Players speak for first time on Marvin's contract situation

[jowczarski]

Curious your thoughts on how they view the situation.

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/sports/nfl/bengals/2017/06/22/cincinnati-bengals-know-must-perform-to-secure-marvin-lewis-future-as-head-coach/418212001/

I'm not sure what I was expecting when I talked to the guys about this, but they seemed pretty matter-of-fact about it. I dunno. Maybe I thought there would be at least one "he deserves to be here" type of quote ... but then again these guys know the deal. Maybe those days are gone?

Anyway, thanks for the reads, shares are appreciated, and as always any questions on this story or anything else feel free to ask!

[Sled21]

I think they all know the deal with the zero playoff wins and what that has done to the fanbase. He's at that point of win one or be gone.... He built the franchise up from where it was, but this is a "what have you done for me lately" league....

[TheUberHuber]

(06-22-2017, 01:06 PM)Sled21 Wrote: I think they all know the deal with the zero playoff wins and what that has done to the fanbase. He's at that point of win one or be gone.... He built the franchise up from where it was, but this is a "what have you done for me lately" league....

No he isnt. If Mike Brown is anything he is predictable,  and firing a winning head coach is just not something he is going to do. Also, this fallacy argument that firing marvin is going to magically get us a playoff win is absurd. Ask the reds how that one works

[Murdock2420]

In this day and age with all the media coverage and all the numbers that are tossed around, these guys see the same thing everyone else does. Not too mention it's a new world among the players as well. In these days guys share the same agents and players from rival teams hang out in the off-season. When the stories of how other teams and other coaches handle things start to swirl around, I'm sure Marvin and Mike don't measure up.

[Murdock2420]

(06-22-2017, 02:09 PM)TheUberHuber Wrote: No he isnt. If Mike Brown is anything he is predictable,  and firing a winning head coach is just not something he is going to do. Also, this fallacy argument that firing marvin is going to magically get us a playoff win is absurd. Ask the reds how that one works

The Reds are not a good comparison, that is a different situation completely.

Yes, they moved on from Dusty, but there is no salary cap in baseball and they moved on from Dusty, and Cueto, and Leake, and Latos and Chapman, and Bruce and other key parts of the bullpen.

Price has basically been there to teach the young guys how to be major league ball players, and honestly he is doing a good job with that. The team looks better this year than last, that's the job during a rebuild.

Marvin could get canned tomorrow and the team isn't going to dump A.J. Green, and Atkins and Dalton and all the other good players that make $$$ for a bunch of prospects. That's not how football works. 

A better comparison would be Tony Dungy being out in Tampa and Gruden coming in with a new voice and the same team and winning the Super Bowl. That is what can happen in football.

[Sled21]

(06-22-2017, 02:09 PM)TheUberHuber Wrote: No he isnt. If Mike Brown is anything he is predictable,  and firing a winning head coach is just not something he is going to do. Also, this fallacy argument that firing marvin is going to magically get us a playoff win is absurd. Ask the reds how that one works

He's 118 and 103 with zero playoff wins. One more losing season and he's more like a .500 head coach....

[TheUberHuber]

(06-22-2017, 02:22 PM)Murdock2420 Wrote: The Reds are not a good comparison, that is a different situation completely.

Yes, they moved on from Dusty, but there is no salary cap in baseball and they moved on from Dusty, and Cueto, and Leake, and Latos and Chapman, and Bruce and other key parts of the bullpen.

Price has basically been there to teach the young guys how to be major league ball players, and honestly he is doing a good job with that. The team looks better this year than last, that's the job during a rebuild.

Marvin could get canned tomorrow and the team isn't going to dump A.J. Green, and Atkins and Dalton and all the other good players that make $$$ for a bunch of prospects. That's not how football works. 

A better comparison would be Tony Dungy being out in Tampa and Gruden coming in with a new voice and the same team and winning the Super Bowl. That is what can happen in football.

Fair enough. But what does salary cap have to do with a head coach? I don't get that part tbh. My point was firing a coach does not guarantee success. 

[Sled21]

(06-22-2017, 02:37 PM)TheUberHuber Wrote: Fair enough. But what does salary cap have to do with a head coach? I don't get that part tbh. My point was firing a coach does not guarantee success. 

Nobody said it does, but going with a coach that can't win a playoff games after 8 tries is kind of like lunacy....

[TheUberHuber]

And tbh, with all the success Lewis has had, if he wins a super bowl he could be compared to madden. Sounds stupid, but the comparison is made to highlight the fact that it's a tough league. You can win the division year after year but can also lose to a hail marry to the Damn steelers! Doesn't make you not able to eventually win a super bowl... this stigma of a coach "not able to win" something is not a sound argument. It is, in fact, a fallacy. And that is my point.

[Murdock2420]

(06-22-2017, 02:37 PM)TheUberHuber Wrote: Fair enough. But what does salary cap have to do with a head coach? I don't get that part tbh. My point was firing a coach does not guarantee success. 

My point with the salary cap was only that when Dusty was fired, the Reds had to accept that they would lose Cueto and Latos and Chapman to bigger contracts from big market teams. So, they had to sell those players for prospects. Bryan Price didn't inherit a complete team fresh off the playoffs, there were pieces that were missing and being taken away. In football, that doesn't happen, coach goes but the team is gutted usually for prospects unless the new coach wants to do so. That was all I meant with the salary cap comparison. Cross sports it is hard to compare when the factors aren't the same.

