and winning pretty much instantly with someone like Matt Ryan or Colin Kaepernick or even, God forbid, Jay Cutler. But it feels inevitable that the second-act success story will come somewhere.
 
Already setting him up for success elsewhere... no chance of failure!
 

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well, the cherry on the top of this terribly written (good god that prose is florid!) and stupidly reasoned article is that he concludes it by stating
 
 
But his next stop should have been right where he was.
 
 
i.e....he shouldn't have been fired. As a Pats fan, that'd be fabulous, but aside from some feints toward fake balance this is basically a full deep throated bj for Rex. Very stupid.  The good news is that with this sort of hail mary media chorus, Rex getting re-hired as a HC seems inevitable, perhaps not this year but after a year in the TV booth for sure. That's bad news for the team that makes that bad decision, and good news for everyone else.
 

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Oh I forgot one in my takedown of the article:
 


Echoing Houdini (or Andy Kaufman), underdog Rex made a mockery of his own funeral, beating the favored Fins with a dazzling array of balls-out coaching decisions.
 
Cuz when you have nothing to play for, coaches never do balls to the walls things.
 

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You guys are insane.
 
I'm serious. I assure you while Ryan's TV agent might like the piece--no such thing as bad publicity--this makes him look terrible as a coach. This is all about how his persona transcends his team's performance. Which is accurate... and very, very not good if you consider yourself a head coach.
 

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There is no Rev said:
You guys are insane.
 
I'm serious. I assure you while Ryan's TV agent might like the piece--no such thing as bad publicity--this makes him look terrible as a coach. This is all about how his persona transcends his team's performance. Which is accurate... and very, very not good if you consider yourself a head coach.
 
I disagree, he gets absolved on multiple occasions in the article as I pointed out. Tons of Idzik and Sanchize blame, little for Rex.
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

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There is no Rev said:
You guys are insane.
 
I'm serious. I assure you while Ryan's TV agent might like the piece--no such thing as bad publicity--this makes him look terrible as a coach. This is all about how his persona transcends his team's performance. Which is accurate... and very, very not good if you consider yourself a head coach.
 
The piece calls, multiple times, for him to be given another head coaching job immediately, and in fact says that he shouldn't have been fired by the Jets at all. That does not scream "makes him look terrible as a head coach" to me at all.
 

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tims4wins said:
 
I disagree, he gets absolved on multiple occasions in the article as I pointed out. Tons of Idzik and Sanchize blame, little for Rex.
 
Absolve him? It frequently talks about how shitty his performance is despite being loved.
 
This is a Grantland piece, not a scouting report. It's about the tensions and contradictions that are Rex Ryan. It's a wonderful piece of Americana and Matt Taibbi is absolutely the guy to write it.
 
Y'all are just mad he didn't write the piece you wanted. So write your own damned piece. ;)
 
 
Smiling Joe Hesketh said:
 
The piece calls, multiple times, for him to be given another head coaching job immediately, and in fact says that he shouldn't have been fired by the Jets at all. That does not scream "makes him look terrible as a head coach" to me at all.
 
See above. He's not a scout, he's a fan.
 
Rex Ryan and the New York Jets really are the perfect mix, if you'd stop and think about it for a sec.
 
Where's my boy SSF to bring some real reveling hate to this party?
 

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GeorgeCostanza said:
He was once a "part time" sports writer/columnist and shit like that is the product. I really like this guy, home town guy made it big, by journalism standards. But Christ, write about what you know Matt. One would think that a guy raised in the Boston area wouldn't go all Borges on us but here you have it.
 
Taibbi peaked early as a football writer, when he convinced Mikhail Gorbachev that Bill Parcells wanted to hire him to give a series of motivational speeches to the Jets on "restructuring" a team (perestroika).  Its all downhill from there.
 

soxfan121

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There is no Rev said:
Y'all are just mad he didn't write the piece you wanted. So write your own damned piece. ;)
 
No one would publ...wait. We do that, don't we?
 
