Sports need more big, bold statements

By midafternoon on Sunday, another piece of the Mike McCarthy legend will be part of NFL history.

It might be reminiscent of Joe Namath.

Or of Matt Hasselbeck.

People tend to remember guarantees, no matter how they turn out, and two unforgettable playoff games illustrate the point. Before Super Bowl III, when Namath famously predicted that the underdog New York Jets were “gonna win the game — I guarantee it,” he provided professional football with a storyline that helped lead to a merger.

Thirty-five years later, when his Seattle Seahawks won the overtime coin toss in an NFC Wild Card game against the Green Bay Packers in 2004, Hasselbeck declared, “We want the ball, and we’re gonna score!”

To this day, the clip of Hasselback uttering those words, followed by him almost immediately throwing a game-ending pick-six to Al Harris, remains an all-time foot-in-mouth YouTube highlight.

So McCarthy, the Dallas Cowboys coach, should have known he’d cause a stir this week when he made a confident declaration about Sunday’s game against Washington.

“We’re going to win this game,” McCarthy said. “I’m confident in that.”

Yes, this has the potential to blow up in his face. But should we be discouraging sports guarantees? Absolutely not.

In fact, we’d love to see a few more of them, including the following hypothetical ones:

“We’re going to give David Culley another chance.” — Texans general manager Nick Caserio.

Seriously, what did anyone expect? Holding the new coach responsible for Houston’s record is like ordering chicken tartare and holding the chef responsible for salmonella.

This season was going to be a

disaster no matter who was in charge, and Culley deserves another crack at it.

“We’re going to get something for Thaddeus Young.” — Spurs general manager Brian Wright.

San Antonio’s oldest player is a joy to watch on the court and a dream of a teammate in the locker room. He also has no place in the Spurs’ rebuilding project, which is why he isn’t getting much playing time.

The Spurs did well to get Young in the DeMar DeRozan trade last summer. But for that deal to go down as a true success, they need to turn him into long-term assets. His $14 million salary makes that challenging but not impossible. Several contenders would love to have him, and a lucky one will by February.

“We’re going to make our decisions, once and for all.” — 76ers general manager Daryl Morey and Trail Blazers general manager Joe Cronin.

Speaking of NBA trades, can we get a resolution on Ben Simmons and Damian Lillard already? Two months into the season, the biggest stories in the league continue to revolve around two guys who aren’t playing and are presumed to be on the move. A resolution or two would be nice.

“We’re going to stop getting our hopes up.” — Everybody in college football except Alabama.

So this was going to be the year of unpredictability and chaos, eh? The year we’d finally get some new blood playing for the championship? The year the game passed old Nick Saban by for good?

Yeah, about that …

It turns out, Saban and his Crimson Tide were just letting everyone believe that for a couple of months. It was fun while it lasted.

“We’re going to let Urban Meyer know what he can do with his so-called motivational tactics.” — every Jacksonville Jaguars assistant coach.

If this weekend’s NFL.com report is true, and if Meyer really did hold a staff meeting in which he “delivered a biting a message that he’s a winner and his assistant coaches are losers” and challenged “each coach individually to explain when they’ve ever won,” the only surprise is that the all-out mutiny hasn’t started yet.

If only there had been any way for the Jaguars to have seen any tyrannical behavior coming.

“We’re going to start letting actual researchers do our research.” — Kyrie Irving and Aaron Rodgers.

This, admittedly, is a long shot.

“We’re going to show up for spring training.” — Major League Baseball owners and players.

And this might be a reach, too, as both sides appear dug into to a labor dispute that led to the owners instituting a lockout. But no matter how far apart they might be on issues concerning free agency, playoff expansion and salary caps, there’s no way they would allow this to linger into March and April and risk losing those who weren’t alienated forever by the strike of 1994.

Right?

“We’re going to start a podcast, and I’m going to host it.” — Gregg Popovich.

Hey, he’s happy, he’s more outgoing than ever and he has plenty to say. And if that guarantee still sounds crazy?

Remember, Broadway Joe’s once did, too.

Richard Rodriguez / Getty Images Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy made waves earlier this week when he definitively declared his squad would beat Washington.