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Message: [QUOTE="OrangePA, post: 58167, member: 204"] Good one - we got rid of a coach because of his answers durng press conferences? How one answers a question posed by a guy like Bud Poliquin - who is a nice guy but who knows nothing about football - is a way to guage coaching ability? It was Mac's ability during press conferences that made a difference? Coach Mac was a wise man and a very good coach but his press conferences were often indecipherable and certainly did nothing to quell the "Sac Mac Pac" that was in full force right before the 1987 season. Assessing Coach Marrone on the basis of answers following a game is for media types who are trying to fill dead air - the calculation is an utter waste of time. Press conference performance is the least of our problems at this point. I remain surprised that so many still don't seem to understand what happened during Pasqualoni's last five or so years - you still think it was his schemes and press relations were his downfall. The fact is that his downfall was a function of precisely what your post embodies - it was a bunch of amateurs who had great financial influence at the University acting upon their own presumed nderstanding of our talent level and our structural ability to compete. With delusions firmly in place, they became convinced that all we needed was a good coach and all would be well - that our talent and infrastructure were just fine. Coachng was not the problem then and not the problem now. We have a very good coach who is making progress - we are 5-3 with a very good chance to get back to a bowl with four games to go - with more money and better resources, but who still needs better financial support and who also acknowledges, if you listen to him, just how hard it is to succeed at Syracuse University. And, the notion that Pasqualoni's experience at SU and Reid's experience in Philly are even remotely comparable is without merit. Andy Reid, however you feel about him - I for one feel that he is a very solid coach - has never had the kind of financial disadvantages that confronted Pasqualoni. Have you ever visited the NovaCare Center in South Philly. It is probably the best of its kind in the NFL. And, the living experience in Philly for professional football players is very positive and very attractive. The fact that the Eagles signed a great CB, a good DE and a decent back-up QB got far more attention than was deserved. The Eagles have trouble because they can't block plays and can't stop the run. The lock-out and some bad luck - the injury to Ryan Harris - hurt the team as it tried to cover those problems. I am pretty sure that Jeff Lurie and Joe Banner are quite happy with Andy Reid. I am also very aware of how Philly fans react to coaches - many wanted Charlie Manuel fired a few years ago. Andy Reid's experience is not all that unusual in the NFL. Bill Cowher had many more close misses than Reid - he finally one won and shed the image of a guy who couldn't win the big one - but it took a lot of time. The same thing happened to Tom Landry in Dallas - he lost many big games before he finally won one. Marty Schottenheimer lost many big ones - and the teams that fired him soon regretted their decisions - he was a great coach. I think all of us have to focus on the big issues - infrastructure, money, time - and not the kind of "issues" that talk radio tries to create - such as press conference performance or "clock managment" or "playcalling" [/QUOTE]

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