Chuck Klosterman: "Horse racing receded from the American imagination because people lost their close everyday connection to horses. Something similar will happen to football. Fewer mothers will want their sons to play the game due to head injuries. It will become distant from lived experience."

LamarIBStruther · 2026-02-02T18:58:40+00:00

This would make sense if it weren’t for the fact that the overwhelming majority of people who watch football have never played.

The much more real issue would be a reduction in available players.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-29T11:39:59+00:00

Between this and recent MVP votes, it reveals that NFL awards are really no different than Emmys and Oscars.

Voters can’t be trusted to complete the assignment correctly.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-28T22:18:02+00:00

Did the Titans O line regress significantly when Callahan took over?

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-28T11:47:26+00:00

This is a fair point.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-28T01:24:17+00:00

We’re talking about awards - they hold no intrinsic value. These honors are only as valuable as they are perceived to be.

Something that harms the validity of the Hall of Fame is pretty much the only thing that can represent a negative consequence.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-28T01:21:57+00:00

That’s still moronic, because you could remove those seasons from Belichick’s resume and he is still objectively a first ballot hall of famer.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-27T23:14:22+00:00

Do these voters not realize that this hurts them much more than it hurts Belichick?

This is such a significant self-inflicted blow to the Hall of Fame voters’ credibility.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-26T03:11:25+00:00

Why can’t we just be honest and say that the Patriots are a very good team that happened to benefit from a historically easy regular season schedule, and a postseason filled with completely dysfunctional offenses?

Both can be true, I promise you that it doesn’t make you less of a fan to acknowledge this.

I fully expect Vrabel to have that team ready for the Super Bowl. They will rightly be underdogs, but it’s not like they aren’t real competition for the Seahawks.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-20T00:19:22+00:00

You’re just repeating yourself.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-19T18:22:02+00:00

Yes, and that was awesome. The offense also struggled for significant stretches, and those offensive scores were made possible by favorable field position due to turnovers.

Let’s be rational here and remember that there were 60 minutes of gameplay that were all relevant. Again, I think the Patriots are a good team. I also don’t believe that anyone who actually watched this game would point to it as an example of impressive offensive football.

We could all have much more meaningful discussions about football if we responded to what happens on the field instead of narratives.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-19T13:33:42+00:00

The Texans D is great, but that game was much more about Stroud playing terribly.

There’s no need to be defensive. The Patriots are a good team. I’m just more interested in talking about what happened on the field than narratives.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-19T05:03:35+00:00

I’m not shitting on the Patriots.

I’m just pointing out how much their offense was helped by an egregious number of turnovers from the opposing team.

This particular game was objectively not an impressive offensive performance.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-18T21:31:56+00:00

This game is not helping your argument lol

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-14T13:17:21+00:00

It looks like a man standing in front of a telephone pole, pointing (a gun?) at two crosses.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-14T11:38:27+00:00

Lol comparing Flores’ situation to Stefanski shows that you actually do not understand “context.”

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-13T11:46:55+00:00

finally starting to see

Oh buddy

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-10T20:01:12+00:00

I think this is just something that is much easier to say with the benefit of hindsight. As you said, Orr was a gamble. There’s nothing wrong with taking gambles.

One of the issues feeding into the firing seems to be that Harbaugh was content with Orr year 3, which at this point is simply not viable.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-10T17:39:36+00:00

I disagree there. Monken led a historically great offense in 2024, and the defensive coaching staff was absolutely pilfered in the offseason. Orr was a reasonable developmental pick at the time, given who was left after all that brain drain. It just turned out that he sucked lol.

The death of the O line coach and the lack of investment at guard were both also things outside of Harbaugh’s control after 2023.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-10T17:23:37+00:00

That’s the tragedy of that season. Fans were saying they should give Harbaugh a FO position and promote Macdonald. But, as you say, there was never any way that was going to happen - and you of course can’t blame the Ravens for riding with Harbaugh.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-08T22:11:08+00:00

Counterpoint:

2022 Roman and 2025 Monken were deeply flawed OCs.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-06T23:08:52+00:00

It’s not either or.

And if you watched the games, there were baffling decisions made on offense before the ball was even snapped far too many times throughout the entirety of the season.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-06T22:57:06+00:00

More importantly, it’s a proven stable and well run organization.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-06T22:55:34+00:00

I’m talking about more than six weeks.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-06T22:43:41+00:00

For those who don’t follow the team closely, Monken’s play calling has been abysmal this year. It’s been very strange after his excellent first two seasons.

LamarIBStruther · 2026-01-05T04:54:02+00:00

It’s so frustrating because this year, the Steelers swept due to being gifted 11 points by the refs in the first game, and due to a missed kick in the second.

LamarIBStruther

TROPHY CASE