According to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel on Sunday morning, the Miami Dolphins were engaged in a “full-court press” to sign free agent quarterback Matt Flynn, although Alex Smith, who remains unsigned by the 49ers pending the conclusion of the increasingly tiresome Peyton Manning merry-go-round, also paid a visit to the team. It was news that should have gladdened the hearts of Tarvaris Jackson supporters, hot on the heels of reports on Saturday that the only thing that Seattle offered Flynn during his stay here was the “promise” that he would have the “opportunity” to “compete” with Jackson for the starting quarterback job; no serious contract offer was discussed. Some people (like me) might find such an “offer” insulting; if the Seahawks were not going to pay him, they could have done the next best thing by telling him (at least privately) that the starting job was his to lose. If Flynn was signed, I don’t believe that Seahawks fans would have tolerated anything less. It is for that reason that the Seahawks initially low-balled Flynn, because after the organization bloated T-Jack into something that most of us do not recognize; they couldn’t back down and admit that they had their doubts about T-Jack. To suggest that Flynn and his two starts had demonstrated superior fundamentals and intangibles compared to T-Jack would be a deflating suggestion. Going after Peyton Manning—no matter how much in the realm of fantasy—at least had the advantage of the tacit acknowledgement that there was at least one quarterback on the market that the organization could save face with.
So while the Seahawks played small ball with Flynn, I imagined that the Jackson apologists who portrayed Flynn as little more than a pee-wee leaguer (like Danny O’Neil, Eric Williams and Hugh Millen)--if they had their way--would have trouble all season wiping that egg off their faces. Their credibility already shot, these guys would need to explain why they belittled Flynn while harboring relentless excuses for T-Jack. I understand that they regard T-Jack as an “underdog” who only needed the loving care and self-esteem support he didn’t receive from Chilly. T-Jack was actually forced on Childress by management, and it showed. I remember the first game I saw T-Jack, a late season game against the Packers in his rookie season and Mike McCarthy’s first year as coach; the Packers won the game on a late field goal, 9-7. I remember thinking that the Vikings couldn’t be serious about this guy; he looked like a soccer player who got his “game” mixed-up. Favre--a year removed from his season “best” 29 interceptions--was playing defensively for his new coach, yet the Packers couldn’t give away this game even if they just stood there like statues. Chilly just stood there with a look on his face that said “Why me?”
In 2009, Vikings’ DT Pat Williams said “I talk to Tarvaris all the time (and) tell him you have to put in the time. This ain’t college no more. This is the NFL. You have to put in more time than you are used to putting in. If you are putting in four hours, you have to put in eight. You have to put in more time than what he’s doing.” Whether or not it would improve his skills if he did so is another matter. The Vikings were so tired of his shtick that if Favre hadn’t arrived in 2009, most Vikings fans assumed that Sage Rosenfels would be the starter that year. After Favre’s final injury in 2010, Jackson’s 46.3 QB rating performance in his first start of the season against the Giants (a “home” game in Detroit) signaled the end of the Viking’s patience with him; third-stringer Joe Webb played out the rest of the season, leading the team to a victory over the Eagles in Philadelphia. That is not to say that there are one or two people who remain delusional about T-Jack’s “up-side”—such as offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell.
Look, I am perfectly willing to grant that T-Jack, after six years of practice, can function as a quarterback in the NFl. He may even “shock” some people with an occasional competent performance that can’t be entirely credited to the defense or playmakers. He can come into a game and tread water if he has good players around him; but Seattle was arguably a better team than Cincinnati from top to bottom, and a rookie quarterback with only above-average skills took his team to the play-offs, and T-Jack did not. I’m amused by Eric Williams suggesting that T-Jack’s play might improve if he had better blocking; one of the criticisms of T-Jack is that he stands around in the pocket forever in indecision. The question then is, how much time does he need? Should the NFL pass a rule stating that for certain quarterbacks, linemen have to wait five seconds before they are allowed to rush the quarterback?
So it was inconceivable in my mind that the Seahawks would not be serious about Flynn, for if so then we could probably expect the following scenario: Another year of relative mediocrity, perhaps not even as “good” as last year’s team if Carroll and Schneider can’t pull more rabbits out of their hats if they can’t adequately replace the players they are losing. By mediocre I mean just bad enough to have fans asking WTF were they thinking, and just “good” enough to play themselves out of the running for Barkley or Landry Jones. It is also useful to note that if history is any judge, the Seahawks may never draft a quality quarterback (like Favre instead of McGwire); Zorn and Krieg were undrafted free agents, and Hasselbeck was acquired in a trade with Green Bay. At least they can go on what has worked in the past?
