04/25/24
October 08, 2015
SportsFilter: The Thursday Huddle:
A place to discuss the sports stories that aren't making news, share links that aren't quite front-page material, and diagram plays on your hand. Remember to count to five Mississippi before commenting in anger.
Bill Belichick has his Grumpy Old Man shtick down cold. #snapface
posted by yerfatma at 09:41 AM on October 08, 2015
He's quickly becoming the Greg Popovich of the NFL.
posted by Ufez Jones at 10:07 AM on October 08, 2015
Belichick just heard of butt dialing, wanted to know how it works, called Kanye to find out. Figured someone in his household was bound to know.
Always thinking ahead to possible in-game deployment of the latest technological innovations.
posted by beaverboard at 11:17 AM on October 08, 2015
Even if your favourite team is losing, you can still have some fun when you are a kid.
Update: He's the Babe Ruth of kid fans.
posted by grum@work at 01:58 PM on October 08, 2015
Former Green Bay Packers and Jacksonville Bulls coach Lindy Infante has died. He lived near me on Crescent Beach in this sweet beach house for many years. I never met him, but his son and grandchildren lived in my neighborhood and I saw them often. One of those kids scared the hell out of me once by darting in front of my car as I was driving when he was a toddler.
Condolences to his family.
posted by rcade at 04:43 PM on October 08, 2015
Gene Frenette offers this funny detail in a remembrance of Infante:
In a 2010 interview with the Times-Union, he kiddingly called himself "The Before Coach" because he was fired by the Packers two months before they traded for Brett Favre, then fired by the Colts three months before they drafted Peyton Manning."My career might have taken on 15 more years of longevity had either one of those worked out," Infante said.
posted by rcade at 12:19 PM on October 09, 2015
If Infante (not to speak ill of the departed) had gotten better results and therefore not had the same high draft picks, most likely neither team would've gotten the QB it did.
posted by billsaysthis at 10:00 AM on October 10, 2015
Favre was acquired in trade for a first-round draft pick, but it wasn't the one the Packers got for going 4-12 under Infante. They gave up a 19th overall pick to the Falcons. The Packers used their own pick on Terrell Buckley.
It's kind of amazing Green Bay traded a first rounder for Favre. He'd only been drafted a year earlier in the second round at 33rd overall, had done nothing in Atlanta his rookie season and coach Jerry Glanville was dogging him publicly. Yet his value went up?
Infante was fired pretty quickly by the Colts. He went 9-7 his first season and reached the wild card game with Jim Harbaugh as quarterback then went 3-13 and was dumped. New GM Bill Polian used that first overall pick on Peyton Manning, so Infante definitely contributed to that.
3-13's a pretty good record to earn the first pick. The 4-12 Raiders, Chargers, Cardinals and Bears were tied for second worst.
posted by rcade at 02:42 PM on October 10, 2015
Some peewee football players don't let football get in the way of their real passion, dancing.