One day an innocent sports journalist cub pulled in from New York with fancy credentials and calmly dropped the hot words to the head coach of the Detroit Lions.
“Quarterback controversy?” the reporter started.
And the two words triggered a tizzy fit by the coach. He screeched and hollered and the reporter retreated.
“We don’t have a quarterback controversy,” fumed the coach.
This was not a question asked of Jim Caldwell about Matthew Stafford in the wake of last Bloody Sunday.
It was nearly a half-century ago. The angered coach was Harry Gilmer. And the reporter was a new guy from the popular, polished, slick know-everything magazine Sports Illustrated.