Deadspin: Dolphins Fire a Scout Who Worked From Home to Care for his Wife

Since he was a scout, which implies that he gave input on players the Dolphins might have an interest in drafting or signing in free agency. I really don't see how him no longer scouting for the Dolphins has no effect on the football side of the business.

Unless you know for a fact he was a terrible talent evaluator, I have to assume he was kept around for as long as he was because the previous three GM's valued his ability as a scout.

 

What he's saying may not apply to this particular drug, and doesn't apply to a lot of drugs. Private Pharma companies often spend billions on research and don't rely on the government to spend and do it for them

 

Makes sense. I'd just like to see the breakdown on what they issue to whom and what the requirements are etc.

 

Miami has no obligation to keep someone on their payroll that they dont want, just ask incognito

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No it's much easier for people to have near heart attacks and knee jerk reactions that paint Ross as some sort of evil villain.

 

Has anyone blamed Ireland for this yet? Seems overdue.

 

They don't have to have those pills though, as there was a time the pills did not exist and subsequently there is always at least one alternative option. Additionally, I don't believe it is an obligation by these pharmaceutical companies to make products available to everyone at all price ranges.

 

Yes, I did R&D for a major tire company (they do more than tires) in college and majority of the projects/tests fail. You're banking on your successes to offset your failures and give you the ability to keep trying.

 

My friend, that is only partially true. The truth - the gov't does spend a lot on research (although that amount is diminishing rapidly over time). The 2nd truth, that money is not always spent wisely. Almost ALL of the breakthrough medicines that have hit the market in the last 20 years have been fully developed in the private sector.

- best case you can make for the gov't - is the grants they give to academic scientists. typically, the way it plays out, the academic group will identify a viable target to go after to try and treat the disease, but they have no idea or no methods to go after the target. A pharma or a biotech will then do all the heavy lifting. In the end, >95% of the costs are still on the pharma side, not the gov't side.
- The one area where I would say gov't funding makes the most impact is probably in cancer. The academic groups tend to make more impact in oncology than other disease areas. The oncology targets have a lot more leeway for drugs that are less safe and only moderately efficacious - essentially a success is adding several months onto someone's life.
- These days, with diseases like cystic fibrosis, MS, ALS, Alzheimers, the costs of trying to find treatments are skyrocketing, probably closer to 2 billion, partially because of a higher failure rate, partially because they are targets within the central nervous system. The CNS diseases are ones that older people have to take forever and have to be extremely safe, very difficult to achieve.

 

there are other options as well. For something like cystic fibrosis, which typically is affecting your child, you could move to another country to get the same treatment for less. Most people don't like the idea of uprooting, but if it saves your kids life (or in this case doubles their life expectancy) you do what you have to.
Plus, many times, if you have no health insurance coverage for these orphan drug treated diseases like CF, there are usually programs either from the pharma or the gov't that will cut the costs of the drug so you don't have to pay 200K/year.

 

and to elaborate on a previous comment. I've never seen a case where the gov't develops a treatment and pharma "gets it for free". doesn't work like that.

there are some cases where gov't will step in and help with costs - but only in rare cases. For example, my team has come up with a new treatment for influenza. blows all current treatments out of the water. It's so impressive that the gov't is willing to pay for our phase 2 and 3 trials because there's such a desperate need. this is only done in rare cases like this for a much needed anti-viral because it's in their best interest to stockpile a better drug for the military

 

given the recent lack of talent from past gm's, maybe it was time for a new scout or two...

 

You're assuming (based on nothing) that the guy has been a bad scout for his entire time in Miami. Bad assumption. He was on staff for 7 years before his wife took ill and he needed to make arrangements so that he could live in Orlando.

 

I wish I could cut ties with my fandom of this team sometimes. Does the bull**** ever end?

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True. But then why am I being forced to pay for insurance?

 

I'm not even taking into account his performance. He is an employee of the Miami Dolphins who has been granted an alternative work schedule by his employer for the duration of his employment outside of what was expected in the contract. I don't care if he's...poor, comptent, or exceptional. For 10 years he was allowed AWS. That is a concession. I don't see what's so inhuman about it when most companies would have said "No" or You can do AWS for X amount of time while you find something in Orlando. It's a messed up situation, but I don't see how that is on the backs of the Miami Dolphins. Yes, it would be GREAT of the Dolphins to never fire him and pay for all of his medicals. It would be GREAT. But to label them as inhuman for doing essentially what most companies would have never done in the first place? I mean...essentially...it would have been better for the Dolphins to have been inhuman from the start and when his wife got CF, when he asked say, "No. You can't work remotely anymore than you already do."

 

It's like the "lamb chop" show song........but worse.

 

You're also assuming (based on nothing) that the guy has been a good scout for his entire time in Miami. Bad assumption.

I'm actually a little stunned we've kept a pro scout around for 17 years. This team hasn't won anything significant in that time frame, at a certain point you'd like to think everyone involved with the mediocrity would get canned.

 

Fire them all!!!!

Except for the guy with a sick wife.

 

How about fire them all for performance based reasons, not because the GM is slightly inconvenienced by a phone call.

 

No google hangouts???

