Death of a Gettleman: JR is at best Carolina's Tragic Hero

[frash.exe]

Wake up folks, it's 2012 again

 

I'm writing this long because I didn't have time to write short. I have a lot of thoughts to get off my chest. Never have I been more motivated to write a critiquing letter to the organization explaining to them what they just did, but the guy who answers letters no longer works for the company (I wonder how that happened). Seeing the news on Monday was like watching Sirius Black die at the end of OoTP. Of course, we have no explanation from JR of why he fired the most prolific executive he's ever had working here, because he holds the fans in such high esteem and he's such a social butterfly. 

 

Eulogy

 

What did Gettleman bring to the Carolinas that once was not there? Well, for one, Gettleman was a very worldly executive in the context of his career background compared to anyone else that had managed the front office here. He contributed to the success of the Bills in the 80s, the Broncos in the 90s, and the Giants of the late 2000s and early 2010s. Maybe he wasn't the all-encompassing visionary demigod that Bill Belichick is touted as and constantly compared to as, but Gettleman understood the fundamentals of the game in a similar way. Find players that can provide the skill set and/or measurables that make them project to someone who can provide a productive value to a football team. 

 

This doesn't emulate the Patriots model (and that's not a great blueprint anyway since multiple teams have tried and failed to do this very thing; most notably the Browns and the Jets multiple times), but in a granular sense of analyzing players and evaluating schemes, there is an overlap, and that's the source component of what you see when you're watching the Patriots operate like a bunch of hyper aware super soldiers. This resulted in better drafting and better free agent acquisitions. 

 

The previous Hurney-Fox paradigm drafted for shits and good feels many times. Yea let's just draft Jake Delhomme's cousin in the fourth round. Let's trade back into the third for local DII sensation Armanti Edwards and lose what would have been the first pick in the second round in 2011. Let's actually start a 43 year old man at QB because we are so ill-prepared with our depth when our 32-year old QB goes down with an injury. What could go wrong besides maybe he can't finish the game because his ankle has gotten so sore that he's struggling to drop back and he hasn't even really gotten hit?

 

Such moves and such poor end results would never be observed while Gettleman was overseeing our personnel. Yea, you can get a lot worse than what this team has been the past few years. I remember.

 

A Steady Hand

 

If you think Gettleman rubs people the wrong way, perk your ears up and open your mind. And when I say this, I'm speaking directly to anyone that has ever said something to the effect of "why can't you Gettleman slurpers admit to any shortcoming of his??!" It's true, Gettleman's not a messiah, but this is such a poor, irrational argument, and the only reason I'm addressing it is because it's become such a prevalent and self-validated sentiment on here. 

 

Here's your answer. No. I don't think Gettleman was perfect and that every decision he made ended up being the correct one, but he provided such a great blend of football expertise and culture shock to this ass backward franchise of ours, I actually believed we were headed on the eventual road to progress for a while there. Gettleman approached his craft with rationale and provided not a leak of evidence to suggest otherwise, and as somebody that had sat through years of poor output and the expectation of seeing guys on the field that clearly didn't belong there, either because they were too old, or because they didn't have good enough skills and were being propped up as viable even though they laughably were not (James Anderson, Charles Godfrey, Jeff King, Maake Kemoeatu, Tyler Brayton), this was a breath of fresh air. 

 

Sometimes, you have to make the hard decisions. Do you think I wanted Steve Smith to be handed his release papers? fug no. In a perfect world Smitty can stay and coordinate with the team in perfect harmony leading up to a dynastic championship winning run of success. But if Steve Smith's locker room antics and persistent assertions that he was the alpha on the roster were bad things in a football sense, this was the only way to remedy it. 

