12 comments MMQB Review: I Hate the NFL Owners Edition

It's another Monday, which means Peter King graces us with another MMQB. I wonder what will be on Peter's mind today? Does Peter finally confront the idea Jerome Brown was underachiever? Is Mike Utley just another Detroit Lions draft bust? More importantly, what are his thoughts on baseball and life in general? I have to know what I think he thinks. That's why we (don't) love MMQB isn't it?

This week Peter has semi-bad news from the owners meeting in Orlando. It doesn't seem like a modified overtime rule is going to pass. Personally, I don't currently hate the NFL overtime rules now, I just think the coin flip should be decided sooner in the game than the beginning of overtime. If the owners are going to change it though, I want a reasonable and sane way of doing it, and I liked the proposal that was made well enough. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like too many other people did.

Everyone here at the NFL owners meetings seems to have a "yeah, but'' reaction when they talk about the overtime-reform rule.

You mean like, "yeah, but we are trying to ruin the NFL by having a lockout," or "yeah, but why would we going to try and improve the game while still making steps to ruin the game like have an 18 game season and make our fans hate us?"

McKay has six members of his eight-man committee convinced that the time for reform has come, including longtime if-it-ain't-broke-don't-fix-it Indy GM Bill Polian.

The problem is that overtime very well may be broke. It depends on who you speak to about this. Of course who is anyone to question Bill "The Combine is useless" Polian? Certainly not me, nor can even God himself question Bill Polian. In fact, God has been fucking with Bill's Colts a few many times lately and Bill Polian is quite pissed off about this. God better beware the wrath of Bill Polian.

I don't think this is the year. McKay's making progress, but I spoke to three team officials at the Ritz Carlton Grande Lakes who aren't ready to support change. Four reasons:

1. It might be an improvement.
2. Owners are stubborn.
3. This doesn't help them make more money.
4. They aren't in the mood to make decisions while they are sitting at the pool drinking right now. Ask them later.

As one NFC GM told me Sunday night: "Is there a poll anywhere with fans demanding a new format for overtime? Where's the demand coming from? I don't hear it from fans or from players.''

The uproar is coming from people like Peter King,. who when his favorite player doesn't get to touch the ball in overtime due to the current rule, has a shit-fit in his column. That is where the demand is coming from. I would link the 4,861 articles talking about overtime needs to be changed, but I am sure you all get my point.

In fact, that is exactly where the demand is coming from, sportswriters like Peter King. He has whined, bitched and moaned about this overtime rule in the NFL for over a year now. Of course when this GM says he doesn't know where the demand comes from, Peter is too chicken shit to say, "well, actually it is coming from me."

2. Coaches don't seem to want it. "I want to be fair, and I want to hear the arguments from the committee because I respect the Competition Committee,'' one AFC coach said. "But there's going to be decisions that have to be made if you change overtime from sudden death, strategy we're going to have to think about. I think it's just another thing we've got to worry about, with all the other decisions we have to make.''

Well I personally think NFL coaches shouldn't have to make too many decisions in an NFL game. It's not like their job as head coach is to make decisions, it's to stand on the sidelines and then give interviews each week about how the team did. Why should a head coach have to make any more decisions during the game, THAT'S NOT WHAT A HEAD COACH DOES!

Seriously, there are probably 10 coaches on each staff in the NFL. The head coaches can barely make decisions very well right now as it is, but this isn't a reason to prevent them from having to make more decisions. It is sort of their job. I am 95% sure they get paid to make decisions as part of their job.

4. Some don't want a different rule in the postseason from the regular season.

This is a valid concern. I don't know how I feel myself about having a different rule for overtime in the postseason than in the regular season. It seems kind of stupid to me.

"That makes no sense to me,'' said one GM. "What if you have a game in Week 15 with huge playoff implications? To me, that's a playoff game.''

This is actually a good point. I think the NFL, if it adopts a new overtime rule, should adopt the rule for the regular season and the postseason.

I think it is interesting how Peter King is one of the ones who has been advocating fixing overtime and he didn't seem to mention it to the GM who asked who exactly has been advocating the changing of the OT rules.

The NFL Draft's a month from today, and this weekend has proven one thing to me:TimTebow's going higher than we thought he would.

There's a shock. Teams are high on Tim Tebow. The funny part is if I am not wrong, Peter indicated this fall that Tebow could go in the Top 5 of the draft or at least he indicated he thought Tebow should go that high. I couldn't find the link, but I remember him saying something like this. If that was an expectation of Tebow at one point, he can't go too much higher than we thought he would.

