Well, OK, obviously that isn’t breaking news, but we did stumble across this article by Mark Craig at the Star Tribune from before the Super Bowl actually where he gets in touch again with former Vikings running back Mewelde Moore to ask him some questions kind of related to the Steelers, but really just fishing for Vikings news by starting in with how much Moore (and everyone everywhere) loves Omar Epps/Mike Tomlin:
After one season with the Vikings, a 34-year-old Tomlin was hired as head coach of the Steelers. When Moore reached free agency a year later, he knew exactly where he wanted to sign: Pittsburgh, to play for the young coach with the infectious attitude and, as Moore puts it, the “it” quality.
“You knew right away he had the understanding of knowing football, playing football and being around football players and addressing them that way.”
Oh. Well, what did you think about Childress?
“With Brad, it was more schoolteacher, mundane, boring.”
GOD DAMMIT. More from … Moore … after the jump:
Moore was asked to describe the biggest difference between Tomlin and Childress when it comes to coaching.
“Simple,” Moore said. “One you respect, one you don’t.”
You can guess which one is which, at least in Moore’s eyes.
“I tried to do everything Brad wanted,” Moore said. “But as you go through games and things happen at adverse moments and chances and adjustments need to be made, it just wasn’t there for him, man. I’m just trying to keep it real. Not trying to talk bad about Brad. That’s just me being straight up.”
Moore said Childress was unyielding in the way he wanted the West Coast offense run. That’s a complaint that’s been made before.
“One individual, [quarterback] Brad Johnson, understood the West Coast offense but also understood there are defensive schemes designed to try and stop certain things,” Moore said. “You’d need to make adjustments in midgame. Brad would be making those necessary adjustments on the field, and we’d be making plays, too. But sometimes it was like head-butting with Brad because that wasn’t what he wanted.”
Moore did have high praise for Vikings owner Zygi Wilf.
“There’s going to be a point in time when Minnesota wins because the Vikings have a great owner in Zygi Wilf,” Moore said. “With good people, things will catch on there.”
One of those good persons, Moore said, is new coach Leslie Frazier, who was in his first year as Vikings defensive coordinator when Moore was in his last year with the Vikings.
“He’s different than Mike Tomlin,” Moore said. “But he has that Tony Dungy makeup going on.”
So how does Frazier compare to Childress?
“Apples and oranges, man,” Moore said. “Apples and oranges.”
This, quite frankly, is so upsetting to hear I’m not even sure where to begin. The basics of it is that what Moore is saying is exactly what everyone already knew; that after one year everyone and their dead dog knew that Childress was never going to amount to head coaching material, and that we were sitting on a guy that had amazing potential as a coach. The players loved him, they played well for him, and he was young and engaging. Shit, the fans were calling for this guy even though we had just hired a new coach. All we wanted to know was if you could fire a new coach in the middle of his first season to replace him with Tomlin. That’s honestly ALL I heard. In fact, even after having only been in Minnesota for one year, fans still look back on Tomlin like he’s Tony Dungy, like he’s some forgotten Minnesotan son, rightfull ours and always welcomed back. I’ve never seen anything like it for a guy that spent, really, such an insignificant amount of time in one location. No one even liked Jesus this much (rightfully so I might add, only because Tomlin really is that fucking awesome).
And here we are four years later or whatever, and Childress has shit all over our franchise and Tomlin has only been to two Super Bowls, winning one. Oops! Is Frazier the second best option? We’d all like to think so. Moore gives him high praises, which at this point may be good enough. When he retires we apparently just need to hire him on as a coaching consultant, because our own staff looks like they can’t figure out who’s worthwhile to keep and who needs a pink slip (a non-sexy pink slip, if you know what I mean).
God, it just makes me hurt in my aorta.
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