 

Dave's hardline approach may be abrasive to you guys, but this is the only way to bring better football here. Do you want to be productive and contribute to morale and a winning team? Great, because that's what got Luke Kuechly, Kawann Short, Cam Newton, and Kurt Coleman contract extensions. Do you want to be a diva and not take part in teamwork because you think you're too cool for the fuging room? Hit the road. That's why Josh is not here. That's why Williams is not here. The expectations are reasonably consistent. You can play here if you're not asking for an outrageous price for your services, and if you are willing to take the burdens of leadership that come with the glory.

 

The Carolina Way

 

We have a tendency on this platform to judge this team's actions in a vacuum in general. If it doesn't adhere to the Carolina way, and the finished product is not desired, it must be wrong and we need to go back to doing it the old way. If you look at all of the consistently successful teams in this league (there's not much), what Gettleman was doing here was not all that dissimilar. 

 

Coughlin clashed with Tiki Barber ages ago and Tiki was unceremoniously released a year before the Giants went all the way in 2007. And Marshawn Lynch is out of retirement, but not with the Seahawks. Why? Because the Seahawks are committed to putting the best product they can on the field above all other interests. In Carolina it may be priority No. 3, after 1. making sure we meet the required quota of first-round runningbacks and 2. make those romantic charity/fanservice player transactions. 

 

So how does Gettleman become so vilified, hated and lashed out at by these players and their fans as opposed to other GMs? It's the culture. It's the way these players were introduced to the league. Why do you think on multiple occasions former players have mentioned that other teams like the Patriots and Steelers have a different atmosphere? These players were brought in under the context that the team was going to sponsor them as the stars, and they didn't have to win, and they didn't have to be accountable, and they could run roughshod and Papa Jerry will have their back if an assistant coach pisses them off. Then Gettleman comes in and the expectation changes. Now they are being held accountable and they can't take liberties and they hated it. 

 

I was ecstatic when I heard that JR was bringing in an outside consultant (Ernie Accorsi) for guidance. I felt like a change of culture was definitely being given a concerted effort, and my desires were satiated when they brought in Dave Gettleman. Dave didn't appease the press with platitudes about "running the ball and stopping the run" during his introductory press conference. He dropped gold nuggets of football knowledge that I hadn't seen from the non-committal figureheads that had once stood at that same podium. 

 

He directly quoted Tom Coughlin, a two-time SB winning head coach and the architect of a once productive expansion team that had foundered in the years after he had left (Jaguars). He said something to the effect of "if we do this right, we're going to be holding a Lombardi trophy when we're done". Looking back now, we came pretty damn close. 

 

Gettleman spearheaded his first impression by making his very first big move to revamp the DT position by drafting Star and Kawann Short, immediately stabilizing what was once a void of actual talent and a persistent weakness of the defense. And people still scrutinize the selections with all the comments about "double dipping" (a term of which I feel is particularly overused and does not define Gettleman's approach in the least) and talking about all the other guys we could have taken there. He then filled all the gaps he could with the money he was allotted to spend that was left to try and level up the anemic talent pool, the other guys that were there to support the main players. The Panthers won their division for the first time in 5 years, went to the playoffs and though they lost, it was a sign that this team was on the rise.

 

Then 2014 happened. I don't care what anybody says, but 2014 was a success story for the Panthers. A bit of serendipity in the form of poor divisional competition and a late-season surge of momentum led the Panthers on the road to another division title, and their first playoff win since 2006. December 2014-January 2015 is the prologue to the 2015 Season. It helped give the team the confidence it needed to play on bigger stages. Without that, I'm not sure if the team is in the right mindset to go 14-0.

 

Dave was the architect for one of the most cohesive locker rooms ever put together in 2015. The Panthers dominated like never seen before, shredding the NFC East, and both NFC West opponents in the playoffs. I mean what else can I possibly say about that season? It had a shitty ending but literally everything else went right. 2016 was obviously a disappointment, but in the face of everything else that had preceded it, not enough to shitcan the 2015 Sporting News Executive of the Year by itself. Which brings me to my next act...

