Showing posts with label Tony Sparano. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tony Sparano. Show all posts

Friday, July 29, 2011

Say hello to the 5-11 Miami Dolphins in Jeff Ireland & Tony Sparano's last year with the clueless, unappealing Dolphins

The worst is yet to come!
Above and below, just some of the dozen Chad Henne jerseys that were NOT flying off the shelves at the Aventura Target last year. October 9, 2010 photos by South Beach Hoosier.
Yes, "the Venezuelan Target," home of la bellessima!


The same store that presciently had the Ronnie Brown #23 jerseys on clearance months and months ago, even as the Dolphins were pretending that he would be coming back to the team this year.
Don't you hate it when retail outlets have a better grasp of the obvious with the team than the people who actually work for the team? The so-called experts.

As I've written here for years, and gotten abuse for saying in numerous Herald stories about the Dolphins, developer and Dolphins owner Steven Ross has no business owning the team, and is making the Dolphins a combination of the worst of the worst -the Bengals of the '90's and the Lions of just three years ago.

Ross may be the single-worst NFL owner around, which is really saying something given the miscues and screw-ups of Jacksonville and Carolina's owners.

Hey Mike Dee, how's that Club LIV at the stadium doing?

View more videos at: http://nbcmiami.com.


Club LIV Comes to Sun Life Stadium
First of its kind nightclub at a football game ready to debut
By Adam Kuperstein | Thursday, Sep 23, 2010 | Updated 7:45 AM EDT

See also:
LIV nightclub creators bring South Beach nightlife experience to Sun Life Stadium for Dolphins football season

What a f-ing embarrassment!!!

I've got a lot more to say about the dismal prospects for this once-proud team that has fallen into a black hole, but since today is the first day of training camp, the day that savvy Dolphin fans have been dreading since the lockout started, I'd have been remiss if I hadn't posted this Henne photo, which I've been saving for months just for today's post.
I'll likely have more this weekend, once Matt Moore has arrived from Carolina.
Yes, Matt Moore.

That was their back-up plan, after they refused to take a chance on Ryan Mallette or move up in May's NFL Draft, and then couldn't pull the trigger this week for someone else?
(Patriots snapped Mallette up!)
Yes.

Folks, this year, like a bad move that keeps repeating, Dolphin fans are stuck on the S.S. Titanic and this time, we passengers know the iceberg is out there, but they keep steering right towards it, anyway.
Over-and-over!

For once, almost six months ago, I actually agreed with Armando Salguero.

Miami Herald
Too many reminders of Miami Dolphins’ futility
By Armando Salguero
Posted Sunday February 6, 2011
It’s becoming something of a depressing yearly rite that we look at the Super Bowl teams and think about what might have been for our Dolphins.
If only someone with a functioning brain would have made this or that decision correctly, stuck with this player or that coach, then maybe, we say, fate would have been written differently and that might be our team playing for the Lombardi Trophy on Sunday.

Remember back in the late 1990s when the Patriots went to Super Bowl XXXI with Keith Byars and Jeff Dellenbach? Remember the Packers that eventually won that game boasted Keith Jackson as their tight end?

Remember when the Dolphins discarded all three players?

Last year, Dolphins fans watched in disgust as Drew Brees – the quarterback the Dolphins could have had but passed on twice – helped New Orleans win it all.

This year, the local lament is about coaching talent that got away.

When the Steelers and Packers play this Super Bowl, Dolphins fans can take absolutely zero solace in the fact Mike Tomlin once interviewed for the Miami head coach job and was passed over for someone far less capable of doing the work.

In the first month of 2007, the Dolphins were searching for a coach to replace Nick Saban and identified Tomlin as a rising star worth a visit. They talked to Tomlin. Probed him. Considered him.

Then they passed on him.

A bad choice“Too hip-hop,” one Dolphins employee who had a say in that decision would say of Tomlin weeks later.

Miami went with Cam Cameron instead.

Tomlin interviewed with the Steelers days after his Miami interview. He hadn’t suddenly gotten wiser. He hadn’t magically become a better coach. He was just himself – prepared, pointed, optimistic, realistic.

