College Football Coaching Changes Thread

[JonInMiddleGA]

FWIW & since you asked, I'd say neither side is looking very good but every time Rodriguez opens his mouth (or someone does it for him) he really looks more & more like a real p.o.s. to me. The absolute best thing he could do at this point is pay what he owes & then concentrate on coaching Michigan. right now he seems more obsessed with being the ex-WVU coach than with the current Michigan coach, and I'd say he's unemployed after no more than three seasons.

[Logan]

To give somewhat of a more real answer...I'm sure Rodriguez and his camp are being a dick about things, I'm sure WVU people are being dicks about things, I'm sure some shit we hear is true, I'm sure some shit we hear isn't true, and I'm really sure, as st.c said, no one gives a shit anymore who doesn't have a stake in this.

[bhlloy]

Not really a college football change, but we were discussing him about half a page ago. Anyway, Matt Barkley committed to USC this evening. Easily the best QB to come out of SoCal since Matt Leinart, and the consensus #1 QB in the 09 class. Great news for SC seeing as there were a few things starting to go UCLA's way on this one.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

FWIW & since you asked, I'd say neither side is looking very good but every time Rodriguez opens his mouth (or someone does it for him) he really looks more & more like a real p.o.s. to me. The absolute best thing he could do at this point is pay what he owes & then concentrate on coaching Michigan. right now he seems more obsessed with being the ex-WVU coach than with the current Michigan coach, and I'd say he's unemployed after no more than three seasons.

Fair enough, I was honestly looking for an unbiased opinion on it but I wasn't going to post it because I'm sure everyone is as sick of this shit as I am. I just want to see the school get every penny of its $4 million.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Atocep

... an unbiased opinion

Well I'm certainly not biased ... I don't like anybody involved

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by st.cronin

+1 to Logan's comment.

Non-biased observers don't care.

I'll one up you.

Biased observers don't really care either (e.g., me).

I am sick of this nonsense.

[DeToxRox]

Originally Posted by Honolulu_Blue

I'll one up you.

Biased observers don't really care either (e.g., me).

I am sick of this nonsense.

+ 1

I am more excited about maybe getting BJ Daniels, a 4 star QB from Florida. He's backup plan to Pryor but I like him more I think because he is a natural passer first, and runner second, comparable to Troy Smith. I mean if we get Pryor I'm pumped but Daniels seems like the best of both worlds.

[Swaggs]

Fair enough and, in a way, the non-interest answers my question, as well.

I was away for the three-day weekend (w/ no internet access) and missed some of the more newsworthy stuff over the weekend (racism charges on MLK Day by Rodriguez's and Magee's agent, a Mitch Albom article, etc.), but obviously a lot of the information that I (and a lot of Mountaineer fans) get are from WVU sites, where the opinions are slightly slanted.

I suspected that it was no longer newsworthy to 95%+ of the country by now, but half of the WVU folks think that this will set us back 20-years and the other half think that Rodriguez looks like a snake everytime he or his agent open their mouths and that he will be out of work sooner rather than later.

I am somewhere in the middle and more concerned with how we close our recruiting (mitigating our losses), finalize our coaching staff (which is turning out to be much better than expected, in my opinion), and just hoping that we get all or most of the buyout money soon.

[DeToxRox]

I too wanna say as a UM fan thanks to Swaggs, Atocep, Timmy and the other WVU guys here who are being totally class about this situation. I know a lot of WVU fans basically crucify UM fans and refuse to take their posts seriously and look at Rod as a reflextion of them, and most UM fans see WVU fans are second class citizens so to actually be able to have civil football talk with them is a godsend.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by DeToxRox

I too wanna say as a UM fan thanks to Swaggs, Atocep, Timmy and the other WVU guys here who are being totally class about this situation. I know a lot of WVU fans basically crucify UM fans and refuse to take their posts seriously and look at Rod as a reflextion of them, and most UM fans see WVU fans are second class citizens so to actually be able to have civil football talk with them is a godsend.

