The Donovan Quandary

I think I talked about this before on this blog, but what did Donovan McNabb ever do to the people of Philly? Did he rape a bunch of school children? Did he unleash a plague on the city? Did he turn into a slum lord in downtown Philly?

For some reason it happened the day he was drafted. I do not specifically remember the draft and who the Eagles fans wanted, but it certainly wasn’t Donovan, because they booed him mercilessly and have really never stopped. Most recently the talk of the town was his benching in the Baltimore game and then Andy Reid deciding to start him again against the Cardinals on Thanksgiving day. Was he playing bad at the time of the Baltimore game, absolutely. But the fact is he was playing his 3rd bad game in a row, before which he was completing 63% of his passes with 10 TD’s and 4 INT’s while leading the Eagles to a 5-3 record. Guys are going to slump, it doesn’t mean you have to get rid of them.

Philadelphia is known as a rough sports town, the place that booed Santa Clause. But Philly does love its sports hero’s as well as anybody. How many kids in and around the area are named after Michael Jack Schmidt, millions I would say. They still hold Allen Iverson in high reverence. Bobby Clark once a hero for their beloved Flyers hockey team is still universal loved even though as the GM he tried to single handedly ruin the once proud franchise. Former Eagles players like Chuck Bednarik, Harold Carmichael, Mike Quick, Ron Jaworski, Randall Cunningham, Reggie White etc are granted hero status.

Their however is a Mt Rushmore of hated Philly athletes; Eric Lindros who brought it on himself, Pat Burrell who failed to live up to almost mythic expectations (though he has been an All Star and now key player on their World Championship team) and Donovan McNabb who has done nothing short of be a role model on and off the field, win games at a pace better than any QB in franchise history, while being a continuous league MVP candidate and doing it all without complaint, a fan base who isn’t totally behind him, and save for the TO years (yikes) without a tremendous amount of talent around him on offense.

Like I said to an Eagles fan friend of mine, there does come a time when the Eagles need to leave the McNabb years behind them. It happens with superstar athletes, look at Brett Favre. In some other cases other favorite franchises of mine had to part ways, the Giants with Lawrence Taylor, the Yankees with Don Mattingly and the Knicks with Patrick Ewing. In each case the player could still be a viable commodity but was no longer the once great player he had been and maybe it was just time for the franchise to move on without him.

That time will come with McNabb and maybe that time is sooner rather than later, but that doesn’t mean you have to kick the man out of the door. Appreciate McNabb for what he has meant to your franchise and treat him with the respect and reverence you treat guys like Schmidt, Clark, Carlton, and Iverson with. Remember all the wins and all the good games because the chances of getting someone like him again is slim.