Whine and Cheese are back at the Big House

Gee.  It's been a great season so far.  All of the bandwagon-jumpers came back.  The Maize and Blue were doing great, and it even looked like an undefeated regular season was possible with a few breaks.  Then, Sparty temporarily derailed Michigan's season, mostly due to their chronic and intentional dirty play causing Michigan to lose their poise. 

So, what happens next?  Many of the same "Michigan fans" that bitched about Rich Rod for three years and was so happy to get a "Michigan Man" as a head coach are now BITCHING ABOUT BRADY HOKE AFTER ONE LOSS.

What a classless bunch of morons.  What do you expect out of your football coach?  What do you expect out of your players?  The fifth-year seniors on this team have played for three head coaches, three offensive coordinators, and four defensive coordinators.  The fourth year seniors have played for two head coaches, two offensive coordinators, and three defensive coordinators.  

Michigan has changed coaches almost as much as American Idol has changed judges.  I said this about Rich Rod, and I'll say it about Brady Hoke: you can't really judge a head coach for five years because he has to have a fifth-year senior class filled with his own people.  If you don't believe me, maybe you can believe the original source of the statement: Bo Schembechler. 

I know that, so far, the whiners are a very small percentage.  Even one is one too many.  Brady Hoke is the head coach.  Most of you who were whining about RR wanted Brady Hoke as the head coach.  Don't you think one loss is a little bit early to start whining about they guy you wanted in the first place?

Please, people: grow up.  Pretend you have actually watched college football before.  Pretend that you have the class Michigan fans are supposed to have.  I just said it, but it bears repeating: Brady Hoke is the head coach.  He is deserving of your support.  Period.  No ifs, ands, or buts.  Mostly, though, no whining.  Please.

Sparty Shenanigans

 We've all seen the video of William Gholston's disgusting attempt to dislodge the cervical vertebrae of Denard Robinson.  We have all seen his punch to the head of Taylor Lewan.  We all saw Sparty's six personal fouls against Michigan.  We have all seen Sparty DC Pat Narduzzi's quote that they "try to do...sixty minutes of unnecessary roughness."

The bottom line here is that William Gholston should be suspended for the rest of the year, and Pat Narduzzi should be suspended for the rest of the year and then fired.  Both player and coach are against everything the NCAA supposedly stands for.  Will the seedless NCAA do anything?  Maybe.  Will the punishments be enough?  Of course not. 

The NCAA talks big, but at the end of the day, they allow thuggery such as that of Gholston and Narduzzi as long as nobody gets arrested.  Since the violations happened in East Lansing, the chances of that are extremely slim.

I wish David Brandon would put his money where his mouth is, get off his butt, and file a complaint with the East Lansing police about Gholston's attack on a helpless Denard Robinson after the play.  Gholston deserves jail time for this mugging.  Robinson could have been paralyzed for life if things had gone wrong.  Denard Robinson deserves better.  College football deserves better.

An Open Letter to the NCAA

To the NCAA Enforcement Committee:

For years, you have been seen by your myriad critics as toothless hypocrites.  You have a history of talking big and acting small.  You are quick to accept self-imposed penalties and show your "power" by adding something minor onto them.  But when it comes to programs that stonewall, lie, or intimidate potential witnesses into silence, such as the Ohio State University, you usually do nothing. 

You had a chance to punish the Ohio State University once, in 2004, when Maurice Clarett was seen on television by millions of viewers.  You may remember it; he told ESPN how he had received free cars, "escorts," "tutors" who not only did his classwork but took his tests for him, and "golden handshakes" from well-heeled boosters. 

You then "investigated" the Ohio State University, but "found nothing."  You scheduled Clarett to testify before the committee, but elements within and around the program who often like to refer to themselves as the "sacred brotherhood" intimidated Clarett into silence.  Actually, they intimidated him so badly that he ended up going to jail when caught driving with the weapons he had purchased for self-protection.  But I digress.

You told the public that Clarett's appearance on television didn't count as evidence, and that you had no evidence to proceed with a case against the Ohio State University.  To those in Columbus, you appeared to be fair and just.  To the other 98 percent of the football world, you appeared to be idiots. 

