Quote:
Originally Posted by Rain Man
Yeah, that's a good point. And in the only words of defense I'll ever say for Herm, he and Tom Wiggin both inherited teams whose best players were either immediately retiring or had just retired. I think that made a difference for those two as well, shifting blame from Vermeil, Cunningham, and Stram (yes, Stram), who should have been replacing those players and didn't. While Stram is obviously golden, the decline in talent his last three years was precipitous, and he had more than enough time to reload before the whole thing collapsed.
I think Stram and Vermeil (and to a lesser extent Marty) were all milking the last reserves of their key veterans at the end, and then left as the ship went down.
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Yeah, I think that's a pretty normal occurrence for a coach that's had a decent run as they try to give it one last shot. The unusual situation was Herm's. He had to know that going for a complete rebuild was pretty risky for his Chiefs' coaching career (although maybe he thought he'd get 2 years instead of just 1). IMO, he and Carl really did the franchise a favor with that last act.