New head coach Scott Linehan plans to put his mark on the Rams early this season, and he would like to implement his own special brand of motivational techniques. Former head coach Mike Martz was known for yelling at and talking down to his players, while former head coach Dick Vermiel would weep in his players' presence. While both of these methods had their own successes, coach Linehan has chosen to move in another direction. Like many other coaches in other leagues and at other levels, Linehan has selected various sports movies with inspirational themes and back stories to get his players excited about the game of football.
However, after a recent showing of the college football classic Rudy, several players left the room with mixed emotions. Rudy is the story of an undersized football player who has the life long dream of playing for Notre Dame. As the movie concludes, the protagonist, Rudy, is given a walk-on spot as a defensive reserve after the team players lobby the coach. The game in hand, Rudy is put in on defense for the last few plays of the game. He records a sack, earning the love and admiration of the fans and fulfililng his fantasy. Grown men typically weep during this film, and are not ashamed to admit it.
The Rams players who watched Rudy did not seem to find the film very motivational or inspiring. Rookie cornerback and first round draft pick Tye Hill commented to the media, "I just didn't understand that movie very much at all. Why did they keep breaking away from the football scenes to show Rudy walking around with books? It was very distracting. What the hell was he doing with books in a football movie anyway? Why would a college football player be carrying books around? Clearly the people that made this movie know nothing about college football."
Linehan defended his choice of movie motivation, noting that he "could have shown some other hip, jive-assed movie like The Waterboy", but found it to be too unrealistic. Coach elaborated. "Typically walk-on players come from the stands, like in the new movie Invincible, or from the grounds crew, like in Rudy, but not from the waterboy corps, like in The Waterboy, or from wherever the hell all of those other guys worked at in The Replacements."
Pro bowl defensive end Leonard Little added additional comments, noting that "in the movie, the defensive player tackled the quarterback and then got up and celebrated appropriately. I usually stay on top of the QB and let him have a little trash talk, Leonard Little style. Of course I have my own patented smack down that I like to use, but only the sucker QBs get to hear it. And by the way, since when did the fat hobbit play football? Man, I need to forget about this weird-assed movie. Coach is crazy, showin' this crap."
[This story is a satire of public figures.]
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment