ANOTHER MASS SHOOTING IN THOUSAND OAKS, CALIFORNIA

Another mass shooting happened on Wednesday night.  This time it was at the popular Borderline Bar & Grill in Thousand Oaks, California; a city that prides itself in being among the safest municipalities in the country.  It’s clear that crime statistics have no bearing on predicting mass shootings; as these atrocities have proven to happen anywhere.  In fact, most of them happen where they’re not supposed to happen – you know, “safe” communities like Littleton, Newtown and Thousand Oaks.  The identity of the gunman was just released, a 28-year-old male named Ian David Long.  By dinner time you’ll probably have forgotten his name – likely upstaged by some petulant tweet from our Narcissist in Chief or perhaps by closing your eyes in the hope that someday these horrific shootings will just end.  I’ve been trying it for years.  It doesn’t work.

So far twelve are dead in this shooting, including the gunman, as well as a 29-year veteran from the Ventura County Sheriff’s Office, Sgt. Ron Helus.  The remaining victims are presumed to be young adults, as the Borderline was a popular night spot among local colleges and universities.  As with every time this happens, the debate about guns will rise to surface for a day or two; though its voice continues to get drowned out for three main reasons: 1) This seems to occur now on a biweekly basis, and thus, we condition ourselves into a false denial that, statistically, our children are still more likely to get struck by lightning than die in a mass shooting.  What else can we do but block this out?  We probably won’t die eating dinner at Applebees, right?  2) That The Left offers nothing but rhetoric since they’re covertly owned by the gun lobby, while The Right takes a hard stand on protecting the Second Amendment since they’re overtly owned by the gun lobby.  And 3) Anti-gun organizations have been largely ineffective.  Most gun control legislation is completely toothless; written for the sole purpose of scoring political brownie points without enticing the wrath of the NRA and its lesser known brethren. Background checks do nothing.  Most of the weapons used in these senseless slaughters are purchased legally anyway.  Guns exist to kill people.  The old, tired arguments we’ve heard ad nauseum such as if only there was somebody armed at the time this happened, or that a good guy with a gun is better than a bad guy with a gun, or that a man with knife can cause as much carnage as a man with a gun don’t hold up.  They never have.   On the surface people may nod in agreement about these hollow points, but privately, when one takes a good hard look in the mirror, the fact that this is an utter lie can’t be denied.  You may fool your neighbor, but you can’t fool yourself.

To dedicate time, energy and resources to “understanding” what made Ian David Long tick is doing our society a disservice. Of course we’re curious, but the more these perpetrators get their names in lights, even posthumously, the more likely it is to motivate the next aspiring mass murderer in relatively short order.  It’s come out that Long was a former Marine and may have been suffering from Post-Traumatic-Stress Disorder, or PTSD; only the world’s most convenient diagnosis to when former soldiers commit crimes like this.  You can see it’s already being set up that, once again, this latest mass shooting is about mental health instead of insanely easy access to guns.  No doubt our president will be tweeting that exact point soon enough if he hasn’t already.  And since we’ll never concede to the obvious truth that a society saturated with an estimated 300 million fire arms gets innocent people killed, we go through the perfunctory exercise of identifying other possible causes that fuel such incidents.  It’s just another lie, and yet we still look the other way regardless.  I’m sure you have the same percentage of violent sociopaths in Japan as you do in the United States, only they can’t get access to guns; which is why you never hear about mass shootings coming out of there, or anywhere else with similar laws for that matter.  Maybe they cold-cock some poor guy on the street, or stab someone on the Tokyo subway on a rare occasion, but the damage and frequency of such incidents is infinitesimal in comparison to what happens in America.  

This Picture Could Be Generic, However This Is From Wednesday Night In Thousand Oaks, California Where 12 Died

Mass shootings have become an outlet, an answer, a calamitously grandiose way for the angry and ill adjusted to end the dead end.  Everyone’s messed up to some extent, they’re just incredibly more dangerous when they get their hands on a gun.  You want an end to the violence?  Start by ending the denial.  