All I could say was that I tried my best; I grew-up a Packer fan, and I was just trying to help-out your silly team. The Packers have had only two losing seasons in the past 20; that expectation of winning is something that Flynn would bring to the Seahawks. Guys like O’Neil and Eric Williams—they would foist continuing mediocrity on the team for political reasons. Oh, and one other thing: Millen’s career NFL line proves that he knows what a good quarterback is:
W-L 7-18, 22 TDs, 35 INTs, 73.5 QB rating.
T-Jack IS a better quarterback—than Millen was.
But was it really hopeless? Scouring the Internet for updates all day Sunday, I came across the curious story that not only did Smith visit South Florida, but so did ex-Jaguar David Garrard, he of the bulging disk that no one was interested in after he was cut before the start of last season. I thought to myself "I understand Smith getting an invite, as a way to push Flynn into signing a contract he might not like. But Garrard?" Was there a message here, that Miami knew it was about to get stiffed again? Somebody was desperate, and it wasn't necessarily Flynn. Could it be that Seattle's interest in Flynn was more than cosmetic, as the notoriously wrong O'Neil repeatedly insisted? Flynn's father was quoted as saying that Flynn's desire was to sign with Miami, but he did suggest that his son got along fine with Pete Carroll, and Seattle was still a possibility. More tellingly, Miami sports commentators were worried that the Dolphins were going to find a way to "screw-up" the Flynn deal.
And then, a miracle: Matt Flynn has agreed to a 3-year, $26 million contract to play for the Seahawks. Far less than the Kevin Kolb deal, but it was enough to convince Flynn that the Seahawks did not intend for him to be an expensive back-up, a tacit expectation that he would be, as it stands now, the team's best option at quarterback. There are people who still insist that we haven't seen enough to warrant high expectations, based on a "meaningless" game against Detroit. It continuously frustrates me when sob-brothers like Mike Salk say that game was "meaningless." The Packers didn't "need" to win it, but McCarthy did intend it to mean something by giving Aaron Rodgers the responsibility of calling the plays in the first half, and Rodgers didn't want to look like a fool doing it; Flynn not only demonstrated his ability to handle complex plays, but to have the gonads to use his own judgment and change plays at the line of scrimmage. The game certainly meant something to the Lions, who played all their starters from first to last. It certainly meant something to Stafford, who played to win right to the end. And, in the end, it meant everything to Flynn to play well.
If the Detroit game represented Flynn's "upside," then that was at least as good as the top half of the current starting quarterback line-up--and certainly better than anything we've seen from a Seahawks' quarterback in a long time. It certainly is better than what his critics "see," who whine about his "experience" without taking note of his polished fundamentals. My own expectation is that Flynn will immediately demonstrate the on-field leadership and skills that will make this team better than it was before. According to Flynn's father, the Seahawks' saw the light that others did not want to see: "They (Miami) had a difference in evaluation as to his value." For me, I was not a Seahawks fan before, but with Flynn given the opportunity to display his gifts close-up, I can't wait to see how the 2012 season transpires for this team.
There will, of course, be speculation on how this deal came down, particularly because the “experts”—such as the local sports writers—were completely blind-sided by Flynn’s signing with the allegedly lukewarm Seahawks, due mainly to their personal prejudices against Flynn. If indeed the Seahawks did not initially offer Flynn a contract, Carroll and Schneider may have simply made the smart move by not alienating Flynn with a completely unacceptable deal, waiting to see what the Dolphins were offering. The Flynn camp seemed to feel that the Dolphins were so convinced that he would do anything to play for his old coach, that they were trying to take advantage of him by making a low-ball offer. This might have confirmed for Flynn that Miami was just as dysfunctional an organization as the Jets and the Redskins, and the Carroll/Schneider team had their act together. After the signing, Carroll released a statement which not surprisingly attempted to avoid upsetting T-Jack’s sensitivities, although frankly he should by now be honest about his limitations. As ESPN’s Adam Schefter implied, the reality is that the Seahawk’s monetary commitment only makes sense if they intend to tailor the offense to best take advantage of Flynn’s skills.
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