Tomlin got the job succeeding Bill Cowher.

If the Steelers win on Sunday, that would deliver to Tomlin his second Super Bowl ring as Pittsburgh’s coach and third overall because he’s got one from Super Bowl XXXVII when he was the defensive backs coach for Tampa Bay.

“Every day I go to work, I don’t think about things I have to do, I think about the things I can do to make my men successful,” Tomlin said this week in North Texas. “So I have a servant’s mentality in terms of how I approach my job, and I get that from coach [Tony Dungy].”

A Tony Dungy disciple with a servant’s heart.

Too hip-hop, the Dolphins decided.

I’m not saying Tomlin would have come to Miami and overcome a roster that lacked talent and certainly didn’t compare to Pittsburgh’s. I’m not saying he would have won a Super Bowl already in Miami as he has in Pittsburgh.

I am saying the Dolphins looked in this guy’s eyes and didn’t see what the Rooneys saw when they interviewed Tomlin. They didn’t find out what the Rooney family found out.

That is the difference between being great and being good. Teams such as the Packers and Steelers look at players or coaches other teams have similarly studied and see something special the others miss.

I remember a phone conversation with Saban in 2005 in which he told me he was about to hire Dom Capers. “He’s one of the best defensive coaches out there and he has been for a long time,” Saban said.

Within a couple of years of Capers’ hiring, very few folks in South Florida would have believed that he was among the best at anything. As defensive coordinator of the 2007 Dolphins, he managed to author the worst run defense in the league and the Dolphins ranked 30th in points allowed.

Capers was fired. This year, under Capers’ direction, the Packers were second in fewest points allowed which was an improvement over last season when Capers had his unit ranked seventh in fewest points allowed.

Did Capers become a terrible coach in 2007 after having proved to Saban previously he was an outstanding coach? Did he, becoming suddenly idiotic in 2007, regain his senses the past two years in Green Bay?

Or is it that Capers never stopped being an outstanding coach, but was simply victimized in 2007 by too many injuries ravaging a roster lined with far too little talent?

Great teams often recognize talented people down to their roots. They get a conviction about people. Then they stick to those convictions when crisis hits – which, in the NFL, is every week.

“Panic doesn’t seem to work. Let’s put it that way,” Steelers president Art Rooney II said. “There are enough people that seem to have gone through that mode and our feeling is that you pick good people and you try to stick with them if you have good people. There are ups and downs in any sport, but if you have the right people in place, you’ll always have a chance to be successful and that’s what we do. ”

Do you hear that Tony Sparano doubters?

Is Miami’s current coach the best head coach in the NFL this year? No. His team couldn’t finish strong or win at home.

But did the guy who led the Dolphins to perhaps the most dramatic turnaround in NFL history – going from 1-15 to 11-5 in one year – suddenly becoming incapable of leading and coaching his team?

Formula for successIt speaks well of club owner Stephen Ross that he didn’t knee-jerk and replace Sparano with an unproven Jim Harbaugh last month. The cautious approach might not be rewarded with a title next season, but it gives the Dolphins a chance to have continuity.

And the Steelers, a club with only three coaches since 1969 and having never fired any of them, have proven that continuity can bring success.

The hope is Ross sees something in Sparano, knows something about Sparano that convinced him to keep Sparano even while some were calling for the coach’s head.

The Dolphins have too rarely made us think they know something no one else does. They made us feel that way in 1983 when they picked Dan Marino late in the first round.

They made us feel that way lately when they plucked Cameron Wake out of CFL obscurity and within two seasons saw him go to the Pro Bowl.

But for the couple of decades now, the Dolphins have mostly been among those folks that weren’t aware or didn’t know or missed on a guy by just this much.

That’s not an indictment on the team’s current administration. That’s an indictment on administrations going back to Jimmy Johnson.

The Dolphins missed on Randy Moss, Anquan Boldin, and Brees twice. This isn’t second-guessing or playing the result. All of those players were favored, expected, supposed to join the Dolphins if the brainiacs leading the franchise had been thinking straight.

