Kurt Warner on Edmonds-McKernon Show

[nighttrain]

lets not forget Zygmont had a small part in his leaving also...at least I think he did

don't forget Suliman, AKA the Slasher
train

 

[Stranger]

I think you are looking at it wrong. He didn't leave, he was thrown out. He was cut, they didn't even make an attempt to trade him for a 6th round pick and a bag of oranges! He spent a year behind an inferior QB with lesser skills and did it with a smile on his face, and he said and did ALL the right things while Martz and Bernie stabbed him in the back over and over and the FO and Georgia watched and did nothing. To Martz credit he did cop to it years later, none of the other parties have.

The fact that he doesn't bad mouth the Rams highlights what a genuinely nice guy he is because almost any other player would, or would at least say "I'm past that and I won't talk about it".

If this type of thing happened to you with an employer how insulted would you be?

I had absolutely nothing to do with any of what you describe. From the way I see it, I'm another injured party.

 

[moklerman]

I had absolutely nothing to do with any of what you describe. From the way I see it, I'm another injured party.

Then the question is why you're holding Warner responsible for your injuries.

 

[CGI_Ram]

don't forget Suliman, AKA the Slasher
train

No kidding. That front office was a shitshow.

 

[max]

Kurt said the Rams should draft an OT at #2. And either a big WR or DB at #13.

All the other posts here dealing with the Warner StL debate are so freaking boring to me now.

 

[Boffo97]

I think you are looking at it wrong. He didn't leave, he was thrown out. He was cut, they didn't even make an attempt to trade him for a 6th round pick and a bag of oranges! He spent a year behind an inferior QB with lesser skills and did it with a smile on his face, and he said and did ALL the right things while Martz and Bernie stabbed him in the back over and over and the FO and Georgia watched and did nothing. To Martz credit he did cop to it years later, none of the other parties have.

The fact that he doesn't bad mouth the Rams highlights what a genuinely nice guy he is because almost any other player would, or would at least say "I'm past that and I won't talk about it".

If this type of thing happened to you with an employer how insulted would you be?

It was unlikely with his injury situation at the time that anyone would have traded for him at the salary he was getting. On the other hand, cutting him let him pick the situation he was going to. And remember, he lost two more starting jobs that had nothing to do with Martz or Bulger.

As far as the "lesser skills" thing, Bulger was better *AT THE TIME* in every measurable category. In the Not For Long League, you HAVE to go with the hot hand. If Warner complained about it, he would have wrecked his reputation of having a stellar attitude forever by looking like a complete prima donna.

 

[LesBaker]

It was unlikely with his injury situation at the time that anyone would have traded for him at the salary he was getting. On the other hand, cutting him let him pick the situation he was going to. And remember, he lost two more starting jobs that had nothing to do with Martz or Bulger.

As far as the "lesser skills" thing, Bulger was better *AT THE TIME* in every measurable category. In the Not For Long League, you HAVE to go with the hot hand. If Warner complained about it, he would have wrecked his reputation of having a stellar attitude forever by looking like a complete prima donna.

This'll be the last time I do this.

Plenty of teams would have been interested, the Rams wanted to get rid of him so they did. They never tried to shop him. As far as losing starting jobs he lost them to players drafted VERY high in the first round with coaches under pressure to play the kid that just got drafted. He was still playing decent football.

As far as the hot hand thing, and Not For Long and Bulger being better in every way. Well it isn't hard to be better than a guy that is down with and injured throwing hand and a moron of a coach calling 14 running plays and 60 passing plays out of 3-4-5 wide sets week after week after week.

It was an absolutely horrible mistake made by a franchise that was run by self indulgent, egotistical, sociopathic, narcissistic people, of which ONE has had the balls to say he made a mistake and mishandled it, Martz. The guy who ultimately made the decision to off Warner has said in hindsight it was the wrong choice. So if you have an issue with my stance on this you can email him since he is in the same camp. I believe Faulk has also hinted that it was a dumbass move.

Anyway, what has the actual facts and history told us? What it's taught us is that the guys who were saying keep Warner and let him recover from the injury were right, and the guys who said dump him and go with Bulger because he awesome were wrong. And that's a fact jack. Spin it any way you want, I'm outta this thread.

And lastly, Warner is right about Bradford.

 

[max]

This'll be the last time I do this.

Plenty of teams would have been interested, the Rams wanted to get rid of him so they did. They never tried to shop him. As far as losing starting jobs he lost them to players drafted VERY high in the first round with coaches under pressure to play the kid that just got drafted. He was still playing decent football.

As far as the hot hand thing, and Not For Long and Bulger being better in every way. Well it isn't hard to be better than a guy that is down with and injured throwing hand and a moron of a coach calling 14 running plays and 60 passing plays out of 3-4-5 wide sets week after week after week.

