Tradition Tuesday: Shortest Honeymoon Ever

If you need to research the origins of The Tradition, Tradition Tuesday, or the House of Georges, make like old man Bush, go back to your Google and figure all that out. We're hip deep in breaking news here, no time for pageantry.

When Coach Doogie was hired and thrust upon the football world yesterday, we all looked upon the move with some degree of skepticism. After all, the guy is an infant. Many who view the world through orange-tinted spectacles allowed themselves a little of that darned hope that's been in fashion lately. And the rest of you haters adopted a wait-and-see-please-God-make-this-kid-suck posture. The common theme with both viewpoints is that we'd allow more than one day before we passed judgement on the new regime.

I'm here to tell you, HoG Nation, that one day is all we need. This reconstruction of the Broncos organization is doomed to failure. Sure, the Chiefs nabbed the top free-agent general manager in Scott Pioli, the kind of surehanded front-office type that Pat Bowlen claimed to demand when he Cannahanned the Mastermind. But I never thought Denver would land Pioli--he's surely drawing a fat salary, and most of the available non-player Bowlen bucks are still going to the former coach. I did foolishly think that my team of choice would hire somebody to assess and modify this damaged roster, and not just hand the job to whatever poor schmuck was left holding the last hot potato.

But here, friends and enemies alike, is that schmuck. And so the Josh McDaniels Era is effectively over before it started.

The GM position in the NFL is unique among the major sports. In some ways it's only now being elevated to a premier position that widely recognized among fans. I doubt that even the most hard-core followers of NFL franchises could have named their GM ten or even five years ago. But because this is a year-round game and every fan plays GM in his fantasy league, we identify with the job much more than the old days when we simply flipped on the tube Sunday and watched our teams.

There's a bigger separation between the front offices and fields of play in Major League Baseball and even the NHL, simply because those sports have minor-league systems and the draft is not always immediately fruitful with talent. Baseball GMs once toiled in obscurity as well, but the rise of fantasy and Michael Lewis' Moneyball--which detailed Oakland's wunderkind GM Billy Beane--has made these employees much more visible.

Pro basketball relies on the draft for immediate help much like the NFL does, but the NBA has a gimmick that is still exceedingly rare in the NFL--the midseason trade. If you build a shitty team through free agency and the draft, ahem, Denver Nuggets, you can simply work a swap and try again.

Building a team in the NFL is unique, because you get one shot a year. Between now and July, every GM must look at what he has, see what's out there, and craft a roster. He hands his coach a little less than a hundred men, and then that coach starts weeding through those men. I don't even know what these GMs do once the season starts, other than scout malls for cell phone salesman that can play tailback in a pinch.

Which brings me back to Pat Bowlen. I was led to believe that Bowlen fired one of the best coaches the game has ever seen because his moves as de facto GM were crippling the Broncos. We as fans accepted the fact that we'd be stuck with a coach inferior to Shanahan in the short-term, but that the payoff would be an immediate front-office upgrade. We'd finally have someone signing free agents, drafting kids and manipulating the salary cap that was free of the old status quo.

Yet what we got was the embodiment of the old status quo. I don't know what you call that, but I'll bet it rhymes with bullspit. How exactly is Jim Goodman going to independently assess and evaluate the makeup of this roster when he had a hand in creating it? Somehwere in the Broncos' draft war room was the biggest advocate for George Foster, or for Jarvis Moss. How do I know that guy wasn't Jim Goodman? And how exactly is Jim Goodman going to cut Jarvis Moss loose, if that's the best thing for the Broncos to do, if Jarvis Moss is his pet project?

If you brought in an outsider, any outsider, you could at least get a fresh set of eyes on some of these vital decisions. By keeping the same dudes in place you don't address the problem, the problem that was so severe that it forced Pat Bowlen to make a move that for many was unthinkable.

So I wouldn't expect too many big changes, Bronco fans. This team may switch to a 3-4 or go after a big name in free agency like Albert Haynesworth or Julius Peppers. But it will fundamentally be the same as the club that choked harder than any NFL team ever has. By leaving the status quo in place as far as player personnel, it's a lock.