Even after Tebow performed with much-improved mechanics in his on-campus Pro Day Wednesday in Gainesville, I thought it might be good enough to get him into the second round, but who wanted to spend a second-rounder in a very deep draft on a guy you might need to redshirt for two years?

I still think this is the case, but I am apparently a massive Tebow hater.

A top player is usually happy to talk about a conversation he had with Bill Belichick or advice he got on how to throw the ball from Mike Holmgren. Not Tebow's agent Jimmy Sexton over the weekend. And not Tebow. Both said they'd like to keep the opinions from the teams to themselves, and they'd like to keep which teams are interested to themselves, partly because the teams had requested as much.

So teams are embarrassed to admit they have interest in Tim Tebow? That doesn't sound like it is a positive thing. I am kidding, of course. Tim Tebow is such a wonderful NFL specimen that no team wants the spot at which they may select Tebow to be revealed. In fact some teams want to try and select Tebow BEFORE the draft.

I believe it says in the TeBible, "The position of the The Tebow shall not be revealed until the proper place and time. Nor shall the fate of The Tebow shall be decided until the NFL Draft has been upon us. Then, and only then, shall the true destination of our football savior be revealed as will his plan for his position to be played be revealed to his true fans."

Of course, it's an open secret that Washington coach Mike Shanahan worked out Tebow in Gainesville on Saturday, and that Cleveland, Seattle, New England and Buffalo will either do so or already have. But you won't get that from the Tebow camp.

I want Mike Shanahan to pick Tebow #4 in the NFL Draft. I have to have this happen.

What this tells me is that teams interested in Tebow don't want the other teams interested in Tebow to know how interested they are.

It's not very Tebow-esque to lie about how much interest you have in him. It's pretty much denying The Tebow. It's a sin to deny Tebow.

If, for instance, the Seahawks want to add Tebow to the Matt Hasselbeck/Charlie Whitehurst stable

Which would be borderline retarded since they just traded for Whitehurst and gave him a fairly large contract for an unproven player...anyway, let's carry on. I just had to add it would be stupid for the Seahawks to draft another quarterback after making the investment in Whitehurst.

With New England having three picks in the second round (44, 47, 53), the Patriots could be in prime position to take Tebow and groom him as either a long-term replacement for Tom Brady (I don't buy that, with Brady wanting to play eight more years) or as a durable, versatile offensive weapon who could play multiple positions.

I think the Patriots should trade the three 2nd round picks and Tom Brady for the rights to draft Tim Tebow at the #1 spot in the draft. Actually, that's not fair. The Patriots would have to at least throw in Jerod Mayo or Wes Welker to make this trade even somewhat fair.

I now think Tebow's going in the 28 to 45 range, to a team willing to be patient with him at quarterback and maybe to allow him to help the team in other ways immediately. That's how much he helped himself with the aggressive remaking of his throwing motion at his workout Wednesday.

So in summary...Peter King had Tim Tebow being drafted late in the 1st round or in the early 2nd round to a team willing to be patient with him. Now that Tebow has changed his motion, Peter thinks Tebow is going to go in the late 1st round or early 2nd round to a team willing to be patient with him. See how much has changed from Tebow's aggressive* remaking of his throwing motion.

"Aggressive" being defined as, "he now throws the football more similarly to how an NFL quarterback needs to throw the ball to be successful."

Hey, I will never argue that trying to turn Tim Tebow into an actual NFL quarterback when it comes to throwing the ball isn't aggressive. Aggressive action had to be taken to get rid of his terrible throwing motion. I don't know if he can do it, but if he does get his throwing motion figured out, he has a good chance at success in the NFL.

"I've got to figure out what will be more fun for me and best for my family,'' he said. "But I have to say I liked what [Cleveland tackle] Joe Thomas did on the day of the draft a couple of years ago -- he went fishing with his dad.''

I think Tebow would probably prefer to spend his time that day down in the forests of Brazil turning foul, dirty, heathen non-believers into followers of Christ. It's like fishing, except so much better.

If I were him, I'd stay as far away from New York as I could on draft day. If he gets picked low in the first round, the cameras of ESPN and NFL Network will be on him all night. And if he goes undrafted through the first round, all day Friday -- rounds two and three are scheduled for Friday the 23rd -- will be Tim Tebow Watch.

