2. Say it ain’t so, Joe Haden
I used to love Joe Haden. I still do. It’s not Joe’s fault that he became a Pittsburgh Steeler. It’s like the movie, Invasion of the Body Snatchers. He played the entire 2016 season with torn groin muscles that required surgery. The team was terrible, going 1-15, and the fans didn’t want to hear about Joe Haden needing surgery. They were just angry.
General manager Sashi Brown was worried about his team in 2017. Coach Hue Jackson was so good that he might win too many games and the Browns might not get the top quarterback in the draft that he was dreaming of (probably Sam Darnold or Josh Rosen, because they were big, tall kids with cannons at major universities).
So he decided to terminate veteran quarterbacks Robert Griffin III and Josh McCown…and Joe Haden. He would swallow $11 million of Haden’s salary over the next two years in order to trim $4 million from his budget and hopefully produce a poor record that would result in a star quarterback in the 2018 draft.
This writer blasted Brown for that move. At the time, I wrote: “Hello Browns! You’re sure Joe Haden is through, right? Because if not, there is going to be **** to pay, and heads may roll in the Front Office.”
I also questioned whether Brown was tanking the team, in the following question; “If they made the cut mainly to get $4 Million taken off the salary cap, and if they are deliberately seeking draft position over wins before the season starts, that is a very serious organizational issue.”
Not everybody agreed with this position. In particular, some fans were downright gleeful to finally get rid of old Joe Haden. They couldn’t wait to say DeShone Kizer and Corey Coleman torch his behind! Haden is old and slow! Coleman is young and speedy! Boy, this is going to be great! And actually, it did start out great as Kizer had the best game of his career in game one of the 2017 season losing a close game 21-18. Kizer even threw a touchdown pass to speedy Coleman.
But the thrill didn’t last. Old Joe turned into the same hard-nosed physical corner that he had been with Cleveland, and Corey Coleman sped off into the sunset. As prophesied, Sashi Brown was out of football by the end of the year.
Haden with the Steelers is kind of like seeing the girl you had a crush on in high school, and your Mom wouldn’t let you go out with her because she was from the wrong kind of family. Well, now she is more gorgeous than ever, like a Hollywood starlet, and she is Vice President of an Oil Company but married to a complete jerk.
No way is that guy better than you, but that’s the way it turned out and you have to pretend to be happy for her and her jerk husband. Don’t be jealous.
Every time I see Joe Haden in black and gold I feel like I’m going to throw up.