 

What do you mean, the money wasn't spent wisely?>?????

U.S. Will Pay $2.6 Million to Train Chinese Prostitutes to Drink Responsibly on the Job

The National Institutes of Health spent $442,340 to study the behavior of male prostitutes in Vietnam.

The National Instutes of Health paid researchers $400,000 to deduce why gay men in Argentina engage in risky sexual behavior when they're drunk

 

so, at the end of the day because of recent issues within the organization this no longer is an issue about the scout and his performance or ability to perform. it is unfortunate that the scout has a family member that is in this situation, I know about medicines that are there one day then dropped the next regardless of affect. as you stated a couple of times Hickey is not his employer, only his supervisor. which should mean that if there is an issue with performance then he would have to work with HR so the company does things correctly in his termination for unemployment insurance and such. if that is the case then this is nothing more than a cash grab as we might retain a lower functioning employee based on his personal issue and not his actual performance. or... Hickey is just an *** and fired this guy because he didn't care for him on a personal or situational level. either way the Miami Dolphins organization loses.

 

I am going to play devils advocate here. Maybe Hickey and the rest of the front office said "hmmmmm we've been pretty crappy for a long time. Lets trim some fat" and went after the guy sitting at home scouting these billions of **** free agents over the last decade. And it has nothing to do with the wife?

I have no clue. But it's not like it was the patriot scout with multiple winning seasons and division titles that was fired. Its not the dolphins responsibility to keep a crap scout (if he is) employed just because his wife is sick. It's a double edged sword.

 

I mean that's fine, but it doesn't mean the "arrangement" worked for the Dolphins anymore. Maybe the dude with the cushy job is pissed he can't watch youtube videos of NFL highlights and breakdown game film in his PJs anymore? Just flippin' the coin.

 

Remarkably insensitive.

 

Even if they eventually fired him for performance issues, attempting to force him into quitting by targeting the health issues of his wife is massively and incredibly unethical and shady.

 

Do you really think the GM of any team has anything to do with selecting the health care benefits? I strongly doubt the two things actually had anything to do with each other.

 

Some people in this thread have been pretty bad but if you want to be left questioning the value of the human race just check out the thread about this topic on finheaven.

 

Yes, that would be an awful thing to do.

But do you really think they did that? "Hey, lets not fire this guy, instead lets make him quit"? Isn't he an at-will employee? Whats their motivation in trying to make him quit? And is the person deciding his employment status (presumably Hickey), really getting involved in the Dolphins health insurance coverage? This really just doesn't pass the smell test.

 

You called it. Obamas Affordable health care. I have employees that paid around $230 a month that are forced to pay around $650 out of pocket now or do without insurance. That's a quick small example of his fine work some of it just makes me sick.

 

Their problem, if you believe the story, is that Hickey apparently decided the reasonable accommodation was no longer reasonable.

What changed from the other guys who thought it was??

 

Meathead is not a protected class.....

 

Or maybe he was the guy who recommended we sign Wake and Grimes?

 

It's disgusting if the Dolphins did that. If they did that, there should be a paper trail. And hopefully full action is taken.

 

Agreed man. I was just trying to bring some other side stuff to the table. We've only seen one side of this story, and it's from someone who was just recently fired. I wanna pump the brakes on dismantling our franchise until facts are stated and proven.

 

I am not bashing a man I don't know. But piece of crap people can have family members with sicknesses too. Hell he might of pissed off the wrong people and got let go and is using his wife's illness to blackball the dolphins. (again, I am not saying thats true but we only have one side, and its of a man that just lost his job). I find it incredibly hard to believe Steve Ross would allow this to happen or call for this to happen. I mean seriously, he has been a very very successful business man for a long time, say what you will about him owning a sports franchise, but what the Dolphins are being accused of is horrifying and I find it hard to believe Ross would sign off on it.

 

There are always two sides to every story. And when each party tells theirs, it is often exaggerated or incomplete. The truth is always in the middle. The scout can easily paint a dark picture of the Miami Dolphins and the media and everyone else who wants to polish the halo suspended over their head will eat it up. Who knows what happened? I empathize with his situation, truly, but you always have to think about both sides of the coin.

 

17 years as one of our pro scouts. 17 years! I thought about this long and hard last night. Think of how bad we've done in FA in this time span. I know the GMs obviously make the final call but assuming this scout has provided info and insight on players throughout the years it means he's provided some bad info and bad insight. In the past 10 years I think we could count our "great' FA pickups using only our hands. (Grimes, Joey Porter, Randy Starks, Brock Marion, (traded) reggie bush, would cameron wake fall under here? And most of these were no-brainers) Now think about all the FA busts...Jake Grove, Earnest Wilfork, Reggie Howard, Culpepper, Trent Green, Brian Griese, Ellerbe, Wheeler, Clabo, Justin Smiley, Incognito, Derrius Thompson, (Trade) AJ Feeley, and this is all just the big ones i can recall. Our laundry list of failed KR/PR returners comes to mind too.

How is it one of our pro scouts has had such good job security? Yes, its not up to him to sign all or any of these players, but we have to assume he endorsed some of them over the years.