I concur 100%.

[JonInMiddleGA]

I don't quite believe this shit ... remember this?

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

"I wanna be a college coach ... no, wait, the pros ... no, wait, college ... no, wait a minute, I'm sure it's the pros for me ... umm, upon further review ... "

Well ...
http://www.ajc.com/sports/content/sp...ge_tab_newstab
Brian VanGorder's stint with South Carolina and Steve Spurrier didn't last long. VanGorder is negotiating to return to Atlanta as the Falcons defensive coordinator under newly hired head coach Mike Smith, according to two people within the Falcons organization.

The Columbia, S.C., State newspaper, citing sources, reported that VanGorder informed Spurrier of his intention to leave South Carolina as defensive coordiator and return to the Falcons in that role.

VanGorder, the former University of Georgia defensive coordinator, served as the Falcons linebacker coach last season and left to become South Carolina's defensive coordinator in mid-December after former Falcons head coach Bobby Petrino left after 13 games to coach at the University of Arkansas.

A month ago, VanGorder declared to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "I'm a college guy." When asked if he was sure he replied "I've declared. I'm committed."

Since leaving Georgia after a relatively stable four-year run, VanGorder reinvented himself annually. He left after the 2004 season to coach linebackers with the Jacksonville Jaguars, under Smith, thinking it was time to take the professional track. He left there in '06 to be the head coach at Georgia Southern. After one unsuccessful season back in college, he jumped from Statesboro to the Falcons' assistant job.

"I'll enjoy all the things about college football that I always have and I won't look back at the NFL," VanGorder said in December. "That's something I've put behind. I'm ready to finish my career as a college football coach."

[miami_fan]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

I don't quite believe this shit ... remember this?



Well ...
http://www.ajc.com/sports/content/sp...ge_tab_newstab
Brian VanGorder's stint with South Carolina and Steve Spurrier didn't last long. VanGorder is negotiating to return to Atlanta as the Falcons defensive coordinator under newly hired head coach Mike Smith, according to two people within the Falcons organization.

The Columbia, S.C., State newspaper, citing sources, reported that VanGorder informed Spurrier of his intention to leave South Carolina as defensive coordiator and return to the Falcons in that role.

VanGorder, the former University of Georgia defensive coordinator, served as the Falcons linebacker coach last season and left to become South Carolina's defensive coordinator in mid-December after former Falcons head coach Bobby Petrino left after 13 games to coach at the University of Arkansas.

A month ago, VanGorder declared to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "I'm a college guy." When asked if he was sure he replied "I've declared. I'm committed."

Since leaving Georgia after a relatively stable four-year run, VanGorder reinvented himself annually. He left after the 2004 season to coach linebackers with the Jacksonville Jaguars, under Smith, thinking it was time to take the professional track. He left there in '06 to be the head coach at Georgia Southern. After one unsuccessful season back in college, he jumped from Statesboro to the Falcons' assistant job.

"I'll enjoy all the things about college football that I always have and I won't look back at the NFL," VanGorder said in December. "That's something I've put behind. I'm ready to finish my career as a college football coach."

But what was he supposed to say? He has absolutely no clue what he wants and the big bad media would not stop hounding him

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by miami_fan

But what was he supposed to say?

After the latest karmic development, I believe that next thing likely to come from BVG's mouth is pretty obvious ... "Sooeey"

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=3212796
On Thursday, Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino announced Ellis Johnson would be leaving the Razorbacks to take the defensive coordinator's opening at South Carolina. Johnson had been at Arkansas less than a month. ... Spurrier had interviewed Johnson for the Gamecocks' opening before settling on VanGorder. "You might ask, 'Why didn't you hire him the first time?'" Spurrier said. "I should have. I really should have."

Johnson said after 32 years in coaching, little surprises him. He is thrilled to be returning to his native South Carolina. "It was probably the last thing on my mind when I got up, but I was really happy when he called," Johnson said.