But hey, at least the Chiefs hired a successor to Carl Peterson. That's big news, right? Not really--Pioli blows. Belichick ran everything out there, except the cheating. That was all Pioli. So I see KC vastly improving in the areas of black ops and covert counterintelligence yet remaining awful everywhere else. Cheers to that.
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Monday Mayhem: Brain Candy

Quite the week, HoGnation. Quite the week. Hot mitt in hand, I've taken the miniature lid off of my simmering (redacted) and peered into the stewed contents. I can neither sort them in any focus-related way, nor can I list them in any order of importance. I can offer feeble attempts at commentary, however, and I'll do just that after the jump. There won't be any shocking details or hints of genius; those are beyond my capacity. There will, however, be many misused words, typos, and inconsistencies in the form of idiocy and white supremacy. Those, I'm told, are my four tays.

As Cecil reported last night, the Denver Broncos have in fact acquired their man. The more-professional, and also more-dying sports journalists have put together a "story" full of facts and other nonsense, mostly painted with full-of-potential brushstrokes, and that's fine with me. There are, however, speculations that Pat Bowlen doesn't like to make these kinds of big hires, and in all honesty, who wouldn't admit that the selection process, even once it's complete, isn't stressful and nerve wracking. Granted, there's got to be a part of you that's pumped if you feel like you've pulled the trigger at precisely the right time.

And Bowlen may've done just that. He's got a young guy that's been around football his entire life, and, in his half dozen years with Robert Craft's organization, he's witnessed a ton of winning. A ton. There's also the angle that Denver was ahead of the game, or got to the best candidate first. And there's also a fresh blood/not-a-retread slant that will, at very least, instill a healthy sense of optimism throughout the organization. For your best examples of how this could go, one could look, if one was so inclined, to Al Davis' club. Not, of course, as a model of how to do things, but as historical references to signing super-young guys to run the show. Some feel that Jon Gruden is still, championship and all, an overrated coach. I think he's pretty good. The other side of that coin is Lane Kiffin. I'm not sure what folks really think about the kid; I think he got the rug pulled out far too early. Either way, the hire is an exciting one, one that, in my opinion, is better than getting a dude who's had the position elsewhere but been without success.

Championships are, of course, the ultimate Litmus, but I'm eager to see how Mos' Dan fares in this troubled division, and I'm also fascinated to see what kind of time he gets to get his prints on the operation and run with it. That is, I'll certainly be comparing it to the Herm Edwards regime in Kansas City, but only in aspects that are fair. Will he keep a standard mix of veterans on the roster? Gut things and go young? Will he finish 2009 above .500, then drop to four losses, and then to two? Well, I never really thought that was possible. Not in the modern-day NFL. I'm also a guy that's been wrong before. I've also been real damn wrong, and most recently, wronger than rufie-inspired sodomy, like I was with Edwards' '08 "effort." I mean, draw the comparison to your job or mine, and we're canned before Halloween. But you know, another tale, another time.

Seriously though, there are a few things that every new head coach must stomach when he slides into the new pair of snakeskins, and based solely on non-requests, here are the three that Denver Broncos Head Coach Josh McDaniels must suffer through before tabbing his mile-high slate a clean one.

First -- and keep in mind he has no choice in these matters -- he has got to completely destroy his first draft. Oh, no. I don't mean hit the thing out of the park. I mean destroy it. Literally. Like, he should draft all CU Buffaloes, or only Division II guys. He could Shanahananigan up the joint and take a bunch of defensive guys that blow, or have unwieldy egos, or a history of weapons charges, or hell -- all of the above. He should probably squander at least one pick via trading up or down in the process, too. For good measure.

Second, whether it's in the off-season, during camp, in the pre-season, or regular season, he has got to facilitate the consummation of the unsexiest, most fucktastic bromance of all time: the Cutlerfucker-Marmalard bukkake. It shall be the best-of-the-West, wearing-only-a-vest-while-fantasizing-of-Ryan Seacrest mutual masturbation phenomenon. The kicker, of course, is their must be footage. McDaniels can put it on the StubTubes. Cecil and Old No. 7 can watch it, rate it, and then vomit while worrying about the "partial" that it gave them, and then you know what? We can put this vial (Editor's Note: Betta' ax somebody.) of bad blood behind us all.

