It started five years ago with Brad Childress, Fran Foley, and Rob Brzezinski. It continued with Rick Spielman replacing Foley. And now Leslie Frazier will be the be the new Brad Childress.
Even though the name was abandoned long ago, the “triangle of authority” persists in Minnesota, with Frazier, Spielman, and Brzezinski working together to run the football operations.
Owner Zygi Wilf told a small group of reporters on Monday that the existing power structure will remain in place.
“We believe what we have right now as an organization has worked,” Zygi Wilf said, per Tom Pelissero of 1500ESPN.com.
Well, if it really was working, Childress would still be the head coach. But it has the potential to work, if Frazier and Spielman will work together to reach a true consensus on player moves. In the past, we got the impression that the consensus approach worked as long as Childress agreed with it, and that if there was a disagreement Childress typically got his way.
That said, it can work under Spielman and Frazier. Both seem to be men of goodwill, who know how to disagree without being disagreeable. Not that Childress was disagreeable. But it became clear as Childress had problems with more and more other people that the problem wasn’t the other people but Childress.
The first challenge? Finding a quarterback. And we’ve got a feeling that Spielman wishes that Childress hadn’t summarily shipped Sage Rosenfels out of town before he ever got a fair shot to compete for playing time.