DTC. Welcome Dr. Erath. Thank you for letting us interview you. If you would just let us attach these electrodes we'll start the questioning...
Erath. Back off pimple face. We agreed that no electronic devices would be attached to me.
DTC. Sorry about that. Help yourself to the Skittles and Green Blob Fusion Energy drink.
Erath. I hate Skittles but that drink looks pretty good...
DTC. It's delicious.
Erath. Mmm. Yes it is.
DTC. You have the 3rd best overall record in the TTFBA (98-35) only arch-division rival Mark "Smarty Pants" Liveringhouse of North Carolina and Mike "MROD" Rodriquez of NW Missouri have won more games. You've made the playoffs 7 out of 8 seasons, have 4 division titles and one Super Bowl appearance (a loss to Wausau way,way,way back in 2001). Outside of the lopsided trades you've made that make the billion dollar bailout ripoff of taxpayers look tame by comparison, what would be two or three key reasons why you've had such success?
Erath. Despite your snarky comment, I've made very few trades over the years. At least trades which affected anything. I was fortunate in the initial draft to be able to ignore skill positions until the 10th round or so and then get lucky with Jeff Garcia, who was just starting out. That gave me a good base of non-skill players, and I overcame my lack of RBs with a committee approach initially and then taking some guys who could become starters before they were. As they became starters, the team improved to where it could compete. But I have no magic wand, as evidenced by the Minnesota Viking-like flameouts I've taken in the playoffs.
DTC. The 10th round? That's hard to believe. You had a 13-3 the first season. Unfortunately, the draft records for that year have disappeared (coincidence? I think not) so we are unable to verify your statement.
Erath. I think I had one receiver and no RBs or QBs in the 10th round, when I took Garcia.
DTC. You said your "team improved to where it could compete". What was there to improve? Consistent excellent records and all those playoffs. The one missed appearance was the 2005 season where you obviously blew off the season for a high draft pick and went 2-14. However, you went 11-5 in 2006 and 15-1 last year (choking against arch-nemesis NCT in week 5 and round 2 of playoffs). That's more than just building a great base 8 years ago. I could see a few great years maybe but you have nearly 100 regular season wins like NW Missouri (except that he's appeared in 4 Super Bowls and won 2 of them and you've only been in only one a long,long time ago and withered under Wausau's blitzkrieg attack in the 4th quarter).
Erath. Improved in the sense that I could not compete with [NCT] in year 1; I made the playoffs, got lucky against [Dallas], and then got trampled by [NCT] for the third time that year [in the conference championship]. And if we had played 50 times, NCT would have won 51. After that first year, I could compete, and was in the set of teams that had a legit chance to win, even if it didn't work out that way due to poor owner and substitute playoff coaching (Full disclosure: Gladiator owner/coach Greg English coached Tillman against NCT in round 2 of the 2007 playoffs and lost 34-20.)
DTC. Is good coaching a part of your success or is it mostly player talent?
Erath. It's largely player talent because of the software. If your defense is not up to snuff, you'll get freighttrained even with the right call most of the time. And if your defense is good against the run, teams without a top-notch running attach will struggle to do anything on the ground even if you call pass every time. Dave K, if you are listening, make the software more responsive to play calls and do not be a slave to having replays turn out just like real life.
At this point of the interview, one of the DTC reporters overdosed on Skittles and Energy Drink and threw up on the digital recorder, shorting it out. Fortunately, the DTC has the greatest technology in the history of the TTFBA and was able to extract the data for your reading pleasure.
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