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13 Jul 2009

Brian Griese Hostage Crisis Ends

Tampa Bay FINALLY released Brian Griese today. Man, what the hell took them so long? Now he can go sign with a team that needs a veteran backup -- or, more importantly, a veteran backup who has played at some point since 2005. I'm looking at you, Jaguars. You too, Bears.

Posted by: Aaron Schatz on 13 Jul 2009

17 comments, Last at 27 Jul 2009, 2:42pm by chadtower

Comments

1
by Joe T. :: Mon, 07/13/2009 - 1:23pm

My initial response to the headline was "Don't tell me Griese is running around with an unhinged cocktail waitress too."

Might've been a little too soon for that metaphor.

6
by Mr Shush :: Mon, 07/13/2009 - 6:54pm

Griese's art . . . is death . . . and he's about to paint his masterpiece.

Christopher Walken said so, so it must be true.

2
by tuluse :: Mon, 07/13/2009 - 2:15pm

I don't think the Bears are going to take another ride on the Griese train.

They seem pretty happy with Caleb Hanie as their primary backup.

3
by J.D. (not verified) :: Mon, 07/13/2009 - 3:25pm

I'm a big fan of Brian Griese - I think he's done OK in some tough situations - but I don't understand why teams don't take more chances with unproven backups in general. Chances are your rookie mid-round draft pick won't be that much worse than a middling vet, but you might uncover a solid player (see Tom Brady, Matt Cassel, Kurt Warner, Marc Bulger, Elvis Grbac, Mark Brunell).

Let's say you're the Bears - you're not going to win the Super Bowl without Cutler anyway, so why not see if Hanie is for real?

4
by Dennis :: Mon, 07/13/2009 - 3:35pm

I don't think any team expects to win the super bowl if their starter goes down for the season. But they want an experienced backup so that if the starter goes down for 4-5 games, they have confidence they can win 2-3 of those and stay in the playoff hunt. So most coaches feel more comfortable with someone like Griese than someone like Hanie. Obviously there are exceptions, like Belichick.

5
by DrewTS (not verified) :: Mon, 07/13/2009 - 4:52pm

I'd even wager that most of those exception are really just victims of circumstance who got lucky. Everyone would love to have a Steve Young to back up their Joe Montana, but in the salary-cap era, that just isn't going to happen. All coaches feel more comfortable with someone like Griese than Hanie. Bill Belichick didn't really CHOOSE to play Cassell in 2008 or Brady in 2001. They were cheap backups to starters who had previously been very durable. Lots of teams play that game (the Colts come to mind), but it's a calculated risk rather than a preference for the unproven player.

16
by Pat (filler) (not verified) :: Tue, 07/14/2009 - 11:02pm

Also, in Belichick's case, it's not really fair to compare Cassel and Brady. Cassel was a fourth-year vet last year. He might not have had any NFL regular season playing time, but the Patriots had likely seen enough in him to know that he'd be just as good as any backup they could get on the market. Brady was quite a bit more of a risk.

8
by Noah of Arkadia :: Mon, 07/13/2009 - 9:05pm

Griese has done well in some situations, but he struck me as the most pathetic QB to ever wear a Dolphin uniform... and that's against some very tough competition: Culpepper, A.J. Feeley, Joey Harrington (second place), Ray Lucas...

I should say that the first thing I look for in a QB is leadership and character. Griese is the only QB I've ever seen who's struck me as a little boy who just wanted to go home during a game. He simply crumbled to the ground.

So many people used to hate Jay Fiedler, but whenever he'd go down, he'd be missed. And never more than when Griese got to start. In fact, Fiedler was the perfect anti-Griese: not very talented, and he'd usually throw a pick-six early in the game, only to lead his team back in the 2nd half.

14
by Thailand Bomber (not verified) :: Tue, 07/14/2009 - 2:54pm

You said:

"I should say that the first thing I look for in a QB is leadership and character. Griese is the only QB I've ever seen who's struck me as a little boy who just wanted to go home during a game. He simply crumbled to the ground."

That's ridiculous.

