Phil Gould, Anthony Griffin, Wayne Bennett – what does it all mean?
We follow professional sports – or any sport we watch – on the field because of the uncertainty of result and because of tribalism. Even without gambling, it’s a gamble.
We tie ourselves to the mast of our region, family or favourite colour and if the ship goes down, we go down with it.
It’s a herding instinct – humans are herd animals.
The off-field stuff is definitely part of that. The currency of modern online sports journalism is contract speculation – our tribe may have lost in the battlefield today while we were chasing bison, but Ogg The Toothless is joining us for the hunt tomorrow after we offered him as many sabretooth tiger spleens as he could grind to a pulp and drink.
A lot of it, also, is voyeurism.
In the same way that locking a bunch of dopey millennials in a house on the Gold Coast and filming them in the shower will expose their personality flaws, locking a bunch of grumpy old men and horny 20-somethings inside rugby league for 15 years will allow them to make fools of themselves and us, in turn, to feel better about ourselves.
Look at the silly coaches and players!
I’m reluctant to join this pointless idiom but, hell, I’ve a column to write. So, if the off-field soap opera is some sort of morality play from which we can learn valuable lessons about ourselves (and it kind of is – because everything is if you are determined to see it that way), here goes:
Phil Gould comes across as someone with a healthy regard for his own intellect, who makes decisions based not just on the facts at hand by the sure knowledge that he understands them better than anyone else.
No-one wants their boss to have done their exact job for years and years, much less have been blindingly successful at it.
Phil Gould is definitely not the Panthers coach. (AAP Image/Dave Hunt)
Think about your job. Let’s say you work in a car factory and you install gearboxes. Surely it would be better if your supervisor had a working knowledge of gearboxes and was not the greatest gearbox installer in company history.
It’s like the old cliche of halfbacks not lasting long under Ricky Stuart; coaches not surviving for long under Gould.
But as much as ‘Gus’ has form at sacking coaches, Anthony Griffin has form at being sacked.
He did arguably his best work with the Broncos’ Under 20s, where kids needed an authoritarian figure and swore by him.
I could buy into the convenient narrative that this did not translate well to dealing with men who need to shave daily but I’d just be guessing.
But, you know, perhaps a lack of flexibility is the flaw that we’ll glean our daily allowance of schadenfreude from ‘Hook’ over.
Just couldn’t adapt to the abundant compromise and ego-polishing needed to get ahead in modern life.
Unlike Gould, Bennett was never smart enough to kick himself upstairs where he could have an opinion on everything but responsibility for only that which he chose to appear to have responsibility for.
Bennett’s stayed at the coalface, like a newspaper roundsman addicted to the rush of news gathering who’s seen off two generations of cub reporters. Be good at one thing and do it well forever; one man’s glory, another’s hollow addiction.
Wayne’s been doing the same job for 42 bloody years, using his shamanic ability to read character to survive cull after cull and change just about everything but that crooked smile in the pursuit of keeping a job, helping young men and remaining an all-around important dude.
If I was to dare use the word hubris, I’d use it in relation to the conviction that one will always be employable if one uses the same psychological parlour tricks on the media, administrators, players and the public ad infinitum.
“I’ve done this before, I know what works,” Bennett would often say when quizzed on his methods.
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But just because KFC has those secret herbs and spices doesn’t guarantee it will remain the king of fried chicken joints into the 23rd century. Many, many, other things keep it there and the worst thing the old Colonel can do is fall into the trap of believing it’s just those herbs and spices.
Besides, who wants to do the same job for 42 years?
Downfall comes when you buy into your own myth. The longer you stay in the same vocation, the more likely it is that this will happen.
Put another way, sometimes when people are successful, they believe everything about them is awesome – including the things that others repeatedly criticise them over.
It never occurs to them that they may have been successful in spite of these characteristics, not because of them.
Big daddy
Guest
Steve, For the oldtimers rex Harrison worked at tooths brewery for 50 years as a sales representative. He also managed to play rugby league for manly and NSW.
farkurnell
Guest
Never thought I'd see the day the NRL coaches bailing our the Refs. How ironic the Coaches Soap Opera has replaced the Bunker on the back pages
buttery
Roar Rookie
Steve, Hook was not really liked by all the Broncos U20 team, he was respected by some, he was not very good at reading games then.
Charles NSW
Guest
Wayne Bennett may come back to coach the Dragons? They must kidding surely! We gave him a team before so he could win one premiership but enough is enough. For a start of he is a Queenslander so should never have been chosen in the first place. The Dragons have one of our very own Paul McGregor doing his best to coach and we should give him our best to help him. Our team is frustrating to watch at the moment but hopefully Mary can turn it around.
Major Bumsore
Guest
I’m not sure anyone ever knows , what your talking about.
jimmmy
Roar Rookie
Have you ever been really , really good at something ? You don’t become a world leading neurosurgeon by swapping to carpentry or a great novelist by swapping to sculpture. You have a successful niche you excel in and as a bonus you love it as well. Yeah go and do something else...??
