- Joined
- Mar 13, 2006
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- 3,219
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I know I’m beating a dead horse and I know there’ll be a number of members that say it’s not even worth mentioning because he’s not going to sell the team, but I believe more today than ever that this team never will win while Stephen Ross is involved in any significant way with the direction of the team.
I thought we had the pieces in place this year. I really did. I thought Ross was a poor leader of the organization, but I thought he changed directions so many times that the law of averages eventually was bound to work in our favor. Something he did at some point would work because the odds said it had to. I think McDaniel was the right coaching hire and I think Tua had enough quarterback talent to win a Super Bowl.
I was wrong about Ross, though. He can’t get out of his own way.
The blind squirrel can find the nut but that doesn’t do him any good if he keeps throwing it out of his nest. That’s Stephen Ross … in a nutshell.
Ross strikes me as the guy that likes shiny things. He gets fascinated with being excited. Processes and working to achieve something special aren’t big on his list if he can just buy it, so that’s what he does.
People talk about how pro sports teams are just toys for billionaire owners, but no one epitomizes that more than Ross. Thing is, Ross doesn’t see this “toy” for its intended use. It’s like he’s using this model plane as a leg on a Lego.
I don’t care of Colin Cowherd’s shtick, but once he said that you can be a relevant sports organization either by being good or being interesting. Ross follows the latter to the downfall of the former.
Ross will buy the good looking piece that doesn’t fit the puzzle. He’ll soup up the motor to the car you bought because it was reliable and got great fuel economy.
He has no patience.
We were going in the right direction this time, but we still were several significant pieces shy of really contending. What does Ross do? He costs us two prime draft picks for tampering with a coach and player that he would have been fine talking to if he just waited a few months. That really, really undermined what we’re trying to do if it’s to be believed we were trying to build a winner.
Then the guy he hired to be GM overpays for a good but not great pass rusher who really was more a luxury than a need, further depleted resources he need very much right now. And, no, it doesn’t matter that Chubb is better than the player we’d draft at the end of the first round; that pick could have been used in a number of ways that would have better benefited the Dolphins.
Ross hired a coach who sabotaged a quarterback he drafted. Let that sink in. If that’s not the definition of insanity, nothing is. Ross had to have been aware of this, but he did very little to make it work or to show belief in the QB he wrote off on drafting beyond not moving the QB or firing the coach until the coach finally took one step too far. By then, the coach had inexplicably undermined what has in retrospect turned out to be a very talented QB, and, IMO, we’re seeing the results of that in Tua’s play now -- a guy with the tools but with such an incredibly fragile psyche that I doubt he’ll ever be able to reach his potential.
Of course, this isn’t first time Ross has hurt this organization because he doesn’t know how to run a sports team or really, apparently, to work with people. He pursued Harbaugh and then it got out, undermining Sparano, who was good if not great, then he extends Sparano instead of just releasing him and the whole thing goes up in flames. He signs Ndamakong Suh to make a splash, which it does but it also effectively diminishes resources we needed to build a full team.
Ross’s instincts on who he hires are suspect, but I think, maybe just because of the sheer volume of changes he’s made out of either desperation or boredom, he’s hired some people who can win. The problem is he isn’t satisfied with then letting the competent people do their job. He has to be involved. He has to be a direct reason the team succeeded. As a result, there is no plan or process because you have too many cooks making the soup, each in their own way.
Ross seems to want everyone to see his hand in bringing a Vince Lombardi Trophy back to Miami. Ironically, that’s the biggest reason he’ll never hold up a Vince Lombardi Trophy as owner of the Dolphins.
I thought we had the pieces in place this year. I really did. I thought Ross was a poor leader of the organization, but I thought he changed directions so many times that the law of averages eventually was bound to work in our favor. Something he did at some point would work because the odds said it had to. I think McDaniel was the right coaching hire and I think Tua had enough quarterback talent to win a Super Bowl.
I was wrong about Ross, though. He can’t get out of his own way.
The blind squirrel can find the nut but that doesn’t do him any good if he keeps throwing it out of his nest. That’s Stephen Ross … in a nutshell.
Ross strikes me as the guy that likes shiny things. He gets fascinated with being excited. Processes and working to achieve something special aren’t big on his list if he can just buy it, so that’s what he does.
People talk about how pro sports teams are just toys for billionaire owners, but no one epitomizes that more than Ross. Thing is, Ross doesn’t see this “toy” for its intended use. It’s like he’s using this model plane as a leg on a Lego.
I don’t care of Colin Cowherd’s shtick, but once he said that you can be a relevant sports organization either by being good or being interesting. Ross follows the latter to the downfall of the former.
Ross will buy the good looking piece that doesn’t fit the puzzle. He’ll soup up the motor to the car you bought because it was reliable and got great fuel economy.
He has no patience.
We were going in the right direction this time, but we still were several significant pieces shy of really contending. What does Ross do? He costs us two prime draft picks for tampering with a coach and player that he would have been fine talking to if he just waited a few months. That really, really undermined what we’re trying to do if it’s to be believed we were trying to build a winner.
Then the guy he hired to be GM overpays for a good but not great pass rusher who really was more a luxury than a need, further depleted resources he need very much right now. And, no, it doesn’t matter that Chubb is better than the player we’d draft at the end of the first round; that pick could have been used in a number of ways that would have better benefited the Dolphins.
Ross hired a coach who sabotaged a quarterback he drafted. Let that sink in. If that’s not the definition of insanity, nothing is. Ross had to have been aware of this, but he did very little to make it work or to show belief in the QB he wrote off on drafting beyond not moving the QB or firing the coach until the coach finally took one step too far. By then, the coach had inexplicably undermined what has in retrospect turned out to be a very talented QB, and, IMO, we’re seeing the results of that in Tua’s play now -- a guy with the tools but with such an incredibly fragile psyche that I doubt he’ll ever be able to reach his potential.
Of course, this isn’t first time Ross has hurt this organization because he doesn’t know how to run a sports team or really, apparently, to work with people. He pursued Harbaugh and then it got out, undermining Sparano, who was good if not great, then he extends Sparano instead of just releasing him and the whole thing goes up in flames. He signs Ndamakong Suh to make a splash, which it does but it also effectively diminishes resources we needed to build a full team.
Ross’s instincts on who he hires are suspect, but I think, maybe just because of the sheer volume of changes he’s made out of either desperation or boredom, he’s hired some people who can win. The problem is he isn’t satisfied with then letting the competent people do their job. He has to be involved. He has to be a direct reason the team succeeded. As a result, there is no plan or process because you have too many cooks making the soup, each in their own way.
Ross seems to want everyone to see his hand in bringing a Vince Lombardi Trophy back to Miami. Ironically, that’s the biggest reason he’ll never hold up a Vince Lombardi Trophy as owner of the Dolphins.
