Dialing back a year plus to the end of the first of two seasons in which the Stillers did not make the playoffs, I was in the camp that said Tomlin needed to win, or else. Recall, also, that that was in the context of Tomlin’s contract coming up and then his getting an extension. Recall, also, that his extension was rather short, as coaches’ extensions go. So, Stiller management was, to some degree, on board with “win or else”. Naturally, having to insert Mason Hardheaded Rudolph and Devin Duck Dodges (now available to teams needing a replacement QB) behind center made winning a goal much more difficult to reach. As most commentators including me will say, the fact the Tomlin was able to get an offense held together with baling wire and bubble gum to an 8-8 record was a tribute to his coaching skill. Accordingly, and to be fair, dialing back the “Fire Tomlin” is both fair and just. OTOH, this year he has a healthy-so-far Ben, a useful cast of backs, ends and receivers on O, and the same brutal D. So, assuming no major injuries, a deep playoff run is almost mandatory for Tomlin to either get extended again (IIRC next season is his last on this deal) or get a new deal. Missing the playoffs for the third year in a row could be a job terminator. This, particularly in the 7-team format now in place – we woulda been in last year, under this year’s format.

It’s worth noting that while the Stillers don’t change coaches the minute a great QB retires, there is some level of correspondence. I’d have to look at the dates and such, but replacing Bradshaw (#12 on your program) with the immortal Bubby Brister (appropriately #6 on your program; surely half the QB Bradshaw was) would have been enough for any coach to say “enough”. And, so, replacing Ben with whomever may catalyze a Tomlin departure, particularly if Ben closes things out on a down note.

So, we can put firing Tomlin on the back burner, turned way down low, until things develop one way or the other.

On the issue of Big 10 kids wanting to play and filling stadia (even part way) and all the rest, I have to come down in favor at least of the games being played. Like it or not (I don’t), the stepwise perversion of the ideal of the student-athlete into the unpaid minor leaguer playing under the flag of State, Tech or the U (of whichever state or city) and taking gut classes between practices has left a collegiate generation (i.e., 4 years’ worth) of kids with a gaping hole in their resume for their hoped-for next job. These games are resume-builders for the kids, who have struggled and worked most of their lives for the chance to play for pay Sunday instead of for meals and rooms Friday night or Saturday. I know the odds are against them making it, but they knew that going in. Stacking the odds further is just unfair to the kids.

To move the example away, consider the kid who has the chance to try out for Julliard but isn’t sure he’ll make it. You take the chance because those chances only come along once. A kid from a fine near-Ivy Eastern college developed into a good pitcher while studying and playing (in that order) there. A major league team didn’t draft him but tendered him a minor league contract as an UDFA after his junior year. In the time of corona, do you sign, go to the minors and forego your final season of eligibility AND senior classes, or do you stay in school?

Tough choices. Decisions to be made now, for opportunities which will most likely never come again. Good arguments on both sides. But denying the opportunities out of fear of a virus (which has likely already spread through the neighborhood) is more than a little high-handed.

On the PA decision, before you undertake to come down one way or another or all over the block about it, do take the time to read it and digest it. The judge did a remarkable job in a very short time frame. Keep in mind that Wolf’s decrees were constructed by people who never created any objective criteria for which activities would or would not be allowed, in committees whose members were never named and whose composition repeatedly changed, with no objective criteria for anything, and a waiver process that suffered under the same opacity and subjectivity, which allowed some businesses to operate and others not despite their selling the same things or services, and then closed down the waiver process so those which had not received waivers could never receive them. Take the time and read the opinion carefully.

An acquaintance once worked as a contracted advisor in an African country run by a strongman and notorious for both its corruption and its rather ruthless approach to dissent. Pennsylvania’s approach to its shutdown makes that country look the model of Athenian democracy and enlightenment (except that Wolf hasn’t had henchmen wiping out opponents and their families. Yet). Pennsylvania politics being what it is (corrupt) I have little doubt that the “life-sustaining/non-life-sustaining” distinction and particularly the waiver process were replete with favors asked, granted, and paid for. That is the only real-world-believable reason for all that work being done with no record created. Recall, around the beginning of summer the media outlets in PA made open records requests for documents around the waiver process: how waivers were being granted/denied, criteria, who was or was not getting them, etc. Wolf’s administration denied the requests because the state’s offices were closed and the requests couldn’t be processed until the offices were reopened after corona was vanquished, at some indefinite future time.

Under PA’s application of the life-sustaining/non-life sustaining definition they made up out of thin air, the company that makes (everyone’s favorite) Marshmallow Peeps was allowed to remain open and operating, while every realtor in the state (and law firm) was ordered to close. I read, at the time, that people were complaining Wolf’s personal business was allowed to continue operating; it was unclear whether his business’s competitors were, too.

And before you go on about how “it was for a Good purpose” or “they were trying to stop people from dying”, please keep in mind a couple things. One, Wolf’s or your definition of “Good purpose” doesn’t necessarily match other people’s definitions of “Good purpose”. “For a Good purpose”, a governor could decree a public health emergency in that a large loss of life goes on in abortion clinics, so they must be shut down. Or he could go even further and have waivers granted (or denied) to women of one race but not another. It’s not inconceivable; I’m sure it was discussed in some red state capitol somewhere. Where Wolf went is a very treacherous slope.
Two, “people might die” is, in the long run, a banality. Every one of us will die one day. The politicians are arrogating unto themselves the power of life and death, dangling the false promise that only they can save you from death, but only if you obey them.

One more thing about Wolf’s shutdown. As the judge rightly noted, this kind of shutdown is unprecedented in American history. It was the equivalent of home confinement, a sometimes punishment imposed as part of a criminal sentence. Only this time, the entire country was turned into a big jail, without trial, on the decree of politicians.

So, before you go off, take the time and read the opinion, then allow it to digest for at least a day.

And I’m saying this as someone who, for once, was an early adopter. I’m pretty sure I had a relatively-minor case of corona in early April. It was back when you weren’t supposed to go to the doctor lest you contaminate the office. So I didn’t. I sucked it up and gutted it out at home. It wasn’t as bad as others’ cases (very thankfully) but it sucked nonetheless.

“Public health” is a good and legal reason for what the state did. I’m just sorry for PA that some of its judges don’t understand it.
(CA is still pretty much locked down. We’re still mostly functioning.)