[ISiddiqui]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

I don't quite believe this shit ... remember this?

LOL!! That's fucking hilarious! What a trainwreck this guy is?!

[MJ4H]

It hurts losing Ellis Johnson. I was as excited about what he was going to do with our defense as I am about the Petrinos with our offense. Hopefully there is a suitable replacement still out there.

[Eaglesfan27]

Originally Posted by bhlloy

Not really a college football change, but we were discussing him about half a page ago. Anyway, Matt Barkley committed to USC this evening. Easily the best QB to come out of SoCal since Matt Leinart, and the consensus #1 QB in the 09 class. Great news for SC seeing as there were a few things starting to go UCLA's way on this one.

I missed this until this morning. Very nice to see as I'm more excited about this kid than any Trojan QB in a long time.

[Fighter of Foo]

Originally Posted by MattJones4Heisman

It hurts losing Ellis Johnson. I was as excited about what he was going to do with our defense as I am about the Petrinos with our offense. Hopefully there is a suitable replacement still out there.

Can't help but smile. karma indeed.

[MJ4H]

It happens all the time. I don't know why it is surprising and I don't know why there was such a pile on when it happened before, but there isn't ever a pile on other than that. I'm just glad the Rich Rod to Michigan change was a much bigger clusterF so I don't have to hear the stupidity any more.

ETA: This change has nothing to do with Bobby Petrino. It has to do with Ellis Johnson wanting to go home. I don't blame him a bit.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Gosh, can't say I saw this one coming at all.
http://www.ajc.com/sports/content/sp...nuta_0201.html

Former Georgia Tech defensive coordinator Jon Tenuta will become Notre Dame's assistant head coach for defense, the Irish announced Thursday.

Tenuta succeeds Notre Dame secondary coach and former Tech head coach Bill Lewis effective Feb. 18. Lewis is retiring from coaching because he needs to have both his hips surgically replaced. Corwin Brown remains the team's defensive coordinator.

"I love coaching defense, and Corwin [37] is a very bright young coach who has a bright future ahead of him," Tenuta said in a statement released by Notre Dame.

The Irish were 3-9 last season and lost to both Tech and Navy, which was coached by new Tech coach Paul Johnson.

"Early in December, I learned that Bill Lewis needed to have both his hips replaced and that he would have a four-month recovery," Irish coach Charlie Weis said in a statement.

"I spent time with Corwin Brown in January discussing possible replacements. ... Corwin and I talked to a few candidates and agreed that Jon was the best person for the job."

Tenuta, 50, was defensive coordinator in all six of Chan Gailey's seasons at Tech and served as interim coach in Tech's Humanitarian Bowl loss to Fresno State on Dec. 31.

He's famous for his aggressive, zone blitzing schemes. In 2007, Tech ranked 20th in the nation in rushing defense and total defense and 21st in scoring defense.

[Swaggs]

Interesting title, if nothing else.

Tenuta seems to have a great reputation and I think he is pretty good, but I'm not sure that I buy that he is that phenomenol of a defensive coordinator. Still, pretty good hire for Notre Dame, in my opinion.

[Swaggs]

I'm curious if Honolulu Blue or one of the other attorneys/legal experts on the board can shed some light on this article and what it means or could mean:

http://wvrecord.com/news/contentview.asp?c=207333

It sounds like Rodriguez was originally served with the lawsuit at his home in Morgantown. His wife and children still live in Morgantown, with his children still enrolled in schools. But he and his wife registered to vote and got drivers licenses in Michigan and are claiming Michigan citizenship, which changes the case from circuit court to district court.

Any thoughts on the reasoning behind this and what the difference is between having the case heard in district court, rather than circuit court? And, does having the case heard in district court lessen the number of opportunities for an appeal?

[Mr. Wednesday]

Tenuta is getting the same title and probably a similar role in the coaching staff to Bill Lewis, who is retiring because he's going to be out for four months getting both hips replaced.

