If Brian Mitchell could ask Sam Cosmi one question after his final Monday media session it would be this: if you say you’re going to do all the things you need to be part of a winning culture going forward, why weren't you doing them in the past?
“I heard him say I will be doing all these things, showing up, trying to lead by example, going forward – what stopped him from doing it before?” Brian asked Monday.
Charles Leno also spoke to the media Monday, and, well, he had some comments BMitch found curious as well:
“This is part of the business, but that’s what happens when you have a season like this. It’s tough; everybody in this building loves Ron Rivera as a person and all that, but when you're the leader of the ship, somebody has to go down with it,” Leno said of Rivera’s dismissal. “It’s tough, but one of the things I always say is control what you can control, and as a player, you can only do your job. You’re not the one making the decisions that he's making, but this is the outcome and this is the result of it. So, as a player, you just gotta do your job and stay focused on what you gotta do, and for a lot of guys, change is not always a bad thing.”
Leno had just finished his rookie year in Chicago when the team fired Marc Trestman after a 5-11 season and brought in John Fox, so he knows what that looks like – and whomever replaces Ron Rivera will be his fifth head coach in 11 seasons in the league.
And, it seems, maybe a fifth different culture?
“Energy is contagious in good and bad ways; some people are energy vampires, some people bring good energy, so if you get the right coaching staff in here, get the right GM, and all the people making the decisions give great energy, it can reboot a whole franchise,” Leno said. “Two things that always come to mind is a standard and structure, and I feel like that was something that was lacking here in in our organization. When you have those two things, this is the effect, and that starts up top. It has to be like, this is what we are, this is what we're going to do, and this is how we're going to do it every single day.”
BMitch & Finlay played Leno’s entire media session, as JP was there in the scrum, and yeah, it seems like structure and accountability have been missing, as has been sort of a poorly-kept secret.
But Brian, for one, is a little ‘flabbergasted’ by Leno’s words.
“I’m hearing a lot of saying, but nothing is definite. We heard a lot of complaints about EB, and he was the person that was trying to hold people accountable, trying to make sure things are gonna be the same,” BMitch said. “But you know what? It's gonna be a little more stringent than it was in prior years to try to get you to a point where you haven't been. And I keep hearing it comes from the top…who was the top? The decision maker was Ron, right? Is this now a way of changing the flow? Because we heard all the talk about Eric, now you're saying that what he tried to consistently do was not allow from the top? Only one person was above him that was making decisions, right? I know the Harris group damn sure didn't come here and say I don't want y'all to work harder to become better.”
And so, yes, that plays into Cosmi’s comments as well.