Rookie Observation
 

Although I have been a Saints follower since the beginning I have not taken to participating in any forums other than office talk. However, as my office partner is so much more of an ardent, diehard fan than I the compulsion to participate in this forum has overcome me. The first year it seems Jim HazHadit for the most part fielded a team that he inherited from Mike Didit and put good numbers. The second and third year the inhereited players went to greater things and more HazHadit players donned the black and gold, but the seasons crumbled on them. Now we find ourselves with a total (except Fontenot) HazHadit team and we find ourselves with what we have. This not to withstand the fact we have many that could be poster children for handicap parking. I think due to poor conditioning and offseason development in part -- attributable to HazHadit and his band of incompetents disguised as coaches. I really feel that HazHadit began his road to demise when he completely wronged Jeff Blake. Under normal circumstances, which we are not dealing with in this situation, when a #1 player goes out with an injury upon his return it is his to lose. However, called whatever you want BillyC, Blake was never given a chance. Of course, like Delhomme, has gone on to better things and places. As long as the diehards live-on and pack the Superdome and the coffers of Tom Benson he will continue to be happy with the 15 percentile. He is like what we used to call in school a tease. He brings someone in that wins just enough to excite us but not enough that he has to come off his big fat pocketbook to take us to the promiseland. Actually there is another smiling besides AB, who was described as looking drunk on the field -- Tom Benson because of record ticket sales and below average wages in comparison to other teams. Point all of the fingers in whatever direction you will, the real deal is that it is us the faithful followers that cannot seem to walk away from a bad deal, get excited over 1 win, buy record numbers of tickets when we know, but continue to deny, it will never change, not until you hurt Benson in his big fat pocketbook. He continues to try and hold the state of Louisiana hostage with hints of moving. Truth be known he can't afford to move without taking a loss -- because other fans would never put up with what we have put up with out of him and John Meacom. Again just an observation from a long time follower of the Saints and rookie to the forum world.

Rookie Observation
 

Here, here. My compliments to a great post.

Rookie Observation
 

Well well...looks like the original swamp found himself a playmate.

:P

[Edited on 3/10/2003 by JOESAM2002]

Rookie Observation
 

Touche, you came up with that all yourself or did the nurse help you?

Rookie Observation
 

Welcome DblBogey, and by the way nice post.

But.....if you believe that.....why are you a Saints fan? You have nothing to gain from being one, so I question why you are?

On any professional sports organization, you have a collective group of players and coaches that I can guarantee you are spirtually dedicated to being winners. Whether they are physically or mentally capable is debatable, but I don\'t think anyone could say they believe any one player or coach in this league is here because they\'ve come in with the intention of being a loser.
While I think it\'s fair to question ownerships intentions with a team and the balance of financial gain to franchise success, I would not question individual intention. No player or coach cares how much money the team makes. They care solely about winning and how much money they make personally. And they know that winning will mean they make more money.
There are so many small market franchises in sports that perenially get by with greater financial and ownership related obstacles and achieve worse results and better results. Teams like the Twins in baseball and the Wild in hockey, have some of the lowest payrolls, least individual talent levels and seem to be successful. The NFL allows the least obstacles for teams of any of the other major sports, and it creates the greatest parity than any other league. It is the goal of every owner to want the most results from the least financial risk. I can also guarantee that Benson would want the team to succeed any year. He, like the owners of the Twins and Wild, want to win and be know they can do it without having the highest payroll, having a top market, having the marquee players or coaches. Benson wants to win. He\'s not satidfied with what he has achieved so far in my mind. He just wants the success without any further risks on his part. He wants his cake and he wants to eat it too. Being a fan, I don\'t relish in this thought, but I still believe that teams don\'t have to buy the championship. It can be won through hard work and dedication. Randy Mueller, I think, knew how to get us there, but not within the constraints that Benson wanted him to operate in. Benson wants a group that can win it, but on his terms.

Rookie Observation
 

I think that if Benson doesn\'t fire Haz like he did Mueller if we go 1-7, he is a farce and a money grubber. PERIOD

Rookie Observation
 

Wow.