The nut who writes letters to the editor is FAR more respectable than the obnoxious guy ranting on the streetcorner. 
 

DJnVa

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Devizier said:
I liked the Taibbi article, but what the hell is a salad antagonist?
 
Wasn't there some quote in there about someone never hearing Rex order a Cobb salad?
 

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Question for the group: Based on this article, can you imagine Bob Kraft hiring Rex Ryan? Even interviewing him?
 
Or do you think he would run away?
 

Smiling Joe Hesketh

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Based on this article? No way Kraft talks to him.
 
Now, back when Ryan was up for a HC position initially? Had the Pats had an opening, I'm sure Kraft would have talked to him at least. But Ryan's boastfullness and inherent selfishness in his approach to his job (note how many times he says "I beat them" or "I held him to X yards" in his pressers) might give Kraft the Parcells-ian heebie-jeebies.
 

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Smiling Joe Hesketh said:
Based on this article? No way Kraft talks to him.
 
Now, back when Ryan was up for a HC position initially? Had the Pats had an opening, I'm sure Kraft would have talked to him at least. But Ryan's boastfullness and inherent selfishness in his approach to his job (note how many times he says "I beat them" or "I held him to X yards" in his pressers) might give Kraft the Parcells-ian heebie-jeebies.
 
The Rexism that drives me crazy is the number of times he talks about how many top ten defenses he's had>  He's had 9 top 10 defenses by yards in his 10 years as a head coach or coordinator but 5 top 10 by points (and 5 that were 19 or worse).  Of course he says he's coached 9 top 10 defenses.  Aside from using the misleading stat, who freaking remembers and quotes their own stats?
 

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Smiling Joe Hesketh said:
 
The piece calls, multiple times, for him to be given another head coaching job immediately, and in fact says that he shouldn't have been fired by the Jets at all. That does not scream "makes him look terrible as a head coach" to me at all.
 
Agreed---I think Rev is reading in a personal opinion that Taibbi's words don't suggest at all.  I happen to agree with Rev's opinion, but the article does not.
 

GeorgeCostanza

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Shelterdog said:
The Rexism that drives me crazy is the number of times he talks about how many top ten defenses he's had>  He's had 9 top 10 defenses by yards in his 10 years as a head coach or coordinator but 5 top 10 by points (and 5 that were 19 or worse).  Of course he says he's coached 9 top 10 defenses.  Aside from using the misleading stat, who freaking remembers and quotes their own stats?
Ricky Henderson?
 

Hendu for Kutch

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As for these two coaches, who will likely be linked together forever in a bitter, mostly one-sided rivalry along the lines of Sampras-Agassi or pre-2004 Woods-Mickelson
 
Bill Belichick is a key figure in the story of Rex Ryan, as seen in this article.  But in the story of Bill Belichick, Rex Ryan is a footnote in Chapter 12.  They are not "linked together forever" by any stretch of the imagination.
 

Tony C

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So true...amazing, though, how even on a Pats' board so many still buy into Rex's myth-making. There's no doubt he's a larger than life figure and totally get that his players do love him and he handles the media great. The rest of the HC stuff, though -- stuff that matters -- not so great on that.
 
Probably the most telling part of that article was this
 
 
Exactly in the manner of the more successful modern presidential candidates, he also won over a new generation of fans/voters addicted to new forms of media — reality TV, the Internet, etc. — that stressed emotional cues and “genuineness” over the actual meaning of the things people said. Even Koeppel, the FireJohnIdzik spokesman, invoked the Great Presidential Campaign Cliché when talking about why he and his friends didn’t blame Rex. “He’s the kind of guy I’d like to have a beer with,” he said, contrasting Ryan with the disingenuous Idzik
 
 
I mean...just how stupid is that? And how indicative of way too many -- you're a fan of the team and you want to fire the guy who has the least to do with their patehtic record and keep the guy who had much more to do with it...because you like his personality? Seriously?
 
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