First, though Griese is not the most talented and has a relatively weak arm and this year registered for the AARP, the one thing that's probably not very accurate is to question his leadership or character. His leadership with the Bears and in college should show be enough to convince most fans with football knowledge that he is a journeyman talent level quarterback who plays smart. That's why he's stuck in the league as long as he has. If he lacked "character" or "leadership" he wouldn't be on a team. Lord knows he's not there for his rocket arm.

Second, since you're apparently from Miami, and you've seen the Harrington Experiment v3.0 in person, I know you've seen a quarterback with less leadership and character than Brian Griese.

15
by Noah of Arkadia :: Tue, 07/14/2009 - 9:16pm

All I can tell you is what I saw. Granted, he was a different player in Tampa and Chicago, but in Miami he was even weaker than Harrington. Playing for the team with whom his dad was a legend is what most people think got to him. I still remember how Fiedler was rushed back onto the field while not yet healthy in the 4th quarter of the Washington game, and the offense was instantly resuscitated. Many were under the impression that Griese lost the respect of his teammates to a degree Harrington (in Miami) never did.

Just to be clear, I'm not comparing the Harrington from Detroit with the Griese from Chicago. Just what I saw of them in Miami.

17
by chadtower :: Mon, 07/27/2009 - 2:42pm

Dude cracked his skull while drunk in a teammate's driveway.

Dude fell downstairs while drunk and blamed it on a dog.

Dude was caught stealing shopping carts - despite being a millionaire.

Not question his character? He's a freakin cartoon character.

7
by Rich Arpin (not verified) :: Mon, 07/13/2009 - 7:21pm

I'd debate your take on Belichick. I remember seeing the "America's Game" of the 01 Patriots, and after week 11 Bledsoe could have played, and with only 6 or so games with Brady, Belichick stood with brady. 5 games doesn't seem like much experience to me. To back this up further, Bledsoe went in for an injured Brady in the AFC Championship against Pittsburgh and won, and still two weeks later Brady was the starter.

In terms of Cassel last year, from watching preseason I rather would have had O'Connell out there than Cassel. Cassel was terrible and threw something like 5 or 6 picks and O'Connell was terrific.

This makes me think that Belichick tries to go through as many back ups as possible till he finds someone that will fit his system, and has the measurables that he's looking for, and yet falls in the draft because of perceived inabilities (knock on O'Connell is accuracy, yet in preseason action he showed no such deficiency).

I think it would be interesting to hear Belichick speak about how he evaluates his QB's in Practice situations. Heck, I remember that Damon Huard, before he had that one pretty good year in KC, was a NE backup.

11
by DrewTS (not verified) :: Tue, 07/14/2009 - 10:38am

I assume you were responding to me.

Yes, Belichick chose to STAY with Brady, after having seen him play in real games. By the time Bledsoe was able to come back, Brady had done a good job of seizing the opportunity, a la Kerry Collins last year. But that's a far cry from saying that Belichick preferred Brady to Bledsoe at the start of the season. If he had, Brady would have been starting to begin with. He only put Brady in there when his hand was forced.

That Brady turned out to be so good is a testament to the Patriots' drafting ability, player development and luck. (And let's be honest -- one year previously, the Patriots passed on Tom Brady 6 times before taking him. They didn't think he would be a star. There's nothing wrong with getting lucky, but let's call it what it is.)

12
by tuluse :: Tue, 07/14/2009 - 12:33pm

To be fair, Bellichick kept Brady on the roster, and promoted to be the primary backup.

13
by DrewTS (not verified) :: Tue, 07/14/2009 - 2:03pm

I talked about that in the post he was responding to (#5).

9
by PerlStalker :: Mon, 07/13/2009 - 10:24pm

I think it would be funny if Griese ended up with the Bears just so that they could have two former Broncos QBs.

10
by MilkmanDanimal :: Tue, 07/14/2009 - 12:06am

I have hated almost every moment of the Bucs offseason. Firing Gruden, cutting Derrick Brooks, slapping the franchise tag on Bryant rather than working a deal, burning draft picks on an injury-prone head case TE rather than just accepting you're rebuilding, hiring a guy who seems like Mike Tomlin II mainly because he's got the same resume, gutting the roster . . . yet, somehow, tonight I sleep well, because Brian Griese has been cut.

Somewhere in a dictionary next to the phrase "Just Good Enough To Get You Fired" is a picture of Brian Griese.

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