Can Coach Cupcake Get Tough?
December 31, 2008
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Head Coach Wade Phillips
Wade Phillips won’t lose his job as head coach of the Dallas Cowboys, or at least that is the tune that Jerry Jones is currently singing. Jones has professed his faith in his current coaching staff and has indicated that none of them will get the axe, or at least not from him. However, the breakdown in the Cowboys organization during the 2008 season can not go uncorrected. Wade Phillips plans to shake things up, starting with himself.
Phillips thinks that he needs to change his notoriously soft coaching style and get tougher on his players during the offseason and during practices. Phillips is famous for padless practices, half-days and even for cancelling practices. He has done this in order to avoid wearing out the players too early in the season and to avoid possible injuries during practice. This strategy resulted in a group of players that were not properly conditioned and were more easily injured during games.
Phillips has always kind of avoided stirring the pot, trusting his players to do what was necessary to help the team win, and that is a decent management style. After all, these are grown men who shouldn’t have to be told what to do and micromanaging such men can quickly turn them against him. However he must also be able to identify those that are not pulling their weight and those that are interfering with the ability of others to do their jobs. He must then step in and immediately put a stop to the detrimental behavior. This is what he hasn’t done in the past, preferring to let the men work it out amongst themselves.
There are 3 big questions with Phillips’ new approach to coaching. Can Wade Phillips actually be the hardass coach that Bill Parcells was? Will the team accept the sudden change in their head coach and actually take him seriously? And finally, will it work? After all, let us not forget that the last two years of Bill Parcells’ tenure resulted in the same 9 – 7 record that the Cowboys ended up with in 2008.
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December 31st, 2008 at 10:06 am
[...] Coach Cupcake get Tough? This blogger wonders. I think Wade Phillips can’t suddenly change his way of coaching, boot him, fire him, move [...]
December 31st, 2008 at 11:28 pm
The only way Wade Phillips can change, is to change the very essence of who he is. And “that”, is an impossibilty. You cannot change who you are. At least, not without a “Near Death Experience”. But even those cases only last for a period of time before the individual goes back to being who they were to begin with. So no, Wade Phillips will never change. Except, hopefully, to another team.
January 1st, 2009 at 7:26 am
I think you’re right, but in my opinion the problem isn’t Phillips, it’s Garrett. Think about it… Garrett was in charge of the offense, Stewart was in charge of the defense. Stewart wasn’t getting the job done, so Phillips (a defensive coach) stepped in and the defense improved considerably. Garrett, though, was the golden child, head-coach-in-waiting. It was his job to call the offensive plays, and it was his job to placate T.O., Romo and Witten. Under Garrett, the amazing offense just completely crumbled. I think Garrett should definitely be fired. Cupcake? Maybe, but I’d like to see what he can do with another year. After all, Coughlin changed to a cupcake and won a superbowl, why can’t Phillips go the other way and do the same?