Anyone who was paying attention to what was happening at the Ohio State University knew that there was both systemic and systematic cheating going on, but you chose to bury your individual and collective heads in the sand.  You chose to allow the Ohio State University to not only get away with cheating, but to continue their actions with no consequences.

Whenever compliance is publicized, you are always sure to mention that self-reporting is the very backbone of your entire code of ethics: that without it, the system doesn't exist.  When the Ohio State Univesity started reporting numerous "minor" violations on a yearly basis, you chose to interpret it as evidence that the Ohio State University was serious about self-reporting.

In truth, though, the Ohio State University's behavior is and has been antithetical to the entire concept of self-reporting.  When two players were interviewed this year about violations and admitted to many, they were silenced by the "sacred brotherhood" within twenty-four hours of speaking.  They tried to recant their stories, but both had been taped, one in a courtroom. 

There are many more examples of the stonewalling, lying, and tampering with potential witnesses that routinely happens in Columbus, but you already know of them.  This does, however, lead me to the real problem here: as long as you continue to reward programs that refuse to fully cooperate with investigations, those programs are going to continue to lie, stonewall, and tamper with potential witnesses.

You cannot insist that self-reporting is the backbone of NCAA ethics when you punish programs that self-report worse than the programs that don't cooperate.  If a school is punished for cooperating and rewarded for dragging its feet, what motivation does that school have to cooperate with any investigation? 

How can you expect a school to display ethics under those circumstances when unethical behavior is the reason they are being investigated in the first place?

The only way you are going to clean up the NCAA is to punish programs that don't cooperate more severely than those that do.  Otherwise, unethical programs, including but not limited to the Ohio State University, the University of Southern California, Oregon, Alabama, and Auburn, will continue to cheat because the reward for cheating and refusing to cooperate with the subsequent investigation is greater than the punishment for getting caught. 

In the case of the Ohio State University, you have a chance to fix all of this.  You have an opportunity to show programs that lie, stonewall, and tamper with your potential witnesses that they will no longer be rewarded for doing so.  The first thing you must do is to utilize recorded interviews by third parties such as the media as evidence in your investigation.  The burden of proof isn't the same as it is in court because your members agree to abide by your rules and accept punishment according to your judgement.

It has been shown in the past, and shown again in the last two months that anyone who threatens to expose the Ohio State University's cheating to the NCAA recieves threats on their own personal well-being, including death threats, and subsequently refuse to testify before the committee.  Therefore, if you want to get to the truth, you will have to accept testimony outside of the committe as evidence.  Taped interviews will have to count as testimony before the committee, because nobody who has been threatened with death is going to physically testify before your committee. 

Then, you need to give the Ohio State University the worst punishment ever given to a school.  If they want to threaten potential witnesses with death, it is very appropriate to give their football program a two-year death penalty.  Also, you should make the Ohio State University forfeit every game they have played since those in which Maurice Clarett admitted he was ineligible. 

I seriously mean forfeit: not vacate.  Vacating games does nothing to reimburse teams who were cheated out of victories in those games by teams who used ineligible personnel.  That is why every team that played against the Ohio State University and their ineligible players should recieve credit for a win in every game they played against them. 

For the last part of their punishment, you should sentence the Ohio State University to ten years of probation and allow them no more than fifteen scholarships a year during that time.  The only way to deter other schools from cheating is to punish the Ohio State University so badly that other schools know you are now serious about enforcement.  Anything less will only empower schools that cheat. 

Your bottom line is this: you can continue to be a major part of the problem or you can decide to be a major part of the solution.  The Ohio State University has reaped huge profits from their cheating for the last ten years.  It is time for them to make restitution. 

How Many Christmases can I Stand in One Year?

THE scandal at THE Ohio State University just keeps getting better and better.  There seems to be one or two bombshells related to the investigation into their systemic and systematic cheating every week now.  Last week, Jim Tressel quit.  Then, George Dohrmann (rhymes with "George Foreman") finally released an article in Sports Illustrated with evidence that 28 players have hung out at Ed Rife's tattoo parlor, and that they regularly were provided with free drugs, alchohol, food, and apparently whatever else they wanted.