Hall of Fame Should Say "No" to T.O.

Terrell Owens, better known at “T.O.” is among the finalists for 2018 NFL Hall of Fame vote taking place on Saturday.  The other finalists being considered besides Owens are Ray Lewis, Brian Urlacher, Edgerrin James, Randy Moss, Isaac Bruce, John Lynch and Brian Dawkins. 

Nobody doubts T.O.’s talent as a receiver. He was big target at 6’3” and 226 pounds, physical, had good hands, and when his head was straight, a hard worker.   Over his fifteen-year career where he played for San Francisco (8 years), Philadelphia (2 years), Dallas (3 years), Buffalo (1 year) and Cincinnati (1 year), he had solid statistics; with more than 1000 receiving yards in nine of those fifteen seasons, eight seasons with ten or more touchdowns, and all but one season (49.3% in 2008), where his completion percentage was below fifty percent.   In addition, Owens was a Pro Bowl selection for five of those fifteen years, a third of his career.  To even last fifteen years in the NFL is an amazing feat.  Heck, to even keep a job these days for fifteen years is an amazing feat; much less being a starting wide receiver in the world’s most violent sport.  And while the numbers don’t lie, they don’t always offer the whole truth either; which is why I am not entirely convinced that T.O. makes it into the Hall of Fame.

I say this simply because most will not recall T.O.’s brilliance nearly as well as they’ll recall his shenanigans.  The first thing that crosses my mind when Terrell Owens is mentioned is the game on September 24, 2000, when playing in Dallas, T.O., who was with San Francisco at the time, sprinted out to the iconic star at midfield, arms extended, looking up at God as if He had scheduled appointment to watch him bask in self-aggrandizement after scoring a touchdown.  Shortly thereafter, Emmitt Smith, a doubtless Hall of Famer, countered Owens’s antagonism by doing the same thing.  Rather than look heavenward, Smith emphatically placed the ball on the star as if to say, “you don’t that in this house, mother&*$#@%.”  One would think that would be enough to put such silliness to rest.  But no, not T.O.  He scored another touchdown.  Just a little one-yard garbage time reception with 4:05 remaining the game, but nevertheless, that was enough to go out and repeat what he started before.  He was rewarded with getting decked by Dallas safety George Teague.  A minor brawl ensued.  Teague was ejected.  Dallas lost 41-24, and despite scoring two touchdowns the only thing anyone remembers about Owens that day was his immaturity.  It was a game, like many others, that served as a microcosm of Owens’s entire career.  And if that’s what you remember the most, one has to wonder how much the Football Establishment wants that kind of player enshrined in Canton.  Incidentally, another wide receiver on the 49ers quietly scored two touchdowns in that game as well.  His name is Jerry Rice.

"Are you there God?  It's me, T.O."

Even if Terrell Owens played with Jerry Rice’s humility, is he still a Hall of Famer?  While there’s no firm definition of what constitutes a Hall of Fame player, there is a general consensus that a Hall of Fame player isn’t just great, but one whose greatness singlehandedly elevates the play of those around him.  A player who makes people better through a contagious aura of sheer will.  Such players could be flawed.  In fact, many of them were.  Lawrence Taylor, Charles Haley and Michael Irvin, all somewhat recent Hall of Fame inductees, had their public off-the-field issues.  It didn’t matter with those guys though, they knew their play spoke for itself and the extracurricular riff-raff would eventually blow over.  If their egos sought the adulation of the fans, the answer was to simply play well.  T.O. certainly played well much more often than not, he just couldn’t understand that was enough to get what he so desperately needed.  But he also lacked that contagious aura, remaining a loner instead of a leader.

