Marinelli addresses media; cue laugh track!

By Os Davis  |   Tuesday, September 16, 2008  |  Comments( 4 )

Detroit Lions
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With each loss, the reason behind head coach Rod Marinelli’s continued stint with the Detroit Lions (aside from general inertia and probably the unwillingness of anyone else available to take the damn position) becomes more apparent: The Ford family and Matt Millen are looking for some comic relief, the Bill Gates to their Jerry Seinfeld. Indeed, Marinelli’s willingness to bring setup line after setup line to the mass media following loss after loss is a boon for a Detroit fan base needing to laugh at someone rather than with them. Except that Lions fans aren’t laughing.

Commentary: It was another Lions loss – this one mostly inexplicable even by Millen era standards – on Sunday, followed by another round of rambling, incomprehensible quotes from Marine Marinelli. As the Lions entrench themselves further into the latrine-scented foxhole (remember, folks, they’re 1-9 since that artificial 6-2 first half of 2007), Marinelli continues to demonstrate a breathtakingly loose grip on reality in quote after quote.

Cue up the laugh track, crack open your mind-deadener of choice and plop down for a half-dozen comedic highlights from Marinelli. It’s almost too easy.

• On the Packers game: “It's a loss. You can't take anything more from it." Except in this loss, the Lions gave up four scores in just over three minutes. This after spotting Green Bay the now-customary 21-point Detroit cushion. Come to think of it, maybe you can’t “take anything more from” the latest edition of Lions “football” except maddening flashbacks and an overwhelming sense of the inevitable. (Ripple of laughter.)

• "We've got to keep going, keep driving, keep pushing.” And maybe next game, they can start the second quarter 28-0! And they can close out the season with a couple of wins! Is Oakland on the schedule this season? Kansas City? Oh, come on! (Laugh track booms.)

• "All of it starts with me. It has since I've been here." Nice of Rod to say, but not quite true. It actually all started back in 1957, when men were men working for IBM and gas-guzzling automobiles had tailfins... (Marinelli’s face goes all wibbly-wobbly here as we enter flashback mode.)

• "My job is to keep going forward with this team." (Big laughs from the laugh track.) Marinelli is the only person I know whose forward is backward. (Brief burst from laugh track.) Prunella Scales enters to retort “He’s from Barcelona.” (Standing ovation-level laughs from laugh track.)

• "The bottom line is winning.” Unfortunately, the businesspeople of Detroit Lions Football Product Inc. seem to be more concerned with a different bottom line; remember this is the front office that brought you F*** ‘em-gate. (Background silence; this is the dramatic denouement bit of the sitcom.)

• "Is [the team’s supposed inconsistency] hard to swallow? It's a big turkey going down my throat with a couple bones sticking in there. But I have to spit the bones out and move forward." Millen mugs for the audience without dialogue while audience members craft their own biologically obscene punchlines involving the swallowing of large objects.

(Thunderous continuing applause. Credits roll. See you next week, same Lions time, same Lions channel. You’ve been an “awesome” audience: Rod even said so himself.
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About Os Davis

Os Davis has taken a twisted route to get to RealFootball365.com in his nearly 17 years in professional writing, working in any number of capacities in the sportswriting, news reporting and film criticism worlds. In print media, Os has served as editor at a few publications, including Albuquerque's ...
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