Conspiracy at work in the NFL?
[FONT=Verdana,Helvetica,Arial]By Amy Donaldson and Chuck Gates[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana,Helvetica,Arial]Deseret Morning News[/FONT]
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Call me paranoid, but something besides FEMA's response time stinks down in Cajun Country. I'm talking about transforming the New Orleans Oswalds from last season's NFL roadkill into this year's Super Bowl tournament darlings. Remember, this is the patron franchise of lost seasons. The producer of ONE LOUSY playoff victory during its pitiful 39 years. A team with fans once so embarrassed they launched sports' brown-bag movement.
That's why this "Up With Football" revival defies rational explanation. It's akin to Norma Jean's suicide, Di's fatal crash or that phony moon landing. Fittingly, it's unfolding in the Big Easy, which gave us conspiracy godfather Jim Garrison, the deceased D.A. made into an icon by Kevin Costner's portrayal in Stone's "JFK."
Far-fetched? Yea, but that's what the former Russian spy guy thought until he walked past a Geiger counter.
Recall 2005 when Hurricane Katrina's aftermath turned New Orleans' season into a 3-13 traveling punch line. It started with the team's 2005 HOME OPENER being played ON THE ROAD at Jimmy Hoffa's place in Jersey and ended with the wacky owner making overtures more unseemly than his "Benson Boogie" to spirit the team away to San Antonio.
Meanwhile, NFL headquarters was botching things as badly as Rummy botched U.S. post-war strategy in Iraq. When wide receiver Joe Horn lashed out at the league, accusing it of treating the players and city shabbily, it was a rare case of someone playing the league's prima donna position opening his yap and actually talking some sense.
Fast-forward to the present. New Orleans is the NFL's feel-good, ratings-grabbing story about a new head coach and more than 30 new players assimilating into an appetizing football gumbo. And we're eating it up. If Dallas is America's Team, the Oswalds are its Survivor. There's enough pixie dust swirling around the Mississippi Delta these days that the EPA should be monitoring for unsafe levels.
But not before some strange happenings en route to the 2006 season. First, New Orleans outmanaged Miami to add premier free-agent quarterback Drew Brees, while subtracting scatter-armed/scatter-brained Aaron Brooks. True, Brees was recovering from offseason rotator cuff surgery, but even if his throwing arm was only attached with duct tape, how could you ignore his 20-11 record and 51 touchdowns as San Diego's starter the two previous seasons? We're being asked, of course, to believe the playoff-contending Chargers cut Brees loose to turn to unproven Phillip Rivers. Wink. Wink.
The gumbo thickens when you learn the Dolphins' front office, after lengthy negotiations with Brees' keepers and amid reports he preferred sunny South Florida to the corner of Devastation and Destruction, inexplicably ended contract talks to trade for the Minnesota Sex Capades' Dante Culpepper. Then, in a beaut of irony, Culpepper is the one's who's damaged goods.
We're also supposed to suspend belief and think franchises in Oakland, Baltimore and Detroit, also shopping for free-agent starting quarterbacks, thought they could do better by someone else. Although those nitwits in Oakland and Detroit probably did.
Brees, meanwhile, has left Harry Connick Jr. in his contrails to become the Crescent City's newest fan fave — proving he can DO DO THAT VOODOO with the best of them by channeling Joe Montana.
Even with Brees, however, New Orleans looked to finish no better than a 6-10 or 7-9. So next, the Oswalds drafted USC running back Reggie Bush — the NFL draft's consensus No. 1 pick. Note: This is extremely difficult to do when you're picking second. Unless — Ta-Da — the team (Houston) picking first inexplicably (that word again) selects the second-best player in the draft. While defensive end Mario Williams has played well for the Texans during an injury-hampered season, Bush has shined for the Oswalds in a multipurpose role.
Shades of Patrick Ewing to the New York Knicks? An NFL make-up call? Was the then-Tagliabue-led football cabal employing a defibrillator on a franchise in danger of flat-lining?
If you thought the fetid stench of conspiracy couldn't worsen, consider Marques Colston — a seventh-round impact player (the 252nd of 255 players drafted) from Hofstra. Keep in mind that in today's NFL, seventh-round impact players come around as often as Haley's Comet.
Despite a midseason ankle injury stalling his run for NFC Rookie of the Year, Colston still topped 1,000 yards receiving and has been an end zone regular for New Orleans. The NFL's official cover story is that the sophisticated scouting of 31 other teams let Colston (inexplicably?) slip through their fingers to the Oswald's good fortune.
Who am I to complain, though? Everyone seems happy with what they're being fed. I only wonder what the NFL is cooking up for dessert?