It was an absolutely horrible mistake made by a franchise that was run by self indulgent, egotistical, sociopathic, narcissistic people, of which ONE has had the balls to say he made a mistake and mishandled it, Martz. The guy who ultimately made the decision to off Warner has said in hindsight it was the wrong choice. So if you have an issue with my stance on this you can email him since he is in the same camp. I believe Faulk has also hinted that it was a dumbass move.

Anyway, what has the actual facts and history told us? What it's taught us is that the guys who were saying keep Warner and let him recover from the injury were right, and the guys who said dump him and go with Bulger because he awesome were wrong. And that's a fact jack. Spin it any way you want, I'm outta this thread.

And lastly, Warner is right about Bradford.

Hey Les, no offense but here's how I read that..

"Same ol', same ol', same ol', same ol', same ol', same ol', same ol', same ol', same ol', same ol', same ol'....

Warner is right about Bradford"

This is all tongue in cheek, of course.

 

[LesBaker]

Well, IMO he is right about Bradford.

Which isn't to say that Bradford has issues that cannot be overcome, and I know a lot of posters feel that he won't get better. I think he has the ability to move into the type of QB that everyone would rank somewhere between 8-10 if he finally blossoms.

The issue is his draft slot and contract. People, and maybe rightfully so, expect a guy drafted there to be top 5. But since nearly every year a QB gets drafted in the top 1-3 picks they cannot all be top 5!

So. Where does this leave us with Bradford? Well if he doesn't show some significant upward trajectory then he will have to be replaced if not next year then for sure the year after.

 

[Boffo97]

This'll be the last time I do this.

Plenty of teams would have been interested, the Rams wanted to get rid of him so they did. They never tried to shop him. As far as losing starting jobs he lost them to players drafted VERY high in the first round with coaches under pressure to play the kid that just got drafted. He was still playing decent football.

So plenty of teams would have been interested in a trade, but the Rams were just so evil that they threw away a valuable resource rather than profit from it? That doesn't sound silly to you?

As far as the hot hand thing, and Not For Long and Bulger being better in every way. Well it isn't hard to be better than a guy that is down with and injured throwing hand and a moron of a coach calling 14 running plays and 60 passing plays out of 3-4-5 wide sets week after week after week.

That "moron" of a coach was the one who made Warner in the first place... or at the very least discovered him.

He should have stayed out until he was absolutely healthy. He kept insisting he was fine and sabotaging his own recovery. (Then Brenda's antics didn't help either.)

It was an absolutely horrible mistake made by a franchise that was run by self indulgent, egotistical, sociopathic, narcissistic people, of which ONE has had the balls to say he made a mistake and mishandled it, Martz. The guy who ultimately made the decision to off Warner has said in hindsight it was the wrong choice. So if you have an issue with my stance on this you can email him since he is in the same camp. I believe Faulk has also hinted that it was a dumbass move.

Anyway, what has the actual facts and history told us? What it's taught us is that the guys who were saying keep Warner and let him recover from the injury were right, and the guys who said dump him and go with Bulger because he awesome were wrong. And that's a fact jack. Spin it any way you want, I'm outta this thread.

And lastly, Warner is right about Bradford.

Even if Marc Bulger never existed, Warner would have never remained with the Rams until he finally got hot again, especially if he faced the kind of circumstances that... well... Bulgerized Bulger and probably would have made it so Warner never would have recovered. Not with the salary. Not only did the Rams make the right move, they made the only sane one.

Now was Warner better than Bulger overall? Absolutely. Was Warner better than Bulger at the end of their careers? Absolutely. But at the time, Bulger was hot and Warner was really, really struggling. Maybe Martz could have handled things better, but that never could have included keeping Warner.

I love the dude, and I thank him for everything he did for us, but you don't win games with sentimentality, and that would have been the only reason to keep Warner over Bulger ***AT THAT TIME***.

 

[Stranger]

Then the question is why you're holding Warner responsible for your injuries.

My point is:

(1) loyal fans got punched in the gut when Warner was unceremoniously dumped - we had nothing to do with running him out of town. In fact, most of us opposed it.
(2) now, Kurt should know this. He knows there was a loyal base of Rams fans that never wanted him to leave and still support him. So, why then did Kurt need to come out and publicly say that he's a Cardinal? He should have known that this would hurt his loyal Rams fans. And he didn't need to say it. What did he have to gain?

So, while (1) was not Kurt's direct doing, (2) was.