[Honolulu_Blue]

Originally Posted by Swaggs

I'm curious if Honolulu Blue or one of the other attorneys/legal experts on the board can shed some light on this article and what it means or could mean:

http://wvrecord.com/news/contentview.asp?c=207333

It sounds like Rodriguez was originally served with the lawsuit at his home in Morgantown. His wife and children still live in Morgantown, with his children still enrolled in schools. But he and his wife registered to vote and got drivers licenses in Michigan and are claiming Michigan citizenship, which changes the case from circuit court to district court.

Any thoughts on the reasoning behind this and what the difference is between having the case heard in district court, rather than circuit court? And, does having the case heard in district court lessen the number of opportunities for an appeal?

Swaggs, from Rodriguez's perspective they definitely want this in a district court. The main difference here is that circuit court is a state court, whereas the district court is a federal court.

Circuit court judges tend to be elected state officials, whereas federal judges have lifetime appointments. I am sure Rodriguez's camp feels that they will be treated much more fairly by a federal judge than by a local, state judge given the strong feelings in this case. I am sure there are a whole host of other reasons Rodriguez's lawyers want this case in Federal Court.

There is no real difference in the numbers of appeals, other than the in circuit court the case would be appealed within the West Virginia State court system and if the case were heard in the district court it would be through the Federal System.

[cartman]

Here's an article about Art Briles, the new coach at Baylor. Great read.

http://www.statesman.com/news/conten...ng_Briles.html

Baylor coach shaped by life in tiny Texas town
By KEVIN ROBBINS
Austin American-Statesman

RULE, Texas — The service was on a Monday afternoon in the football season of '76. No church in town could hold such a gathering, so the caskets were taken to the school, where classes had been canceled by order of the superintendent. The lids were shut.

Players from the state finalist team sat together in the auditorium. They could see an old teammate in the section for the bereaved. It was bad enough, sitting at funerals for their coach and his wife, who were teachers, twice-on-Sundays people of God and civic pillars in their community of 1,000. But it was that much worse for their quarterback, Art Briles.

In those caskets lay his parents.

Briles was 20 when his father, mother and aunt were killed. He was a scholarship football player at the University of Houston, and on the morning his family died, Briles was in Dallas, preparing to play Southern Methodist University.

He endured. He left college, returned to the land and people he knew, operated a forklift for a summer and peeled his soul from the dirt.

"I knew I had two paths," said Briles, a lanky man of 52 who still can't talk about his parents and aunt without long pauses, hard swallows and faraway stares. "You could wallow in despair and doubt, and whine and wonder. Or you could choose to move forward and live in honor of your parents and God. I decided I would look for a reason to prevail."

So he coached football.

He installed the wishbone in flat West Texas towns like his own. He moved to Stephenville and won four state championships. He coached five seasons at the University of Houston. The Cougars won games they didn't used to win. Briles never left Texas.

He still hasn't. In November, he became the 25th head coach at Baylor, a dusty relic of the Southwest Conference that last managed a winning season in 1995. When Briles addressed the public for the first time in Waco, he spoke of plans for conference championships and bowl games.

"I'm not intimidated by circumstances," Briles said a few days later. He pictured his parents and added, "Events in my life made me unafraid."

On that October day in the Big Country when they buried his parents, two clergymen read from the Bible. The pastor from the Baptist church, where Dennis Briles was a deacon and Wanda Briles was an alto in the choir, needed his colleague from the Church of Christ to assist him in committing their bodies to the old cemetery out past the cotton gin. It was like a wind kicked up and tore off the face of Rule.

John Greeson, the pastor at the Church of Christ, walked with Briles to the graves prepared for his parents. The sun shined on Rule. It was shirt-sleeve weather at the cemetery. Not much was said on that short walk through the grass, but Briles was like his father that way. They used words like currency and spent nothing on their burdens.

Suddenly, said Greeson, Briles asked the preacher, "Is this ever going to end?"