But Peter, you just said every team wants him and they refuse to talk about when they are planning on drafting him. There's no way Tebow falls this far in the draft according to what I have just read. He has redone his throwing motion and he has so many intangibles! Why is Peter so unsure that Tebow will be drafted high enough to go to New York, yet he spent the last 1/3 of his MMQB talking about how Tebow will go in the 2nd round at least and many teams want to draft him?

Why Peter? WHY????????

But Tebow's life has changed for the better since a lousy Senior Bowl, and he might have done enough to make quarterback-needy teams face a tough decision a month from now.

He's the type of quarterback who plays better when he isn't being rushed in a normal game situation against players who have equal talent to him? If this is true, this whole NFL thing should work out REALLY well for him.

Berry looks like a top-10 pick, but the team that takes him is going to be picking against history. Of the four top-10 safeties this decade, none has had franchise-player impact: Sean Taylor (Washington, fifth overall, 2004), Michael Huff (Oakland, seventh, 2006), Donte Whitner (Buffalo, eighth, 2006), LaRon Landry (Washington, sixth, 2007).

Son of a bitch. What does Peter King have against Sean Taylor? He got murdered for God's sake. This isn't his fault he is not in the NFL anymore. He played in the NFL for 4 years and made the Pro Bowl twice and was named All-Pro one time in that span. He was only 24 years old. He very well could have had a franchise impact...you know, if he wasn't dead right now.

Taylor might have had franchise-player impact if he had not been gunned down three-and-a-half years into his career. But overall, the position justifies the caution lots of teams are taking with it.

This is the 2nd straight week Peter King has put Sean Taylor on a dubious list of 1st round busts and then tried to act like he wasn't throwing Taylor in with other players who were 1st round busts.

Speaking of Pereira, he's interested in coaching, believe it or not.

Not the traditional kind of coaching job that we'd think of. He said Sunday he's interested in a job "that would redefine what your idea of an assistant coach is.'' Pereira, who turns 60 in April, hopes to find a team interested in taking him on when he leaves office in May. He believes he could train the team year-round in penalty prevention, working with the coaching staff on what makes officials reach for the flag on touchy calls like pass-interference, and then be in the coaches booth on Sunday upstairs telling the head coach when to throw the challenge flag.

That would actually be an interesting job. I am not sure how much this person should make, but it would be an interesting job. I wonder if a team would pay to have a person like this on staff?

There's on X-factor for Pereira.

I need an editor STAT!

In conversations with NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith and president Kevin Mawae over the past few days, I got the strong feeling the cushy relationship between the TV networks that enrich this league and the players could be headed for the rocks. This is because the union leadership believes that the networks, in guaranteeing regular payments to the league in the event of a job action next year, are siding with the owners.

This lockout is going to be terrible.

"Management has aligned with the networks,'' said Mawae, the longtime NFL center, "and that concerns the players. It's upsetting. If FOX and CBS and NBC, for instance, are going to finance the lockout, why should we give them free access to our players? We don't get paid to do interviews for the networks. We don't get paid to do production meetings. We are taking a hard look at our players' availability for the networks that choose to pay the league in the event of a lockout.''

Seriously, this lockout is going to stink. I don't know if it is all going to be as petty as this sort of sounds, but I can see nothing positive that comes from this. Already it seems like both sides are taking a hard stance against each other. The players are going to limit their player's availability for production meetings and interviews? I see what they are saying, and why they are saying it. They are going to play hardball. I would love for this to happen since it would pretty much make every NFL pregame show only 30 minutes long and announcers won't be able to recant conversations they had with players and will actually have to call and analyze the game like a professional would.

Secondly, the exposure provided by appearances on pregame shows and in productions meetings -- where players meet with that week's TV announcing crew a day or two before the game -- help raise the profile of players as well as educate the play-by-play and color men. Would center Jeff Saturday have gotten a shot at co-starring in a credit-card commercial with Peyton Manning without the exposure to TV people and his willingness to be a smart voice for national TV feature pieces?

That is what scares me the most, these players are willing to hurt their own public profile (by not appearing on television) to prove a point to the owners.

The league could say players minimum media requirements, for instance, could include the four or five key players meeting with the networks for the production meetings. It's doubtful the league could mandate players doing individual on-camera interviews (Donovan McNabb, for one, eschewed all one-on-one interviews for TV in 2009, doing only at-podium news conferences), but they may see TV production meetings differently. Just one more way the buddy-buddy relationships in the NFL could cool in the next year.

