It’s been a while since I’ve checked in. Hectic holidays as they say. I hope everyone out there had good health and good times and did not become just a little bit worn out by family time.
So, it is on to 2011, although it will be hard-pressed to top 2010.
After all, on New Year’s Day 2010 how many of us predicted the following:
--Tiger Woods not winning a single golf tournament anywhere, anytime, anyplace all year.
--The Saints winning The Super Bowl; The Giants winning The World Series; Butler coming with an inch of winning The NCAA basketball championship and Graeme McDowell, Louis Ousthuizen and Martin Kaymer winning major titles.
--LeBron James making perhaps the worst marketing decision any athlete has made since Andre Agassi looked into a camera and said, ‘image is everything.’
--The New York Yankees targeting a big-money free agent and NOT getting him.
--The Detroit Lions finishing the season on a four-game WINNING streak.
--The Washington Redskins turning their season into a soap opera/circus.
Wait, I digress. The Redskins becoming a soap opera/circus is as predictable as Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer winning major titles in tennis and The New York Islanders battling for the top draft pick.
So much has changed in sports through the years, so much has stayed the same. I tend to hang onto traditions, which is why I watch The Rose Bowl every New Year’s Day regardless of who is playing. This year’s game was great and seeing TCU hang on to win was gratifying to all of us who think the BCS Presidents should all be put to sea in a rowboat for the good of all mankind. Yes, that includes my new best friend Gordon Gee—even though he did tell Pete Thamel of The New York Times that he was planning to eat crow for dinner after TCU’s win in Pasadena. Of course he was eating it in a fancy New Orleans restaurant getting ready to watch Ohio State play Arkansas sometime in January—who among us knows when the college season actually ends these days. (Unrelated note: The college season is now so long that Pittsburgh will be playing under its third head coach since the end of the regular season when it finally plays whatever meaningless bowl it is playing in this coming weekend. Talk about a long season).
Back to Ohio State for a moment. I really think it is time for the NCAA to burn its rulebook. After all why bother having rules if you are going to make up different rules to suit yourself every time something happens involving a major (read moneymaking) school.
Look, we can debate the fairness of the rules forever. But here are the facts: Cam Newton WAS ineligible according to the rulebook. It says if you or any representative (that would include your own father) solicits money, you’re ineligible even if you never receive a dime. The NCAA says Cecil Newton solicited money from Mississippi State. That’s the end of the story. EXCEPT the NCAA says, no, even though it isn’t in the rules, since we believe the player knew nothing (just like Sargent Schultz knew nothing) he’s okay to play. I would ask Auburn fans one question—because I have nothing against you or Cam Newton or Gene Chizik and your former AD David Housel was one of my all-time favorite people in sports: Do you think for one second if your football team was 6-6 and playing in whatever bowl Kentucky is playing in that Cam Newton would have been eligible? If you say yes, PLEASE call me so I can sell you this beautiful plot of oceanfront land I own in Nebraska.
Now we have the case of The Ohio State Five, one of whom happens to be the team’s biggest star, quarterback Terrelle Pryor. They have been found guilty of selling memorabilia, getting discounts (at a tattoo parlor for crying out loud) and receiving ‘special treatment,’ a real NCAA no-no. Again, are the rules silly? Perhaps. But the NCAA says the violations are serious enough to merit a five game suspension.
Now, we can sit here most of the day and make the argument that what Newton went un-punished for is a lot more serious than what the Buckeye Five are being punished for but that’s not the point. The point is this: If they’re guilty, they’re guilty—they go to jail NOW not next September. Except the NCAA, apparently after being lobbied by The Sugar Bowl, says it is okay for them to play in The Sugar Bowl and THEN sit out the first five games of next season. Here are the five games: Akron and Toledo at home (I think they can get past those two); at Miami—coming off a 7-6 season with a new coach—Colorado (another new coach) and Michigan State—perhaps a tough game but a home game too. When do they become eligible again? For the game at Nebraska. What a shock.