Finally. The most important thing that Shanny's replacement must accomplish is a Chiefs victory at InVesCo. Not in the last season of his reign. Not after Seven's daughter gets her driver license. Now. As in, 2009. It's gotta be legit, though. No throwing the game. No SpyGate Junior factor. A win. Just one. Why? Because eight years is e-fucking-nough, don't you think? Come on!

And then, once those teensy headaches are done and out of the way, he can get to workin' for the shield and keeping that torch of sustained excellence -- fire bans notwithstanding -- burning bright for the Centennial State.

Now then. There are the matters of a) What the crap is the status with the Chiefs' GM non-hiring, b) Tony Dungy stepping down in Indy, and c) Mike Tomlin tearing down the Great Wall of Bloachery, but frankly, this has exhausted me, and I need a nap. I do, however, have to get dinner ready for the missus, and so for now...
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Meet The New Boss

I fell back into one of my old habits this morning. No, I didn't trade a handjob for crack or bet the mortgage on a bum fight. I went down to the newstand and purchased a dead-tree version of the Denver Post. I had two pressing needs at the time--I had to take a crap and I had to absorb the conventional wisdom on Coach Doogie. Instead of lugging the laptop to the john, I dropped four bits on the Post and then dropped the deuce.

While I "log on," as the kids say, to both Denver dailies' websites quite often for the news about my home state and my football team, it's actually rare that I buy them in print anymore. In the week or so since I'd picked up a Post, it has undergone a pretty radical transformation. The paper is tiny, made up of only three sections. The former A and B news sections are consolidated along with the Business slice. Sports is still pretty beefy and a standalone section, while all of the various features make up the third insert of the newspaper.

Why does this matter on the day we all await an official announcement of the Broncos' next head coach? Because the way we follow our teams is changing, people. You know this already, of course. It's a scientific fact that reading the House of Georges is the most cutting-edge form of media consumption available to human life, and it will even get you laid. Well, that and veterinary sedatives.

Those who gripe about Coach Doogie's age and relative inexperience are missing one important fact. We sports fans will view McDaniels through a much different prism than we did Shanny, simply because of the times. When Shanahan was hired, we read about it in the paper and watched it on the evening news. We didn't rush to our blogs and crank out posts. Even if he's inept at every facet of NFL coaching, Josh McDaniels is aware of modern communication. Hopefully he'll handle the pressure put on him by it (and, oh by the way, not be inept).

At the very least, the new boss should pass over one of Shanahan's most annoying quirks--his utter disdain for fantasy football. I know it doesn't matter to you, Coach, and I'm even on board with platooning RBs. But you have to acknowledge that approximately 106 per cent of your fan base plays fantasy, at least act like you care.

And hey, sports fans, if you want even more insight on the pitched battle between new media and old, check this out. Sure, it's crafted by the Libertarians, a selfish and pasty race. But it manages to both bag on Jason Whitlock and exalt Nate Silver, so there's that.
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Nickname Needed

What's funny about this hire is that no one knows a God damned thing about Josh McDaniels. Sure, we're hip to his offensive style and play-calling and can project upon him our own visions of the kind of leader he'll be.

But the fact is, none of us have heard him speak. We don't know if he has an accent, or a hot wife, or if he watches Top Chef, or if he's addicted to cigarettes and tanning beds. My wife thinks he's cute, which totally means he can coach the shit out of some football.

One thing that bothers me is that Josh McDaniels is a cumbersome name and needs to be shortened, abbreviated or modified. There are tools out there that will call him J-Mac, but that moniker is already reserved for that special needs kid who drains threes.

I say we call him Doogie. Or, if you want to be formal, Coach Doogie McSparkyshorts.

Don't like it? Leave suggestions in the comments, you jackals.
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