___

Football season used to begin in the summertime. Dennis Briles, a letterman himself at Rule in the early 1950s, summoned his players to the field behind the school, pointed in the direction of a fork of the Brazos River and mandated that the boys run all the way to the water. Then they had to run back.

The Rule Bobcats climbed ropes for conditioning. The ropes are gone now, but the poles remain, testaments to Coach Briles' belief that a football team needed to be conditioned to play as hard in the fourth quarter as it did in the first.

The Briles family — Dennis, Wanda, Art and his older brother, Eddie — had moved to Rule from Abilene. Wanda taught special education.

Dennis was the football coach, basketball coach, civics teacher and high school principal.

He was a man of his times and circumstances. He kept his hair short, wore modest clothes, measured his words, sat in the back at church, understood that kids were kids and believed the players on his football team should be an extension of all that is sacred about living in a small town. The Bobcats didn't just wear the name of their school on their dark blue jerseys. The word "RULE" implied everything those four letters mean.

"You were expected to act right and be right," Art Briles said.

Briles played quarterback for his father. Rule won nine games when Briles was a sophomore and nine his junior year. But the Bobcats lost a game each time, and their seasons were finished before the Class B playoffs began.

The fall of 1973 was different.

Rule tore through the season with not so much as an anxious moment. The Bobcats shut out five teams, including Prosper in the quarterfinals.

Art Briles broke two ribs in that game. He was sore when he and his 25 teammates limbered up before the title game in Weatherford. Carloads of people drove the 180 miles from Rule. They arrived to the coldest night they could remember. Spectators lit fires in garbage cans beyond the field to warm their hands.

Rule players and coaches looked across the field and stared. Their opponent, Big Sandy, looked like a battalion of college athletes. "They had an offensive team and a defensive team," mused Rob Kittley, a running back for Rule who also played defense. "At Rule, 'course, most of us never came off the field. We were just outmatched."

Mere numbers didn't flatten Rule 25-0. Big Sandy fielded a menacing linebacker named Lovie Smith, a future All-American at the University of Tulsa and head coach of the Chicago Bears. Bobby Taylor ran for 183 yards and scored all four touchdowns. His backup was David Overstreet, who played for the Oklahoma Sooners and the Miami Dolphins.

Two seasons after the Big Sandy game, Dennis Briles retired from coaching.

He was elected mayor and named Citizen of the Year in Rule. He kept his positions at the school and attended football games on Friday nights as a spectator. He had church on Sundays. But he left his Saturdays free.

He wanted to see his son's games when the University of Houston Cougars played near enough that he could drive.

___

On the morning of Oct. 16, 1976, Dennis and Wanda Briles rose early, pulled out of their driveway across the street from the school, turned right at the only stoplight in town and accelerated east on U.S. 380 out of Rule. Wanda Briles' older sister, Elsie Kittley, sat in the back seat of their Galaxie 500.

The sky was clear. The road was dry. The sun warmed the cotton fields of Haskell County.

They were traveling to Dallas to watch Houston play SMU at the Cotton Bowl. Their son was a sophomore split end for Bill Yeoman's Cougars, who already had beaten Baylor and Texas A&M to go 3-1 in their first season in the Southwest Conference. It would be Art's first game at that famous football stadium in Fair Park.

Seventy miles into their trip, the car passed Newcastle. Three miles farther, it crested a hill on the highway. A commercial truck on the other side of the slope drifted into the eastbound lane as it reached the apex.

The impact sheared the roof from the Ford. Its three passengers died instantly.

Two hours away, Houston beat SMU 29-6. The announced attendance was 28,204, with three empty seats that, in their vacancy, rerouted the coordinates of one player on the field who kept wondering through all four quarters why he never heard his mother shout his name.

The coaches informed Briles in the Cougar dressing room at the top of the tunnel at the Cotton Bowl. His teammates, delirious from their victory over the Mustangs, dissolved into whispers. They began to undress quietly.

"People just kind of sat there," said Cougar guard Mike Spradlin, a future assistant to Briles at Houston.

