THIS TEAM RALLIED, BY RAMMED FOR LIFE (Sept
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BUT, I would stress something else in addition: THIS GROUP OF GUYS IN RAM UNIFORMS REACTED TO THE CRISIS LIKE A REAL TEAM, not the SOSARS! I give a lot of credit to the TEAM in all of this. They have pulled together like they really cared.
I'm not surprised, but I am gratified. I think you could see it in the team's response to TG going down. They really liked him. According to Fadler, Todd Lyght was near tears. The team felt wounded and frustrated .But it seemed like a positive kind of response. They weren't just despondent anddefeatist. They were riled up--someone had hurt one of their family and they came together over it.
This is what I was talking about last week: a different KIND of opportunity than what we had with TG. Last week, we knew the team has come together AS A TEAM in a deep and wonderful way .If this is correct, then we can expect great dividends for a long time. It would be possible to build team unity for years to come on such an event. The strength that comes from overcoming this adversity could be more significantthan the results of a magical year of easy prosperity.
To bring it full circle, DV gets credit for a lot of this. His off-season made this possible In late Dec. and early Jan. we were all talking about the horrors of last season--and DV's regime. It was in chaos, the low morale, the inept game preps,the wierd personnel decisions, the indecision over Rhome (making a bad situation worse!)--you know the drill.
I don't know of a single case of a coach re-inventing his organization AND HIMSELF as dramatically as DV has this year. It is really miraculous.
DV had questions to answer. He did need to answer them. And the missed meeting episode indicates that the team did not EXPECT him to have the answers. Remember the PD article about the despairing mood in the office right after the season?
So what does he do?
* He hires Martz---good move.
* He gets the staff together to come blasting out of the gate in free agency (again, I don't care who did what--it worked!).
* He KNOWS he cannot trust himself to run training camp without grinding the team down, so he invents a very innovative role for Mike White to take care of that--huge success.
* He trades for Faulk, causing Lyght--one of the meeting missers!--to nearly choke on his food in the restaurant: "WE made that deal? That's US?"
* He drafts so well that Ram Ble, who doesn't like him, drools over a possible dream draft.
And so on .You can go through that list of questions and DV has provided answers for nearly every damn one!
No, we don't know if it will carry over into the season--you can't know that until it starts. But at this point, every possible answer has been positive. It is really, really remarkable. Imagine a sick corporation with low morale connected to a CEO no one has faith in. Imagine how hard it would be to reinvent the corporation and the CEO and turn the thing around in 6 months. DV has done that!
I like to think of it this way: DV has found a way that HE, given his wierd makeup of strengths, weaknesses, emotion, and perfectionism, can get the job done. He has built an organizational structure that FUNCTIONS. I think it is based on much more delegation than is usual--I think largely of the unique role of Mike White. Parcells would never do it this way. But it is what DV needs to do to operate in the late 1990s.
Maybe it isn't so much knocking the rust off after the layoff. It is perhaps more a matter of finding or innovating a new organizational structure that works in this late 90s environment. This Vermeil is not operating the way he did in Philly. He is listening more on personnel acquisitions (remember when he said on draft day, "In the past I wouldn't have passed up a chance for a cover corner. I just wouldn't"?) and, again, he gave the PRACTICE keys of the kingdom to White. It's a re-invented organization and he needs it to succeed.
Well, the result has been wildly successful so far in the most important place: IN THE LOCKER ROOM! Team morale is very high, was high before TG got hurt.
* These guys know the talent level is much higher.
* The O is being PREPARED competently, and they know it!
* Camp was doable, and they came away fresh.
* They went on the field and rather effortlessly demonstrated a high-powered O. A lot of that was TG, but the PLAYERS know it was also talent AND MARTZ'S COHERENT, NUANCED, VERY SMART PLAN! The ones fromlast year know the difference between a lost, bewildered O and this machine.
So, when TG got hurt, they HAD A CHANCE to come together. The front office had made it possible by doing its job on all these levels. They'd lost a key member of the family, but they knew that the family was still very strong. They had faith in Martz to handle the QB replacement. We fans had trouble seeing that, but the players knew it.
That's what I meant last week. Instead of being disgruntled prisoners of a system that had betrayed them (as it did last year) they felt like parts of a whole with a growing synergy.
So, they have a choice: bond and grow strong through adversity, or collapse. But if you collapse, don't blame the coach, because this year the front office did very well by you! DV has done enough this offseason to EARN the players' respect, loyalty, and commitment in this crisis of losing TG. The players have fulfilled their part of the bargain by honoring his efforts. As I see it, they are bonding and getting stronger.
I don't know how far we can go this year .But I believe that we are seeing the coalescence of a team foundation that will be strong for years to come. It's a great moment to be a Ram fan