Personally, if I was Pryor, all pledges to come back aside, I’d bolt for the NFL as soon as The Sugar Bowl is finally over. This isn’t new stuff for the NCAA by the way: back in 1991, it declared Nevada-Las Vegas ineligible only to move the penalty back a year because, um, UNLV was the defending NCAA champion and had everyone back and CBS really needed The Rebels eligible for ratings.
This is what the NCAA does and then it sits back and claims it has never, ever done anything wrong or done anything with the bottom line in mind. Oh please.
Meanwhile, on more pleasant topics: It was wonderful to see Air Force and (especially) Army win their bowl games although disappointing to see Navy lose. Still, all three had great seasons, combining for a record of 25-14. If you don’t think that’s a remarkable feat at military academies in times like these, you aren’t paying attention.
Maryland also won its bowl game—the Terrapins earning the right to travel 10 miles to downtown DC to play in frigid RFK Stadium in return for their 8-4 bounce-back season. The game was the last for Coach Ralph Friedgen, who was un-ceremoniously fired 10 days before the game by new Athletic Director Kevin Anderson. Basically Friedgen, who was 75-50 in ten seasons at Maryland, was fired for not selling enough tickets. Gee, what a surprise that Maryland people don’t get all that excited about ACC football.
Anderson had a plan though that seemed to make some sense: Bring in Mike Leach with his scorch-the-earth offense and mouth. Controversial, sure, everyone knows what happened at Texas Tech but if Leach won and threw for 500 yards a game no one at Maryland would care. If nothing else he would bring national attention to the school.
But Anderson was apparently overruled by the academic side of the school. Leach, they decided, carried too much baggage. And so, to replace Ralph Friedgen, Maryland hired…wait for it…Randy Edsall, who has done a fine job at Connecticut the last 12 years—just as Friedgen did a fine job at Maryland for the last ten.
Wow. The wolves are already at Anderson’s door and he’s been at Maryland for four months. I guess in the end, 2011 isn't going to be all that different than 2010.
Showing posts with label Ralph Friedgen. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ralph Friedgen. Show all posts
Monday, January 3, 2011
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Washington Post column -- Firing Ralph Friedgen is wrong, but Maryland hopes it will generate dollars
The following is this week's article for The Washington Post ------------
The stunning and seemingly sudden decision by Maryland Athletic Director Kevin Anderson to fire Ralph Friedgen as football coach makes absolute sense.
After all, former Texas Tech coach Mike Leach has the potential to bring a passion to the school's football program not seen since Friedgen's first season 10 years ago.
Maryland won eight games this season, statistically the second-best turnaround in college football. Almost no one cared. Fans failed to fill Byrd Stadium, one of the ACC's smaller venues, even once. When 48,000 showed up on a perfect November night for a game against Florida State with the Terrapins still contending for the division title, Maryland officials acted as if they had set a new attendance mark.
That's why Maryland is playing in the low-level Military Bowl. A trip to frigid Washington, D.C., to play in a decrepit stadium on a weekday afternoon in December? Most football people consider that to be more punishment than reward.
Anderson did what he had to do when he had the opportunity to do it. He's absolutely right to force out Friedgen before Leach lands someplace else.
He also could not be more wrong. This has the feel of a professional lynching.
Click here for the rest of the column: Firing Ralph Friedgen is wrong, but Maryland hopes it will generate dollars
The stunning and seemingly sudden decision by Maryland Athletic Director Kevin Anderson to fire Ralph Friedgen as football coach makes absolute sense.
After all, former Texas Tech coach Mike Leach has the potential to bring a passion to the school's football program not seen since Friedgen's first season 10 years ago.
Maryland won eight games this season, statistically the second-best turnaround in college football. Almost no one cared. Fans failed to fill Byrd Stadium, one of the ACC's smaller venues, even once. When 48,000 showed up on a perfect November night for a game against Florida State with the Terrapins still contending for the division title, Maryland officials acted as if they had set a new attendance mark.