 

The Iacocca Allegory

 

You may have heard the name and not the story, but the short of it goes like this. Lee Iacocca is a hardworking automotive executive of ethnic lineage (not unlike Gettleman) that worked his way up to the top of his field from the bottom with brilliance and an analytic mind (again, not unlike Gettleman). Do you own a Mustang or a minivan? If so, you can thank Iacocca then for spearheading the development of these vehicles and the resulting applications of their design that you enjoy so much, whether for practical purposes or if you are an automotive enthusiast. 

 

If Gettleman is Iacocca, then the Mustang is the 2015 Panthers. Unfortunately for Gettleman, the part of Henry Ford II (Iacocca's direct supervisor; will be referring to him as HF2) will be played by Jerry Richardson. HF2 and Lee clashed on a philosophical level multiple times during his tenure as the president of Ford. Lee wanted to implement creative thinking and put out an innovative product to outfox GM and Chrysler, while the conservative Henry Ford was too preoccupied with brand heritage and his own out of touch vision of Ford. 

 

In one of Lee's concepts, he envisioned sanctioning Honda to build motors for a car they were developing, and HF2 nixed it because "Fords should not ever have Jap engines in them" or something to that effect. This was the 70s and with the two oil crises that had transpired during that decade, Lee saw the need to build smaller cars with smaller, more fuel efficient engines powering them, and had in his sights the easiest, most efficient path to developing a small car. 

 

Lee ended up being fired by HF2 in 1978, because "sometimes you just don't like somebody". This was in spite of Ford having been profitable under Lee's leadership, even with the meddlesome HF2. Following this departure, Lee was picked up by Chrysler to perform the same functions and developed the minivan concept, as well as overseeing the introduction of that bell cow K platform that brought Chrysler away from the event horizon and toward record breaking prosperity. Actually if you own any kind of Chrysler or Dodge or Jeep you should thank Iacocca because those brands might not be here today. I mean I personally wouldn't own one and I don't know anybody who does that isn't living in section 8 housing but if you're a mopar guy, hey!... put your lighters up to Lee Iacocca.

 

Time will most likely erase Gettleman's influence on this team much quicker than Iacocca's influence on the auto industry, because overall, the automotive industry continues to build upon the foundation of improvements over the years to stack even more improvements on top. And the NFL is a niche product in comparison, so we're working under a smaller dome of influence on humanity. So why am I using this as a case study to compare? Because just like the head guy at Ford (HF2), JR has no idea what the hell he is doing. It's widely viewed in retrospect that HF2 was an egotist that couldn't get the hell out of his own way. These are the types of stubborn, bull-headed determinators that would rather die by their own sword than live by someone else's. 

 

By Iacocca's account (which I choose to believe) HF2 was a tyrannic boss, a racist and a homophobe. While I don't think JR is nearly the kind of slimeball that HF2 was, to me the first description applies. Don't let his preference to not immerse himself in day-to-day activities deter you from this classification. JR is a control freak. He wants the team to run a certain way. He doesn't like the contract negotiations going on for too long, by the looks of it. (How does that help when it literally pays to negotiate everything because that's how you build a stacked roster?) He wants to employ a certain identity (that doesn't work) and stoic classiness (moderately irrelevant to winning football games in most cases) that the team must adhere to as a finished product. Ron Rivera embodies this, so he's got the job security. 

