We normally think of filibusters in the political realm. They’re intentionally long and unnecessarily detailed orations on a topic designed to fill time and prevent further questioning or progress into other topics.
Matt Patricia gave a great example of a filibuster in a football context during his Thursday Zoom session with reporters.
Patricia has always been verbose and prone to giving elaborately long and occasionally off-focus answers throughout his coaching tenure in Detroit. It’s his personality; coach Patricia is a talkative guy and when he’s interested in something, such as a good question, he likes to talk through his thought process.
Anyone who has heard me on the radio or a podcast knows I’m the same way. So when I say that Patrica’s lengthy answer to a question about the Lions punting competition is an epic example of a football filibuster, I say so with a self-aware admiration and observational tone more than a critical one.
Here is Patricia’s full answer from the question about the battle between Jack Fox and Arryn Siposs to handle the team’s punting duties,
“Two great guys, really, and good question because today you’re actually going to see some coverage stuff. So as you’re watching that, you’ll see some kickoff coverage. We’re working towards this week also the punt coverage aspect of all that too. That’ll be up this week. We’ll get a little bit more live reps at that – or not live – but as close as we can in pads, which will be nice. As far as the two punters, I think they’ve both done an outstanding job. I think they both have extremely outstanding leg talent.
Jack was here with us last year, and we saw his ability, the ball just explodes off his foot just when he drives into it. Certainly with Siposs, a guy that’s a little bit older even though he’s just coming out of college, very calm, another really strong leg, very consistent. I think for both of those guys they’re doing a great job. They’re competing.
Certainly as we go through camp we’re going to have to turn up the pressure a little bit just on some of the different looks they’re going to see and get them a feel for what that rush looks like when it’s coming at them and see how they perform under pressure. Certainly try to do it in the safest manner possible – it’s always a little bit interesting when you’re trying to do that with the punt and the punt protection, but we have to see that the best we can without the preseason games to see how that goes.
Two guys that are doing a great job of competing back and forth. One of the really awesome parts about all of it is (that) they’re back there helping each other. I think when you have competition on a football team, but the players put aside that competition and just try to help each other out, especially with the guys – the specialists and the kickers – because there’s so many details involved there with the snap and the timing of the footwork, the drop angle and the way the ball comes off the foot. They’re helping each other so that’s pretty cool to see.”
That’s one heck of a long answer, 368 words to be exact, for what seemed to be a fairly standard and anticipated question.
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