That's why Maryland is playing in the low-level Military Bowl. A trip to frigid Washington, D.C., to play in a decrepit stadium on a weekday afternoon in December? Most football people consider that to be more punishment than reward.
Anderson did what he had to do when he had the opportunity to do it. He's absolutely right to force out Friedgen before Leach lands someplace else.
He also could not be more wrong. This has the feel of a professional lynching.
Click here for the rest of the column: Firing Ralph Friedgen is wrong, but Maryland hopes it will generate dollars
Monday, November 1, 2010
Washington Post article -- Terps may have saved Ralph Friedgen's job, if Maryland fans care to notice
Here is my column that's running at The Washington Post --------
College football seasons seem to fly by in instants. One minute teams are sweating in the August heat; seemingly the next, they are wondering about wind chill factors.
Eight weeks ago, on a warm Labor Day afternoon in Baltimore, the Maryland football team ran through the tunnel at M&T Bank Stadium surrounded by questions. After a horrific 2-10 season put Coach Ralph Friedgen's future in serious jeopardy last fall, Terrapins football fans (a rapidly dwindling number, it seems) wondered if Friedgen would still be the coach at his alma mater when the snow began flying this winter.
That question seems to have been answered: Friedgen isn't going anywhere. His team is 6-2 and has clinched a bowl berth. They are actually contending in the ACC's Atlantic Division, which may not be the same as contending in the SEC West or the Big 12 South but is nonetheless a step forward. The Terrapins began their season with little clue about how much better they would be.
They won that Labor Day game against Navy, 17-14 in spite of giving up 485 yards. Since then, their improvement has been steady though not spectacular. Navy is still the only team with a winning record Maryland has beaten. The other five victims - Morgan State (a truly bad division I-AA team); Florida International; Duke; Boston College and Wake Forest - are a combined 13-26. West Virginia and Clemson, the teams the Terrapins have lost to, haven't exactly been world-beaters: they're a combined 9-7.
For this group of players and coaches though, none of that matters. After humiliating the Demon Deacons 62-14, Maryland can now focus on achieving goals almost no one thought possible when the season began
Click here for the rest of the column: Terps may have saved Ralph Friedgen's job, if Maryland fans care to notice
College football seasons seem to fly by in instants. One minute teams are sweating in the August heat; seemingly the next, they are wondering about wind chill factors.
Eight weeks ago, on a warm Labor Day afternoon in Baltimore, the Maryland football team ran through the tunnel at M&T Bank Stadium surrounded by questions. After a horrific 2-10 season put Coach Ralph Friedgen's future in serious jeopardy last fall, Terrapins football fans (a rapidly dwindling number, it seems) wondered if Friedgen would still be the coach at his alma mater when the snow began flying this winter.
That question seems to have been answered: Friedgen isn't going anywhere. His team is 6-2 and has clinched a bowl berth. They are actually contending in the ACC's Atlantic Division, which may not be the same as contending in the SEC West or the Big 12 South but is nonetheless a step forward. The Terrapins began their season with little clue about how much better they would be.
They won that Labor Day game against Navy, 17-14 in spite of giving up 485 yards. Since then, their improvement has been steady though not spectacular. Navy is still the only team with a winning record Maryland has beaten. The other five victims - Morgan State (a truly bad division I-AA team); Florida International; Duke; Boston College and Wake Forest - are a combined 13-26. West Virginia and Clemson, the teams the Terrapins have lost to, haven't exactly been world-beaters: they're a combined 9-7.
For this group of players and coaches though, none of that matters. After humiliating the Demon Deacons 62-14, Maryland can now focus on achieving goals almost no one thought possible when the season began
Click here for the rest of the column: Terps may have saved Ralph Friedgen's job, if Maryland fans care to notice
Friday, June 25, 2010
Celebrating in Washington for Wizards moves; Yow moving to NC State, won’t be missed by many at Maryland
There was a lot of celebrating going on in the Washington, D.C. area last night.