 

Yes, he may not be taking a plane to next year's NFL draft venue and sitting in the war room in front of a big board and running the show on his timetable in there like the other Jerry does, but that's kind of hard to do when you're a man of his age and health complications. He famously told Cam Newton to keep his hair very short and not to get any tattoos. He gave his own General Manager and Head Coach bed checks during a lakehouse getaway where they discussed the future of the team. Don't believe me? Here's an article.

http://www.heraldonline.com/sports/nfl/carolina-panthers/article12205979.html

There's more about JR's insistence on his vision of the franchise he has in the article. He basically starts proselytizing to the reader about how wonderful the Rooneys are and how they run such a classy franchise, to the point where you almost forget that their star QB is almost certainly a serial rapist. And back when this story was published, it was also reported by the observer, which had a more detailed account. I can't find the article itself, but I found parts of it in Fiz's commentary on the story, on a blog post he made way back:

http://marginalplayer.blogspot.com/2008/01/jerry-richardson-tucking-in-john-fox.html?m=1

What kind of man who respects the employees under him does this bullshit? A few middle aged guys who run the operations of an actual football team are going to be subject to this kind of emasculating treatment. I haven't had a bed check since I was 8 years old, and I don't care how much you pay me to make a living, you are not giving me a bed check.  If this was the point in John Fox's run where he started to not give a poo, I don't blame him. I never liked Jerry's authoritative, patriarchal leadership personality, and I never will. I think it has no place in running a football franchise. 

 

A note on performance

 

There's only two main theories on the reasoning for this departure. One is the default "the results are not good" explanation, which, in this case, I think is bullshit, as it is in many similar departures, because you can always front this. At the end of the season, 31 teams are going to be unhappy with the results. So you can almost always fire somebody in the NFL and explain that the performance was not good enough, and many people will accept that at face value. 

 

Then there are personal reasons. Even superbowl winning teams have self-destructed because of personal reasons. Jerry Jones' reputation as an inept, meddling owner really gained traction when he fired Jimmy Johnson right after his second superbowl win. I have to follow the 2nd theory because it's plausible to me that Gettleman clashed with JR in a stylistic sense. JR had to have not appreciated his discretion as a GM, and that's the reason he's gone, because it sure as hell couldn't be that the results didn't exceed our standards. Maybe JR thought that Gettleman was letting too many guys walk to find more money, but what JR should really be focusing on, if that is the case, is that we've had so many more players than we've ever had flourish in our system the past few years, and because of like, you know, the salary cap and all, we can't just re-sign all of them to stay.

 

What Dave provided here in just four short years was the longest run of success this team has ever had. Back-to-back-to-back playoff appearances, playoff wins, a superbowl berth, a ridiculously dominant 15-1 regular season performance. So the way I see it is that Gettleman provided a stabilizing, massive influence of objective input that buoyed this team back up from the benthic zone with a sensible analyzation in every decision made to maximize the value that players could contribute to this team, so that this team could be more successful than it ever has been. This conscious has seemingly abruptly become lobotomized out of the brains of this organization.

 

I'm not going to question whether JR wants a winning football team. JR can want this team to win like everybody wants world peace and a cure for cancer. It's easy to say he wants the Panthers to win. Rather I will question his commitment to winning, like I have done so many times because his actions have provided me with so many opportunities to do so. It's not a binary question as much as it is a quantum superposition of how much he wants to win, and how much he wants this team to emblazon a display of his view of how the business of this team should be conducted, and in this case he has assigned far more value to the latter. 

 

CTRL-Z

 

So which direction is the above equation going? With Marty's return, we're going to be undoing all of what Gettleman built since 2013. I'm already seeing reports of Hurney evaluating players and suggesting positional conversions, and I'm envisioning horrors of being one unit of "Jonathan Stewart on a bike" away from Hurney thinking we don't have enough power backs and trading Kawann Short to the Eagles for Blount and a 4th round pick. Maybe this won't happen but a bunch of stupid decisions that follow Hurney's idiotic logical conclusions like this does will. The Panthers are very likely going to regress back to a floundering non-entity of a football team. If they somehow avoid this fate, it will be in spite of leadership. Anything is possible but a well-guided hand really helps, especially in the realm of competition. JR brought back his headless yes man. If JR lets him get his hands on the control panel, expect some moves that are going to make you wonder whether or not Hurney is actively trying to sabotage this team.

