Would You Give Holmgren Another Shot?

by: William P. Tomisser

Hey Addicts. I had a discussion with my good friend in Seattle who has been sharing my season tickets for 34 years now. We were talking about whether we would welcome Holmgren back now and bag this new regime if we had the chance. The discussion got a bit spirited so it seemed it might be something other Seahawk fans would like to discuss and comment on.

I thought since it's pretty slow Seahawk news wise these days, maybe it would be a good topic of discussion here at SA so let me throw this one out there.

Here's the postulation. If you were granted the power to do so (a one time GM decision making privilege), would you revert the club back to having Holmgren back as head coach and undo everything that has taken place so far with Mora and his newly hired coaching staff since the season ended?

You would be reverting back to having everything in place as it was at the end of the season and Holmgren and his coaching staff would be the ones to pick up the pieces and try to turn the club around for the coming season. You would be giving Holmgren a three year extension so it wouldn't be another lame duck season in 2009. Holmgren would be back as if he had never retired. You could just set aside the whole Mora hiring.

Would you pull the trigger?

My friend and I were divided on the issue and I'm not going to say which way.

One viewpoint was that it was time for Holmgren to go anyway and we really needed to get a fresh perspective in place in a number of areas. Except for the Super Bowl year in 2005, we weren't getting to the conference title game and we really needed to shake things up and try a different approach. Happy with Mora and what we see so far, the excitement is back in Seahawk football and that shouldn't be traded for going back to the way things were headed under coach Holmgren.

The other viewpoint was that Holmgren is a future HOF coach and after last season's debacle, Holmgren would have been chomping at the bit to reassert himself and get the team back to it's accustomed place as the NFC West Champs. Embarrassed, Holmgren would have coached his ass off and showed again why he's one of the best. Better to have a coach who's been there and done that rather than rely on a new guy on just his second job as head coach. Experience counts and counts big especially when you're recovering from such a dismal season. The Seahawks had their greatest success ever under coach Holmgren and he should have been the one to bring the Seahawks back to power.

Of course, we're also supposing that Holmgren would have wanted to coach three more years here.

I know we've knocked this one around before here at SA a little bit but not since Mora hired his staff and we've known who's going to be coaching this season under Mora. Now we have all the marbles in place so we can make the comparison and the discussion should be valid. There were a lot of people who thought Holmgren was ousted and who said they didn't want to see him go. Others were unsure and yet others favored a change. Now that we can clearly see who the new staff is comprised of, it should be easier to make an evaluation.

So, you newly appointed "one shot" GM's, you make that big impact call. Do we continue on with Mora or should we go back to our old future HOF coach and give him another chance? Remember that Ruskell's still in place as GM after you horn in and upset the apple cart with your one time decision so whoever wins your support would still have to work with him. Factor that into your decision.

The Seahawks are in your hands Addicts. Heaven help us.

Hasta,

BillT

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