Rex Ryan still has jokes about his nemesis, even as desperation intensifies
On Wednesday, Rex Ryan learned that the Buffalo media were gathered in a room at the Bills’ practice facility. They were holding a speakerphone-teleconference with New England Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman in advance of Sunday’s game.
This is routine public relations stuff in the NFL, but preparing for the Patriots these days is anything but routine. Due to suspension and injuries there’s no telling who might start at quarterback, a list that conceivably includes Edelman, who played the position in college.
Ryan, being Ryan, decided to have some fun. In between questions he walked up to the speakerphone and introduced himself as “Walt Patulski from the Buffalo News.” Patulski is a Bill from the 1970s and a Central New York native with an old-grizzled-newspaper-guy sounding name.
“Are you playing quarterback this week?” Ryan/Patulski asked Edelman.
Edelman didn’t appear to recognize Ryan’s voice and launched into a textbook Patriots answer: “I’m going to do whatever the coaches ask me to do. If they ask me to go out and bring a glass of water to someone on the sideline, I’m going to do that with a smile on my face to help my teammates. You can ask coach that one.”
“Alright, Julian, I will buddy,” Ryan/Patulski responded before walking away laughing.
“OK, Walt,” Edelman said.
It was funny, harmless, ridiculous, juvenile, spontaneous and, quite honestly, exactly what the No Fun League could use more. Football needs characters and personalities and a spark, what with television ratings down so far this year. Ryan is one. So too is his often comic foil, Bill Belichick, who might often speak in monotones but is almost always interesting in his own right.
Half the rest of the guys … not so much. They’d never dare become Walt Patulski because football is serious and preparation is serious and serious … serious … serious. Those 15 wasted seconds on a Wednesday morning might come back and haunt them on Sunday. Seriously.
The Bills are 1-2, of course. And since Ryan dared to joke, that fact has to be mentioned, like you can’t enjoy yourself unless you’re the ’72 Miami Dolphins.
It’s also a fact that he failed to find the playoffs last year, his first with Buffalo, or in any of his final four seasons with the New York Jets. He talks a lot, and especially a lot about New England, but he never has consistently surged past Belichick – which, mind you, is a heck of a professional bar to clear. If he coached in a different division, who knows?
In a sport where results are everything, results really are everything sometimes. The journey there, good or bad, is rarely appreciated from outside the building. So if you crack some jokes but not enough victories, you get ridiculed. Either way, no one will be shocked if this is Ryan’s last season as an NFL head coach. To say he could use a win in Foxborough on Sunday is an understatement.
It’s a far cry from 2010, when Ryan appeared en route to everything, his oversized personality, ultra-aggressive defense and player’s coach tendencies changing the NFL. He’d arrived in New York in 2009 after a long stint as defensive coordinator for the great Baltimore Ravens units. His father was Buddy Ryan, the great architect of the 1986 Chicago Bears defense and a wild man personality through his own long NFL career. His brother Rob, with the flowing locks and Captain Caveman looks, was defensive coordinator in Cleveland.
Eventually the Harbaugh brothers would meet in a Super Bowl, but in 2010 (with Jim Harbaugh still in the college ranks at Stanford) the more likely pairing to achieve that would have been the Ryans. This was a coaching dynasty in the making, a family trinity of brash-talking, always-pounding Ryans, father, sons and the Holy Blitz.
Rex’s Jets went to the AFC title game in his first season. They appeared on HBO’s “Hard Knocks” for the following training camp, delivering the show by far its most entertaining season – “let’s get a [expletive] snack.” That January they beat a loaded Patriots team, in Foxborough, to advance again to the AFC championship game. It was Ryan’s greatest night.
Since that game he’s 35-49. Rob Ryan has bounced from Cleveland to Dallas to New Orleans and is now working for his brother in Buffalo, his fifth coordinator job. Buddy died last summer.
This isn’t the glorious future that seemed apparent six seasons ago.
Rex Ryan seems to be trying to enjoy the opportunity he has and, as always, see where it lands. He has always said bold things. He has always poked the bear. He has always promised greatness. He has always sought to entertain.
One time when the Jets were playing the Browns he held a news conference dressed up like Rob. When someone mentioned Belichick, he said he wasn’t there to “kiss the rings.” When he first got the Buffalo job he promised to live where it snowed the most. Then he bought a custom-painted monster truck to assure he could make it to work.
It sounded better when it was working. It received less criticism when it was winning. To Rex’s way of thinking, if he isn’t himself, if he isn’t portraying confidence then it can’t work. Some of it is just himself. Some of it is calculating.
Back during those AFC championship game runs, Ryan would often try to get into a focused battle with the opposing quarterback – namely Peyton Manning or Tom Brady – in an effort to take the focus off his QB, a young and not remotely as good Mark Sanchez. Look at me. Laugh at me. Maybe Mark can prepare without extra pressure.
There was a method to the madness.
“Obviously, [Belichick’s] style works a hell of a lot better than my style,” Ryan said this week, according to the Buffalo News’ Jerry Sullivan (a real person). “So I’ll give him that. But I learned a long time ago, you got to be yourself in this league. If I tried to be Bill Belichick, that would never work. … Some guys try to copy that style. They’re phonies. Belichick does it, that’s who he is. Belichick is the most consistent guy there is. I try to be consistent, in a different way.”
Differently consistent. Unapologetically himself. If this season is Rex’s last stand, if this is his last trip as an NFL head coach to New England, this time with his brother riding-shotgun, well, he’s doing it his way. Or Buddy’s way. Or Walt Patulski’s way.
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