One post and already an attack on BillyC. *sigh* I guess Brooks elicits passionate feelings in most people. In some people it shows up as a \"defend him to the end\" attitude. In others, their distaste for him just bleeds all over everyone who says anything good about him.

Anyway, welcome DB! The Saints need all the help they can get, even if that help is critical of their organization.

Rookie Observation
 

I don\'t think it is going to take a 1-7 start for most of us to believe that Benson is a \"farce\" and a \"money-grubber\" because I, for one, already feel that way. Unfortunately there\'s more to it than that.

Benson has already shown that he\'ll allow non-football conflicts to hamper the development of the team when he fired Mueller. However, that wasn\'t as damaging as what he did next. Promoting Loomis to GM was a woeful move on many levels.

I say this not because Loomis is not a good fit for the position he has been given, but because what a team needs is a strong leader with a clear plan for the future. Many of you will remember back in the mid 90\'s after Jim Finks passed away that Benson didn\'t have the guts to go get a real GM. Instead, he promoted Kuhurich to GM, allowed Mora to have more power on personel decisions, and let capologist O\'Neil run the money side. He has basically arranged things the same way now and handicapped the management of the team. We already know the results from that earlier disaster and now we have to worry that he\'ll wake up before it\'s too late to recover from the latest.

All of the off-season moves this past year have looked good, but now they\'re showing just how bad they were. Time will only tell, but I\'d wager that the 2003 draft class will turn out to be a major bust as compared to the previous three years under Mueller.

I imagine I could go on for days about this, but I\'ll end it here. Benson is the root of all the Saints\' problems and successes and, until he makes a change to the current organizational make-up, the team is going to suffer.

Rookie Observation
 

I am with you dbl on the first part but you lose me on the second observation.

You said, \"because of record ticket sales and below average wages in comparison to other teams\". Where are the below average wages? He paid the coach what was demanded when EVERYONE was stomping their feet for a contract extension. Now that is biting benson and the fans in the butt, but who knew that was coming.

The unprecedented manner Randy Meuller was fired and the fact he has not been hired by another team tells me there is reason to believe Benson was in the right to can him. There have been plenty people who have great minds or great skills but also great character flaws that make them not worth keeping around.

Rookie Observation
 

ScottyRo, Hindsight is always 20/20.

Quote, \"Many of you will remember back in the mid 90\'s after Jim Finks passed away that Benson didn\'t have the guts to go get a real GM. Instead, he promoted Kuhurich to GM\"

The other side to this is that Kuhurich worked under Finks for several years. Many in the league were touting him as the next great GM of the future. Finks was good at his job and I would be willing to bet he put in a good word for Benson to promote Kuhurch.

One thing you can count on if you are a young aspiring executive in the saints organization is you will be given the chance to be promoted from within, how can you fault that? Except for a handful of coaches and GM tandems in the league much of it is a crap shoot until you find one that works. There have been many more failures across the board then there have been successes and that will never change.

Just my opinion.

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FW, you\'re right I can\'t fault Benson for promoting from the inside. I\'ve always thought it was best to reward your own in that manner.

I just feel that what happened to the Saints then is a prime example of why a team needs a strong GM, who is fully vested with all the power of that position. We had that with Finks. We had that with Mueller. Two of the best era\'s in Saints history. I just feel that we should go back to that, but Loomis cannot handle that type of position so he\'s not the solution. I\'m pretty sure he has admitted that he isn\'t \"a football guy.\" Thus, we need someone who is a football guy to step up and take over. I believe we\'d be better off in the long run.

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Hey I may be mistaken but didn\'t I post something exactly like this a few days ago on September 29th and it got no reply??? See below....

