Pete Carroll and Bill Belichick: Role Model and Cautionary Tale

[Labgrownmangoat]

I don't know if you guys read Mike Tanier, but for my money he's one of the best in the business. His latest column starts:

Pete Carroll is seven months older than Bill Belichick.

Most hardcore fans are aware that Carroll is older. Among casual fans, you could win a lot of bets with this information. The 63-year-old Carroll appears youthful and hearty; he could grab a box of Just for Men and dye his way down to his mid 40s if he tires of the "silver fox" look. Belichick, who turns 63 in April, looks like a bus driver forced to work past retirement age because his pension was gutted. Carroll could play an action movie hero, and it would not have to be an Expendable. Belichick would play the scowling wizard corroded by his exposure to dark sorcery.

It's wrong to equate appearance with virtue. But Carroll and Belichick, viewed side-by-side, look like Kennedy and Nixon in the 1960 presidential debates. Who would you vote for? If they each knocked on the door, and neither was famous, who would you welcome into your house?

Carroll enters Super Bowl XLIX as a role model, a leader for the millennial age, a figure of vitality and a symbol for a brand of success that transcends earning money or winning football games. On the heels of Deflategate, Belichick arrives in Arizona as a cautionary tale, a grasping holdover from the days when greed was good, a reminder of what winning at all costs really costs.

It sounds trite. Judgments based on appearances will get you in trouble every time. No, we don't know these men—only their images. But they are images each man has projected and cultivated for two decades. . .

It's on the dreaded BleacherReport, but Tanier has written for all kinds of outlets, including the New York Times. The whole thing is worth a read. Hilarious stuff, from where I stand. . .

 

[DonyellFreak]

I like Belichick and Brady, I dislike the deflategate thing but you know where you stand with those two they want to beat your head in and keep running up the score when they do. No fake nice guy act out of them like you get with Peyton manning.

I wouldn't trade Pete for Bill but if the Seahawks weren't playing tomorrow I'd back N.E. I like their way of doing things. I hope we send Tom off the field a loser like we did Manning last year, beating the two lock HOF QB's of the early 2000's would be an amazing feather in the cap of this Seahawks club.