Detroit Sports Perspective

BY SCOTT MORGANROTH
PHOTOS BY CANDICE EBLING

I'll never forget the time when my longtime colleague and close friend George Eichorn asked me to write a few paragraphs about all of the Detroit teams when they were struggling in the late 1970's for the Detroit Monitor.

This happened to be the first time that I was published.

I impressed My Lakeland High School English Teacher Mrs. Ann Nozewski, who wanted every student to make an attempt to do this.

Fortunately, my second time getting published was a short story on the US Not Boycotting The 1980 Olympics, which President Jimmy Carter wanted us to Boycott The Olympics.

That would later backfire as the Soviet Union Boycotted the Olympics in 1984 at Los Angeles which I attended.

Nevertheless, lets move the clock forward to 2019 and while Nozewski certainly provided the impetus for me to get published, 40 years later, I'm still going strong!

Back in the 1970's all of the Detroit Teams were struggling.

Here in 2019, they are once again.

But at least during that time period there have been some championships along the way.

The Tigers 1984 Season produced a World Series Championship along with three Hall Of Famers. Those include Manager Sparky Anderson, Shortstop Alan Trammell and Pitcher Jack Morris.

The Pistons won three World Championships which has produced Hall of Famers and retired jerseys in the rafters. In the Bad Boys era of the late 1980's, those included Coach Chuck Daly, Guards Isiah Thomas, Joe Dumars and forward Dennis Rodman. Dumars was an executive when the Pistons won another title in 2004.

The Detroit Red Wings made it to the playoffs 25-straight years and won four Stanley Cup Titles.

The rafters are getting crowded with more retired numbers in addition to the championship banners. Two Hall of Famers and former Captains are Yzerman and Nicklas Lidstrom.

And the Lions....they've won one playoff game and Barry Sanders made it to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

I enjoyed covering Barry from my Pontiac Silverdome Press Box vantage point watching him rise to being the third leading rusher in NFL History.

There was a period of time that I covered all 16 games at home and on the road.

To this day, I'm convinced that if Fontes was not fired and replaced by Bobby Ross, Sanders would be the all-time leading rusher as Barry viewed Wayne as a father figure.

Whether Calvin Johnson gets there remains to be seen.

The fans are waiting for QB Matthew Stafford to be surrounded by a good supporting cast that will at least get him a playoff win.

It's an eyesore when Sanders and Johnson retire in their prime because of the losing culture.

Unfortunately for Lions fans, they're one of two members in the 0-16 club and haven't won a championship since 1957.

Time will tell whether the Patriot Midwest Way anchored by Coach Matt Patricia and President/GM Bob Quinn can duplicate itself in a football starved town which is looking for any kind of success it can get.

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Now the present:

1. The Detroit Red Wings--living in South Florida, the Panthers made a coaching hire I hoped the Red Wings would have made in the Motor City by landing veteran coach Joel Queeneville.

The former Windsor Spitfires coach is second all-time in regular season wins with 890 and 118 more in the playoffs, plus three Stanley Cup Championships with the Chicago Blackhawks.

The Red Wings future just became much brighter when they hired Steve Yzerman as Executive Vice President and General Manager on 4-19-2019, Good Friday. 

The Columbus Blue Jackets made the obvious happen by sweeping Tampa Bay 4-0 in their opening round series.

Yzerman had successful stints as being an Executive Director for Team Canada and The Tampa Bay Lightning. 

There is no reason to think he won't be able to get the Red Wings on the right track in time.

Yzerman will have former GM Ken Holland by his side as he was named Senior Vice President as a major resource.

Holland does has a proven track record guiding the club to Stanley Cup Championships.
I hope his patience is rewarded as he extended Coach Jeff Blashill by two additional seasons.

I think it's smart that Yzerman will honor the Blashill extension.

He worked well with another young coach in Tampa Bay. That being Jon Cooper who led the Lightning to the President's Trophy.

There is no reason to think Yzerman won't work well with Blashill.

But the key to any turnaround while Detroit is in a massive rebuild, the Red Wings must continue to hit on their draft choices.

I respect them for not tanking in an effort to get the No.1 pick in the NHL Draft as they ended up sixth.