The next day, as Dohrmann was being interviewed by Dan Patrick, Patrick asked if there is "more."  Dorhmann, in a voice that sounded like the most attractive woman in the world had just texted him with amourous intent, said three simple words: "Yeah, there's more."  Then, ex-Ohio State player Ray Small said in an interview with the student newspaper, The Lantern, that "everybody was doing it" when he played there.  Of course, the "sacred brotherhood" contacted him and he tried to backtrack.  Since The Lantern recorded the interview, though, it was a little late to lie.

It was a great week, but following college football now is like watching the Daytona 500: it's a great spectacle, but we are always waiting for the "big one" to happen.

Fast forward to this week.  Tuesday, it was annoucned that Jim Tressel sent 77 texts to Pryor's "mentor" Ted Sarniak over a thirteen month period, provinig that he did know what was going on.  Tuesday night, we heard that Terrelle Pryor will no longer be playing at THE Ohio State University.  Then, the "bombshell" dropped that an ex-friend, who Pryor angered and alienated when, according to the ex-friend, he "became more arrogant," had just told ESPN that Pryor made between $20,000 and $40,000 in 2010 alone selling autographs and paraphenalia. 

Then, Sports by Brooks broke the story that the a freelance photographer and a businessman who sells paraphenelia on E-Bay wrote checks to Pryor and that he deposited them in his personal bank account.  Then, we found out that the photographer was told to disassociate himself from the program sometime last year. 

What all of this has done is to show beyond any doubt that the Ohio State University administration and coaching staff knew about all of the cheating, and that they covered it up.  Then, to make things worse, they lied to the NCAA and to Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delaney about what was going on, and then lied about their knowledge of what was going on.

The Ohio State University is the most corrupt program that we have seen since SMU recieved the death penalty in 1987.  The effect of the penalty was so bad that SMU didn't field a team the following year, either.  The Ohio State University deserves the death penalty, but it is well-known that the NCAA doesn't want to ever use it again. 

Since the NCAA won't give THE Ohio State University the death penalty they so richly deserve, they should at least wipe the entire Jim Tressel era out of the record books.  They actually deserve to forfeit all of the games, but under the current guidelines, the NCAA only makes teams vacate them.  

The Ohio State University also deserves ten years of probation with a loss of fifteen scholarships a year.  Let them sign ten players a year and fill the rest of the team out with walk-ons.  They deserve to be on television, though.  Let THE Ohio State University field terrible, undermanned teams on national TV as a reminder of what happens to cheaters when they get caught. 

The Ohio State University fanbase wanted Michigan to get the death penalty over 15 minutes of stretching.  Let them apply their own standards to themselves.

What's really funny about this is that the worst isn't over yet.  I would imagine that the IRS is now very interested in Terrelle Pryor and anyone who wrote him a check.  I would imagine they are now very interested in any other player who may have cheated.  Brent Musburger once said that when the local media get involved in investigations concerning NCAA rules, "it's all over."  He was partially correct.  When the IRS and/or FBI get involved, it's really over.

I just hope the NCAA punishes THE Ohio State University so severely that it sends a message that schools will no longer profit from ignoring the NCAA rulebook.  THE Ohio State University gained an unfair competitive advantage over the rest of the Big Ten for the entire Jim Tressel era becuase recruits signed up knowing that they would recieve a lot of "perks." 

For years, OSU has stonewalled investigators, denied everything, and their toadies have made death threats toward those who wanted to come forward with the truth.  Everyone was afraid to "rat out" the "Sacred Brotherhood."  The Scarlet Wall of Silence and Denial reigned supreme in Columbus.  Finally, though, they found out that you can't hide the truth forever.  They also found out that you can't intimidate everyone into silence. 

And college football is much better off for it.

I just wonder what goodies will be under the tree next week for the continuation of "Christmas in June."

The First Domino Falls in Columbus

Finally, after months of stonewalling, Ohio State University, the second-most corrupt program in college football decided that keeping Jim Tressel was a untenable position.  Of course, it was called a "mutual decision," but we all know what that really means.  The impending release of a Sports Illustrated article detailing a ten-year pattern of abuse in Columbus was apparently too much of a potential public relations disaster to justify keeping him. 