So where does that leave us?

The hope is Miami folks currently in charge can avoid the curse that obviously befell their predecessors. The hope is the folks running the Dolphins now know something other teams do not.

Monday, January 10, 2011

Worse than sad, it's true: Playboy's Hugh Hefner engaged to 24-year old woman who has never been alive when Dolphins were playing in Super Bowl game



Expressen TV video: Hugh Hefner friade till 24-å- ring

http://tv.expressen.se/noje/1.2269295/hugh-hefner-friade-till-24-aring

Worse than sad, it's true: Playboy's Hugh Hefner engaged to 24-year old Crystal Harris, a woman who has never been alive when Dolphins were playing in a Super Bowl game.

Perhaps that thought will sharpen in your mind the amount of time that has transpired since the Dolphins were very relevant to any serious discussion of elite NFL teams competing for the Lombardi Trophy.


Meanwhile, in other news affecting Playboy Enterprises...

TheWrap
Playboy to Go Private

Published: January 10, 2011 @ 6:06 am

By Dylan Stableford


Playboy is going private.


The board of directors for the iconic but struggling men's brand has agreed to 84-year-old founder Hugh Hefner's $6.15-per-share offer to take the company private.


Hefner first made a $5.50-per-share offer in July. The $6.15-per-share price represents an 18.3 percent premium over the stock price at close on Friday and a 56 percent premium over the closing price at the time of Hef's initial offer.


The new offer puts the value of the company at about $207.3 million. On Monday morning, Playboy's stock price jumped more than 16 percent on the news.


Read the rest of the post at:
http://www.thewrap.com/media/column-post/breaking-playboy-goes-private-23768

Playboy's press release at:
http://www.playboyenterprises.com/home/content.cfm?content=t_template&packet=7006C185-E06B-679F-4140890A93180DBD&MmenuFlag=news&ArtTypeID=0002043D-FF53-1C7B-9B578304E50A011A&CFID=8461596&CFTOKEN=41304166


What's my Line? Hugh Hefner
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrKJJge66YI

http://www.playboyenterprises.com/

See also:
New York Times Opinionator blog
Last Call at the Bunny Roundup
By Timothy Egan,
January 6, 2011, 9:00 pm

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/06/last-call-at-the-bunny-roundup/#more-76009,

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/playboy-enterprises-inc/index.html?scp=2&sq=Playboy&st=cse,

and

http://www.nydailynews.com/gossip/galleries/hugh_hefners_many_women/hugh_hefners_many_women.html




Above, May 1, 2007 photo by Mario J. Bermudez of Vince Lombardi Championship Trophies won by Miami Dolphins for Super Bowl VII and VIII, taken at Miami Dolphins HQ, Davie, FL.




Super Bowl Highlights, January 20, 1985, San Francisco 49ers vs. Miami Dolphins.
January 20th, 1985, Stanford University, Palo Alto, California.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/123666/super-bowl-highlights-1985-super-bowl-xix-san-francisco-49ers-vs-miami-dolphins

Ten days from now will mark 26 YEARS since the Dolphins were relevant to the discussion of elite NFL teams. We got proof positive on Saturday that this isn't likely to change with the current Stephen Ross regime in place, as Miami Herald Dolphins beat reporter Armando Salguero confirms here:

The Saturday meeting with the media (w/ audio)

http://miamiherald.typepad.com/dolphins_in_depth/2011/01/the-so-called-round-table-the-dolphins-planned-to-set-the-record-straight-for-what-has-happened-over-the-past-week-and-announ.html

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Most boring U.S. sports headline of year? Could be! 8/14 Miami Herald: "Miami Dolphins' Sparano's goal in preseason is evaluating his players"

My comments follow this early contender for worst -or most boring?- U.S. sports headline of the year, which can NOT be blamed on the reporter.