Where it gets interesting is that, unlike Taylor, Haley and Irvin, it’s been well reported, thanks largely by T.O. himself, that Owens has never had any off-the-field incidents.  No DUI’s, drug arrests, assaulting of women or killing of dogs.  And yet, despite Owen’s self-proclaimed moral turpitude, his compulsion to grab a cheerleader’s pom-poms in front of the TV cameras is far more reprehensible.   Yes, Lawrence Taylor drove drunk a lot, but that’s who he was; a badass that drove 120 MPH under the influence.  T.O.?  He’s just needy.  A tormented narcissist whose “bucket” has a perpetual leak.  And while Owens may have to answer fewer questions than Lawrence Taylor when they reach the Pearly Gates, in football, a drunk driving badass is still more Hall of Fame worthy than a pathological self-promoter.

T.O. has also never won a Super Bowl.  He did play in one in the 2004 season when he was with Philadelphia.  A game he’s yet to get over.  Though there are plenty of other Hall of Famers who didn’t win Super Bowls either.  Guys like Dan Marino or Dan Fouts for instance.  The difference, of course, is that Fouts and Marino made their teams perennial playoff contenders with fluctuating levels of talent.  This is what the great ones do.  Most Hall of Famers usually play for only one or two teams. Owens played for five, essentially collecting a paycheck in his final seasons in Buffalo and Cincinnati the way Rip Torn pays the rent with bit parts in a raunchy comedy.   Such players stay because their organization sees their value.  They don’t want them to leave, and they can anticipate the slew of vituperative repercussions if they fail to do so.  T.O. was jettisoned, repeatedly, for his alienating of teammates and putting vanity ahead of football.  How is that Hall of Fame material?  In fact, if 2005, Philadelphia suspended Terrell Owens for the final four games of the season, where, in the cruelest of ironies, the NFL’s most attention starved player was upstaged by his agent, Drew Rosenhaus, in his infamous press conference by responding “next question, next question,” to nearly every inquiry about the matter from the press.  It’s about the only thing anyone remembers from that fiasco.  He never played for the Eagles again.

Rosenhaus speaking on T.O.'s behalf: "NEXT QUESTION..."

T.O. had three respectable years with the Dallas Cowboys after his stint in Philly, but they never got far in the playoffs, if at all.  He appeared to enter a more vulnerable stage of his life, making several teary interviews with reporters during that period; seemingly aware that his time was running out and that he had burned lots of bridges.  He played two more years after that with the Bills and Bengals.

Owens says that if he is inducted into the Hall of Fame, he doesn’t want to go in as a 49er despite that being where he played in his prime.  Going in as, say, a Cowboy, Bill or Bengal would, symbolically at least, erase many of his career’s finest moments.  Then again, that is ultimate Terrell Owens conundrum. The harder he tries to make us remember him, the more we actually forget.

The beautiful simplicity of Terrell Owens just playing football. 

THE VANILLA ERA CONTINUES

If I were a Chicago Bears fan, I’d couldn’t help but feel lukewarm about former Kansas City Chiefs Offensive Coordinator, Matt Nagy, as my new head coach.  You can admire his candor, but as far as I’m concerned starting your first day on the job with a gigantic mea culpa is not the way to take the reins.  Nagy, in essence, took the blame for the Chiefs’ inexcusable Wild Card loss Saturday at home to the grossly inferior Tennessee Titans.  Since then, Nagy, and his lone mentor, Chiefs head coach Andy Reid, have been rightfully excoriated for their second half collapse. Not to mention abandoning the running game with one of the league’s most explosive backs, Kareem Hunt.  Such disclosures are like having the “check engine” light on your new car go off before even leaving the dealership. 

Matt Nagy will be the 16th head coach of the Chicago Bears

"I know that our offense and our offensive staff supports me,” Nagy said.  “Coach Reid supports me. I called every single play in the second half.  I stand by it.  I promise you I'm going to learn from it.”

