As a famous CEO once (or more than once) said, "What we have here is a crisis in leadership.". This statement easily applies to the current state of affairs in the sports world.
One example of this comes from the New York Jets, who's season imploded from the inside out due to, in part, leadership issues. Their selected captain, Santonio Holmes, basically took his ball and went home. It started with him halfheartedly attending the qb/wr skull sessions during the week that QB Mark Sanchez tried to set up and ended in the season finale where his own linemen told him to get off the field if he wasn't going to give a sincere effort. Come to find out (from their 3rd string quarterback Greg McElroy of all people), that he had that selfish attitude all year long when he didn't see the ball.
This crisis didn't come just from him. Head Coach Rex Ryan and Bart "Can't Wait" Scott were both fined for giving the flying finger of salute to the public when frustrated. Just looking at this team reminds me of the classic Al Heig question, "Who's in charge?"
In the NBA, my own Washington Wizards have this problem. For the last two years, guard John Wall has been the captain. Only problem is that he doesn't know how to lead. With the Wiz terrible 0-6 start, you now see Wall, who only lost three games in his one season at Kentucky, sulking on the court and talking about "not having fun" playing basketball. What made this worse was teammate Andray Blatche, a 6-11 46% career shooter who never met a jump shot that he didn't like, taking the mic opening night proclaiming that he in fact was the captain. He then promptly went out and had a 5-13 night in a loss to the Nets. No surprise that the Wiz held their first first players only meeting this year. It was organized by Mo Evans, a player who has yet to play a game this year.
One example of this comes from the New York Jets, who's season imploded from the inside out due to, in part, leadership issues. Their selected captain, Santonio Holmes, basically took his ball and went home. It started with him halfheartedly attending the qb/wr skull sessions during the week that QB Mark Sanchez tried to set up and ended in the season finale where his own linemen told him to get off the field if he wasn't going to give a sincere effort. Come to find out (from their 3rd string quarterback Greg McElroy of all people), that he had that selfish attitude all year long when he didn't see the ball.
This crisis didn't come just from him. Head Coach Rex Ryan and Bart "Can't Wait" Scott were both fined for giving the flying finger of salute to the public when frustrated. Just looking at this team reminds me of the classic Al Heig question, "Who's in charge?"
In the NBA, my own Washington Wizards have this problem. For the last two years, guard John Wall has been the captain. Only problem is that he doesn't know how to lead. With the Wiz terrible 0-6 start, you now see Wall, who only lost three games in his one season at Kentucky, sulking on the court and talking about "not having fun" playing basketball. What made this worse was teammate Andray Blatche, a 6-11 46% career shooter who never met a jump shot that he didn't like, taking the mic opening night proclaiming that he in fact was the captain. He then promptly went out and had a 5-13 night in a loss to the Nets. No surprise that the Wiz held their first first players only meeting this year. It was organized by Mo Evans, a player who has yet to play a game this year.
Situations like this show just how important it is to get the leadership thing right. Whether it's by example (see Michael Jordon), by motivation/inspiration (see Ray Lewis) or from the top (see Gibbs I), most successful teams get it.
My picks this weekend: Houston (the Bengals were tempting), Saints, Giants and to keep my Raven bandwagon ticket validated, Denver.
Hey Greg,
ReplyDeleteI saw in the Washington Post today that Wall is the worst in the league at 'effective FG
percentage'. I was thinking that we should try to get a disgruntled Demarcus Cousins from
the Warriors to help our interior, but then I read that he is 2nd worst in the NBA!! lol
I love the Wizards (change em back to Bullets), but they can't shoot, can't rebound, and can't play defense. We need to trade some young talent for some veteran leadership.
Or, we can hope to win the lottery again this year and get a guy like Andre Drummond out
of UConn - a man-beast 6-11 270 athlete that is a tenacious rebounder and shot blocker.
Of course, even if we don't win a blessed game, our odds of procuring the top pick is 25% at best - arrghhh!!!! I don't know if I'm more afraid whether or not Wall will develop into a star for us, or if he will leave us if he does!!! Curse of Les Boulez!!!!!
Welcome back bro...
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