--------

Miami Herald

http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/08/14/1775415/sparanos-main-goal-in-preseason.html


MIAMI DOLPHINS

Miami Dolphins' Sparano's goal in preseason is evaluating his players
By Jeff Darlington

Exhibition games aren't for everyone. Not for the established veterans who just want to stay healthy. Not for the casual fans who wish the score would count for something.

But for the coach?


"I have four preseason games right now, and I can't find enough time for some of the players that I have to see,'' Dolphins coach Tony Sparano said Thursday.


Balancing between the task of getting starters enough repetitions and evaluating little-known players, Sparano's agenda during Saturday's 7 p.m. preseason opener against the Tampa Bay will be slammed.

While he focuses on the details, fans will get an opportunity to watch some of the bigger themes of training camp play out.

5. CORNERBACK DEPTH


In the wake of cornerback Will Allen's arthroscopic knee surgery, it has become clear that backups Jason Allen and Nolan Carroll are being pegged as the two players capable of filling his role. Carroll is a rookie, and Jason Allen hasn't lit up the world as a cornerback during his career, meaning the upcoming preseason games will provide coaches with the best proof possible to see if their strong training camp is the real deal. Both figure to get plenty of repetitions once Sparano has decided Sean Smith and Vontae Davis have seen enough playing time to justify sitting them down. So just because the starters might wind up seated by halftime, this preseason opener should provide at least a few reasons to watch.

4. SAFETY CHRIS CLEMONS


Five months ago, the Dolphins were in hot pursuit of Steelers free safety Ryan Clark to fill a significant void. But Clark snubbed Miami. How did the Dolphins resolve the issue? By giving second-year safety Chris Clemons a chance to prove his worth. Sparano said Clemons has taken more than 400 repetitions during practice -- and he has only made one mental mistake. As a result, a strong performance against the Bucs will cause Sparano to declare him the first winner of a competition during training camp. Sparano noted that "if it goes well on Saturday, and he gets enough opportunities,'' Clemons will be the guy. "Chris has proven to me right now that I think he's going to be a pretty good player.''


3. INTERIOR OFFENSIVE LINE


Every time it appears the Dolphins have steered toward a certain combination of players at guard and center, somebody gets hurt. The latest victim of Miami's almost daily injury bug was Nate Garner, who was taking repetitions as the first-team left guard before aggravating a previous foot injury. Center Jake Grove is coming back from a bone bruise on his knee, but Joe Berger is expected to start against the Bucs. Rookie John Jerry is the likely starter on the right side, but the left guard position remains up in the air. It will take more than one game to settle this unit. As the competition plays out, Sparano could take looks at as many as four combinations throughout this game.

2. FRONT SEVEN

If you believe the Dolphins' offense is going to be the catalyst for Miami's overall success this season, then it's important to still realize why a young defense will need to click for any of the rest to matter. Defensive end Jared Odrick and linebacker Koa Misi are slated as rookie starters, linebacker Cameron Wake is trying to prove he's a three-down linebacker and nose tackle Randy Starks is transitioning to a new position. All four will play integral parts in the fate of the defense -- yet none of the four have any extensive body of work during games when it comes to those tasks. The upcoming preseason might be more critical for them than any other group on this roster.


1. HENNE TO MARSHALL


Quarterback Chad Henne is slated to play at least one quarter against the Bucs, Dolphins coach Tony Sparano said. He could play into the second quarter if the offense isn't on the field enough in the first, which should please fans for one reason: He'll have more than a few opportunities to connect with wide receiver Brandon Marshall. Despite a strong start to training camp, Henne and Marshall struggled in the team's only game-like format -- a scrimmage that took place last week. It was no reason to worry, but an exhibition against the Bucs could be the perfect way to prove it. Chemistry will be critical for the pair to flourish. They are getting along great, and Marshall seems to really like the way Henne throws the ball.

Reader comments from very unsophisticated South Florida football fans who make up for their lack of football smarts and historical knowledge and context by being very opinionated sycophants are at:
http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/08/14/1775415/sparanos-main-goal-in-preseason.html?commentSort=TimeStampAscending&pageNum=1

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After reading this article this morning, I wrote the following and submitted it.