I'll continue to invest in the Center Ice Package hoping the younger players ultimately start maturing. But let's face reality, the 2019-2020 season will be the most pivotal one in the direction of this proud Original Six Franchise which owns 11 Stanley Cup Championships.

2. The Detroit Tigers--also owned by the Illitch family are also in rebuild mode.

We get the MLB Package and while the Tigers are trying to develop from within, they're slowly freeing up money from undesirable contracts.

For a team that has made it to the World Series twice under retired Skipper Jim Leyland only to come up short, can another veteran Manager Ron Gardenhire see this project through and reap from the benefits in the next couple of years?

Time will tell as to what comes up from the farm.

But like the Red Wings, patience is something Owner Chris Illitch doesn't seem to lack as he remains loyal to his key front office people.

The one thing about baseball is teams can turn their losing fortunes around in three years and go from worst to first quite quickly as we've found out from the success of the Houston Astros and Chicago Cubs that ultimately led them to World Series Championships.

Just build a good young core of players and lock them up to long term contracts. Then keep building their farm systems.

The Tampa Bay Rays seem to make a lot out of nothing because of strong player development then find solid veterans to blend in.

3. The Detroit Pistons--had the distinction as the first team to play a playoff game in Little Caesars Arena (LCA).

During the regular season, the Pistons were swept 4-0 to the Milwaukee Bucks.

The same held true in the playoffs as Milwaukee won all four contests in the playoffs, all by double digits.

As a result, Detroit now owns the longest playoff losing streak in NBA History with 14.

Despite Griffin playing in two games, it never mattered, and after the season was over he underwent arthroscopic surgery on his left knee.

Milwaukee is considered favorites to win their first NBA Title since 1974.

But getting rid of Stan Van Gundy was a positive step last season. He trades the team's top draft choice to the LA Clippers who had a 48-34 mark in the Western Conference. Like the Clippers, the Pistons are the eight seed but compile a 41-41 mark.

Had Blake Griffin been healthy towards the end of the regular season, they wouldn't have drawn the match-up they ended up with.

Nevertheless, I do believe that Dwane Casey was a coaching upgrade over Van Gundy.

But until the Pistons get financial flexibility and start hitting on their draft choices, it wouldn't matter if they are playing downtown at LCA or the Palace Of Auburn Hills, the fans won't fill the stadium until they're convinced they're a legitimate entertainment option.

4. The Detroit Lions--There isn't much to say about this franchise except that I hope they don't waste away the career of another star player.

Contrary to what people say about Stafford, I do believe he's the best QB the Lions have had since Bobby Layne. He's the all-time leading passer in franchise history with 38,526 yards and 237 TD passes.

The team was relevant when Wayne Fontes was the head coach.

Does anybody remember the last QB to win a playoff game?

Erik Kramer.

He eventually left to play for the Chicago Bears.

In 1987, Jerry Vainisi was the Vice President of Player Personnel and when he departed to create and head the football operations of the World League of American Football (NFL Europe), the Lions haven't been relevant since in the front office.

He was a key contributor in the Lions success which produced a 38-6 win over the Dallas Cowboys as Detroit reached it's lone NFC Championship Game only to get clobbered on the road to the Washington Redskins 41-10.

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Unfortunately, I can't offer a guess as to who will break through and will create Metro Detroit's next championship wave of success.

If I was so smart, I would be working in the front offices of these teams.

So I'll hang out at the beach in sunny Florida and still cover these squads when they come here, when I'm in Metro Detroit, or if they play in a place I travel to get answers like the rest of us.

I do watch the Lions at Duffy's Sports Bar in South Florida.

In the meantime, I'll pull out my Rubik's Cube and try to conquer that puzzle.

But in the spirit of Mrs Anne Nozewski wherever you are, at least more people have heard about me because of my lengthy tenure in the media, my additional platforms, along with people trying to google my name.

Once upon a time at the beginning there was the Detroit Monitor. Now I've created an online publication, https://southfloridatribune.com/.

Now, I still have Eichorn around and there is Cyber Space which enables me to write on numerous platforms.

Stay Tuned.

Scott Morganroth can be reached at southfloridatribune@gmail.com.

My Social Media:
Twitter--Scoop33333
Instagram--southfloridatribune
Facebook--Sports Exchange and South Florida Tribune Pages.