\"Here\'s an interesting bit of insight. When Jim Haslett took over as head coach, he inherited Mike Ditka\'s team. They were 6-1 under Jeff Blake and then Aaron Brooks finished off the season 10-6 if I remember right. We won the division title and spanked the Rams to get our first ever playoff win. Those were the days huh? Since then, Randy Meuller has been fired for stupid reasons. And over the last three years, we have seen the removal of the entire system that Ditka had established. Not only that but great players not brought on by Ditka (Joe Johnson, LAROI GLOVER, Mark Fields) The last straw was the trading of our adrenaline booster Kyle Turley, again for STUPID reasons. So in the end our team has been in decline as the system Ditka built has been slowly removed. This year is Jim Hasletts own team entirely. It is clear that these players don\'t fit the system the coaches have designed. The players Ditka had brought on did! Why stray from what works???? That is what the Saints organization has done exactly the last three years. Now we are left with a shell of our former team and have to bag our heads once again. Las night I thought I was watching the Colts taking on Tulane. I like to pride myself as being one of the biggest Saints fans around. Unfortunately, this year is the first time that I have ever not looked ofrward to next weeks game. I had high hopes all offseason and a quarter of the way through I don\'t care about football and eagerly await my San Antonio Spurs championship defense against the Los Angeles Rapists and Old washed up Veterans. In my opinion Venturi should be fired, and whoever had the brilliant idea of trading or not re-signing all our best players over the last few years should be fired too (if it was Benson, his fat ass can go back to being a car dealer!)\"

Rookie Observation
 

alsaints, some people may not have responded to that post because it covers so many topics. I mean, I really don\'t know where to start.

Your complaints are that we\'ve been getting rid of all our good players since Haslet came in which is true to a point, but my posts really are talking about how Benson has handicapped the organization by not maintaining a strong central leadership with a GM that has a clear plan and the ability to judge talent.

Remember, Mueller was here when the Saints refused to re-sign Glover and lost Johnson to Green Bay. He also traded Roaf and I believe he let Mark Fields go in FA when he first arrived. We\'ll never know whether these moves worked because we wont get a chance to see Mueller\'s vision become reality.

Looking at this past off season, it seems to me that Loomis has actually attempted to emulate the things that Mueller had done (aggresive trading and such), but in the end they don\'t seem to have that same \"genius\" appeal to them. One thing I am most interested in is what Mueller would have done with the 2 first round picks we had. I was against trading them and then shocked when they did and chose Sullivan with the pick they got. Obviously, I hope it works out, but only time will tell.

In the end the simple truth may be that Mueller was just too good for our team. He was building a championship contender. Apparently that was not what Benson wanted. It\'s generally a misconception that winning teams make the most money. The actual fact of the matter is that in past years the middle of the row teams were the ones making the most money because they didn\'t have the super-high priced talent, but they were doing well enough to keep the fans interested. Benson\'s statements yesterday proclaiming how well he\'s done by being 15th in the league in winning % since he took over seems to infer that he is perfectly content to stay right there.

THAT is what irks me the most!

PS. All of you in Louisiana remember to vote today!

Rookie Observation
 

DblBogey --

That\'s a lot of ground to cover, but let\'s start with the Jeff Blake/Aaron Brooks arguement. There is an unwritten rule for most teams that a player cannot lose his job due to injury. However, players lose their jobs due to injury all the time. Sometimes a player goes down with an injury and the backup steps in and plays so well that a coach would be foolish not to continue to let the backup play. I seem to remember Kurt Warner replacing an injuried Trent Green and Warner did so well that he was named the starter without Green getting a chance to win his starting job back. The way Brooks played when he came off the bench, it would have been hard for ANY coach not to name Brooks the starter.

You seem to be upset about all the players that Haslett got rid of. Just keep in mind that the \"Ditka Team\" he took over wasn\'t exactly a \"Power House\". There were a couple of players I would like to have back, but there is no doubt this is a much more talented club than the one Haslett inheirted. The fact is, that good players are let go, for one reason or another, by every team.

On the Tom Benson subject -- All I hear is a lot of speculation, based off of little fact. Benson has spent as much as some clubs that have gone to the SuperBowl. So, the arguement that he isn\'t willing to spend the bucks is far from the truth. You can fault Benson for hiring the wrong people, but that\'s about as far as you can go. It\'s hard to assemble a Super Bowl team and just because things don\'t work out, does not mean that an owner isn\'t commited to winning. Losing causes everything to be called into question, but none of us know enough about Benson\'s intentions to be making bold statements, like I have read on here.