[Proudiddy]

This isn't just directed at you frash, as you are one of my favorite posters, but I just don't understand all of this hero worship for a guy that still couldn't put together consecutive winning seasons, IN LARGE PART, due to his own ego and stubbornness.  Again, he made some solid picks, he made some horrible ones, all while he scorched, nuked, and destroyed multiple legacies and professional relationships along the way.  I just don't see how that is translating to "Gettleman: The Savior of Carolina."  Results were the same with him as they were with Hurney, minus the contract extensions...  But, that was the only difference between them - their respective tenures are marked by polar opposite approaches to retaining players and negotiating contracts.  One was a pushover with an open wallet, the other was a hardass, uber-penny-pincher to the extreme.

And again, the two (non-consecutive) winning seasons he had were with a core that Hurney built, LOL.  Cam, Luke, TD, Olsen, and others...  I get that people are unhappy with the move, but all of these dramatics in mourning are just really over the top, imo.

 

[ickmule]

In a nut shell he told all of us that JR is a $hitty owner and I couldn't agree more. For 22 years we've watched the same story line over and over. Nothing will change until there is a new head man on Mint St.  

[The Huddler]

@Jangler

 

as much as you post music videos..

 

ever listen to TOOL?

[E CaT PanTHer 2]

although I don't agree with everything you said, you are an amazing writer

just giving credit where credits due

[Ship]

fuging bed checks.

My issue with the non-consecutive winning seasons is in 2014 we went to the playoffs and we won a game. Once we made it in the playoffs I could give a poo about what it took to get there. I consider that season a success. At the time it spoke to the mettle of our players and the talent of the rookies Dave drafted that year when they finally got PT and the cohesion of the O-line once Remmers got involved.

Those were moves that Gettleman made. And even though those players aren't here anymore, that doesn't mean they were busted picks or FAs. Every player has their value and runs their course on a team. Without Boston, Philly, Bene, Ealy, and Remmers this team wouldn't have made the playoffs in 2014 and our 2015 season would have also been different. Gettleman could find us answers. Even if those answers were short term.

its fun to think about the team long term and to consider the major players who stay for years, but football is made up of individual games and stand alone seasons. The key to success involves more than just finding the Cam Newtons or Luke Kuechlys. It also involves finding the Dante Rosarios or the Domenik Hixons. The guys who are right for the moments. Gettleman knew how to respond to his own mistakes and find answers to our deficiencies, even if they weren't always the final answer.

I don't believe in Hurney's ability to do that beyond luck. Hurney was Byron Bell and Nate Chandler, Gettleman was Michael Oher and Mike Remmers.

Hurney is boom or bust and Gettleman is more consistent.

[WOW!!]

So is this another "why we shouldn't be fans of this team anymore" thread?

Sent using the amazing CarolinaHuddle mobile app

[ickmule]

4 minutes ago, Ship said:

fuging bed checks.

My issue with the non-consecutive winning seasons is in 2014 we went to the playoffs and we won a game. Once we made it in the playoffs I could give a poo about what it took to get there. I consider that season a success. At the time it spoke to the mettle of our players and the talent of the rookies Dave drafted that year when they finally got PT and the cohesion of the O-line once Remmers got involved.

Those were moves that Gettleman made. And even though those players aren't here anymore, that doesn't mean they were busted picks or FAs. Every player has their value and runs their course on a team. Without Boston, Philly, Bene, Ealy, and Remmers this team wouldn't have made the playoffs in 2014 and our 2015 season would have also been different. Gettleman could find us answers. Even if those answers were short term.

its fun to think about the team long term and to consider the major players who stay for years, but football is made up of individual games and stand alone seasons. The key to success involves more than just finding the Cam Newtons or Luke Kuechlys. It also involves finding the Dante Rosarios or the Domenik Hixons. The guys who are right for the moments. Gettleman knew how to respond to his own mistakes and find answers to our deficiencies, even if they weren't always the final answer.

