Having been on the receiving end of a couple of Dear John letters, I thought it might be worthwhile to see what it is like to be the originator of one. Here then is my letter to former Ravens coach John Harbaugh.
Dear John,
Thank you, but not gonna miss you. You remind me of my first marriage where for 21 years I was happily married. The only problem, I was married for 24 years. Those last 3 years were hell.
Likewise, as the Ravens coach you were here 18 years, 14 of which were pretty good. However, the four not-so-good years were really not…so…good. In fact, they were downright awful.
Somewhere in letters like these, the statement “It is not you, it is me” gets made. Well, in this case John, it IS you. Examples include all the would-be-touchdown passes dropped in or fumbled out of the end zone, missed critical field goals, frequent clock management issues, Derrick Henry not playing when he should have been, stupid penalties at the worst possible times in the game, and way too many blown 4th quarter double digit leads and losses. All of those happened with one commonality – you were the head coach.
I concede that Joe and the Mile High Miracle/Super Bowl season may help offset all of those negative moments. However, as they say – that was one brief shining moment. Does one great run make up for all of the outright terrible moments and the blown opportunities? My answer is “No” and yes as a result, you had to go. So, goodbye and good luck.
And one last thing John, if you did not know about something called the Trump curse you do now I hope.
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Maybe John, your boy will make you President of Venezuela and you can get them back into shape and productive again. At least you won’t have Tomlin and the Steelers around to screw you up trying to do so.
In closing John, ever since I saw that July photo of you with His Nibs, you’ve been on borrowed time with me. Make that goodbye and good riddance!
P.S. John, if on the off chance you do not return to coaching (say the Giants,) and you are ever roaming around Southern Maryland, stop in Buzzy’s for a beer. We do not talk politics, but we do talk a lot of football!
Music-wise, how about something from another John as in Prine?
When David Norris played this song at the Buzzy NY’s Eve party, a close friend there told me how it made her tear up. She said that it reminded her of her husband who had passed several years ago and how much he and she had liked this tune. She then put a very nice tip in David’s tip jar. Once again, I found myself marveling at the power of music. “Memories, they can’t be bought…”