Reaction from the Columbus faithful is predictable, but it is the agreement of the national media that is most disturbing.  Tressel is being portrayed as a "man of integrity who made one mistake" because he was "protecting his students."  Now, just as OSU began to distance themselves from Jim Tressel, they are distancing themselves from Terelle Pryor.  Pryor is actually being scapegoated by many of the Columbus faithful as "The Player Who Brought Jim Tressel Down."

Former players and even fellow head coaches are all rushing to Tressel's defense, praising his integrity and talking about how "tragic" this entire "isolated episode" is.  Counting his tenure at Youngstown State University, Jim Tressel has engaged in over twenty years of systematic abuse of NCAA rules.  Twenty years of abuse does not constitute an isolated incident.  Tressel's sycophants can blame Terelle Pryor all they want, but all Terelle Pryor did was take advantage of a system set up by Jim Tressel. 

Terelle Pryor didn't bring Jim Tressel down; Jim Tressel brought Jim Tressel down.

But Jim Tressel, who has said he lied to the NCAA to "protect his players," is now allowing those very players to be thrown under the bus by Gordon Gee, Gene Smith, and the "sacred brotherhood" of those who have played and coached at Ohio State.  If Jim Tressel is "all about protecting his players," then why hasn't he made a public statement asking fans not to blame Terelle Pryor for everything, as many are now.

The Ohio State way is to lie, deny, rinse, and repeat.  Over and over and over.  Terelle Pryor was just one what will probably turn out to be over 200 players who accepted illegal benefits over the length of Tressel's tenure in Columbus.  They got incredibly lucky when the "Olentangy Mafia" got to Maurice Clarett before he could talk to NCAA investigators.  Really, though, what is happening right now should have happened in 2004. 

Numerous media outlets have documented all of Tressel's abuse, dating back to his early years at YSU.  Despite the blatherings of OSU fans and media shills that the entire affair is about tatoos, and therefore trivial, the tatoos are only the most visible aspects of a culture of corruption.  It seems that if the media has its way, Terelle Pryor and tattoos will become the symbols of the "tragic downfall of a good man."  It's time for someone in the National media to call "bullspit."

It's time for someone in the national media to hold Jim Tressel responsible for his actions.  George Dohrmann's article is a great start, but he needs some support here.  George Dohrmann is a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer.  He was quoted as saying that he investigated Tressel becuase the Columbus media refused to do so. 

The Columbus media has long been reduced to mere shills for all things Ohio State; that is so self-evident as to be expected.  But the national media does not need to follow the lead of the sycophants who masquerade as "sports writers" in Columbus.  Fellow writers at Sports Illustrated and a few from Yahoo agree with Dohrmann's conclusions.  The main problem is that nobody on television is standing up and holding Jim Tressel responsible for his own actions. 

Television still influences more people than any other medium, and somebody has to strike a blow for honest journalism here.  Hopefully, the current allegations are just the beginning of a torrent of abuses coming to light.  Anyone who follows sports with open eyes knows that tattoos are trivial compared to what is really going on in Columbus. 

Maurice Clarett's allegations of golden handshakes, free cars, "hostesses" from local strip clubs, and "tutors" to relieve players of the teidum of things like attending class and doing classwork were correct.  It was only death threats from the "Olentangy Mafia," an absurd NCAA loophole, and the Scarlet Wall of Silence that kept Ohio State from the consequences they so richly deserved concerning Clarett's allegations.

Now, Terelle Pryor is slated to be the "rogue" and the fall guy.  The OSU administration will try to make it appear as if Terelle Pryor walked into a compliant program and ruined it with his greed.  It reality, though, Terelle Pryor is one of as many as 200 greedy players who have played at Ohio State. 

The only difference between Terelle Pryor and almost every player who has ever donned the Scarlet and Gray is that Terelle Pryor is so stupid and arrogant that he made it obvious that something was going on.  Pryor's ego made him see himself as "untouchable," and he flaunted his illegal benefits with a feeling of utter impunity.  On an ethical football team, one that tries to turn young men into upstanding citizens who make a contribution to their communities after graduation, it would be the coach's job to keep Terelle Pryor's ego in check. 