I have a feeling this is going to get very, very petty. I can't say I like it either. Whatever can be done to avoid the lockout needs to be done.

"When has the person working in the auto plant put money in the box to help Ford or Chrysler pay for the building where the cars are built? There's no other way to look at this. The owners are asking the players to help them build the stadiums they play in, and there is no historical precedent for that.''

-- NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith, on the differences between players and owners entering the final season before a possible work stoppage in 2011. Smith refers to owners wanting players to exempt $1 billion of total league income from revenue-sharing with players and instead have the money credited to owners for all the new stadiums and football facilities built.

I 100% agree. $1 billion dollars to be exempted? You can't tell me the owners aren't making a shitload of money aside from this. I can't believe I am taking a side so fiercely on this issue, but I am with the players.

Brunell and Brooks were one year removed from college quarterbacking when they were traded by the Packers. Hasselbeck spent three years in Green Bay backing up Brett Favre. Brooks and Brunell were going to unfamiliar places and coaches, but both weren't far from time on the field. Hasselbeck hadn't played much in three years, but he was going to be reunited with his mentor, Mike Holmgren. That's what's odd about this: Whitehurst has no roots with his quarterback coach (Jedd Fisch), offensive coordinator (Jeremy Bates) or coach (Carroll). He hasn't played a snap of real football in nearly five years. The team paid him $8 million over two years. Without much tape to go by, this is a tremendous leap of faith by the Seahawks.

I am going to go on record as liking Charlie Whitehurst. I thought he was a good quarterback at Clemson and I know the Chargers valued him highly as a backup quarterback. Really, $8 million over two years isn't a huge risk and I don't know if the Seahawks could find a quarterback in the 3rd round of this draft who would be as good as Whitehurst. Yes, I realize he hasn't thrown an NFL pass, but I like this move for the Seahawks. Now they can use the picks they have to improve their overall team and don't have to worry about drafting a QB high in the draft.

Peter King is getting ready to write he thinks a team should draft a developmental quarterback and then develop him quickly, but he doesn't like it when the Seahawks trade for a developmental quarterback. I just wanted to warn everyone of this.

Enjoyable/Aggravating Travel Note of the Week

Peter actually has an aggravating travel note for this week that I don't completely hate. It's a first. It is a really long story but basically a train he was supposed to board at 10:00pm left early. Throughout the story, Peter is still his usual "everyone needs to provide me with 100% perfect customer service or I will act like the world has just ended," but he just has a better reason this time.

b. It stuns me that in these economic times, the NFL can still print money, getting $720 million from Verizon for the mobile TV rights for the next four years. That's $22.5 million per team, on average, for a minor part of the media puzzle that no owner could have even imagined would generate a dime 15 years ago.

I am sure the owners are going to use this money to do more important things like run their team's facilities. No one can honestly tell me these owners aren't rolling in money right now. God, I am going to hate this lockout.

e. There's an unauthorized biography of Al Davis in the works by a reputable writer, and I hear Al's not pleased about it.

Now THIS is some NFL information that I like to hear. I hope the title of the book is "He benched 450 pounds and ran a 4.4, but had never played football before: The Al Davis Story."

g. With the Donovan McNabb market dried up in Cleveland and, apparently, Seattle, Andy Reid will likely shake his head in incredulity and leave the meetings Wednesday with zero trade action on the quarterback.

So I guess both Andy Reid and Peter King don't seem to understand why a team wouldn't want to trade valuable picks in a deep draft for a (previously) injury prone early-30-year-old quarterback. Somehow I get this, but they can't.

2. I think the movement of the umpire from the defensive side of the ball (in the middle of the field) to the offensive backfield -- as reported by Chris Mortensen Sunday afternoon here -- is so that none of the umpires get more seriously injured than they already have been. "Do you know how many times umpires got knocked down last season,'' outgoing officiating czar Mike Pereira asked Sunday. "Over 100. Our guys got two concussions, and there were three surgeries -- all a result of hits on the umpires. Is there any other official in sports who's put in the middle of the action the way an umpire is?''

Yes, there is. The home plate umpire in baseball. He has the action thrown at him in the form of a baseball on nearly every single play. So, while I don't disagree with this decision to move the umpire, the baseball home plate umpire is much more in the middle of the action than an NFL umpire.

I thought about that for a second and said to Pereira: "A second-base ump.'' He acknowledged the truth of that, and said, in essence, that's the only one.