 

[Boffo97]

My point is:

(1) loyal fans got punched in the gut when Warner was unceremoniously dumped - we had nothing to do with running him out of town. In fact, most of us opposed it.
(2) now, Kurt should know this. He knows there was a loyal base of Rams fans that never wanted him to leave and still support him. So, why then did Kurt need to come out and publicly say that he's a Cardinal? He should have known that this would hurt his loyal Rams fans. And he didn't need to say it. What did he have to gain?

So, while (1) was not Kurt's direct doing, (2) was.

I would think he's just identifying most with his most recent team.

Would any of us call foul on Marshall Faulk for identifying himself as a Ram instead of a Colt? (Different situations, sure, but there's never going to be a perfectly equivalent situation.)

That aside, we really can't read Warner's mind to know just what his feelings about the Rams are... but I really don't think he meant that as any huge slight towards the Rams or the Rams fans.

 

[Stranger]

I would think he's just identifying most with his most recent team.

Would any of us call foul on Marshall Faulk for identifying himself as a Ram instead of a Colt? (Different situations, sure, but there's never going to be a perfectly equivalent situation.)

That aside, we really can't read Warner's mind to know just what his feelings about the Rams are... but I really don't think he meant that as any huge slight towards the Rams or the Rams fans.

I was thinking of asking Demoff, in the Kevin Demoff upcoming chat, about Warner's latest comments, and what the F.O. is doing to bridge the gap.

 

[Boffo97]

I was thinking of asking Demoff, in the Kevin Demoff upcoming chat, about Warner's latest comments, and what the F.O. is doing to bridge the gap.

Might be a good idea. If for nothing else, one of the Rams' failings in recent history has been keeping good relations with team alumni, particularly (but not limited to) former Los Angeles Rams.

Reminders in that general area aren't a bad thing.

 

[moklerman]

I never disliked Brenda so this isn't meant as a joke or anything. Kurt's a lucky a guy.

 

[moklerman]

I love the dude, and I thank him for everything he did for us, but you don't win games with sentimentality, and that would have been the only reason to keep Warner over Bulger ***AT THAT TIME***.

At what time? Because in 2003 when they unceremoniously benched Warner with a fake concussion and then left him on the bench even though Bulger was NOT playing like the wunderkind from 2002, Warner'd only played a total of 7 games that were un-Warner-like.

No, there's no hand-washing of the situation by saying Bulger was clearly the better option. The whole situation was handled poorly and the team's treatment of Warner was pretty shameless. One could make an argument for 2002 Bulger I suppose, but it was clear that he wasn't as good as Warner as soon as he started getting the nod in 2003. Martz was going to bench him at halftime vs. Chicago and in recent years said he regrets how he handled the whole situation.

 

[Boffo97]

At what time? Because in 2003 when they unceremoniously benched Warner with a fake concussion and then left him on the bench even though Bulger was NOT playing like the wunderkind from 2002, Warner'd only played a total of 7 games that were un-Warner-like.

No, there's no hand-washing of the situation by saying Bulger was clearly the better option. The whole situation was handled poorly and the team's treatment of Warner was pretty shameless. One could make an argument for 2002 Bulger I suppose, but it was clear that he wasn't as good as Warner as soon as he started getting the nod in 2003. Martz was going to bench him at halftime vs. Chicago and in recent years said he regrets how he handled the whole situation.

At that time = 2002-2003. You can argue that Warner didn't get a fair chance in 2003, and I might agree with that. But statistically during that time, I'm sorry, it's not hand washing, it's night and day. Now, Bulger wasn't as good then (and never was) as Warner *IN HIS PRIME*, but in that time period, yeah.

Sure, Martz may have handled it differently in hindsight, but I still think there's no way they you keep a QB on Warner's salary when he's being outperformed. And, as I said, even if Bulger didn't exist, Warner might have stayed with the team longer, but never as long as it took him to get good enough to keep a starter's job again. And with the Rams' later offensive line injury cursed years, he may never have gotten back to that level again.

As I said, I love the guy, but at the end of the day, it's a business. Every guy on that team knows that if someone else is outperforming them, even if there are completely valid reasons why their performance isn't up to snuff, they're going to be wished well in their future endeavors. I'm honestly not sure why this is even being argued except for sentimentality.

The saddest part for me is that Bulger got a LOT of hatred out of this, and there's no rational way to say any of this was his fault. All he did was do his job well for a certain period.

But I suppose it's called the ENDLESS Warner-Bulger Debate for a reason... at this point, nothing any of us has to say is going to change anyone else's mind, and there hasn't been anyone involved still associated with the team for years, so it's probably best to move on, agreeing to disagree, having respect for others' rights to have an opinion and all that stuff. Let's sing Kumbaya now.

 

[moklerman]

At that time = 2002-2003. You can argue that Warner didn't get a fair chance in 2003, and I might agree with that. But statistically during that time, I'm sorry, it's not hand washing, it's night and day. Now, Bulger wasn't as good then (and never was) as Warner *IN HIS PRIME*, but in that time period, yeah.