However, you are correct that a new coach does not guarantee success, but keeping the same guy who has never managed to win kinda points to a lack of success as well.

[Murdock2420]

(06-22-2017, 02:45 PM)TheUberHuber Wrote: And tbh, with all the success Lewis has had, if he wins a super bowl he could be compared to madden. Sounds stupid, but the comparison is made to highlight the fact that it's a tough league. You can win the division year after year but can also lose to a hail marry to the Damn steelers! Doesn't make you not able to eventually win a super bowl... this stigma of a coach "not able to win" something is not a sound argument.  It is, in fact, a fallacy.  And that is my point.

True, but didn't it always feel like Madden's teams had a chance and were in the game?

Look at the playoff games this team has lost under Lewis. Outside of the pitt game, it wasn't a situation where they were in it till the end. They were out coached and out game planned in every one prior to that. The pitt loss, falls on not being able to control emotions against a team that you know is going to be cheap and try to get you to respond and that plays into being out coached and out prepared as well.

[TheUberHuber]

(06-22-2017, 03:16 PM)Murdock2420 Wrote: True, but didn't it always feel like Madden's teams had a chance and were in the game?

Look at the playoff games this team has lost under Lewis. Outside of the pitt game, it wasn't a situation where they were in it till the end. They were out coached and out game planned in every one prior to that. The pitt loss, falls on not being able to control emotions against a team that you know is going to be cheap and try to get you to respond and that plays into being out coached and out prepared as 

I get the hate. At least two playoff losses fall squarely on lewis' shoulder. We have had great teams..... in the regular season. I honestly can't remember one year where we were healthy going into the playoffs.  Is that a factor of bad coaching in the nfl? Idk quite honestly. But when you are playing guys off the street or practice squads you really are not going that far anyways even if you won the 1st round game.

[TheUberHuber]

I should note that I am not a marvin fanboy.. I just think replacing him with someone better is going to be a lot harder than people think

[masterpanthera_t]

I don't believe replacing Marvin should be that hard, seeing how the draft and scouting part of the organization does well and is in place with a clear hierarchy. The team has a good qb, good defense with potential to become great, with the addition of the new personnel in this draft and almost the same thing on offense. It shouldn't be hard to either identify an up and coming coach and bring him on board, or to have a good former coach who is currently out of the game, to come in for a couple seasons. However, considering that this is a MB owned team, it may not be realistic to expect that a transition would be smooth to a new coach, simply because MB is not keen on conceding any ground to the new coach that Marvin had to work hard to earn. Given those constraints, it will likely be difficult to find any replacement which is not in house, and that, I'm not sure would work out better. IMO, Zimmer would have been the right guy to transition into Head Coach, but that train has long left the station. Unlike many other posters here, I'm not a believer in Hue Jackson, and don't think he would have done better than Marvin.

[Quantum Bengal]

Marvin may not be the best coach, but he'd be hard to replace.

I still have nightmares about the lost 90's

[Hoofhearted]

(06-22-2017, 03:43 PM)Quantum Bengal Wrote: Marvin may not be the best coach, but he'd be hard to replace.

I still have nightmares about the lost 90's

Yep, only second to the "what if" 2000's

[Dr. Bombay]

Marvin is one of the most unique coaches in NFL history.

On one hand it is very difficult to make the playoffs as regular as he has. A bad coach simply could not do that. In fact it takes a pretty good one. People who believe he would be easy to replace are mistaken.

On the other hand he hasn't just lost playoff games, he has been blown out on a regular basis. He rarely had the best team in his playoff games, but even when he did he lost. It was easy to explain most of his playoff losses until we lost to the Chargers at home in '14. We had beaten the exact same team on the road just a few weeks earlier. If Mike McCoy really was able to outcoach Marvin I don't see why he chose not to when his team was 5-6 and struggling to stay in the playoff hunt.

[Hoofhearted]

tl;dr version is Marv needs to win. Must be the offseason...

[BFritz21]

(06-22-2017, 03:43 PM)Quantum Bengal Wrote: Marvin may not be the best coach, but he'd be hard to replace.

I still have nightmares about the lost 90's

I've been on that bandwagon all along, but I'm starting to have my doubts that we can't replace him with a better coach.

It's true that Mike Brown has said that Marvin has had more influence and ability to make changes than any other coach, but the dude is 81 now and can't have the energy or even want to run things as much anymore.

Marvin is an old-school coach in his thinking about the game, which is more of a ground-and-pound and play defense, which is still applicable in some ways in the division, but it's a more offense-oriented league now.  

In that same line of thinking, he's not creative enough in his game-planning and he's not a "go out and win the game" type coach, which is what we need.

Lastly, the lack of respect the players have for him causes major discipline problems, which is a major downfall of this team and caused the loss of our last playoff game (Hill's fumble and then Jones' personal foul, which it would have been a lot harder to hit a field goal from 50 yards instead of 35 after the penalty).

I also think that the players don't get pumped-up to play for him like players of other teams do.  How often do you see a pre-game speech of his that gets players jacked-up to go out there and put their lives on the line to win the game?

[Dr. Bombay]

(06-22-2017, 12:48 PM)jowczarski Wrote:  any questions on this story or anything else feel free to ask!

Did you make a special effort to talk to the Bengals who have been on playoff winning teams?  Dansby has made it to the Super Bowl.  Winston and Bullock have been on teams that won playoff games.  

What is their opinion of the job Marvin is doing?