Interesting Coaching Changes In South Florida

BY SCOTT MORGANROTH

There were two Interesting Coaching Changes recently in South Florida.

One I can understand while the other was mind boggling.

Let's start off with the mind boggling dismissal.

On November 27, 2016, former Red Wing Gerard Gallant was fired after going two-plus seasons with the Florida Panthers. Gallant was 96-65-25 in his tenure in South Florida.

Gallant led the Panthers into the playoffs last season and was replaced by General Manager Tom Rowe. According to Rowe, Gallant wanted a little bit more size and the Panthers wanted to go in a different direction.

In Florida's short tenure in the NHL dating back to 1993, Rowe becomes the Panthers 14th head coach to sit behind the bench at the BB&T Center in Sunrise, FL.

Gallant was a Coach Of The Year Finalist last year and now by Christmas, he will be home for the holidays. He led the Panthers to a division title last year and the best regular season in franchise history with a 47-26-6 mark with 103 points.

This season, the Panthers have battled injuries and were 11-10-1 when he was ousted.

As of this post, through 30 games, Florida is 13-13-4 with 30 points and would be out of the playoffs.

Fortunately for Gallant, he was under contract through the 2018-19 season, having signed a contract extension back in January.

As I mentioned before, Rowe becomes the 14th Panthers coach and the fifth person to be behind the bench in the last five years.

Nevertheless, I don't expect Gallant to be out of work long.

Who knows where his next stop will be and since he's being paid to go away, there is a new expansion team set to begin play in 2017-2018 and it's in another warm climate called the Vegas Golden Knights.

Golden Knights Owner Bill Foley is looking to build a winner quickly, and after a successful tenure in Florida, I wouldn't be surprised if Gallant becomes a serious candidate for this job.

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About 35 Minutes away in Boca Raton, FL., the Florida Atlantic University (FAU) Owls fired head coach Charlie Partridge.

In three years as coach of FAU, Partridge guided the Owls to a 9-27 record----with three consecutive 3-9 campaigns.

On Saturday, November 26, 2016, Partridge's last game with the Owls was one for the ages for perhaps all the wrong reasons.

FAU lost 77-56, and yes, this is a football score, to the Middle Tennessee State Blue Raiders on the road.

Folks in Michigan should be very familiar with FAU. The Owls defeated Central Michigan in The Motor City Bowl 24-21 on December 26, 2008.

FAU lost a pair of games to Michigan State in East Lansing, plus played the Spartans in a home game at Ford Field when its new on campus stadium wasn't completed on schedule.

FAU has only been to two Bowl Games under the legendary Howard Schnellenberger. In addition to the Motor City Bowl, FAU also played in the New Orleans Bowl. FAU is 2-0 in Bowl Games.

The program has recently produced some NFL players with the most notable being running back Alfred Morris of the Dallas Cowboys, in addition to QB Rusty Smith, formerly of the Tennessee Titans, wide receiver Lester Jean formerly of the Houston Texans, and many others.

Beautiful FAU Stadium has a capacity of 29,419, has a yearly Bowl Game and is the only venue in the USA that overlooks an ocean. If you're high enough, you can see the Atlantic Ocean. The stadium can also be expanded to as much as 60,000.

In the past couple of weeks, FAU's rival Florida International University (FIU) made a big coaching splash when it hired former Miami Hurricanes Coach Butch Davis.

When Partridge was fired, I knew that for FAU to be relevant, the Owls had to make a big splash of their own.

During FAU's last home game, on November 19, 2016, according to ESPN's Paul Finebaum, a crowd of around 5,800 saw the Owls lose to Old Dominion 42-24.

Aside from the loss to Middle Tennessee State, this is as close to rock bottom as you can get.

Some of the names which made sense to me that FAU would be ideal candidates for the job included former FIU Coach Mario Cristobal along with former Tampa Bay Bucs Head Coach, current Ohio State Assistant Coach and former Rutgers Head Coach Greg Schiano.

Another coach which came to mind was former University of South Florida (USF) Boss Jim Leavitt, who built that program from scratch and former Hurricanes Coach Randy Shannon.

All of these coaches have big Florida ties.

