ESPN’s Chris Mortensen is reporting that Michael Vick has signed a two-year deal with the Philadelphia Eagles.
I can dig that.
Frankly, there’s not much of a downside: the Eagles get another playmaker; Philly is the right city with the right fanbase to welcome Vick back into the League; and the Eagles have no immediate need to thrust Vick into the lineup.
And if McNabb gets hurt – and he usually does – then you’ve got Vick coming off the sideline to handle things.
Also, let’s be real: if there’s a franchise whose fans might run a dog-fighting ring as part of the tailgating experience, it’s probably Philly. And then Oakland.
In case folks don’t know what Vick used to do before he went into the clink, here’s his resume:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4ssXBzlCdc&hl=en&fs=1&]
arghh i wish we got him.
and this is a good move, because when d-mac gets hurt around game 6 or so, vick will already have finished his suspension.
I actually do not think philly is the right city for him, though, as (and I have no idea how to say this without sounding offensive, so please bear with me) mcnabb is percieved as ‘less black’ in comparison to vick. and I base this on just a few anecdotes of which kids wore which jersey, and mcnabb’s own longstanding reputation as a company man for the eagles (which raises questions of racial loyalty). but i think the philly fans (who are d-bags to begin with) will go after vick racially from the get go.
i’m a Birds fan, obviously, but i can’t disagree with anything you said here. I do like this pick-up from a football standpoint — he can make plays, as blackink said, and can generate yardage when nothing else is clicking — but he’s gonna get roasted by the fans back home. everyone white and over the age of 30 felt Allen Iverson was the devil incarnate. I can’t imagine what Vick’s in for.
I get what you’re saying. And actually, I thought Washington would have been the perfect fit as far as city and fanbase. But really, the, erm, Redskins, have no stability in terms of ownership or management. I think Vick needs that first and foremost.
That said, Philly is an urban city with a pretty decent history of dealing with black athletes. In fact, they dealt with an athlete and personality like Vick before when they had Iverson in town. And that was a sort of love affair, don’t you think?
I’d have been more worried for Vick if he’d gone someplace like Seattle or New England.
I was actually hoping he’d go to the Texans, so he could put Schaub on the bench agains and I’d finally have a reason to root for the new Houston franchise.
i step away from the grid for two hours and return to THIS. i never thought Philly would be the team that signed him; Lurie/Reid tend to do be big on ‘character’ in their FA acquisitions.
Ah, see … I missed this. Well damn.
good call on the AI comparison. and considering that they are both from the same part of virginia, that perception of country/ghetto blackness (no matter how ill-founded and racist) is how he is going to be looked at, rather than a mcnabb 2.0.
speaking of AI and philly, you guys should write something on the politics of loyalty when ai was in his prime. i would love to hear it.
Now that’s just ridiculous. I grew up in Houston, when Brooks played for the Rockets. Clearly, that guy had never seen Scotty Brooks play before. If he ever came into the game, I was counting down the minutes until Kenny Smith returned.
But yeah, I get what you’re saying. Sheesh. Vick’s gonna need some support.
oh, man. y’all should see my facebook homepage right now. people are pissed.
Well, hell. I guess I don’t know what I’m talking about when it comes to East Coast fanbases. But I wonder how much of the call for Colt McCoy is D.C. fans just wanting someone or something to believe in.
But now that you mention it, Houston, Dallas, Detroit (they’ll take anyone who’s willing to move there), Miami, New Orleans … those might have been among the places that would have been a good fit in terms of fanbase.
We don’t have a problem with criminals in the South, and animals are often used to provide entertainment below the Mason-Dixon line. People would understand.
dead serious, man. like, “we need to bring in someone who knows how to play basketball the right way.” the host hung up on him, calling him an idiot. but a lot of people felt that way.
hahahahahahahahahahahhahahah
So, um…you guys are talking about football, right?
yeah, we know what ‘the right way’ means. fuck outta here.
“he’s a vile and disgusting human being”
‘he’s a scumbag’
’screw the eagles’
etc.
i mean, you know. T.O. is obviously an egomaniac, but nobody works harder. and that first year he was with the eagles, he had like 1400 yards on only 77 catches, and like 14 TDs. He was a man possessed, and we went 14-2, so you know it was all love.
and then there was that second season. ugh.
Kinda. But not really.
When you talk about Michael Vick these days, football is almost a secondary issue.
i don’t doubt it. those people were idiots. at one point DOUG OVERTON was our starting point, backed up by Greg Graham, who was like 5′6. And not that Nate Robinson/Earl Boykins little, where they’re built like running backs. I mean, like 5′6, 155, but ‘a lot of heart.’
then we get one of the best players to ever play — top 30, easy — and folks are calling for a return to pass-first, finish-in-last basketball????
(can you tell i’m still mad about this?)
Believe me, I am a TO fan. I know what he did.
And great line on Larry Brown, though I think he died the right way would be more appropriate.
Word.
Shani, we are totally talking about football. Intersected with race, class, philly fans, and a salad on the side
.
word.
Gold, Jerry, GOLD
Damn. It’s hard enough figuring out all the rules of the game itself before the season starts. Now I’ve gotta learn the sociological underpinnings, too?
