Take it for what it is worth...

http://www.mlive.com/golf/grpress/index.ssf?/base/sports-3/1136384107112830.xml&coll=6


Kircus heads to Broncos with contract
Wednesday, January 04, 2006

By Greg Johnson
The Grand Rapids Press

GRAND RAPIDS -- Former record-setting Grand Valley State University wide receiver David Kircus signed a free-agent contract with the Denver Broncos, thanked the Detroit Lions for letting him live his NFL dream and then said his former team fired the wrong person.

"(Head coach) Steve Mariucci should not have been fired," Kircus said Tuesday in a telephone interview from Denver after acknowledging he had signed a three-year contract with the Broncos, and turned down offers for next season from Tampa Bay and Seattle.

"Mariucci is a great coach with all the intangibles it takes to win, and he had every player's respect. I'm not naming one guy or anything, but I don't think Mariucci was really allowed to do what he needed to do. They fired the wrong guy."

Kircus, a Lion for two seasons, had been told by the Broncos that he would be offered a deal to join the team for the 2006 season when the 2005 season ended. The promise came after a workout early during this season. Tuesday was the first day 2006 contracts could be offered to free agents.

Three weeks ago, the Imlay City native worked out for Tampa Bay. Seattle, Kircus said, made an offer without having him visit.

"I've stayed in shape, added five pounds by lifting (weights) and feel really good right now," he said. "I felt I would get another opportunity, especially after the reaction I got from Denver earlier in the season. I just had a great workout there."

Kircus is confident he will make the Broncos' roster. "I look at the roster, and who they have playing now, and I think I'll have an opportunity to play in their No. 3 (wide receiver) spot, and maybe return kicks too," he said. "I see it as a great challenge to play the game I love, and a great opportunity with a team that seems to be playoff-bound every year.

"I got tired of losing in Detroit. It was my home, it had always been my team, but the losing gets to you." He said the answer to stopping the losing in Detroit was not in the firing of Mariucci.

"He believed in the players, and they believe in him," he said. "He was the kind of guy who wanted to play the guys who worked hard Monday through Saturday. But he's part of where it seems like they play who they pay because somebody doesn't want to look bad. That's just my opinion, just one David Kircus, but you know, I don't think I'm the only one who felt that way."

Kircus, 25, was released by the Lions at the end of training camp. He spent 14 games over the previous two seasons on the practice squad.

He was thankful the Lions selected him in the sixth round (175th overall) of the 2003 NFL Draft.

"They let me live my dream of being a Detroit Lion," he said. "Not everybody gets to do that."

Interesting article, I just hope Kircus doesn't end up being a player later on while we were drafting WR with 1 rd picks.

Finally. If the locker room is as screwed up as we're all lead to believe, then I expect to hear more of this.

And we should hear more of this. This is truly the only way to fix the problem. Get the fans knowing about it, get it all out into the open, then no one can hide the truth. It will be dealt with.

You think so?

I think he is basically saying that Millen is the problem, and we already knew that and nothing changed.

Millen forced Mooch to play guys that he didn't want to. This is just further confirmation of that.

The problem is Kircus is wrong. Ultimately Millen is to blame for hiring the wrong (not bad, but wrong) coach for the team. But, you can't fire Millen, keep Mooch and start winning. The system/players would still be wrong. That's what Bly and Kircus don't get. Maybe Mooch isn't to blame for losing, but he sure isn't the right coach for this team either. The only thing you can do now is get a coach/system that works with our personnel. I'm not a Millen fan, but firing him and not Mooch would have done no good.

You think so?

I think he is basically saying that Millen is the problem, and we already knew that and nothing changed.

Millen forced Mooch to play guys that he didn't want to. This is just further confirmation of that.

What's bugged me the most out of this sorry situation was the stories that would come out about how dysfunctional this locker room is, yet it always seemed to be 3rd person accounts, rumours and stuff like that. Now I understand that the players don't want to be running to the media when something goes wrong, but now the season is over, I think the stories need to be told.

