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Adam Gase – “There aren’t fist fights going on.”
This quote was from the Adam Gase press briefing after Joe Douglas was introduced, a rare press conference that wasn’t broadcast anywhere, even the Jets website. Most are these days.
In the quote above, Gase was talking about the topic of GM and coaches battling over personnel decisions.
“It’s hard to explain to you guys, there aren’t first fights going on,” Gase said. “There are discussions and that’s part of football, part of this whole profession.”
Clearly those “discussions” didn’t go well with Mike Maccagnan.
Gase was asked how he will make it work with Douglas.
“[Joe’s] job is personnel,” Gase said. “I’m always going to defer to him in a lot of aspects of that stuff because that’s his expertise. He’s not running down and (saying), “Why are you running four verts (a play call)?” That’s not what we do.
“My job is to coach the players. The more I’m around this game, and I can just coach the players, that is why you like doing. That is what I love doing. I love being on the field and now we have a guy who loves doing what he does and it’s exciting for us.”
There was a blockbuster quote within that quote. I will get to it in a second.
But as I mentioned yesterday, this concept that Gase just wanting to “coach the players” is subject to debate. He had final say in Miami and fought Maccagnan about personnel decisions the short time they worked together. Actions speak louder than words.
But we already covered that.
So what is the blockbuster quote within the quote I’m referring to?
“I love being on the field and now we have a guy who loves doing what he does and it’s exciting for us,” Gase said.
Wow. Did it sink in what he said?
He said the organization now has a GM “who loves doing what he does.”
Look, I’m not making a mountain out of a mole hill, but what other conclusion can we make from this quote other than Gase didn’t think Maccagnan loved being a GM.
That is quite a statement.
What is my take on this?
Well, while I like Mike personally (he’s a terrific guy), I never got the sense he was truly comfortable in his GM skin.
In some ways, he reminded me of the old New York Mets GM Joe McIlvane, who had a reputation of a guy who loved scouting players, but didn’t love the other aspects of the job.
But as Christopher Johnson has said more than once the last few months: “There’s more to the job of being a GM than just adding great players.”
Maccagnan is a soft-spoken man. Maccagnan is not a gregarious sort.
Maybe Maccagnan is more comfortable being a college scouting director. Who knows?
But Gase clearly feels he didn’t love being a GM. I know one thing for sure – he didn’t seem to love doing press conferences, which is part of being a GM.
The operative word in the Gase quote is “now.”
“Now we have a guy who loves doing what he does,” Gase said.
July 10, 2019.
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