And this begs a question: where was Jim Tressel while Terelle Pryor's was drowning in his own ego?  Where was the guidance that a coach is supposed to give a teenager to help him grow and prosper after the cheers have faded?  And where is Jim Tressel right now as Terelle Pryor is getting thinly-veiled death threats on his twitter page?  Jim Tressel is apparently in the same place as his integrity: nowhere to be found. 

There will be more.  Tattos may very well be the enduring symbol of the Tressel saga, but they will only be the most superficial aspect.  While my predictions of the fall of the Scarlet Wall of Slience may have been premature, it has definitely been breached.  The "sacred brotherhood" and "Olentangy Mafia" are going to shut up a lot of people, but they can't get to everybody.  The system of abuse has had too many casualties over the years, and too many of those casualties still have an axe to grind.

If only one or two players or ex-players tells the truth to the NCAA, the entire system of illegal benefits and denial of those benefits will crumble.  And it will be just desserts for a university that his thrived for at least ten years by blatantly abusing the system set in place by the NCAA to ensure fair competition.  As for those "dominoes," I would expect Gene Smith and Gordon Gee to follow their friend Jim Tressel out the door shortly. 

It sure is a fun time to be following college football.

Trending now...

I use Yahoo as my default home page on one of my browsers.  In the upper right hand corner is a feature called "trending now," which tells you the top ten searches for whatever period of time they are using.  Here is what I see as "trending now" in Michigan sports.

Michigan is killing little brother in recruiting.

In basketball, the relationship between Michigan and MSU is more obvious, because it is sometimes possible to win a National Championship with solely instate recruits.  Basically, in basketball recruiting, what is good for Michigan is bad for MSU and vice-versa.  In football, though, it's a little more complicated.

Michigan has a great name and Michigan can recruit nationally.  They are strong in Florida now, and have traditionally gotten a few great players out of Texas.  Ohio has also treated Michigan very well over the years.  For Michigan State, though, instate recruiting is their bread and butter.  If they don't recruit the state of Michigan extremely well, they are terrible.  Sometimes, they are terrible anyway. 

Basically, Michigan is in a position where every kid they get from Michigan is not only an asset, but a player who doesn't go to MSU.  When Michigan gets the best instate recruits, it sucks the lifeblood from the MSU program.  As of right now, Michigan is ahead of MSU 6-0 for instate recruits who recieved offers from both schools.  That's right: Michigan is pitching a shutout agaisnt MSU.

Predictably, MSU message boards are melting down over Michigan's trouncing of MSU in recruiting.  They are making every excuse in the book, from "scum is using firesale tactics to get kids to sign," to "the 20th best player in Ohio is better than the 4/5th best in Michigan this year." 

 I have a feeling the meltdowns on RCMB have just begun...


Where's Waldo?

At the Big Ten meetings, Gordon Gee, Gene Smith, and Jim Tressel have been hiding from the media.  Commissioner Jim Delaney is beginning to disassociate himself from them, and his latest comments are a subtle form of "throwing them under the bus."  It is obvious that Delaney no longer supports any of them, and will be full of his typical pompous, self-righteous statements when Tressel is finally fired and TSIO is finally punished.  I can't wait.

You Stay Classy, Now...

The WTKA "Mott takeover" day collected the most money for Mott Children's Hospital that they ever have.  It was a banner day, and one that should have been reserved solely for celebration.  However, a few former Michigan players and coaches decided that they had to badmouth the previous coaching staff.  This is NOT what being a "Michigan Man" is all about. 

No matter what their personal feelings, the ex-players and coaches need to realize that they can be supportive of the current staff without dumping on the previous one.  My feelings about the entire "process" are on record, and I won't reprise them here.  Really, though, no matter what your feelings, anyone who is representing the University of Michigan should be intelligent enough and have enough class to take the high road.

When former Michigan players make the kind of comments that many made last Friday, it reminds me of a bizarre Hostess Twinkie: Maize and Blue on the outside, but Spartan Green on the inside.

Shame on anyone who made deragatory comments about the previous staff when they should have been celebrating what is good about the University of Michigan.  If Bo was still alive, he would remind them that they are better than that.  Sadly, he isn't, and the moral compass of the program is temporarily MIA.  I hope someone fills the void soon, or Michigan will be just another college football program, but with more wins.

