Rhule does a good job in his pressers of taking the blame, but also walking the fine line between being honest with reporters (not just bland coach-speak) and being too honest and having it come across as blaming the players.Rhule knows it was a bad play call. That's my point. He can't take a bad call and change the trajectory of the "grand scheme" by firing someone. So he took the heat. It's what good leaders do.
A lot of people seem to be fading Rhule after the past couple of weeks. I'll take the other side of that trade. He's making me more confident he's the guy. It's a tough two-game stretch and he's rightfully catching some heat. He even said in his PC that he and Satt deserve criticism.
But he's not whining about hoodies or a lack of talent or that Wistrom and Peter aren't around to motivate the team for him. We are in good hands.
I wasn't happy with the call at the time, but as Rhule explained the play in his presser, it should be fairly safe- your seasoned WR (Kemp) runs to the back corner and either hit him for a TD or sail the ball out of bounds and kick the FG. You don't expect him to flatten his route and run to the front pylon. Has he ever done that in practice? Probably not, but for some reason, he did it when it mattered and the Purdy didn't just lob it into the stands.
I'm not trying to kick the players, but at some point dudes have to execute in games, under the lights, in the 4th quarter when it matters.