While none of these names will roam the sidelines, FAU did exactly what I feel they had to do and that was make a big splash with this hire.

The new coach is Lane Kiffin.

He's as high profile as it gets!

Kiffin was a head coach for the Tennessee Volunteers, USC Trojans and Oakland Raiders. He's been the offensive coordinator for Alabama the past three years under Nick Saban and has had the Crimson Tide competing for a National Championship.

Truthfully, I never thought that Kiffin and FAU could connect.

But as the opportunities dwindled with Baylor, Oregon, Houston, USF as well as other big time jobs being filled, this began to make more sense by the minute.

As I understand, Kiffin's salary at Alabama is $1.4 Million Annually but his three-year contract was up at the end of the season.

At FAU, he's slated to earn around $950,000 Annually over five years, but there is No State Income Tax in Florida, plus incentives.

Kiffin has a buyout after one year of $2.5 Million, but it goes down $500,000 each year over five years.

At age 41, Kiffin goes into a situation where he has a young football program which began play in 2001. Aside from the two Bowl wins, it has no real tradition.

FAU has won just 19 games during the past six seasons, and the entire athletic department's budget for this year was projected to be $27.1 Million.

This is an opportunity for him to build a legacy of his own and perhaps return to a Power Five Program down the road.

But to understand this hire, since Friday when Kiffin's name became a real possibility to become the Owls coach, the publicity FAU has received nationally is incredible.

Aside from traditional, social and digital media, ESPN and many of the other sports networks have swarmed like bees over this hiring.

ESPN has blanketed Kiffin's hiring on all of it's major programming platforms.

The Media is wondering whether Kiffin took a step backwards to go to a smaller program to return to the head coaching ranks. Some wonder if he fails at FAU will this be damaging to future opportunities?

Whatever story lines may be, the free publicity for FAU is comparable to hitting a grand slam home run.

Like Schnellenberger did from the outset, should Kiffin's offensive mastermind follow him to South Florida, this program could be a Hidden Gem. More importantly, Kiffin will have a chance to once again put this football program on the map.

One of Kiffin's strongest attributes is his ability to recruit.

With that said, the talent in Florida can support a lot of FBS teams when you consider Miami, Florida, Florida State, USF, UCF, FIU and FAU.

The State of Florida is a Gold Mind of talent all over the country. Michigan and Michigan State have recruited a lot of players to my home state.

There is no reason that FAU can't keep these players home as Kiffin hopes to do. I wouldn't be surprised to see Lane snap up a few prospects from California.

He'll be coaching in Conference USA which is a solid conference to play in and does produce it's fair share of NFL players.

While I know the hiring of Kiffin is drawing many mixed reviews on Facebook and Twitter, this is one time where I feel it's too early to make any preliminary predictions as to how well FAU and Kiffin do together.

In summary, My Gut Feeling tells me that FAU actually made a good hire, while the Florida Panthers decision to part company with Gerard Gallant is like trying to figure out the Rubik's Cube.

Scott Morganroth can be reached at www.scottsports33.com and is a member of The Detroit Sports Broadcasters Association.

Home Sweet Home?

BY SCOTT MORGANROTH


How did we get to the New FAU Football Stadium?

On October 15, 2010, ground was broken and exactly one year later, the $70 Million Facility hosted the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers as the start of a new era began in FAU Sports History.

Construction workers worked seven days a week giving up their Sundays to make the Saturday October 15th opener a reality.

This is the only stadium in the United States where you can see the Atlantic Ocean. The campus is 2.1 miles away from the Atlantic Ocean.

Prior to the game, the Star Spangled Banner was sung with a Full-Sized American Flag covering the entire field.

But the road to this Beautiful Venue saw Coach Howard Schnellenberger, Athletic Director Craig Angelos, former President Frank Brogan and his successor Dr. Mary Jane Saunders witness some lopsided defeats to some of the most heralded football programs in the country.

FAU took the guaranteed large payouts to Auburn, Clemson, Florida, Kansas, Kansas State, Kentucky, Louisville, Michigan State, Minnesota, Nebraska, Oklahoma State, South Carolina, Texas, and USF.

