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http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/nfl-s...t-the--gps-lady--in-his-iphone-110129162.html
Thought this was kind of funny
Giants' Tom Coughlin doesn't trust the 'GPS lady' in his iPhone
By Eric Edholm 7 hours ago Shutdown Corner
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View photo
Feb 19, 2015; Indianapolis, IN, USA; New York Giants head coach Tom Coughlin speaks to the media at the 2015 NFL Combine at Lucas Oil Stadium. (Trevor Ruszkowski-USA TODAY Sports)
The NFL coaches' breakfasts that are part of the recently wrapped-up owners meetings can be quite the bore without strong, almost amphetamine-grade coffee, as the 32 geniuses of the clipboards dance their way past questions about free agency, the draft and, well, each other.
So consider us blindsided that one of the funniest anecdotes from those breakfasts would come from New York Giants head coach Tom Coughlin, a man so remarkably unfunny that we sort of tend to forget he exists in a room full of Chip Kellys and Rex Ryans and the like.
Coughlin, it turns out, can relate to that lost feeling — even when he's close to home. He relayed a hilarious story about his newly acquired iPhone and the "lady" voice that inhabits it (that would be the seldom helpful Siri) and how she's not really doing her job. If Siri was a sixth-round pick, she'd be cut by now.
Newsday's Tom Rock takes it from here:
"Two weeks ago I'm trying to get to a roller hockey game that my grandson is playing in, so Marc Ross [the Giants' director of college scouting] had showed me how to talk to this phone," Coughlin said. "I don't trust the lady in GPS, I don't trust her, because they don't send you the right way. I hit the button and I go 'Park Ridge, New Jersey.' And she comes back on, she's giving me directions. So now I figure out where I am. I hit the thing and I said, 'Thank you very much, I know exactly where I am now.' And she comes back and says, 'You don't have to thank me.' I swear to God that's what she said. And then I couldn't get her to shut up. Every turn. 'Take a right here.' I know where I am. I know where I am. I'm a block away from my house, and she's telling me where to go. I said, 'I know where I'm going.' "
Picturing a scarlet-faced Coughlin steaming up his glasses while trying to get Siri to shut up is perhaps the most amazing image of the offseason. It's absolutely brilliant. Here's a soon-to-be 69-year-old man barking at a little black box, and all you can think about is what his conversations with Odell Beckham Jr. must be like.
For the record, Coughlin — who has admitted in the past to knowing how to text — said he prefers to hear the sound of OBJ's voice.
"I would call him so he hears my voice," Coughlin said. "He'll pick up."
This Luddite syndrome among coaches is not restricted to Coughlin. Remember the NFL Network piece on Bill Belichick a few years back in which he couldn't change the time in his new car after Daylight Savings? These two men were involved in several of the most historically significant Super Bowls in league annals, and neither one of them apparently can perform basic technological functions.
Sometimes genius has a way of masking other basic skills, sort of an inverse of the human phenomenon in people whose other senses are heightened to help pick up the slack. I once had a college professor who could quote Chaucer and Milton flawlessly from rote in front of a class of disaffected English grads. And yet she had no idea how to work the horizontal blinds. It easily was my favorite college class ever for that very reason.
Coughlin has a generational theory of why that is.
Thought this was kind of funny
Giants' Tom Coughlin doesn't trust the 'GPS lady' in his iPhone
By Eric Edholm 7 hours ago Shutdown Corner
.
View photo
Feb 19, 2015; Indianapolis, IN, USA; New York Giants head coach Tom Coughlin speaks to the media at the 2015 NFL Combine at Lucas Oil Stadium. (Trevor Ruszkowski-USA TODAY Sports)
The NFL coaches' breakfasts that are part of the recently wrapped-up owners meetings can be quite the bore without strong, almost amphetamine-grade coffee, as the 32 geniuses of the clipboards dance their way past questions about free agency, the draft and, well, each other.
So consider us blindsided that one of the funniest anecdotes from those breakfasts would come from New York Giants head coach Tom Coughlin, a man so remarkably unfunny that we sort of tend to forget he exists in a room full of Chip Kellys and Rex Ryans and the like.
Coughlin, it turns out, can relate to that lost feeling — even when he's close to home. He relayed a hilarious story about his newly acquired iPhone and the "lady" voice that inhabits it (that would be the seldom helpful Siri) and how she's not really doing her job. If Siri was a sixth-round pick, she'd be cut by now.
Newsday's Tom Rock takes it from here:
"Two weeks ago I'm trying to get to a roller hockey game that my grandson is playing in, so Marc Ross [the Giants' director of college scouting] had showed me how to talk to this phone," Coughlin said. "I don't trust the lady in GPS, I don't trust her, because they don't send you the right way. I hit the button and I go 'Park Ridge, New Jersey.' And she comes back on, she's giving me directions. So now I figure out where I am. I hit the thing and I said, 'Thank you very much, I know exactly where I am now.' And she comes back and says, 'You don't have to thank me.' I swear to God that's what she said. And then I couldn't get her to shut up. Every turn. 'Take a right here.' I know where I am. I know where I am. I'm a block away from my house, and she's telling me where to go. I said, 'I know where I'm going.' "
Picturing a scarlet-faced Coughlin steaming up his glasses while trying to get Siri to shut up is perhaps the most amazing image of the offseason. It's absolutely brilliant. Here's a soon-to-be 69-year-old man barking at a little black box, and all you can think about is what his conversations with Odell Beckham Jr. must be like.
For the record, Coughlin — who has admitted in the past to knowing how to text — said he prefers to hear the sound of OBJ's voice.
"I would call him so he hears my voice," Coughlin said. "He'll pick up."
This Luddite syndrome among coaches is not restricted to Coughlin. Remember the NFL Network piece on Bill Belichick a few years back in which he couldn't change the time in his new car after Daylight Savings? These two men were involved in several of the most historically significant Super Bowls in league annals, and neither one of them apparently can perform basic technological functions.
Sometimes genius has a way of masking other basic skills, sort of an inverse of the human phenomenon in people whose other senses are heightened to help pick up the slack. I once had a college professor who could quote Chaucer and Milton flawlessly from rote in front of a class of disaffected English grads. And yet she had no idea how to work the horizontal blinds. It easily was my favorite college class ever for that very reason.
Coughlin has a generational theory of why that is.
"When I was raised it was, 'Don't touch that,' 'Don't break that,' 'Don't you dare,'" he said. "These [kids], they have no fear of these things. They just go and they do it. They're probably reinforced by people saying, 'You can't hurt it.' I could hurt it. I defy all odds."
And that's the stuff of coaching genius, folks.
And that's the stuff of coaching genius, folks.