But you're talking about Warner playing through two broken hands and less than 1 season's worth of time. There's no way you jettison a 2 time MVP less than 1 season removed from his MVP season for a guy like Bulger. If Bulger had continued to be lights out like his first 5 starts then okay, I guess you have to do something. But even in 2002 he started to come back to Earth and by 2003, he led the league interceptions in only 15 games.

Even if I didn't think it was personal, I could see why the Rams gave up on Warner medically since their staff apparently couldn't even diagnose broken bones. Bottom line is there was a fix for getting Warner back to his MVP form and the Rams chose not to find it. Aside from all the other hullabaloo, that, IMO, is unforgivable.

 

[Boffo97]

But you're talking about Warner playing through two broken hands and less than 1 season's worth of time. There's no way you jettison a 2 time MVP less than 1 season removed from his MVP season for a guy like Bulger. If Bulger had continued to be lights out like his first 5 starts then okay, I guess you have to do something. But even in 2002 he started to come back to Earth and by 2003, he led the league interceptions in only 15 games.

Even if I didn't think it was personal, I could see why the Rams gave up on Warner medically since their staff apparently couldn't even diagnose broken bones. Bottom line is there was a fix for getting Warner back to his MVP form and the Rams chose not to find it. Aside from all the other hullabaloo, that, IMO, is unforgivable.

From my memory, Bulger was pretty good in both 2002 and 2003.

And the Rams had no way of knowing just how long such a "fix" would take. There's no way you can keep someone for a prolonged period (again, it was several YEARS before he was able to keep a starting job again) on a superstar contract when you have someone who is better AT THE MOMENT to replace him. Also, as I remembered it, Warner wanted to be cut once he heard that Bulger was the starter.

From a point of view of LIKING the guy, it sucked, and I would have given Warner more of a chance in 2003... but it was understandable.

I do share your dislike of the medical staff for another issue: Not being able to see something was REALLY wrong with Warner in that Giants game. Some hang that on Martz. I hang it on the doctors.

I wonder how much of a role the Zygmunt-Martz front office dysfunction played in all of this.

 

[moklerman]

From my memory, Bulger was pretty good in both 2002 and 2003.

And the Rams had no way of knowing just how long such a "fix" would take. There's no way you can keep someone for a prolonged period (again, it was several YEARS before he was able to keep a starting job again) on a superstar contract when you have someone who is better AT THE MOMENT to replace him. Also, as I remembered it, Warner wanted to be cut once he heard that Bulger was the starter.

From a point of view of LIKING the guy, it sucked, and I would have given Warner more of a chance in 2003... but it was understandable.

I do share your dislike of the medical staff for another issue: Not being able to see something was REALLY wrong with Warner in that Giants game. Some hang that on Martz. I hang it on the doctors.

I wonder how much of a role the Zygmunt-Martz front office dysfunction played in all of this.

I think that's a big part of the Warner/Bulger debates. The perception by many(most?) was that Bulger was continuing to play like he did when he came in for an injured Jamie Martin in 2002. Those first 5 games were somewhat magical but it wasn't about Bulger as much as it was about Martz restoring some balance to his gameplans. I don't recall if Faulk was injured in 2002 but Martz and the Rams went a little overboard with their passing game. The percentages were extreme and the team was starting to suffer for it. I believe the games Warner started from 2002 until he left were approaching 80% pass plays. Once the Rams were forced to start their 3rd stringer at QB in 2002, Faulk finally started to get the ball again and the Rams went on a winning streak.

Maybe Warner was at fault too, I don't know how many times he audibled to a pass play when a run was called.

But I think he was as healthy as he was ever going to get in 2003 and because of the various injuries his thumb was a liability. He needed the gloves. Now, maybe he was too proud or unwilling to wear them at that point and I've often thought that if he didn't go through all of the things he went through from 2002 'til the end of 2006 that he may still not have tried them. But that's a huge supposition. I agree that the bridges were probably burned with Martz at that point though so his Rams future didn't look too promising. Add in all the troubles Martz was having with management and Warner leading a resurrection of the GSOT was probably not going to happen.

Flutie, Garcia, Roethlisberger, probably some others that I'm forgetting...all wore the gloves though and it's a shame that Martz and Warner couldn't figure it out in 2002. I still don't understand the rationale though. I mean, it seemed clear that they were trying to give Warner a chance. To succeed or to hang himself. But why they chose to chain him to the bench after 1 game in 2003 and leave room for doubt is what's perplexing. As much trouble as he was having with ball security, they could have given him a half a season or even a whole season to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that he wasn't a viable option moving forward.