If Millen was forcing Mooch to play certain players, then I want someone to come out and say it, clear as day. If the Fords are involving themselves too much in the running of the team, I want to hear about it. I'm really pissed that Mooch has And I want to hear these stories before the new coach is hired. Are we going to have another coach who can't run his own show? I'm sure the new hire would like to know all the stories of how this team is before he comes here.

If this management truly wants to win, I believe these stories, if true, should be out in the open so they can be held accountable - because the only ones who will hold them accountable is the fans.

If they don't, the quiet, pervasive way they run the team will continue to happen, and therefore will ensure the Lions to be the joke of the NFL for a very long time. And I need to find a new team to root for then. ;)

Kircus is a disaster himself. I knew him in High School and I know how he messed up what he had going for him and tried to take everyone down with him. Same thing happened with his DD case earlier...the guy likes to blast off at the mouth...Great athlete..but big assclown, going back to his Imlay City days

My boss is friends with his sister. Apparently his brother his one messed up dude. In jail all the time.

You think so?

I think he is basically saying that Millen is the problem, and we already knew that and nothing changed.

Millen forced Mooch to play guys that he didn't want to. This is just further confirmation of that.

What's bugged me the most out of this sorry situation was the stories that would come out about how dysfunctional this locker room is, yet it always seemed to be 3rd person accounts, rumours and stuff like that. Now I understand that the players don't want to be running to the media when something goes wrong, but now the season is over, I think the stories need to be told.

If Millen was forcing Mooch to play certain players, then I want someone to come out and say it, clear as day. If the Fords are involving themselves too much in the running of the team, I want to hear about it. I'm really pissed that Mooch has And I want to hear these stories before the new coach is hired. Are we going to have another coach who can't run his own show? I'm sure the new hire would like to know all the stories of how this team is before he comes here.

If this management truly wants to win, I believe these stories, if true, should be out in the open so they can be held accountable - because the only ones who will hold them accountable is the fans.

If they don't, the quiet, pervasive way they run the team will continue to happen, and therefore will ensure the Lions to be the joke of the NFL for a very long time. And I need to find a new team to root for then. ;)

I wish this would happen too, but it just about never does. If it did, I'd like to know who really cheated the people of Enron. I want names and I want it said clearly. Who lead Delphi to bankruptcy, I want to know and I want it said clearly. I also want someone to say the real reason Bush keeps killing citizens in Iraq. Alas, I'll never know those things and you'll never hear someone one directly say the Fords suck and are overbearing, at least not until sometime well down the road.

The problem is Kircus is wrong. Ultimately Millen is to blame for hiring the wrong (not bad, but wrong) coach for the team. But, you can't fire Millen, keep Mooch and start winning. The system/players would still be wrong. That's what Bly and Kircus don't get. Maybe Mooch isn't to blame for losing, but he sure isn't the right coach for this team either. The only thing you can do now is get a coach/system that works with our personnel. I'm not a Millen fan, but firing him and not Mooch would have done no good.

I agree 100%

Mooch may have been a good coach but as long as he didn't change his sytem/scheme to fit to his players, he wouldn't have been succesful here. That's where Mooch failed more than anything.

My boss is friends with his sister. Apparently his brother his one messed up dude. In jail all the time.

Yup...anyone that knows the kid or went to HS with the guy has nothing but bad things to say about him

I agree 100%. Mooch wouldnt change his system for his players and thus he had to go. Mooch is a nice guy by all accounts, just soft on his players.

Think I can blame Mooch for TO, because basically he wouldnt control him in SF when he was young and maybe knocked some since in him, but let him run rampet with his mouth.

Art

Translation of Kircus quotes:


I'm blaming Joey for all the balls he threw right to me, that I dropped for no reason, thus causing me to be cut from a bad NFL team, in order to dupe some fool in the NFL to give my butterfingered ass a chance I don't deserve. Whenever I interview for a position, I tell them I'd have been a star in Detroit, if it weren't for Joey. Guess what - it worked. Denver didn't look at any game tape of me dropping everything in sight, and hired me solely on the strength of my Joey bashing!