Jan Allison, Briles' high school girlfriend, met him at his parents' house when he got back to Rule. They walked directly to Dennis and Wanda's bedroom and sat on the end of their bed for a long time.

"Neither one of us really talked that much," she said.

They married two years later at the First Baptist Church in Rule. By that time, Briles had left the football team at Houston, where he couldn't seem to escape his new identity as the player whose family had died on the way to a game.

___

Through nearly 30 years in coaching, Briles never shared his burden. Everyone knew, but the story never came from the man who suffered it.

He never shared the specifics.

About their deaths, alone on a road.

About the suddenness. "One day you have a net," Briles said. "Next day, it's gone."

About the fact that Dennis and Wanda Briles aren't here to see what their youngest son has made of himself. Or the fact that his own three grown children — Jancy, Kendal and Staley — never knew the people their grandparents and great-aunt were.

"He carries that with him," said Spradlin, Briles' teammate at Houston that day at the Cotton Bowl.

Through tragedy came context. The past can elevate a man, haunt him or both. Briles sees that in the players he brings to Houston and, now, Waco. What did they endure? What makes them pause, swallow and stare off? Briles will look a freshman in the eye: Everybody's got a story.

"Most of the time, it's pretty personal."

His continues. The path led to Baylor. Something about the situation, Briles said, seemed scripted.

A Baptist university, a Texas school. A football program with a legacy — beating Tennessee in the 1956 Sugar Bowl and LSU in the 1963 Bluebonnet Bowl, winning the SWC in 1974 and '80 under Grant Teaff — but listless since.

"That doesn't worry me," Briles said. "I've been on the bottom of the floor."

Out in the Big Country, meanwhile, a town half the size it was when its team played Big Sandy in '73 waits to see what happens at Floyd Casey Stadium with the Baylor Bears. Some of the people who went to the funerals at the high school still live there. They work on the farms or in gas fields or not at all because they've retired and prefer to stay in the place they know.

Eddie Briles, Art's only brother, is a registered nurse. He and his wife, Teresa, live in Haskell, a few miles east of Rule, straightaway on 380 at the intersection with U.S. 277. When he drives over to Rule, Eddie Briles can see the trees that envelope the cemetery between the old Tower drive-in and the road.

Dennis and Wanda Briles share a headstone. They were buried right in the heart of the property.

"His intention is to make them proud of him," Eddie said of his brother.

"He's done that."

A class of 25 football recruits is expected to pledge Baylor on Wednesday, national signing day. Then they'll play next season for a coach named Briles, which means they'll climb ropes, run to rivers, lift a small West Texas town in 1973 and not even know it.

[timmynausea]

I had no real plans to revisit this ridiculousness over here, but a couple of lines in this Detroit Free Press article are too hilarious to not post. The "driven past a law school" one made me laugh.

Originally Posted by Free Press

Embarrassing ordeal reveals ugly truths about U-M coach Rich Rodriguez

By MICHAEL ROSENBERG • FREE PRESS COLUMNIST • July 9, 2008

Finally, somebody at Michigan was embarrassed enough to settle West Virginia’s lawsuit.

Not Rich Rodriguez. He is way too bullheaded. And not Bill Martin. He was never going to stand up to Rodriguez.

It took Mary Sue Coleman, the school president, to end this mess. Coleman was on the verge of being deposed, and she obviously didn’t want to be dragged into it. Not so coincidentally, Rodriguez finally settled.

Predictably, Rodriguez got absolutely nothing out of this except embarrassment. His buyout did not go down a dime. The U-M athletic department has to pay his legal fees. Rodriguez got a delay in his payment schedule, but that is a small victory.

This whole thing could have, and should have, been settled long ago. But RichRod was determined to fight West Virginia all the way to the bitter end. Anybody who has even driven past a law school knew he had no case, but that didn’t matter to Rodriguez.

Martin should have told Rodriguez that this whole ordeal was embarrassing the university, and that the case was a lost cause. But Martin’s legacy is in Rodriguez’s hands, so he let his coach do whatever he wanted.