Second base ump? Peter King's first love is baseball. No wonder he never got a chance to cover it. It's probably better to keep his love as a hobby. The home plate umpire gets hit many times during the year by a baseball. I would think he could be a better example in this situation.

For Whitehurst, Seattle gave a 2011 third-round pick and agreed to swap second-round picks this year, which means in the best draft the NFL has seen in years, the Seahawks agreed to move down 20 picks (from 40th overall to 60th) ... and Seattle rewarded Whitehurst with a two-year, $8 million contract. Seattle's new braintrust, coach Pete Carroll and GM John Schneider, will be asked to justify the deal when they meet with reporters here.

I know I am in the minority, but I don't hate this deal for Seattle. I think it could work out well for both teams in the end.

4. I think I probably wouldn't draft a quarterback in the first couple of rounds if I were running the Steelers -- as football czar Kevin Colbert implied Sunday -- but I definitely would add a developmental quarterback somewhere in rounds four through seven. And develop him quickly.

Add a developmental quarterback...and then develop him quickly? If this could be done so easily, wouldn't every team do this? Isn't the entire purpose of a developmental quarterback a guy who takes a few years to develop behind a starter?

So drafting a developmental quarterback is a good idea, but trading for a developmental quarterback who has proven he is worthy of being on an NFL roster is a bad idea? I am just trying to get this straight. Whitehurst will get paid a lot more than a normal developmental quarterback, but he has at least been in the NFL a few years by now.

5. I think new Arizona pass-rusher Joey Porter will be motivated, again, by wanting to show his previous team, the Dolphins, that they didn't use him right. He strikes me as one of those it's-never-my-fault guys.

Joey Porter? He's a me-first guy who never thinks things are his fault? How does Peter have intuition about players like this? He's a genius!

I love it when Peter realizes things about NFL players a few years later than everyone else.

9. I think these are my quick observations about March Madness:

a. Never seen a game a game that two teams wanted less than Texas-Wake Forest.

This could be seen by the thrilling and exciting comeback Wake Forest made in the last seconds, which ended with Ish Smith hitting a shot to win the game with 1.3 seconds left. Wake Forest just laid down as they came back from 8 points down with three minutes left in overtime.

In my opinion, this Rick Barnes-led Texas team has played like they could care less all year. I don't know if it was the injuries or what.

b. Looked like Robert Morris, losing to Villanova, got robbed to me. Wouldn't the Big East be hiding its head in shame this morning if that Thursday afternoon game got called right?

No team got shitted on like New Mexico State. They got called for a ticky-tack lane violation which gave Michigan State another foul shot and then when they had the ball, the officials refused to review how much time was left and gave them 0.3 seconds to hit a three point shot, which is actually impossible to do. The officials blew that game and they should be embarrassed about this.

h. I hear three-point-shooting machine Ryan Wittman of Cornell won't find a spot in the NBA. Why? Considered a plodder, he got his shot off consistently and accurately against Temple.

You mean the Temple team that has approximately zero legitimate NBA prospects? Now if he gets his shot off against Eric Bledsoe and Kentucky then maybe I will start to believe he does have a future in the NBA.

k. It took me a long time to love the three-point shot, but I'm a convert now.

Holy shit, Peter. It's been over 20 years since the three-point shot was introduced. It's good to hear you are a convert now that your team, Ohio University, beat Georgetown using the three-point shot.

o. Wish I'd seen more of the Northern Iowa-Kansas game, but watching the highlights, it struck me that fearless good players on any level are the best players.

Northern Iowa was fearless until Kansas decided to start playing with 3 minutes left...and then they looked very much fearful, even though they ended up winning the game.

p. Thursday night, 10 eastern: How can you not watch Kentucky-Cornell?

Kentucky will beat Cornell by 25 points. Yes, I am discounting Cornell again. The difference between beating Temple and Wisconsin and beating Kentucky. Like maybe 4-5 McDonald's All-Americans.

e. I am very much against Michael Jordan's number being retired by all NBA teams, following in the footsteps of baseball with Jackie Robinson's number 42. Robinson was a trailblazer. Michael Jordan was a basketball player.

Other than the fact Michael Jordan essentially changed how all basketball players are measured and marketed, he didn't really do anything to help the NBA...unless of course you count him being the biggest star during the revival of fan interest in the NBA and winning 6 NBA titles and being the greatest player of all-time.

i. Very proud to be an American today. Thanks for thinking of the uninsured, Washington.

All the problems in the world have been solved! What will Peter have to bitch about from now on?