While we Colts fans are red hot at the Colts front office for seemingly botching the injury recovery of Peyton Manning, members of the 'established media' are fire-breathing mad at them for different reasons today.
Earlier this morning, news broke over Twitter, via Colts owner Jim Irsay, that the team had signed veteran quarterback Kerry Collins. This tweet happened during Colts head coach Jim Caldwell's morning news presser. I mean, like, right smack dab in the middle of it!
While the news on Twitter made its way through the media members on hand to ask questions of Caldwell, the Colts head coach did not mention the team's acquisition of Collins.
Not once.
When it came time for media to potentially ask Caldwell about Irsay's tweet, he'd apparently left the press room. Needless to say, this seemed to REALLY piss off people like Bob Kravitz, Paul Kuharsky, Tom James, and especially Phil Wilson, who wrote about as scathing an article on Caldwell and his motives that I've ever read from the Indy Star reporter.
If the intent here is to discourage us from asking Caldwell too many questions, just one man talking here, but it’s working. I’m to the point where I doubt if I’m ever going to get anything useful from the head coach. Sorry. Nice guy, but just telling it the way I think it is. And if you think I’m the only idiot in the media who feels this way, ask around.
Dang.
Now, there are two possibilities as to why Caldwell didn't bring up the Collins signing:
- He's so far out of the loop with front office moves that he didn't know, which speaks very ill of Caldwell's status within the club, or
- He knew and chose not to bring it up because he didn't want to answer questions about it.
Both options do not paint Caldwell in an especially happy light.
From Paul Kuharsky:
It sure seems to me like Irsay’s timing there made his coach look bad or uniformed or out of the loop. I don’t know why an owner would allow for, or add to, the perception that Caldwell ranks as weak in the organization.
I'm all for a team having multiple voices. Usually they don't talk over one another.
From Bob Kravitz:
Decision to tweet Collins news during Caldwell presser (during which he didn't mention Collins) makes Caldwell look bad, out of loop.
From Phil Wilson:
Colts coach Jim Caldwell angered the media today with his Collins announcement. Oh, yeah, that’s right. He didn’t even bring it up, reminding us that sometimes the franchise’s age-old policy on such things is "Don’t ask, don’t tell." I’m hoping Chris Polian, if he is indeed running the day-to-day stuff, can change this.
Because seconds after Caldwell departed from the podium, we learn the Colts have signed Collins. And Caldwell knew. Of course he did. Caldwell was Collins’ position coach at Penn State. Bill Polian drafted Collins fifth overall in 1995 while in Carolina. It fits. But we had to learn about the singing from owner Jim Irsay’s Twitter account. (Thanks again, Jimmy, the check is in the mail, I promise.)
Wilson is of the thought that Caldwell knew of the signing, but chose not to bring it up. If so, that's pretty douchey of Caldwell, especially if his owner is tweeting the news while he's talking to the media.
Regardless of his motives, or the motives of Irsay and the front office, the way this announcement was handled has pretty much pissed off just about everyone who can be pissed off.
Colts media relations in a nutshell, folks.
Again, I know this is something you hear often from me, but when I rail against the Colts for how they treat fans and media, I'm clearly not alone in my opinions. Everyone in Indianapolis media (save Colts sock puppet Dan Dakich) feels the same way. I mean, seriously. When the team has managed to piss off rabid Colts apologist Nate Dunlevy and even-keeled Phil Wilson on the same day, you know it's a titanic media and fan relations screw-up.
It will be interesting to see if Caldwell's relationship with Wilson becomes icy after Phil's throw down of the third year head coach. Regardless, I applaud Phil for his honesty. Might be nice to see a few more local media types grow a pair and actually demand some accountability from this organization.