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Home > Terence Moore > Archives > 2008 > May > 13
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Blank can ill-afford more slip-ups
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The Falcons have an image problem. Now let that sink in. After all, from his GQ attire to his spiffy facilities throughout Flowery Branch to his stated emphasis on keeping fans happy and coming, no NFL owner is more obsessed with the perception of his franchise than Arthur Blank.
So this isn’t good: Starting with December 2006, there was Jim Mora boasting to a Seattle radio station that his “dream job” was coaching the University of Washington football team instead of Blank’s professional one in Atlanta. There was that dogfighting mess with Michael Vick. Then Bobby Petrino bolted in the middle of the night with three games left during his first and only season as Mora’s replacement to call Hogs in Arkansas.
Now you have rising linebacker Michael Boley sacking what was a good-guy image after he was arrested on battery charges against his wife.
“It’s been hard. It’s been a hard [17 months],” said Blank, easing into a laugh to keep from crying. “Everything you do in the NFL is played out in the eyes of the public. It means that owners, executives, coaches and players, all of us, we have to take real responsibility for our behavior. It’s not just a matter of winning on the field. It’s a matter of what we do off the field as well.”
So this is good: Blank knows his franchise can’t keep suffering these mighty blows to the belly without having its legs wobble more at the gate. He knows the Georgia Dome already is becoming a lovely place for empty seats during the NFL season with the Falcons spiraling the past three seasons from 8-8 to 7-9 to 4-12.
Blank knows, all right, but what about those around him? It makes you wonder, especially since these things keep happening. “Well, they know how I feel,” he said, adding that there are significantly more folks who have helped the Falcons’ image than harmed it during his six years owning the team. “When you have certain situations that are disappointing, they’re just disappointing. You go back, and you examine all the research of anybody we’ve drafted and the free agents. Did we miss on character, and if so, why?
“There are things that happen that can change somebody. They get married. They end up with a lot of money and end up with a lot of distractions. So you think you know somebody a certain way, and you do know them. And then things happen in their lives that give them other choices, and sometimes their choices aren’t always the best.”
Take Boley, for instance. One day, he was entering his fourth season with the Falcons as a 25-year-old on the verge of stardom after spending 2007 with three sacks, two interceptions, three forced fumbles and seven pass breakups. The next, he was interrupting Blank’s evening at a black-tie affair with news that he had been arrested and released on a $1,200 bond for physically abusing his wife of less than a year.
A stunned Blank stepped into the hallway to speak to Boley for 30 minutes over the phone. Through it all, the owner had the same feelings he had during those other moments of woe with his Falcons over the last 17 months. “Well, you know, the first thing I am is disappointed, disappointed in the individual,” Blank said. “Then I have a variety of emotions. Some are anger. Some are trying to figure out how I can help. Is there any way I can help with our coaches or GM or Rich [McKay], our president, or is there anything I can do to be productive and not get into anybody’s way? I’m pleased to say that this kind of thing doesn’t happen very often.”
No, it doesn’t, but when it happens for the Falcons these days, it happens big. And this is an owner who doesn’t even like things to happen small when it comes to negative images of his franchise.
That’s why this makes no sense. Then again, neither did the actions of Mora, Vick, Petrino and Boley.
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