Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Organizational Leadership

Sorry Dolphin fans. Your favorite team will not be winning the Super Bowl anytime soon. How do I know this? Poor ownership. In professional sports, its all about ownership. Teams that win championship have strong owners or ownership groups who stand strong even against their own fan base. Who wins big in sports? The Steelers, the Lakers, the Celtics, the Yankees, the Patriots - all strong ownership groups that don't get held hostage by players nor by their fan base. Shaq wants to rock the boat, the Lakers ship him to the Heat. Kobe demands a trade, the Lakers just ignore him. The Steelers have only had 3 coaches in the teams long and storied history. The Patriots will get rid of any player at any time - see Randy Moss. Under Doc Rivers four years ago, the Celtics lost more games than anyone in the league. Ownership correctly realized that they had a good coach, they just lacked talent. They added talent and have been in the finals in 2 of the last 3 years.

I bring all this up to contrast what went on in Miami. Miami has a head coach that they did not fired. They also pursued  Jim Harbaugh after his Orange Bowl blowout. Allegedly, they never offered him the job but if your owner and general manager are across country talking to Harbaugh, it doesn't take a genius to realize that if he would have wanted the job, he would have been made an offer.  Would any of the top organizations behave this way? The answer is no. Top sports organizations don't chase coaches, they believe they can evaluate talent and hire a coach regardless of if he's a hot name or not. Losing organizations lack the confidence to do this. The simply chase the hot name.

Losing organizations also get held hostage by players. The Denver Nuggets have been held hostage by Carmelo Anthony simply because he chose to add an extra year to his contract. Melo came into the league with Lebron, Wade and Bosh. These players all chose 4 year deals instead of six when the reached free agency. Melo on the other took 5 years. You really can't blame him since he grew up in the poorest areas of Baltimore so he just couldn't turn down all those extra guaranteed dollars. That comfort on the front end turned into a bad idea on the back end. So instead of touring the country and signing where he wanted last year, he got stuck with the Nuggets. To further his problems, the collective bargaining agreement is up so he most likely will not be able to sign a deal worth as much after the new CBA than now. The team has all the leverage but they have failed to realize this. Carmelo is not going to give up potential 30 millions dollars. I'd tell him to sign or walk. What do you think the Steelers would do? How about the Lakers? Denver's management doesn't have the guts to do this though so they will cave in and trade Anthony. Melo will get his new team and still get a new contract. Denver, like Miami in the NFL, you won't be winning a title any time soon.

I'm not just picking on the the Nuggets and Dolphins. There are plenty more shining examples. The Redskins come to mind. They listen closely to fan opinion which directly correlates to them rarely making the playoffs under Dan Gilbert.  This phenomenon is not just in the pros, it occurs in college too. The University of Michigan and Nebraska listened to their fan base's call for more modern offenses so the they fired Lloyd Carr and Frank Solich respectively. We witnessed unprecedented failures at both of those institutions under the new coaches they hired. Nebraska has yet to fully recover and we will see how long it takes the Wolverines. Do you guys feel me on this? Its a about organizational leadership. What are some other examples? 

1 comment:

  1. As a Maize and Blue fan, I get this. I think owners and athletic directors jump the gun. Notre Dame jumped the gun and hired "Spanky" Weiss. I think the Browns may have jumped the gun with Eric "Mangenius". It's hard to say. But, the Skins going after Steve "Superior", retreading Joe Gibbs, and who knows why Jim Zorn got a job, is the prime example of a franchise that's lost.

    You're exactly right when you said that great franchises don't chase coaches. Even when Phil Jackson went to L.A., it wasn't from Dr. Buss chasing him, it was Phil wanting to coach Kobe and add some more hardware.

    I don't see why it's so hard for teams to follow the leads of the Steelers, Pats, or even the Eagles who seem to load up every year with youth. Isn't this supposed to be a copycat league?

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