Steve Mascord
Guest
But you only get one life. Why not go find other jobs you enjoy? You know how to do one thing well, move on. Learn how to do something else.
Karma Miranda
Guest
Who wants to do the same job for 42 years? Someone who enjoys their job. But leaving that aside.. There is no morality among NRL Coaches. Griffin was happy to step in when the Broncos shafted Henjak, only to be ousted prematurely and replaced by Bennett, who also now seems to be on the outer. If either of the latter two had any sense of Fraternity or Solidarity, they would have told the Broncos to go jump in the lake. Why would you willingly join an organisation with a proven track record of sacking Head Coaches prematurely? Their own conduct is a major part of the situation they now find themselves in.
anon
Roar Pro
Great read!
Larry1950
Guest
Well in reality, it's cheaper to sack one coach who's on between $400k and $1m (depending on their record or purported reputation) than to pay out any number of players on similar sums who aren't performing because: (a) the money you pay out to players counts in your salary cap into the future (b) you'd look silly if the sacked player/s you're subsidising come back & beat your team (c) the players union is a lot stronger than anything the coaches have (d) there's always an assistant coach or 2 at the club keen to take over & disavow responsibility for their part in the form slump/player unrest.
Onside
Guest
Deciphering the morality = money. NRL is a multi billion dollar industry. Not even the club strip is sacrosanct. A billboard to the highest bidder. Same worldwide all professional sport ; but morality? it's for dreamers.
steveng
Roar Rookie
Whatever (you are right it was colonel Sanders my mistake) I think the old times know what I'm talking about lol
Hanrahan
Guest
I think it was Colonel Sanders' chicken. Colonel Parker's meal ticket was Elvis.
John
Guest
The timing of Bennett could not be any better. Look at the focus on him when the focus should be squarely on his under-performing team.
sham
Guest
Good article. With Gus Penrith do have someone who really knows not only the game but what it takes to coach a team to real success. Most clubs appear to lack this knowledge and probably don’t do as well as they could as a result. There is a danger that non-league directors on boards can lose their normal good judgement as they have not played first grade. Maybe some of them get ‘star struck’ when it comes to coaches and players. This won’t happen to Gus. In the old days some players would ask journalists ‘how many tests have you played for Australia’ as if no one else is entitled to a view. If a coach is consistently failing to be successful, then questions should be asked. To be fair sporting contests such as the NRL are a zero sum game which is mostly not the case in other spheres. It is interesting to compare the Raiders to some of the other clubs. Ricky has coached them to a final series in one out of five years. Given the squad for next year it is quite likely that he will go 1 in 6 and then 1 in 7 noting that he is contracted to the end of the 2020 season but not one journalist seems to question Ricky’s record. Why? And why is this record ok with the Raiders club when it is not ok with the fans? Being realistic maybe the Raiders are a team that should not be taken too seriously. Maybe they are just there to make up the numbers while making fans of other teams feel good. They will go ahead in games only to fold toward the end giving real joy to opposition fans. As a Raiders fan the message seems to be don’t expect too much we just make up the numbers. We are ok with consistent failure despite having a very talented squad. Success is for other ‘big clubs’ not for us so get with the program. Ricky doesn’t miss tackles; it is not his fault. Perhaps Raiders fans just had 2016 to enjoy — it was an aberration not to be repeated soon. And maybe Ricky is doing better than anyone else would given the squad — I doubt it but it is possible. Whatever the answer Canberra fans need to get very familiar with regular failure. I hope that I am wrong. Ricky deserves one more year but if he goes1 in 6 next year should he be given the chance to go 1 in 7?
Chris.P.Bacon
Guest
You're a testament to all KFC connoisseurs stephng.......bless you mate.
steveng
Roar Rookie
Steve, great article and very adequately put but and I’m lol, if you knew anything about KFC and their recipes, its nothing like when Colonel Parker first introduced KFC into Australia in 1968 (it was a much better product , more successful and unique and that is why it worked and was revolutionary) the herbs and spices are definitely not there anymore including the tenderness, uniqueness of their fried chicken, hence your quote is wrong ‘But just because KFC has those secret herbs and spices doesn’t guarantee it will remain the king of fried chicken joints into the 23rd century’ it’s the same with Bennett and Gould, their uniqueness, herbs and spices have disappeared and all that the Broncos and Panthers have left is just ordinary fried chicken that surely doesn’t work and people are getting sick and tired off lol
kk
Guest
Mr Mascord, A seamless soliloquy of superior sensibilities. You should engage PSM to get signed up to one those ten season specials like DCE. One of Gould's greatest feats was purportedly a $200K collect on Catbird in the 1999 Slipper. Ironically, the colt was trained by Frank Cleary. You can understand why Gus has an affinity with the name Cleary and wants both sire and son back in the stable. As I poke the campfire embers it is clear to me that Gus will contract Wayne for a last hurrah lasting two seasons and they will then both exit the game together. Win, Lose or draw.