Ron Rivera hints he "didn't mesh" with David Tepper

[Khyber53]

It was also a generational change in leadership going from Richardson to Tepper. Old school owner versus the new style of owner. Old money vs new money. 

And Rivera might be the youngest of the old school coaches out there. How he came up in the business speaking to ownership/management may have been extremely different from the younger generation of coaches making their way in the system today. 

Now, he's in the coaching chair as another old school-type owner is on the way out and a new school type of owner is on their way in. I think Rivera is referring to the need to be able to speak in a different method than just x's and o's to whoever takes ownership of the team. And I think he's facing the reality that if he doesn't learn the needed language, he's going to go the route of John Fox, Jim Caldwell, Lovie Smith and other relic head coaches that won't grab the head coaching gig again and will be relegated to advisory roles or the C-team on ESPN2 weekends.

I like Rivera as a person, I think there's a really first class guy there. As a coach, he's a player's coach who tries to develop hard-nosed, scrappy teams heavy on grit. The teams are throwbacks, as he is at this point, and he's got to find the secret formula to getting someone else to believe in putting the franchise in his hands again.

He mirrors Washington's organizations in soooo  many ways -- a relic direly needing a total makeover, a record that is meh and one that is starting to billow in the winds of change.

Good luck to him, but I think the task before him isn't going to work out in his favor. There's an entire sea change happening to Washington and I don't think he can find the magic.

[TheCasillas]

7 minutes ago, CamWhoaaCam said:

You can work with people you don't mesh with. Also who doesn't love a free dinner?

 

Im sure you have worked with people you don't mesh with on your job before.

 

No big deal dude. No need to keep discussing this.

I didnt take them to dinner nor did I join them for dinner. These guys had options for employment... and came back to us...

I think the discussion ended long ago when you were attempting to share a false narrative with little to no infromation to support it. I don't get the precedence or the drive to do so.

[TheCasillas]

2 minutes ago, CamWhoaaCam said:

apologize my friend. If you ever in Raleigh hit me up we can go have some coffee and talk about this in person. Have a good day friend.

You too. I appreciate the reasonable response, and the offer.

[countryboi]

He didnt mesh because he was on his way out, everyone was. This is what happens when you get a new owner, they build the team in their vision. The new Redskins owner is going to do the same

[Mr. Scot]

34 minutes ago, TheCasillas said:

but Luke, TD, and Greg are employees/ambassadors of the Panthers.... so that means they came back... not sure you can say they dont mesh with Tepper if your reasoning is going to be players leaving a franchise going through a rebuild... or retiring for the betterment of their long term health. 

Tepper wasn't the issue 

[PanthersATL]

48 minutes ago, CamWhoaaCam said:

Luke retired,

 

I don't think anybody saw Luke's retirement as a player as being attributed to Tepper.

There's a small chance that Luke retiring from his office job is slightly related, but there are plenty of stories about how that particular role wasn't the best fit for Luke, time-commitment-wise.

I'd love to see Luke brought on as a specialty education coach -- doing tape reviews with individual players, to teach his preparation and analysis skills.   Or even as a coach advisor, doing his own tape analysis and providing to the team.

 

 

[Icege]

Sounds like it wasn't so much Rivera that didn't mesh, but that he wasn't able to communicate a detail-oriented vision of the team's future.

[SmokinwithWilly]

18 minutes ago, Mr. Scot said:

Tepper wasn't the issue 

For entertainment value, go and watch the body language of the people around Rhule from year 1 to the beginning of year 3. It's like they all ate "fresh" sushi from backwoods gas station. 

[PantherOnTheProwl1523]

1 hour ago, CamWhoaaCam said:

Nobody meshed with Tepper from the Keep Pounding era.

 

Ron fired, Luke retired, TD left, Greg left, Cam got kicked out.

 

Then when Cam came back he mentioned something about this not being the same Panthers franchise as he once remembered. Saying that when you have major ownership change then stuff like this always happens. Key faces get moved around or moved out.

 

 

Luke left because of the many concussions he was dealing with and had nothing to do with Tepper. TD and Greg retired which was on their own recognizance because their time was up and their bodies couldn't take it anymore. Also nothing to do with Tepper.

[onmyown]

29 minutes ago, Mr. Scot said:

Tepper wasn't the issue 

Tepper hired him and offered him a contract other owners laughed at

Tepper was an is the issue until proven otherwise.

Why so many apologists? Is it because we are stuck with him? I still remember quite a bit of people on this forum backing moves JR for 2010 then go on to a two in season.

Y’all don’t have to love everything that the owner does and excuse all wrong…it’s weird

[ladypanther]

1 hour ago, CamWhoaaCam said:

Nobody meshed with Tepper from the Keep Pounding era.

Then when Cam came back he mentioned something about this not being the same Panthers franchise as he once remembered. Saying that when you have major ownership change then stuff like this always happens. Key faces get moved around or moved out.