The Plot Thickens...

Finally, as I had suspected all along, there is confirmatin that Lloyd Carr had something to do with "transfer-mania" in 2008.  Ryan Mallett's father has told the media that Carr advised Mallett to transfer when Rich Rodriguez was hired.  Of course, it's OK because Carr, who graduated from NMU, is a "Michigan Man," while RR "wasn't."  And now, Brady Hoke, a BSU grad born in Ohio, is celebrated as the consummate 'Michigan Man" in the media.   

That begs a rather obvious question:

What the fuck does the "Carr-tel" think a "Michigan Man" is?  Do they think a "Michigan Man" is someone who puts his own agenda ahead of "his" school?  Do Carr and his minions think it was OK to sabotage the University of Michigan's football program for three years, only to be welcomed back with open arms and given their way when one of "their own" was hired?

Why isn't Lloyd Carr being held responsible for this?  Why doesn't anyone remember that it was Carr on the sidelines for the first four losses in the seven-game streak to Ohio State?  Why doesn't anyone seem to remember that it was Carr's terrible coaching in a four game streak that ruined two potentially great seasons that caused Bill Martin to "retire" Carr in the first place?

Does he really think his team's utter inability to beat truly elite teams and his embarassing losses to Ohio State, USC, Appalachian State and Oregon in succession entitled him to name his successor?  Or that he should have been totally exempt from criticism when he misused his power to sabotage his successor? 

Lloyd Carr was still on the payroll of the University of Michigan while he was sabotaging the program.  He should have to pay back every penny he earned during that period.  Better yet, he should donate it to Mott Children's Hospital. 

For what it's worth, I don't fault Brady Hoke for taking the job.  He was in San Diego, coaching his team and doing his job, when he got the "offer he couldn't refuse."  He interviewed for his dream job and got it.  Hoke is to be commended.  Greg Mattison should also be commended for coming back.  Neither had anything to do with what happened in Ann Arbor the last three years.  The people I have a problem with are the ex-players, ex-coaches, and boosters who worked so hard to get Rich Rodriguez fired. 

Michigan had better hope Brady Hoke succeeds beyond any vision they had for him.  If he doesn't, the Carr-tel and their followers will be exposed as being exactly what they stereotyped Rich Rodriguez as being: ignorant, dishonest hillbillies who think nepotism is the only legitimate reason to hire anyone.

Hoke and Mattison are exempt.  They were far too busy with their own teams to take part in Carr's assassination of RR's character and sabotage of the University of Michigan football program.  Hopefully, they can bring the program back.  It will certainly be easier now that nobody is actively sabotaging it from within.

Now that some sabotage has been documented by a player's parent, it's really not a question anymore that Carr was actively sabotaging the program he professed to love and the school that was signing his paycheck.  The only question now is one of extent.  How much sabotage did Carr get away with while collecting UM paychecks? 

Wouldn't it be ironic if it turned out that it was Carr, whose system of counting practice hours was the one RR inherited in the first place, was the one who suggested the story to Michael Rosenberg?

I'm not saying that it happened that way, but I am saying that it certainly is possible.  I'm certainly not holding my breath waiting for Lloyd Carr to come clean.

Grab bag for "silly season."


For college football and basketball fans, it's now time for the equivalent of NASCAR'S "silly season." That's when there are no actual events, but owners and drivers move around, and the rumors run rampant. In college sports, the months from April through August are sorta like that. Here are a few topics for discussion.
 
Doom for Sparty?
 
Tom Izzo can't be happy with the way this season went. His team was ranked the second best in college basketball going into this season, but they were swept by Michigan, and lost their first game in the NCAA tournament to UCLA, proving that they didn't really belong there and that their selection was a "courtesy berth," based on coaching politics and past performance.
 
Izzo now knows that his Cavalier Indulgence affected the Spartans more than he possibly thought it would. It was obvious to anyone who wanted to watch that his team tuned him out. Tom Izzo, whose claim to fame is his ability to get "Spartan effort" out of his Spartans, watched his team go through the motions as though they didn't give a shit for 35 minutes every game, and try to turn on the effort switch the last five minutes. Sometimes it worked, but it didn't work enough.
 