Thank you ladies and gentleman but you can stop sending in nominations now as we already have our most boring sports headline of the year: 8/14 Miami Herald: "Miami Dolphins' Sparano's goal in preseason is evaluating his players"


Actually, the honeymoon of sorts that Dolphin fans have given Sparano will end in late October if he can't start showing that he can actually out-coach someone once in a while.

While we're at it, how come Sparano was never quite able to figure out last year how to create a scenario for a super-talent like Pat White, who has been a legit difference-maker and great teammate his entire college career, where he could have some early success to help his confidence?

Frankly, it often looked to me like the team flat out quit on Pat White, and then his inexperience resulted in wasted opportunities or hasty turnovers. Don't give up on this kid.
I still do NOT believe in Chad Henne, whether his self-evident staring-down of receivers or his lack of a 'touch,'Midas or otherwise, on thrown balls.
Far too often, he resembles a statue with a bazooka.

Interesting perhaps to look at in a museum, but his lack of mobility always makes me think he's about two seconds from either a concussion or a fumble.


He could've run for first downs so many times last year, too, yet stayed in the pocket too long, only to over-throw, under-throw or get sacked. His sense of inner timing is problematic, esp. in close games in the 4th Quarter.

After I got back early this evening from doing some errands and swinging by the beach to read some newspapers, political direct mail and make some notes and organize my thoughts about some things I need to write about here in the future, I went back to the article above.
Wow!

The Hectors in Hialeah and Mikes in South Miami do not like critical scrutiny of the Dolphins.

Not that this is a surprise to me, though, as you'll get no argument from me that South Florida sports fans are THE most ignorant in all of the major North American cities having pro teams, and the sports radio here proves it everyday.
Listening is the proof.


There are STILL people defending
Randy Shannon everyday who say he should get a few more YEARS as the University of Miami's head football coach before any decision is made.
YEARS!

So after perusing some of the predictably dopey reader comments before the game started, I cobbled together some more thoughts to respond.

It was fun to write but not all of it would fit, but here it is:

Reading the reader comments to my earlier comments has been pretty funny.

I could mention that my first Dolphin home game was in 1970, that I first went to summer training camp at the then-Biscayne College 2-3 times a week in '71, that I purchased the first copy of Dolphin Digest -when that was really a new concept- at the mobile snack bar north of the scorching-hot metal bleachers.

That I was at MIA to greet the team with thousands of others after their '71 Christmas Day playoff OT win against the Chiefs, had season tickets for the first time in the '72 Perfect Season, only missed one home game -preseason, regular and playoff in eight years until I left for college.

Or, that I actually got to know some of the players personally who were most responsible for their glory days, even baby-sitting kids from time-to-time whose Dolphin father made it into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Or that I've forgotten more Dolphin history than 99% of you will ever know. I like him, but if White ends up being a bust with the Dolphins, Y-O-U and the Herald's sycophants have to blame Parcells for wasting an early second round pick, no?

Or that with the easiest schedule in the NFL, the Dolphins made the playoffs but lost, while the Steelers, with the most difficult schedule, won the Super Bowl.

Or that last year, the Dolphins had the worst fourth-quarter defense in the NFL.
But I won't, because that would be taking advantage of people who simply don't know what they are talking about.

I will mention, though, that while at West Virginia, Pat White finished in the top seven for the Heisman Trophy two years in a row, a not-inconsiderable feat, and was personally responsible for some of WVU's greatest victories in school history, including Bowl Game upsets that turned into routs.

Meanwhile, Chad Henne never beat Ohio State while at Michigan and is, in part, responsible for some of the worst games played in Michigan history, and often disappeared in games where he needed to have a strong presence, which perhaps explains why he wasn't an NFL First-Round pick, don't you think? (Oh, and that he often had no "touch" on his passes.)

Now, you kids go back to Los Marlins store on Calle Ocho and admit to your dopey pals that you're a football fraud who doesn't really knows anything about the game before you were born.

Adios!