 

 

See below:

 

 

 

 

 

32 minutes ago, Mr. Scot said:

Tepper wasn't the issue 

 

[MechaZain]

1 hour ago, CarolinaRideorDie said:

I took Rivera's comments as he as the HC didn't really have an explanation or plan for their vision. I can see it that way given how Tepper wanted precise and detailed answers from Frank Reich about building his staff and vision for the QB position. I didn't take it as a slight against Tepper from Rivera. 

Yeah, pleasantly surprising for a guy who was notoriously stubborn. It sounds like Washington has the best version of Rivera now, hope we can say the same for us with Reich.

[backINblack28]

1 hour ago, Khyber53 said:

It was also a generational change in leadership going from Richardson to Tepper. Old school owner versus the new style of owner. Old money vs new money. 

And Rivera might be the youngest of the old school coaches out there. How he came up in the business speaking to ownership/management may have been extremely different from the younger generation of coaches making their way in the system today. 

Now, he's in the coaching chair as another old school-type owner is on the way out and a new school type of owner is on their way in. I think Rivera is referring to the need to be able to speak in a different method than just x's and o's to whoever takes ownership of the team. And I think he's facing the reality that if he doesn't learn the needed language, he's going to go the route of John Fox, Jim Caldwell, Lovie Smith and other relic head coaches that won't grab the head coaching gig again and will be relegated to advisory roles or the C-team on ESPN2 weekends.

I like Rivera as a person, I think there's a really first class guy there. As a coach, he's a player's coach who tries to develop hard-nosed, scrappy teams heavy on grit. The teams are throwbacks, as he is at this point, and he's got to find the secret formula to getting someone else to believe in putting the franchise in his hands again.

He mirrors Washington's organizations in soooo  many ways -- a relic direly needing a total makeover, a record that is meh and one that is starting to billow in the winds of change.

Good luck to him, but I think the task before him isn't going to work out in his favor. There's an entire sea change happening to Washington and I don't think he can find the magic.

Perfect post and encapsulation of Rivera.  I loved Ron, more than anything in the sense that I see a good player coach that most guys would want to run through a wall for--any of his and Wilks locker room speeches--I don't see how anyone could just straight up not be a fan. 

With that said, he had several (clock/time/huddle management, conservative offensive outlook especially juxtaposed against having a QB that was impossible to stop on 4th and 3 and better, etc) 'old school' conservative quirks that I just thought okay--if we can pair this great player's coach with him getting the staff around him to essentially cover for his shortcomings, he could reach Reid.  Andy Reid had a ton of the same issues essentially that Patrick Mahomes put a huge 2/4 superbowl bandaid on. 

Had Rivera hired Pat Shurmur here instead of just promoting Shula when we lost Chud--that would have been a much better mix and IMO would have resulted in winning a super bowl we lost because we couldn't do things like *run one screen pass to backup a ridiculously over-aggressive pass rush*.  Rivera has learned some from that experience, but he's also stayed mostly the same.  He finally has Shurmur...possibly 8 years too late. T

The whole "riverboat" thing....he essentially changed that outlook because he was on the verge of being fired outright at 1-3 in year 3...and then after that season--he realistically wasn't doing Doug Pederson 4th down stuff. We would go for it on 4th and 1 with an unstoppable 250lb running QB and ESPN would tout here comes the riverboat like if we didnt go for it he didnt deserve to be killed in the streets for not letting Cam Newton try to get 1 yard rushing.  Never was he truly riverboat.  You could see Cam have to yell over to change his mind.  And god -- the amount of times we got playcalls in with 6 seconds left on the playclock/left timeouts in our pocket and could have had extra field goals...just so much conservative stubbornness that hiring one teenager who ever played Madden could have been like 'hey dude, don't do this thing, it's not 1985' and he could be similar to Reid, just on the defensive side.  Alas, here he is. On his last legs at a second job.

I maintain this best Rivera compliment--other than the promotion of Shula--I don't think he held back a healthy roster.  When Cam/most of our roster was healthy, we got results.  I think a lot of that is Luke/Cam masking some other glaring holes (WR, OL), but Rivera still deserves credit there.  He had awful injury luck that certainly did not help his shortcomings/stubborn ways, and I think inevitably Tepper was always going to want his own guy when it's not like Rivera was providing a glowing example of why he should stay.  

I don't blame Tepper for HIRING Rhule--the Giants wanted him as the top candidate of that coaching class and we stole them.  That was awesome.  I DO blame Tepper for holding onto him after two years of pretty much no discernible system/identity/signature wins other than beating Kingsbury a couple of times. I do love the new staff in place. And I think Tepper deserves credit for giving Wilks an opportunity to have the majority of the season to prove "I'm not Ron Rivera" to which Steve Wilks took and bottom line said "I hear you and all but also, I'm Ron Rivera."

[NanuqoftheNorth]

Sheesh!

Read between the lines people!

Rivera is basically admitting he screwed up on Tepper's meatball quiz.