After Sunday’s victory over the Detroit Lions, the Buffalo Bills carried defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz off of Ford Field on their shoulders. While that may seem a bit overboard for a regular season game (Ok, it’s totally overboard for a regular season game), Schwartz really wanted his ‘Rudy’ moment against Detroit, where he was the head coach of the Lions between 2009 and 2013. He reportedly went so far as to request the carry-off during the offseason:
Randell Johnson, one of the players who gave Schwartz the celebratory lift, said they just were doing what Schwartz asked back in Organized Team Activities this spring.
“He said that once he plays his former team that he wanted to be carried off and chant and have fun, and we just tried to make a dream come true,” Johnson said.
Lions players were understandably salty with Schwartz rubbing their loss in their face. Golden Tate, who wasn’t even on the Lions last year, may have been the saltiest:
“It’s a terrible gesture. Just being a spectator, that’s not the first time that he’s done some things like that,” Tate said Tuesday on 105.1 FM in Detroit. “One thing that I heard, I don’t know how true it is, I heard that it was planned.
“Like do this if we win. That’s a total douche move.”
Tate went as far as to say he would have thrown Schwartz to the ground if, you know, fines for that sort of thing didn’t exist.
“I thought it was so disrespectful. So disrespectful. I didn’t like it at all,” Tate said on 105.1. “If I knew I wasn’t going to get fined, I would have snatched him right down off their shoulders and threw him on the ground, personally. But obviously I couldn’t do that.
“But if that’s what they feel was the right thing to do, then so be it. But I just thought it was a bit disrespectful to come on someone’s home field because you have a past with them and kind of do that. So it is what it is and hopefully he feels better for doing it.”
If Schwartz was unjustly or wrongly fired, the carry-off may have come across as righteous. However, Schwartz’s track record isn’t that of some misunderstood genius. It was clear that the Lions never really found their stride under Schwartz and his 29-51 record as the Lions head coach over five seasons shows that Schwartz couldn’t get results, even when the Lions were patient with him. Gotta agree with Tate on this one.