Good for Nagy to fall on the sword and move forward his bigger new job.  There’s nothing wrong with that.  However, the Chicago Bears don’t just need another head coach, they need a boost.  They need sizzle, sex appeal, a jolt of caffeine and any other cliché that’s applicable.  For city that’s once been described as the Hog Butcher of World, Toolmaker, Stacker of Wheat, it’s been a long draught of uninspiring head coaches for its football team.  More than twenty-five years if you mark the beginning of the “Vanilla Era” with the firing of Mike Ditka in 1992.  It hasn’t been pretty. Chicago’s most recent head coach, John Fox, who was fired on New Year’s Day, was nothing more than a burned-out retread who further secured his retirement with three years of pedestrian service.  Before Fox was Marc Trestman, a perennial assistant with a long line of noticeably brief stints throughout the NFL, NCAA and CFL that dated back to the early 1980s.  A B-Lister at best, except in Canada, Trestman hopped from job to job like a young TV weatherman until landing the gig with the Bears in 2013.  He lasted two years, and is regarded primarily as a guy who filled in at a time when prime coaching talent was thin – a beneficiary of market conditions.  And before Trestman was Lovie Smith, who in nine years of work took Chicago to the Super Bowl in 2006, where they lost to Indianapolis; a team with a great quarterback – which was something Smith could neither find nor develop himself.  Though perhaps Smith’s ultimate undoing was his patented nonchalance, which for those leery of a Mike Ditka redux, saw this as a laudable trait of patience and level headedness at first; only to have that same demeanor translate into indifference and bewilderment as things soured down the road.  And before Lovie was Dick Jauron, another face in the crowd coach who was more lucky than good, and before him was Dave Wannestedt; a much-ballyhooed hiring post Mike Ditka in 1993, who’s lackluster performance seemed to get a free pass from the sports punditry during most of his time there.  

Lovie Smith showing anger, joy, sadness, frustration, fear and love all at once.  The NFL's version of Hamlet

This Ain't No Mud Club: Marc Trestman looking a little bit like David Byrne and perhaps wishing he was at a press conference that couldn't end soon enough

So enter Matt Nagy, a 39-year-old former quarterback from the University of Delaware, who still holds the team passing record of 556 yards in 1998 against the University of Connecticut.  A family man, with four boys, Nagy, with his trimmed beard and crew cut to morph with his balding head looks like an energetic elementary school principal.  Known as having a “connection with quarterbacks”, he was brought in to help nurture quarterback Mitchell Trubisky who’ll be in his second year in 2018.  So far Trubisky has shown signs of promise, though he’s yet to prove he’s worth what Chicago gave up to move just one spot in the 2017 draft to nab him in the first round.  To hire a purported quarterback guru almost sounds like there’s a nervous Ryan Pace, Chicago’s General Manager, walking the floors at night: Matt, I need to look good with the Trubisky pick…OK?  Even so, Mr. Pace needs to get more talent around Trubisky before Nagy’s Svengali effect can occur.  As for Nagy’s defensive capabilities, it’s been widely reported that the Bears are very much hoping to retain their current defensive coordinator Vic Fangio.  Though there are already potential philosophical differences in the team’s defensive scheme.  As in, should the team go with a 3-4 or a 4-3?

“Again, again, that’s something we’re really going to start hammering out right here,” Nagy said. “We don’t know that just yet. It’s a valid question, because there are benefits to both. One thing to keep in mind is, everyone keeps talking about 3-4 or 4-3 but 60 percent of the game is played in sub defenses.”

Kudos should go to Chicago for at least hiring a someone from outside of the main pack of coaches that everyone else is interviewing.  So maybe they are the smartest guys in the room after all.  The same was also thought when the Giants hired Ben McAdoo however.  Nevertheless, Nagy wasn’t really a name that came up much, unlike the two descendants of the Belichick family tree, Matt Patricia and Josh McDaniels who are being wooed all over, or Pat Shurmur, Minnesota’s Offensive Coordinator, who’s more of a mystery as to why he’s such a hot prospect.

Nagy seems like a good man, but by starting off with an apology grates against the soul of this once storied team.  They need someone big; someone that commands the attention of everyone present.  A Monster of the Midway.  These Bears haven’t been mean for an entire generation, and Nagy just seems too darn nice.  

The Glory Days.  Richard Dent #95 mauling Phil Simms #11 in 1985