Rex Ryan Poll: Are coaches like him close to extinction?
The Tyrannosaurus Rex, or T-Rex was the most feared of all the dinosaurs. It was an opportunistic carnivore, acting as both a predator and a scavenger.
Maybe I’m stretching it, but Coach Rex Ryan could be considered a predator for the way he goes after other players and coaches - mostly through trash talk.
Before you bite my head off for even suggesting there's a correlation, remember that he’s the one who said he wanted the Buffalo Bills to be a bully on the field. He’s also been very successful in scavenging for players that could be considered bullies, ie. Richie Incognito and IK Enemkpali.
As you all know, IK Enemkpali broke the jaw of Jets QB Geno Smith while he was a member of that team. IK was released by the Jets and promptly picked up by T-Rex........excuse me, coach Rex.
A sportswriter for the New York Dailey News suggested that Rex Ryan's latest decision to appoint IK Enemkpali as a team captain for Thursday night's game against the Jets has crossed the line of decency - and he’s probably right. But when has pro football – which is both a physical and mental battle – ever been “decent?”
If you want decency, go watch golf.
This is the NFL…..and as much as the writer of the aforementioned article would like to remind us that the NFL wants to change their image, deep down inside, the League and the owners love this stuff. It sells tickets and it puts people in front of their big screen tv’s - and the advertisers who pay the networks, who in turn pay the NFL billions of dollars to air the games.
To say that Rex Ryan is somehow hurting the NFL’s efforts to address domestic violence and workplace harassment by having IK Enemkpali as the team captain, is stretching it. If a coach can use a little psychology 101 to get his team motivated - while at the same time putting a thorn in side of the other team - then what’s wrong with that? Here's a sportswriter who tells everyone to lighten up and laugh at Rex Ryan's troll job.
Do NFL coaches always have to be politically correct? Not Rex. He will let you know exctly how he feels - just like he did to a fan after this game in Miami.......
Listening to most of today's NFL head coaches is like listening to elevator music. They have nothing interesting to say and they never answer the question the way they would really like to answer it, but every once in a while a coach will let down their guard – and let loose like Dennis Green does in the following video.
Or how about this classic Jim Mora press conference.........
It’s refreshing to see a coach who isn’t afraid to say what he really thinks, although there are times when both coaches and players need to put up or shut up. As a former player, I liked it when our coaches played mind games with our opponents and when they let the fans know how they really felt about something.
Rex and other NFL coaches know that if you can get the other team to use their hearts more than their heads, you’ve already won half the battle. Players start making mistakes when they get caught up in their own emotions. The Bill’s defensive end, Jerry Hughes, is a prime example of a player letting his emotions rule his actions. Losing your composure not only hurts a team, it can hurt a player’s wallet. It can also affect a coaches wallet when they cross the line of decency.
I think Buffalo Bills fans find Rex’s personality a lot like the people of our city. We tell it like it is - we don’t back down – and we don’t take sh*t from anybody. Maybe that’s just my recessed Neanderthal genes speaking, but I hope that coaches like Rex Ryan don’t go the way of the T-Rex and become extinct. The NFL needs coaches like him. Yes, he is self-promoting and he ruffles a few fethers, but right now he's entertaining us and he still has the Bills in a position to make the playoffs. Thursday night will tell us a lot about this coach and this team. If they win, Rex can say just about anything he wants to say, but if they lose, it won't really matter what he says, because winning is the only thing that can keep him from going the way of the Dodo bird and becoming extinct.
(Update: The Bills and Rex Ryan won the game 22-17)
After the game, Nigel Bradham laughed when he heard Ryan compared getting let go by the Jets to getting dumped by a hot girl. "Well, hopefully he's got a hotter one now," he said, laughing.