There were four notable wins as FAU defeated Hawaii, Central Michigan, Memphis and Minnesota. FAU defeated Memphis in the 2007 New Orleans Bowl and followed that triumph in the 2008 Motor City Bowl defeating Central Michigan.

A year ago, the Michigan State Spartans were supposed to open up FAU Stadium but that never materialized. FAU's home game was moved to Ford Field as the Owls shared a home with the Detroit Lions. FAU lost this game 30-17.

So instead of seeing the Spartans, Owls fans saw their team lose 20-0 to the Hilltoppers in front of 29,103. The score could have been worse for FAU if Western Kentucky would have converted three field goals and an extra point.

But these numbers tell the story!

FAU had only six first downs, 25 rushing and 121 total yards. More importantly, Owls fans would have to wait until Saturday October 22nd against the Middle Tennessee State Blue Raiders to see the first points in the new stadium at 8:07 PM.

On Saturday October 15th, No. 23 Michigan State defeated state rival No. 11 Michigan 28-14 in East Lansing, a place that wasn't kind to the Owls earlier this year. The Spartans whitewashed FAU 44-0 on September 10 in East Lansing.

When the contest was over, there was a huge sense of happiness and relief that the new on campus stadium dream has become a reality.

By the same token, now that the opener is over, reality has set in that FAU dropped to 0-6 and 0-3  in the Sun Belt Conference. The Owls are in last place and know they have to start winning games.

Quarterback David Kooi said, “Our offense was shaky and we put no points on the board. We didn't execute and just hurt ourselves. This was a great atmosphere and we didn't get the job done. I just want to say I'm sorry to the fans.”

Running back Alfred Morris added, “ I'm very disappointed and wanted it so bad. We just couldn't get it together. This was a very exciting atmosphere, it was crazy. We'll try to get them next time.”

Senior defensive back Marcus Bartels was in a somber mood when he said, “I never expected this. We feel like we let everybody down. I want to apologize to the fans.”

Coach Schnellenberger said, I've never been in a situation like this before. We worked so hard and so long to make this stadium. We played badly on the offensive side of the ball. We expected to win this game but yet played so poorly in front of dedicated fans. That's what happened and I have to deal with that. I'm the coach and I have to do fix this situation.”

Former Owls QB Rusty Smith now of the Tennessee Titans came in town due to his teams bye week. On this day, the Owls could have used him in his old No.11 jersey.

But now, the stadium is open for business. The team has to focus on winning since there will be no more hype.

It's all business as the Owls hope to send Schnellenberger out on a respectable note to end his 52-year coaching career
 
Game 2 at the new stadium would produce another loss and it was ugly.
 
The attendance was listed as 16,344 but in actuality, it looked like the crowd was in the 10,000 range.
 
What they saw was a team that fell behind 21-0 as Western Kentucky and Middle Tennessee scored 41 unanswered points. The Owls broke the scoring drought with 9:57 left in the second quarter. The Historical Touchdown was a Wilbert Graham to Darian Williams five-yard connection that was set-up by a 48-yard run by Morris.
 
In the first half, Middle Tenessee Sophomore QB Logan Kilgore set a school record with 19 straight completions for a school that's been playing football for 100 years. He used 10 different receivers to set the mark.
 
When the game was over, the Blue Raiders offense gained 479 yards to roll to a 38-14 win. FAU had eight fumbles, five were lost to go along with two interceptions and 55 yards in penalties. Morris did gain 153 yards.
 
At his post-game press conference, Schnellenberger looked like he was trying to figure out the Rubik's Cube.
 
"With all the experience I have, I can't figure out all the problems we have," he said. "It will be harder to teach and an involved process."
 
One thing is certain, FAU will have two weeks to digest the fact that its record has dropped to 0-7, 0-4 as it hosts Arkansas State on November 5th. In the meantime, there will be no bowl game in 2011 and the Owls can only hope for "A Win."
 
I do believe that when they field a competitive team, FAU Stadium will be a fun place to watch a game. It's a beautiful stadium.

But for now, the fallout of the first two weeks have given mixed reviews with plenty of more chapters to be written before we can say this indeed is a "Home Sweet Home."
 
Scott Morganroth's blog can be seen at http://www.scottsports33.com/ and he can be reached at scottsports33@aol.com.