I don't believe in Hurney's ability to do that beyond luck. Hurney was Byron Bell and Nate Chandler, Gettleman was Michael Oher and Mike Remmers.

Hurney is boom or bust and Gettleman is more consistent.

Hurney stays GM for more than 1 year this team is screwed.

[NanuqoftheNorth]

8 minutes ago, Ship said:

ts fun to think about the team long term and to consider the major players who stay for years, but football is made up of individual games and stand alone seasons. The key to success involves more than just finding the Cam Newtons or Luke Kuechlys. It also involves finding the Dante Rosarios or the Domenik Hixons. The guys who are right for the moments. Gettleman knew how to respond to his own mistakes and find answers to our deficiencies, even if they weren't always the final answer.

I don't believe in Hurney's ability to do that beyond luck. Hurney was Byron Bell and Nate Chandler, Gettleman was Michael Oher and Mike Remmers.

Hurney is boom or bust and Gettleman is more consistent.

This ^^^

Hurney plays checkers while Gettleman plays 3D Chess.

[Jay Roosevelt]

Truth is, like most things, somewhere in the muddled middle.

Gettleman was not as great as many people are saying; not was Hurney as bad. People remember the highs and lows of each, but the average is what should count.

That said, in the long run, while they used different approaches to get there, the overall results were pretty similar when you consider everything.

Gettleman was better at finding talent in the middle rounds of the draft, but Hurney's 1st round success is hard to top. Gettleman was far superior at managing the cap, but Hurney was much better about addressing glaring holes on the roster via free agency.

Overall, if you look at the true core of this team, both deserve credit for key pieces. Hurney drafted Cam and Luke, and made the best trade in team history to acquire Greg Olsen. Gettleman drafted Kawann Short and Trai Turner, signed one of the best UDFA's in team history in Andrew Norwell, and we've still yet to see the best of James Bradberry, IMO.

Both deserve criticism (Hurney's cap management, bad draft trades; Gettleman's handling of the OT's in 2014 and Josh Norman last offseason) and praise (both added key pieces to our core) so to act like either was truly horrible or exceptional is just wrong and the result of major generalizations by many fans.

Sent using the amazing CarolinaHuddle mobile app

[TheRed]

I was not at all happy about this, but some of you are taking the angst to epic levels. Just calm down, geesh.

[ickmule]

3 minutes ago, Jay Roosevelt said:

Truth is, like most things, somewhere in the muddled middle.

Gettleman was not as great as many people are saying; not was Hurney as bad. People remember the highs and lows of each, but the average is what should count.

That said, in the long run, while they used different approaches to get there, the overall results were pretty similar when you consider everything.

Gettleman was better at finding talent in the middle rounds of the draft, but Hurney's 1st round success is hard to top. Gettleman was far superior at managing the cap, but Hurney was much better about addressing glaring holes on the roster via free agency.

Overall, if you look at the true core of this team, both deserve credit for key pieces. Hurney drafted Cam and Luke, and made the best trade in team history to acquire Greg Olsen. Gettleman drafted Kawann Short and Trai Turner, signed one of the best UDFA's in team history in Andrew Norwell, and we've still yet to see the best of James Bradberry, IMO.

Both deserve criticism (Hurney's cap management, bad draft trades; Gettleman's handling of the OT's in 2014 and Josh Norman last offseason) and praise (both added key pieces to our core) so to act like either was truly horrible or exceptional is just wrong and the result of major generalizations by many fans.

Sent using the amazing CarolinaHuddle mobile app
 

In the end we are still a very mediocre franchise with a stubborn owner and nothing will chance until that changes. At least with Gettleman we had hope for the future because he had us moving in the right direction as a whole. With Hurney I'm scared to death of any decision he makes. 

[The Lobo]

Pie for the large wall of text and Vsauce 

[uncfan888]

Frash wrote a damn thesis. Hurney fans probably can't understand the big words you used anyways