The party that everyone noticed took place at Verizon Center where The Washington Wizards officially welcomed John Wall as the new face of their franchise. The Kentucky guard was considered by everyone in the NBA the no-brainer first pick, the closest thing there was to a sure-fire star in this year’s draft.
Almost as important, the Wizards made several other moves to acquire players, notably the Bulls Kurt Hinrich, who should help them improve after their woebegone 2009-2010 season that was ‘highlighted,’ by their star player being hauled into court for gun possession and was suspended by the league in part for bringing the guns into the locker room, in part for acting like an idiot.
Wall comes across as a nice kid who has overcome a tough childhood to become a future NBA star. One thing he needs to do though is drop the campaign he unofficially began last night to wear number 11 for The Wizards. That number was retired by the franchise years ago because it was worn by Elvin Hayes, who played a major role in the team’s only NBA title in 1978 and was a key player during a five year stretch when the Washington Bullets reached three NBA Finals. Hayes was a truly great player. You don’t go pulling numbers from the rafters (figuratively) for anyone, much less for a 20-year-old rookie, no matter how heralded he may be.
If Hayes makes some kind of money deal with Wall to use the number it will be smarmy and gross. If he graciously says, ‘go ahead and wear it,’ it will be less so but still wrong. Wall should establish his own identity and find a different number. It isn’t as if he’s worn number 11 for 15 years someplace and is attached to it that way. He wore it for one year at Kentucky and (I assume) for a couple years in high school. Move on.
Speaking of moving on: While they were delighted in downtown D.C. to welcome Wall, they were just about as happy down Route 1 in College Park to wave bye-bye to Debbie Yow, who is leaving Maryland after 16 years as athletic director to take the same job at North Carolina State. To quote one Maryland person: “What are THEY thinking.”
Yow was perfectly competent at some aspects of her job. She balanced an un-balanced budget (largely through cutbacks but nevertheless she did it); she hired some solid non-revenue coaches and she kept the trains running on time for the most part in College Park. But she didn’t make a whole lot of friends among those she worked with. People came and went in the athletic department the way pitching coaches came and went when George Steinbrenner was still running the Yankees.
She always had a bad relationship with the most important person at Maryland, basketball coach Gary Williams, and her relationship with football coach Ralph Friedgen went straight downhill just as soon as Friedgen stopped winning on a regular basis. She went from taking bows for hiring Friedgen—whose hiring she had little to do with—to acting as if she’d never heard of him and putting a ‘coach in waiting,’ in place which, even though she insisted Friedgen had ‘signed off on,’ clearly didn’t make the coach happy.
Her downfall—and believe me she’s getting out of town ahead of the posse here with a new president taking over the school on September 1—came when she thought she saw an opening to get rid of Williams in 2009 and the notion blew up in her face. The basketball program was struggling and Williams made the mistake of taking a frustrated public swipe at Yow when asked about some recruiting efforts that hadn’t panned out. Yow saw an opening and tried to pounce only to find that most Maryland people remembered what Williams had done to rebuild a fallen program into a national champion and also believed he could still coach.
Williams’ players rallied behind him to make the NCAA Tournament in 2009 and then had a very good year in 2010. Yow was forced to retreat. She even went so far as to “nominate,” Williams for the basketball Hall of Fame last month, an absolute grandstand play if there’s ever been one. Debbie Yow nominating Gary Williams for the Hall of Fame is the equivalent of Tiger Woods nominating me for The Pulitzer Prize. No one bought that act—especially Williams, who was as close to speechless as he ever gets when the subject came up.
There was also the botched attempt to get rid of Friedgen last fall. After failing to raise the money from boosters to buy Friedgen out, Yow let it leak that perhaps the money could come from state funds—an idea quickly shot down by Governor Martin O’Malley. So, she looked bad again and looked even worse because she had committed $1 million to James Franklin as the coach-in-waiting when no one on earth could see any reason to anoint Franklin.
I wrote a column on the football coaching situation last fall, saying that Yow had botched it with the Franklin deal and by not standing behind Friedgen, a Maryland grad who revived the program when he arrived before falling on some hard times. