It’s not too hard to figure out the reason there are “haves” and “have-nots” in the NFL: Players. You can talk all the scheme, coaching, personnel people you want but in the end, on the field, it comes down to players. And good ones. A couple of years ago, the Miami Dolphins had the first […]
Standing in the back of the “media lounge” (a euphemism for the eating room) behind the Norm Carlson Press Box at Florida Field two years ago, Will Muschamp was introduced to the Gator Nation as their next head football coach. The anticipation was thick and exciting. Muschamp had been the “coach in waiting” at Texas […]
Toward the end of the game with the Titans, even after Josh Scobee hit a field goal to give the Jaguars a 5-point lead I sent a Tweet with the hashtag #noleadfeelssafe. Perhaps a bit cynical, but honestly a comment not necessarily on how the Jaguars have played this year but how hard it is […]
For the first time in his tenure as the Jaguars Head Coach, Mike Mularkey got a little testy in his post-game press conference. His team had just lost 31-14, and trailed 24-0 at one point. The first half, by Mularkey’s description was “pathetic” when it came to offensive production. “three and outs don’t get the […]
I’ve always been intrigued by the personalities in sports. Players and coaches thrown together from all kinds of different backgrounds and different cultures all trying to accomplish the same goal: win. Pretty simple when you watch the games, see plays develop, hear the analysis of the how and why. But being around teams day after […]
“I’m just tired of losing,” Maurice Jones Drew said in the postgame locker room after the Bears beat the Jaguars 41-3. “It’s been five years. I’m tired of not sleeping at night. I’m tired of not being able to play with my kids after a win. I’m tired.” And with that, MJD summed up what […]
“It’s why I love coaching. It’s why I do this. It’s a personal challenge to take on adversity and overcome it. It’s why I’m in this.” With those words, Jaguars Head Coach Mike Mularkey very succinctly put on display his personality, his philosophy, his coaching style and even his ability to deflect media scrutiny after […]
What was strange about this game from the beginning was the lack of expectation from the fans. New owner, new coach, home opener and a division rival in town but it wasn’t like the fans were ferocious or were hungry for a win. They seemed happy to be there. It was a great atmosphere, with […]
It’s not that the Jaguars are a bad team. I think it would be more accurate to say they’re an incomplete team. “We have a plan in this organization,” Head Coach Mike Mularkey said Sunday after the 27-10 loss to Cincinnati at home, “And we’ll stick to that plan. We’ll have to take our lumps, […]
As the Jaguars embark on another season, it’s anything but just another season. On one day, Wayne Weaver fired the coach and sold the team, all before breakfast and changed the course of Jaguars history. Firing Jack Del Rio was long overdue (hard to believe Del Rio was the Jaguars head coach for 9 years […]
Arthur is the third person I met when I came to Jacksonville in 1981. He was the Player Personnel Director for the Jacksonville Tea Men and moonlighted as my broadcast partner when we televised the games. But we all knew it was his job to be Noel and Dennis’ best friend. It seemed at every […]
It’s easy to write about great people and certainly Mr. Bragan was a great man. Decorated WWII veteran, figured out how to make some money after the war, wanted to be in baseball, bought the Suns and found out he liked everything about it: The baseball, the ownership, the players, the managers, coming to the […]
Sometimes you are the sum total of your parts. While I’m not one of those ready to make the jump from RJ Soward, Reggie Williams and Matt Jones directly to Justin Blackmon, his recent history is painting a picture of inconsistency that is, frankly, inconsistent with what the Jaguars found out when they vetted their […]
I don’t know if it was the weather or just everybody’s mood but this year’s Players had a whole different feel from Monday through Sunday. It’s always been a party, and for a long time, that seemed to be the main focus of the people attending. But this year the events themselves, from the Military […]
I’ve been a bit of a watch geek since I was a kid. My dad tells a story of me taking apart a whole clock when I was two years old and apparently being very proud of it. So I’m always interested in what watches the players are wearing because they always have the high-end […]
I can’t remember a draft pick for the Jaguars that was a universally liked as their choice of Justin Blackmon. Perhaps when they picked Fred Taylor but outside of that, it seems that every other pick was greeted with some skepticism. Certainly there were complete busts in R.J. Soward, Reggie Williams, Derrick Harvey and Matt […]
Who’d have thought that Mike Mularkey’s first test would have come before one football was snapped with him as the Head Coach of the Jaguars? Mularkey, along with the rest of the coaching staff and the personnel department had their feet held to the fire for a couple of days this week as Tim Tebow […]
If Shad Khan has told his football “people,” namely Gene Smith, to get quarterback Tim Tebow, (and there are rumors that he has), how do they make that work? To begin with, that puts Smith in a spot where he’ll have to eventually make a tough decision: swallow hard, stay with the Jaguars and go […]
Here’s the only way Tim Tebow ends up on the Jaguars: Shad Khan says make it happen. Khan hasn’t stood over Gene Smith’s shoulder when it comes to any of the football decisions he’s made. He let Smith cull through the coaching prospects before he brought Mike Mularkey to the table. And Khan hasn’t been […]
It was early. Especially for somebody who’d been a bartender and was working on the first job of his career that also required working the “second shift.” In the summer of 1979 I was living and working in Charleston, S.C. Just after 7am my phone rang, jolting me out of bed as only a ringing […]
In the Jaguars locker room today, I talked with Mel Tucker and Mike Mularkey about the whole hiring process and how Mularkey convinced Tucker to stay. “Actually it wasn’t,” Mike said when I asked him if it was a tough sell to keep Tucker as his Defensive Coordinator. “Mel and I are a lot alike. […]
The Jaguars will win the Super Bowl. That’s right, they’re going to win it. I don’t know when and I don’t know if it’ll be under the new head coach, but they’re going to win the Super Bowl. Shad Khan won’t accept anything less. Getting to the playoffs will be the first step. Winning in […]
When Shad Khan arrived in Texas Wednesday morning, he was the star attraction. His every move at the NFL owners meeting was documented and then some. There were nearly a dozen photographers catching glimpses of Khan as he moved through the halls of the Four Seasons hotel. The celebrity of being an NFL owner is […]
We’ve had some good luck as a city to have people in critical decision-making positions at critical times who turned out to be the right people at the right time. Mayor Jake Godbold served as “best Friend of the city” at a time that luring an NFL franchise was a complete pipe dream: to everybody […]
On a team with Vince Lombardi and Tom Landry as the coordinators, you might think the head coach would operate in relative obscurity. But Jim Lee Howell was well respected as the Head Coach of the New York Giants, getting them into the NFL Championship game three times in his seven years as head coach. […]
There are many cliche’s involving sports and life. “Sports doesn’t build character, it reveals it.” “Sports imitates life.” But perhaps the truth is how sports gives us a chance to gain perspective on what might be going on around you. As the tragedy at Penn State continues to unfold, it’s much more a story about […]
A friend of mine was sitting in a sports bar during a recent Jaguars road game with some “real” Jaguars fans. Not just casual observers but guys who have been supporters of the franchise since the beginning. When the opposition took the lead, my friend was at first appalled and then amazed when these fans […]
There’s lots of chatter about the Jaguars win over the Colts in Indianapolis Sunday afternoon, most of it somehow discounting it as a victory, because Indy is winless this year. Tell that to the Chiefs last week who got spanked by a previously winless Miami Dolphin team. A win in the NFL counts no matter […]
After 6 weeks of camp and exhibition games, practices and meetings it was pretty clear that Luke McCown had played his way into the mix as the best quarterback on the Jaguars roster. McCown had produced when he was on the field in games, he was sharp in practices and the guys on the team […]
I’m sure you know what Tony Boselli, Fred Taylor, David Garrard, Kyle Brady, Mike Peterson and even Byron Leftwich have in common. All were either unceremoniously cut or dumped from the Jaguars when they seemed to have some productive years left in their NFL careers. Stars at one point while playing in Jacksonville, they all […]
It’s about the quarterback. Always will be. It’s the most important position in sports. The only other one in the discussion is starting pitcher and they only get the ball every four or five days. The QB touches the ball on every offensive play, is the leader and the manager and has to be among […]
For years, my friend Keith has said, “When July 4th comes around, summer is over.” I always laughed at that, because when we were kids, the 4th of July marked the beginning of summer! But alas, now he’s right, as seasons have expanded, once the holiday is finished, it seems all eyes turn to football. […]
This summer will mark my 30th year of working and living in Jacksonville. Having also worked in Charleston, S.C., going to school in Washington, D.C. and growing up in Baltimore, I’ve had a taste of all different city sizes and lifestyles. Baltimore is a city that’s really a big town. In fact, Jacksonville is similar […]
Nobody lives in North Florida or South Georgia because they have to. Nobody has to stay here because they owe money to the company store. So why is it that our civic leaders, elected and otherwise, can’t figure out that’s the frame of reference they should be using for every decision? Is it right that […]
There aren’t too many better places to play golf in the world than here in North Florida and South Georgia. We can play year-‘round and some of the most desirable golf courses in the country are in our backyard. No matter where you look, north to Sea Island or Amelia, any one of the courses […]
What’s a big deal anymore? Jacksonville has grown from a town of 200,00 in 1980 to a sprawling city of nearly 1.4 million in the last 30 years. Yet, it’s hard to pin down just what is a big deal to the people who live here. Is it because we’re so diverse? Westsiders almost never […]
In Daytona for Speedweeks there was a lot of talk about the quality of racing, the two by two and what was going to happen when the Daytona 500 rolled around. Regardless of what you thought of all of those ideas, it got me thinking that we were at least talking about the actual “sport.” […]
It was awkward at first. Wayne Weaver walked into the room filled with reporters to give his year-end assessment as well as his plan going forward for the Jaguars. (BTW, he showed up a couple of minutes early. We were planning on showing the entire press conference live but he walked in during a commercial […]
The question all week was “Can we beat the Colts.” The answer was easy. “If they play like they have been, they can win.” The problem is, they didn’t play anything like they’re capable of playing. Indianapolis had been struggling on both offense and defense. Peyton Manning didn’t have all of his regulars and even […]
It was a pretty upbeat and loose locker room after the Jaguars beat Oakland 38-31 Sunday. I was trying to interview Don Carey and Derrick Cox kept interrupting. In a fun way. Rashad Jennings has his locker cordoned off and Montel Owens was giving him grief for being messy. That kind of stuff doesn’t happen […]