Almost everything I have predicted for Izzo, starting last June or so, has either happened or been surpassed. Discipline problems, "losing the locker room," less victories, an early exit from the NCAA, attrition, and Michigan starting to close the gap between the two programs were all predictions that came true. There is really only one prediction left: Izzo to the NBA this season.
 
When it comes to Sparty, Michigan is in a win/win position right now. If Izzo stays, it will probably take him the same four years to rebuild his program in the wake of his Cavalier Indulgence that it did for Billy Donovan to rebuild the Florida Gators after his "Magic Moment." That, of course, is if Izzo can handle the losing. If he can't, we might see a glorious meltdown that does Woody Hayes proud. If Izzo leaves, it will still take four years to rebuild the program.
 
Either way, Michigan is poised to regain the same position it had for about 20 years prior to Izzo's ascension: dominant instate program. Life is good.
 
Jim Tressel is in trouble
 
At this point, the question isn't whether or not Jim Tressel will be fired from TSIO, it's when he will be fired and whether they will call it a "retirement" or a firing. Tressel was lucky that he never paid for his violations at YSU, and was actually rewarded with the TSIO job when he should have been kicked out of the profession.
 
He got lucky again when somebody got to Maurice Clarett and intimidated him to change his story when NCAA investigators made it to Columbus. The Scarlet Wall has protected him for a long time, but there are cracks in the wall and his luck is running out.
 
Even TSIO fans know that Tressel is Toast. In fact, the only two people in the football universe who haven't figured it out seem to be Gene Smith and Gordon Gee. The only question now is "who is going to be the new coach?"
 
I would like to see Mark Dantonio get the job. First, it would throw MSU into total disarray. Second, Dantonio hates Michigan enough to keep the rivalry interesting, but isn't really a good enough coach to dominate the rivalry.
 
There are two nightmare scenarios, though. The first is that they could talk Urban Meyer out of "retirement." Meyer's preference for the TSIO, Michigan, and Notre Dame jobs over all in college football aren't a secret. I would imagine that someone in the TSIO office has already made exploratory contact with his agent.
 
If you are a Michigan fan, you do not want to see Meyer at TSIO. If he coaches there, the same maggots who screamed "the spread won't work in the Big Ten" and whined until RR was run out of town will be bitching because Michigan "can't solve Urban Meyer's spread." This brings to mind the other nightmare scenario.
 
Rich Rodriguez is available and TSIO needs another coach soon.
 
Stranger things have happened. RR got shit on from almost the moment he got into town. Lloyd Carr and his Carr-tel sabotaged the program from within at every turn. Carr turned from consummate Michigan Man into a petty, jealous old man who put his personal agenda over the well-being of "his" school.
 
I would be willing to bet my bottom dollar that Carr gave Michael Rosenberg the information that would eventually turn into "Practice-gate." Carr had this information because it was he who had originally come up with the incorrect interpretation of the rule and implemented the program in the first place.  You certainly wouldn't know it from listening to David Brandon, though.  Then, of course, there were the charges that RR didn't know anything about "Michigan tradition" or the rivalry with TSIO.
 
The Carr-tel made sure to tell everyone they knew that "Rich Rodriguez is not a Michigan Man." Fielding Yost was from WV. Bo Schembechler was from OH. Brady Hoke is from OH. The were all "Michigan men." But Rich Rodriguez was "not a Michigan man" because he was from WV? RR heard more about Michigan tradition and "the rivalry" in his three years at Michigan than most people hear in a lifetime. You can rest assured that RR knows all about "the rivlarly."
 
And you can rest assured that RR has more reason to be utterly and profoundly pissed off at the University of Michigan than Lloyd Carr ever did to assassinate RR's character. If I was RR, my agent would already have contacted TSIO for exploratory discussions. RR wasn't allowed to finish what he started at Michigan, but he could "finish" it if he takes the TSIO job.
 
There are about ten coaches you don't want to see with the TSIO job. AFAIC, RR is number two on the list, only to Urban Meyer. Off the top of my head, those I would most fear at TSIO would be both Kellys, Patterson, Peterson, Mullen, and the two I mentioned already. Let's hope Saint Dantonio gets his "Dream Job" in a month or two.