[FONT=Verdana,Helvetica,Arial]By Amy Donaldson and Chuck Gates[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana,Helvetica,Arial]Deseret Morning News[/FONT]
Call me paranoid, but something besides FEMA's response time stinks down in Cajun Country. I'm talking about transforming the New Orleans Oswalds from last season's NFL roadkill into this year's Super Bowl tournament darlings. Remember, this is the patron franchise of lost seasons. The producer of ONE LOUSY playoff victory during its pitiful 39 years. A team with fans once so embarrassed they launched sports' brown-bag movement.
That's why this "Up With Football" revival defies rational explanation. It's akin to Norma Jean's suicide, Di's fatal crash or that phony moon landing. Fittingly, it's unfolding in the Big Easy, which gave us conspiracy godfather Jim Garrison, the deceased D.A. made into an icon by Kevin Costner's portrayal in Stone's "JFK."
Far-fetched? Yea, but that's what the former Russian spy guy thought until he walked past a Geiger counter.
Recall 2005 when Hurricane Katrina's aftermath turned New Orleans' season into a 3-13 traveling punch line. It started with the team's 2005 HOME OPENER being played ON THE ROAD at Jimmy Hoffa's place in Jersey and ended with the wacky owner making overtures more unseemly than his "Benson Boogie" to spirit the team away to San Antonio.
Meanwhile, NFL headquarters was botching things as badly as Rummy botched U.S. post-war strategy in Iraq. When wide receiver Joe Horn lashed out at the league, accusing it of treating the players and city shabbily, it was a rare case of someone playing the league's prima donna position opening his yap and actually talking some sense.
Fast-forward to the present. New Orleans is the NFL's feel-good, ratings-grabbing story about a new head coach and more than 30 new players assimilating into an appetizing football gumbo. And we're eating it up. If Dallas is America's Team, the Oswalds are its Survivor. There's enough pixie dust swirling around the Mississippi Delta these days that the EPA should be monitoring for unsafe levels.
But not before some strange happenings en route to the 2006 season. First, New Orleans outmanaged Miami to add premier free-agent quarterback Drew Brees, while subtracting scatter-armed/scatter-brained Aaron Brooks. True, Brees was recovering from offseason rotator cuff surgery, but even if his throwing arm was only attached with duct tape, how could you ignore his 20-11 record and 51 touchdowns as San Diego's starter the two previous seasons? We're being asked, of course, to believe the playoff-contending Chargers cut Brees loose to turn to unproven Phillip Rivers. Wink. Wink.
The gumbo thickens when you learn the Dolphins' front office, after lengthy negotiations with Brees' keepers and amid reports he preferred sunny South Florida to the corner of Devastation and Destruction, inexplicably ended contract talks to trade for the Minnesota Sex Capades' Dante Culpepper. Then, in a beaut of irony, Culpepper is the one's who's damaged goods.
We're also supposed to suspend belief and think franchises in Oakland, Baltimore and Detroit, also shopping for free-agent starting quarterbacks, thought they could do better by someone else. Although those nitwits in Oakland and Detroit probably did.
Brees, meanwhile, has left Harry Connick Jr. in his contrails to become the Crescent City's newest fan fave — proving he can DO DO THAT VOODOO with the best of them by channeling Joe Montana.
Even with Brees, however, New Orleans looked to finish no better than a 6-10 or 7-9. So next, the Oswalds drafted USC running back Reggie Bush — the NFL draft's consensus No. 1 pick. Note: This is extremely difficult to do when you're picking second. Unless — Ta-Da — the team (Houston) picking first inexplicably (that word again) selects the second-best player in the draft. While defensive end Mario Williams has played well for the Texans during an injury-hampered season, Bush has shined for the Oswalds in a multipurpose role.
Shades of Patrick Ewing to the New York Knicks? An NFL make-up call? Was the then-Tagliabue-led football cabal employing a defibrillator on a franchise in danger of flat-lining?
If you thought the fetid stench of conspiracy couldn't worsen, consider Marques Colston — a seventh-round impact player (the 252nd of 255 players drafted) from Hofstra. Keep in mind that in today's NFL, seventh-round impact players come around as often as Haley's Comet.
Despite a midseason ankle injury stalling his run for NFC Rookie of the Year, Colston still topped 1,000 yards receiving and has been an end zone regular for New Orleans. The NFL's official cover story is that the sophisticated scouting of 31 other teams let Colston (inexplicably?) slip through their fingers to the Oswald's good fortune.
Who am I to complain, though? Everyone seems happy with what they're being fed. I only wonder what the NFL is cooking up for dessert?
