Eytan Shander: Don't blame Roseman for this Wentz debacle, blame Lurie

Can we please stop blaming Howie Roseman for all of this? It’s not his fault. He doesn’t write the checks.

Can we please stop tweeting how enraged we are with Howie? It’s not his fault. He doesn’t enable himself. He doesn’t defend the bad draft picks to the public. He isn’t the owner. That’s what this all comes down to, where you are directing your rage.

"You can’t fire the owner, Shander!"

No, you can’t. Nobody can. But guess what? He’s not firing Roseman, and that's a big problem. 

There isn’t anything that’s changed with the latest mishandling of Jeffrey Lurie’s Philadelphia Eagles. As bad as you may think it is, the optics of everything going on, this hasn’t put any new or added pressure on Lurie to fire Roseman.

In their bizarre, warped world, I’m sure someone is pushing the narrative that the Eagles did everything right in making this move. It had to be done, and therefore just by making the trade Philadelphia looks better.

We know that to be utterly ridiculous. This wasn’t even salvaging a bad situation, no matter how many people try and spin it otherwise. This was more like a quarterback throwing for 87 yards, 3 INT and a TD — with that score coming in the fourth quarter of a blowout loss — looking for praise at the post-game podium.

But don’t blame Howie. It’s not his fault. Stop tweeting how he’s the source of all of your anger. Stop trying to remind the world how he’s the reason why your football team is a joke. It’s not his fault. Even if it is his doing.

It drives me insane watching people direct their anger at the muppet in charge of running the Eagles, when they know the owner is the one actually pulling strings. It lessens the emotion charged behind any tweet when I only see “Howie Roseman” and not any combo of Roseman and Lurie.

The responses remain the same, with people questioning what they can do about Lurie in the first place. Well, what exactly do you think you can do about Roseman? Where exactly do you see any power or leverage you have as a fan? Because any example you can conjure in your mind should be used to force the owner’s hand. Not the GM.

If you are going to stop buying merchandise, or not buy tickets, or sell your season tickets — whatever method or means of an economic boycott you can create should be applied to the owner making a fundamental change in how he approaches this team. Stop buying jerseys in order to make the owner sell, not replace one puppet with another.

The same people who watched the Eagles replace one puppet (Doug Pederson) with another (Nick Sirianni) think Lurie’s problems would be over by simply firing Roseman. It’s the business practices that are fueling this historic downfall. 

It’s not the people making the decisions, it’s the one who keeps those people in power.

I question how many times we need to go over this, then I see how many tweets omit the words “Jeff Lurie” in their blame games. Maybe it’s because Lurie isn’t trending like Roseman, and not enough people will see if they're not clout chasing. Maybe they don’t even realize that Roseman is a physical extension of Lurie. Maybe they simply don’t care about yelling at a stuffed toy and need to feel better about something going on at home. Be it basic ignorance or willful ignorance, it says a lot about us that we continue to ignore the owner.

Stop tweeting these laundry lists of bad decisions made by Howie Roseman. Stop trying to spread the word about how crazy it is that he’s still employed.

It’s not his fault. He doesn’t control his own job security.

Just stop asking in general how he still has a job. You know why. You know exactly who to blame, and that is something you should never stop doing.

The Middle w/ Brooks, Mayes and Eytan – Clip of the Week

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Follow Eytan on Twitter: @shandershow

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