We’ve all been here at one point or another…seeing people fall upward and thrive all the while knowing good and well that the ascension – the come up – is fueled by nothing but audacity, charm, and bluster.
Former Panthers head coach Matt Rhule BS’ed his way to Charlotte and sold David Tepper that same premium blend of BS to buy more time at the helm. But the thing is, you can BS your way to the top however, at some point, you’ll get exposed. In Rhule’s case, he’s been exposed as a fraud as a coach years ago. Now, he’s being exposed as a prolific liar and a coward – ducking the fade of responsibility for putting the Carolina Panthers in a hole they are trying to claw out of.
Recently, Rhule appeared on ‘The Season With Peter Schrager’ podcast and had the audacity to thrash the franchise and absolve himself of his role in the team’s overall state. Among the lowlights of the interview, Rhule said:
“He wasn’t the GM and didn’t make picks.”
“That Tepper ‘sped things up and changed the timeline.”
Sigh! This man is being obscenely obtuse and shameless in his damage control tour. His lie game is more elite than his coaching ever was in Carolina. First of all, Rhule absolved himself of the responsibility of general roster construction and draft picks when in actuality, he had more control of personnel decisions than any coach outside of Bill Belichek.
Justin Fields was there for the Panthers to select in the draft. Reportedly, even Tepper wanted him. Instead, they selected Jaycee Horn. I’m not saying that Horn was a bad pick, but the immediate need was for a quarterback. Ruhle oversaw the decisions of the roster. For example, he willingly twerked for Sam Darnold and Baker Mayfield when they had Fields and other QB options available in the draft. Now that it didn’t work out like he expected with Darnold and Mayfield, he wants to backpedal quicker than “Prime Time” in his prime. Now, it’s “I’m not the GM.I didn’t make the decisions.” But he did and he screwed up the roster behind those decisions.
Rhule’s assertion that Tepper ‘sped up the timeline’ was another lie. Rhule had three years. Three years to turn the team around and he failed miserably-turning a proud, competitive team into an incompetent and impotent shell of itself. The NFL stands for “Not For Long” if you aren’t winning, it’s nothing for you to be gone. Honestly, Rhule should have been gone immediately after last season.
Not only that Rhule sucked as a coach in terms of X’s and O’s, but he also was garbage in managing his “Jimmys and Joes”. It was nothing for Rhule to throw his players under the bus and shift the blame for his mistakes. Two classic examples could be found in the way he ran down and berated Eli Apple and blamed Cam Newton for a couple of losses against Buffalo and Atlanta in his second stint as a Panther. What Rhule failed to realize in his three years at the helm is that what you can get away with in college, you can’t get away with in the NFL. Rhule dealt with grown men. He couldn’t just talk to these players like he would at Baylor, or at Temple.
Since the Panthers fired Rhule and Defensive Coordinator Steve Wilks took over, the team is competing and even has a shot at the playoffs. Now, Rule wants to go on this media tour like people actually care what he has to say, flap his gums and bloviate to anyone with an NFL platform and try to take credit for Wilks is doing.
Rhule is right; he is responsible for the culture change in Carolina. Responsible for destroying it with his bluster and mediocrity and starting the rebuild when he hit the unemployment line.
With these appearances, Rhule is the ex that won’t go away is giving Rhule more reverence than he deserves. Saying that he’s more like the soup and spaghetti stain you can’t get out of your plastic bowl is more fitting.