Ha. The line will be long, I’m sure. D.J. and Ray will know what everyone was talking about soon enough. If they don’t already know.
Depending on what we mean by ‘best’ Iverson could make the top 15. You should be bitter about this.
And Earl Boykins is not exactly built like a running back, but I know what you are talking about.
And Oh god Doug Overton… that reminds me of one of my best nights at JMU when I played beer pong with my roomie and these other friends where we had to name an obscure nba player while making the shot. Doug Overton’s name was most def used. Christ philly had a sad squad… though I guess a Wiz fan should not be talking.
seriously, i think we had like 25 roster players that year. a lot of ten-day contracts. it was sad.
I think Vick deserves a second chance. Im surprised he got more than the minimum. But i think the eagles are going to be able to some interesting things on the field with both mcnabb and vick out there.
As someone who lives in suburban Atlanta (fifteen minutes out, not 50 miles) I’m still too personally shell shocked from the Michael Vick situation to comment objectively.
We are the kind of family that bases all autumn decisions on the football calendar, the first thing my husband ever bought my daughter was an MV jersey, the kids had bobble heads, etc etc etc. B/c they are so young explaining the Vick fiasco to them was our first unavoidable current events moment.
Long before the dog fighting came to light, Vick was emblematic of a lot of the dichotomies in the metro ATL region. I didn’t think it was ever primed to end well, but the enormity of the explosion was jaw dropping in its scope.
Despite my personal heartbreak- made infinitely better by that upstanding product of a Quaker education, PA’s own Matty Ryan- I agree wholeheartedly that an organization with all its ducks in a row was the best fit for Vick. I remember having a conversation with someone who argued Vick’s outlaw image was best suited for the Raiders. All signs indicate that is an organization in free fall, where the lunatics are running the asylum, so I couldn’t think of a worst place for Vick to end up…
Anyway, he’s got everybody’s fave magical negro, Tony Dungee, to guide him so maybe all will end well for MV. At least now the MV fanatics will get off local sports radio with their genius plans to bring him back to the Falcon fold.
nah, man. people hated A.I. up until he dragged those bums to the Finals, kicking and screaming. It took a long time for him to win folks over.
no joke: i was listening to sports radio during Iverson’s second year and this guy was begging they trade him for Scott Brooks.
oh no, dc would have been TERRIBLE to vick. he would have had an built in fanbase from the start (hampton, VT, beating nfc east teams in the past), but a lot of people do not realize the historical fanbase of dc; racist white southerners. dc was the historical team of the white south until the cowboys were created, which the owner of the skins knew would cut into his white southern support so he blocked the creation, and a rivalry was born. even dc’s status as a chocolate city would not insulate vick from the nutty-ass skins fans (we have people calling for COLT MCCOY to start of Jason on extremeskins.com for crissakes)… and the gentrified carpetbaggers/bandwagon fans would not be able to forgive him for killing dogs. He is too black for a decent chunk of the dc fanbase. Though I suppose one could argue that for most NFL franchises.
Couldn’t agree with you more on the instability issue, our management and ownership is gawdawful. Still, vick would have been great considering our o-lines inability to pass protect. A scrambling qb with portis, cooley, and moss woulda done damage.
I woulda loved for him to put schaub on the bench, that uva bastard.
And GD, that last story is priceless. Scott Brooks?!!
You mean TO?
I kid, I kid, actually I think TO is a great character guy (how many laws has he broken?) who keeps getting a raw deal but is sort of a megolomaniac.
lol. comedy.
But many of those same people did not get behind Jason in the first place. I mean, we are the same franchise that kept Mark Brunell playing, so obviously popular discontent is not that big a deal, but the press would turn on Vick real fast.
I do not think that Vick needed a black town so much as a wack quarterback. Detroit, Miami, Oakland, maybe Minny (though I think Jackson could be decent), etc. I have no clue of Vick is going to be as good as he used to be though. Prison sucks.
What the hell is on your facebook page?
Lol. Isn’t “Play the Right Way” going to be the epitaph on Larry Brown’s tombstone, though?
yeah, if it isn’t eroded from the piss of all the point guards who ever played for him.
compared to our owner, vick is a saint. who the hell do you let post on your facebook page?
Shani:
1) Get yourself a used PS2 or Gamecube
2) Get a used copy of Madden 2002
3) Play it for a weekend
You will know 95% about football after that. Trust me.
you’re absolutely right. i think people our age are so much smarter about the nuts and bolts of football because of the Madden franchise. we’ve been calling plays our whole lives.
Listen to Winslow: a couple weeks of madden will make you a reasonably knowledgable fan.
from (the sorely missed) Play magazine:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/14/sports/playmagazine/0914play-SHOW.html?pagewanted=all
I wonder when the Madden generation starts coaching and what sort of innovations will come with them?
Raheem Morris probably played some (youth + move to college coaching in the late 90s + he was a player), so I expect interesting things out of him… even though head coaches do not always call plays and are basically ceos and motivational speakers rather than xs and os tacticians.
wouldn’t that be nuts? the circle — NFL playcalling influencing video games influencing NFL playcalling — would be complete.
[...] they say, he should be able to get on with his life. The football fans like blackink and GD at PostBourgie discuss what Vick will add to the Eagles’ offense. (By the way, PB is up for a well-deserved [...]