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Originally Posted by Longtimefan
It is a very bad mistake to give any player the false impression that any form of behavior is acceptable as long as he turns in a good performance on the field. I am not one who condones pre-madonas, and feel that performance on and off the field are of equal value.
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I agree with this, to a point. The whole point of this thread was to determine whether you would BENCH Sean Taylor for missing these VOLUNTARY workouts.
I agree that you can't send the message that all behavior is acceptable as long as you perform well in games. But the question at hand is: exactly how bad has Sean Taylor's behavior been so far?
I say not that bad at all. He has not missed anything mandatory. He has not taken any shots at his QB or coaches, a la TO. All reports suggest he is working his ass off on his own. As long as he comes to mini-camp and training camp in shape, and he works hard there to improve himself, then benching him would be a MAJOR overreaction. It would just be plain stupid.
Now, in contract negotiations, that's where you send the message in my opinion. That's where you sit down and say, "hey, we here at the Washington Redskins reward people who work hard on a voluntary basis. We like players who are with us for all practices, voluntary or not." And you offer a contract accordingly. If Sean Taylor wants to be a part of voluntary sessions, then he'll earn the top dollars in his next contract. If not, then maybe he has a million or two shaved off of what he would have otherwise been offered. And if he walks, fine, he wouldn't have been a good fit for us so long as voluntary practices are that important to team chemistry in Gibbs' eyes.
But you don't bench him (unless he starts skipping mandatory practices). That's just plain moronic. Winning games is still the bottom line.