There are only two winners here. One is West Virginia, which will get the $4 million it is rightfully owed. The other is those of us who just wanted the truth.

We now know Rodriguez to be a serial job-shopper. His agent, Mike Brown, had pitched Rodriguez’s services to Alabama, Arkansas and Lousiana State in recent years before pursuing Michigan.

We now know Rodriguez doesn’t believe in contracts. He signed an amended contract with West Virginia just four months before he left. He then claimed that the signed contract was not as important as a verbal agreement that preceded it — a laughable legal argument.

Rodriguez said in December that he was battling the buyout because “we have to do what we feel is right.” He meant right for him, not the school.

Michigan is just a name to him. The school is just a platform for winning championships. This is evident in everything Rodriguez does, from his abandonment of a century-old captains tradition to his bristling at the notion that Michigan holds itself to a higher standard.

“The Michigan way is just the right way,” he said in December, before adding that a lot of schools do it the right way.

Rodriguez is an excellent coach. I’m not sold that he is the right coach for Michigan.

He can charm the media, which is nice. But those who have attended his practices say Rodriguez’s staff uses some of the foulest, most degrading language imaginable. I know coaches curse, and I’m no prude, but this goes way beyond a few dirty words. He belittles his players. This is a big part of why offensive lineman Justin Boren left the team. He felt his dignity was at stake.

Of course, a lot of Michigan fans would rather think of Boren as a traitor who couldn’t handle tough coaching. They tell themselves Rodriguez is no different from Bo Schembechler, whose rigorous 1969 practices are part of the program’s legend. And there will always be some people who happily make that comparison, especially if their income comes from Michigan football.

Tell yourself what you want. I find it sad that the University of Michigan is paying a man millions of dollars a year to humiliate some of its students.

When Rodriguez was hired, he and Martin spun the story well: Martin landed a premier coach, and Rodriguez, who loved West Virginia, couldn’t turn down Michigan. The truth is not as simple, or as pretty.

On the night of Dec. 6 — several days after the Les Miles fiasco — Martin told several people he had hired a coach. He thought he had landed Rutgers coach Greg Schiano. But the next day, Schiano turned down the Michigan job, sending Martin scurrying for another plan.

Schiano’s financial adviser, Mike Wilcox, nudged Michigan in the direction of another of his clients: Rich Rodriguez.

Rodriguez wanted a chance to compete for national championships. Martin saw a chance to hire a big name. They were in love with each other’s names — so much so that they failed to do their due diligence.

Martin met with Wilcox before he ever talked to Rodriguez. When Martin finally met Rodriguez at Wilcox’s office in Toledo, he brought Coleman with him.

Martin and Coleman did not go to Toledo to interview Rodriguez. They went there to hire him.

At Rodriguez’s introductory press conference, he was still selling the line that he was in Toledo to meet with his financial advisor. You know, like they were discussing tech stocks and all of a sudden the president and athletic director at Michigan magically appeared in the room.

Rodriguez might win big at Michigan. But if he does, and he demands a big raise every year, or flirts with other employers, or ignores his contracts, or refuses to put the school’s interests ahead of his own, then Michigan fans should not be surprised. As we have seen in the last few months, this is who he is.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Auburn Tigers hire Scot Loeffler as offensive coordinator - ESPN

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Auburn Tigers hire Scot Loeffler as offensive coordinator - ESPN

Okay, Jon, you're too smart to not know this is a 2008 coaching changes thread, but I don't have enough time to look back and see why this post was better in here than the current coaching changes thread. So I'll let you tell me what the significance is.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Chief Rum

Okay, Jon, you're too smart to not know this is a 2008 coaching changes thread

You're giving me waaaaay too much f'n credit

The truth is I didn't see the current thread, so I searched for it under a term I knew was in there: "Van Gorder".

I saw "college coaching changes thread", clicked it & posted ... and that's how this ended up in here