Do we know as much football as coaches?

I got the idea for this on about page 37 of the Gundy/Ok. State thread, and I wanted to open it up to more discussion.

At a certain point, after we've covered a certain number of high-level college or NFL seasons, do we know as much football as the coaches do? I say yes, and furthermore, I saw there are many, many knowledgable fans who knows the Xs and Os as well as coaches.

I'm not talking in terms of personnel, how to use the players, etc., in various situations because they have the advantage of being around them and knowing them much better. But I think good beat writers and columnists know the game, in general, as well as the coaches -- who try to use a lot of high-tech talk and perceived superior knowledge to more or less cover their asses.

 

Absolutely.
You don't have to play the game to research it, learn it and understand it.

 

Most don't. Otherwise we would be football coaches.

 

Nope.

 

Hell yeah. God knows the money and hours are better!

 

No. Just like they don't know newspapering after years and years of being interviewed.

 

No way.

A first-year assistant coach in the pros would lose 99.99 percent of writers and fans in 30 seconds of serious discussion.

Have you ever watched film with a coach? You can't believe the things they notice and the things they're looking for -- elements of the game you never get from any analyst or any network replay.

 

Thanks, Coach Gundy

 

I think there are two separate discussions here.

No, I don't think the average NFL or major college writer knows as much football as the average NFL or major college coach.

That said, do I think the game is as complicated as some of these clowns would like to make it seem to writers?

Not at all.

 

There are some writers who, I wound say, are close to being on par with coaches and/or personnel guys in terms of their knowledge of the game.

I would also say that percentage is somewhere around, oh, 1-2%. With the years of coaching and film study these guys have under their belts, most have forgotten more than us writers will ever know.

And that's not to say those who are interested in bettering themselves can't learn and improve; every time the coach I cover offers to let me in to film sessions, I'm in there in a heartbeat. But by and large, the chasm of knowledge is huge.

 

Perhaps the better question to ask would be: Do writers know enough about the game to do their job competently, which is to cover the team and evaluate its performance (in columns).