An example of Bill Polian's "genius"

[Cyberjag]

drafted peyton manning. that's about the extent of it. nothing else special about what he did.

btw, he's the guy that hired jim mora, sr. he wasn't allowed to hire any coaches after that and he was against hiring dungy.

polian isn't liked around the league. he and his son are considered toxic, meddlers, and pricks.

their success had everything to do with peyton and little to do with building a team. they had a lot of success drafting from '98-'06, but after that was considered pretty bad...and a lot of that had to do with their personnel guru and top talent evaluator, dom anile, getting pushed out of the job by polian's son.

Based on the results he's gotten, I guess he's just the luckiest GM to ever live, huh?

[rayzor]

this is completely false

no it's not. if you idsagree with it, you're either blinded or just haven't been paying attention. the guy was/is not liked by a lot of people. he's abrasive to boot.

good read from a few years ago... http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/story/9968427

excerpt:

He has claimed the story is false, this Mr. Belligerent, this occasional non-practitioner of subtlety and decorum. The story might be false, but if it is true, and it likely is, it would best exemplify the thorny, bruiser personality of Indianapolis Colts president Bill Polian.

Earlier this season, numerous media outlets reported that Polian shoved a New York Jets employee after the person placed loudspeakers too close to the Colts bench for the liking of Mr. Belligerent.

Though Polian stated in an interview with a Buffalo newspaper that the incident never occurred, other media reported that Polian was forced to apologize to the employee in writing.

The Jets were incensed at Polian's behavior and later, when the Colts played New England, the Patriots took advantage of his hot-head reputation by playing a little gamesmanship. They asked the league office for protection of their employees from Polian.

If you talk back to Polian, you will get an earful, quick as Mercury. If you write something not to Mr. Belligerent's liking, you will get dirty looks tossed your way and maybe a few dirty words as well.

In the press box, while watching games, he has been known to repeatedly pound the table with his fists in anger at a failed play on the field.

There is little question that although Polian is respected by many people in football, he is intensely disliked by others.

He can be a bully and jerk, this Mr. Belligerent, but also uber-talented and a future Hall of Famer, a screamer and yeller, a builder of franchises, a man who sometimes seems to enjoy far too much demeaning other human beings, an intimidator, and one of the best football minds this league has ever seen.

Polian is called "Napolian" by the website profootballtalk.com and a great man by quarterback Peyton Manning. Both are true descriptions of Mr. Belligerent.

This is also true of Polian: He is a winner. In his 19 seasons as a pro football general manager, Polian has had 10 teams that have won at least 11 regular-season games. That is a remarkable accomplishment.

Polian wins, but his personality is about as cute and cuddly as a moray eel.

This is the same man who, when in Buffalo, bullied a significant number of Bills employees, seeming to enjoy his pulpit and malpractices against people far too much. Once, Señor Belligerent got in a three-point stance and challenged an agent to demonstrate what the agent knew about offensive line play. That is a true story. It is too bad the agent was not Deacon Jones.

and another...

Polian, who habitually watches games from the press box, is a prickly, ultra-intense, control freak of a man who sometimes makes a spectacle of himself in such settings. In January of 2004, when the Colts were in the process of suffering a 24-14 road defeat to the Patriots in the AFC Championship game, Polian angrily and visibly reacted to the rough treatment of the Indy receivers by New England's defensive backs.

.

.

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When the Colts finally defeated New England, 40-21, at Gillette Stadium in November of '05, Polian, according to nbcsports.com's Tom Curran, watched then-New England backup quarterback Doug Flutie scramble on the last play and blurted out, "Break his leg."

I didn't hear the remark, but I'm fairly sure he wasn't wishing Flutie good luck.

Last season, during an October game between the Colts and Jets at Giants Stadium, Polian went even further, quite literally taking matters into his own hands. According to a report on FOX's pre-game show by Jay Glazer, Polian became upset before the game that loudspeakers had been set up too close to the field and began arguing with a New York Jets operations employee. At one point, Glazer reported, Polian grabbed the employee by the lapels of his suit jacket and jacked him up against the wall of a tunnel underneath the stands.

According to Glazer, Jets general manager Mike Tannenbaum raised the issue with a league office, and Polian was later forced to write a written apology.

http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?slug=ms-thegameface110207

and it doesn't take much effort to see more about the reputation polian has around the league.

[bleys]

didn't this news already come out about 2 years ago?

[Montsta]

I used to beast people at the arcade with biakabatuka and Jeffers on NFL Blitz. I had the high score all time and wanted to remove the game from there like George did on Seinfeld with Frogger

[saX man]

no it's not. if you idsagree with it, you're either blinded or just haven't been paying attention. the guy was/is not liked by a lot of people. he's abrasive to boot.

good read from a few years ago... http://www.cbssports...l/story/9968427

excerpt:

and another...

and it doesn't take much effort to see more about the reputation polian has around the league.

It is true that Chris is a spoiled d*ck but the perception of Bill is very skewed. I'll admit a bias because of relations but that's as far as I'll go.

