Good point on Fisher liking Keenum as both a person and a player. Some here may say that it doesn't matter if a player is a jerk and shows no enthusiasm as long as he's good at his job. That may work for star players but last time I checked we had few stars on this team, especially at the QB position.
If you're an employer and you have to pick between two employees - firing one and keeping the other - who do you pick to keep his job, the one that is great at his job but shows up late and leaves early and is annoying to be around, or the one that doesn't have the same skills but tries hard and applies himself each and every day?
Personally I want the best QB available in either free agency or the draft regardless of personality, but then again I'm not the one who has to work with him.
I really do think it matters. Take Fisher and Jenkins. They made an offer, stuck to their guns, let him test free agency, and didn't match. Jenkins is a wet freaking mop of a personality and I don't know if Fisher particularly cared about him, because all he said about him was the things you'd expect a coach to say about a player. Talked him up with coachspeak. But when he had to let Long and Laurinaitis go, he said it was the toughest decision he had to make as a head coach. Up there with McNair and George. He really liked those guys, and it had to kill him to let them go. He could have taken the same approach with them and said they were great players who will do well with their new teams and blah blah blah, locker room guys, blah blah blah, etc. But he made it a point to explain how difficult a decision it was.
Fisher on Jenkins:
"And then the money did take off," Fisher said. "The market was there. But we were a lot closer than people think. So I was disappointed to see him go. But you know this is the first time since we’ve been here or we’ve had to deal with unrestricted free agency because we drafted them four years ago and we developed them. Try and keep them all, you can’t. The staff did a great job, especially developing the defensive backs."
Fisher on Long
"He’s great. Really consistent day in and day out over the years. Loved to come to work, always had a great attitude, playful, jokes around and does it the right way, works hard. When he was 100 percent healthy, he was really, really good for us. Obviously, the last couple of years injuries set him back. But we released him and 10 days later he texted me a picture of his newborn [son]. So he’s the kind of player that a head coach or assistant coach will stay in touch with for a long, long time after he’s done playing."