More specifically, he's not a prick. He'll sit in the 500s at BOFA occasionally for home games and he's a very down to earth guy. On the actual management side of things, he was put into a situation in Indy where he came into a organization with a very hands-off owner who all of a sudden became hands-on when Peyton got injured and is now trying to do damage control. The upper tiers of NFL management are a hard game to play, they are all meddlers to a degree but Polian is not what these bullsh*t articles make him out to be. A lot of false info being thrown around.

[rayzor]

Based on the results he's gotten, I guess he's just the luckiest GM to ever live, huh?

he had some talent, but not as much as the success that his track record would lead you to believe.

the success of the colts had more to do with peyton and dungy than polian's team building skills.....which were diminishing over time.

he drafted peyton insted of ryan leaf...but that should have been a no brainer anyway because leaf's bad attitude and lack of work ethic and intangibles were pretty well known, but he was highly touted because of his size and "cannon for an arm".

drafting edge instead of ricky williams...edge had been impressing more people in the interviews pre-draft than williams, mainly because people were getting the idea that williams was a flake. williams had been slipping down people's draft boards for weeks heading into the draft. again...if you pay attention to personalities, it is more of a no brainer and both leaf and williams showed that you need to pay attention to those things.

but how long ago was that? even if it showed his skills as a talent evaluator.

how many times did he hit it with draft picks in the last 5 or so years he was there? and i'm not talking about the udfas that he landed because that's more luck than anything...otherwise shouldn't they have been drafted?

how often, aside from vinitieri did he hit it in FA?

sorry....i'm just not awed by his accomplishments. during his tenure he only had 2 more probowlers and one more all-pro drafted than we did.

and i haven't even brought up his decision to hire his son as GM.

[rayzor]

I'll admit a bias because of relations but that's as far as I'll go.

all that needs to be said.

your opinion is skewed.

[magnus]

Colts owner Jim Irsay says Polian wanted to trade away Peyton Manning in 2004 (link)

Bill Polian is also the guy who was once known for throwing a chair at an agent during contentious negotiation and who, when asked whether he had any concerns about the durability of first round draft pick Tshimanga Biakabutuka, said flatly "None" :unsure:

he also came somewhat close at one point, rumors said, that Carolina was going to trade a 1, Collins, and more, for the pick that became Manning.

[csx]

all that needs to be said.

your opinion is skewed.

And yours is based upon a google search, no?

[Cyberjag]

he had some talent, but not as much as the success that his track record would lead you to believe.

the success of the colts had more to do with peyton and dungy than polian's team building skills.....which were diminishing over time.

he drafted peyton insted of ryan leaf...but that should have been a no brainer anyway because leaf's bad attitude and lack of work ethic and intangibles were pretty well known, but he was highly touted because of his size and "cannon for an arm".

drafting edge instead of ricky williams...edge had been impressing more people in the interviews pre-draft than williams, mainly because people were getting the idea that williams was a flake. williams had been slipping down people's draft boards for weeks heading into the draft. again...if you pay attention to personalities, it is more of a no brainer and both leaf and williams showed that you need to pay attention to those things.

but how long ago was that? even if it showed his skills as a talent evaluator.

how many times did he hit it with draft picks in the last 5 or so years he was there? and i'm not talking about the udfas that he landed because that's more luck than anything...otherwise shouldn't they have been drafted?

how often, aside from vinitieri did he hit it in FA?

sorry....i'm just not awed by his accomplishments. during his tenure he only had 2 more probowlers and one more all-pro drafted than we did.

and i haven't even brought up his decision to hire his son as GM.

Don't forget his good luck in Buffalo and Carolina before then. Pretty impressive streak for a guy with no talent, huh?

[rayzor]

i said he had some, not none.

pay attention.

[Mr. Scot]

Polian picked a guy who's in the conversation for the greatest of all time at his position, but - outside of Ryan leaf apologists - most would call that pick a no-brainer.

The team he built around that guy became a perennial doormat for a team run by a sixth round pick surrounded by a bunch of role players.

Very easy to believe that Manning with a better team around him would have multiple rings by now.

[Stroupe-a-loop]

Look, that Colts roster deteriorated under him. He made some good picks at first but that roster was awful by the end. Like people said, that success was a product of Manning and without him it was one of the worst teams I've ever seen.

As for his time here, his first rounders were Kerry Collins, Tyrone Poole, Blake Brockemeyer, Tshimanga Biakabatuka, and Rae Carruth. He went 7-9 twice and 11-5 once. That's basically Hurney's resume with a worse first round record.

Good on him for fixing the Bills, but that just makes him a good GM, not one of the best ever.

[bleys]

all that needs to be said.

your opinion is skewed.

you're also basing an opinion without any knowledge of the man besides a few articles, which we both can agree have a possibility of being just as speculated about in their opinion as does your opinion which was simply formed from said articles..

I don't really care who Polian is or what he does from here on out, but let's be honest here.. I'll take a weird chance on someone who knows the man over articles and their potential bias any day. It's a neat insight if true and something different if not. At the end of the day who says that opinion is any more real than those articles..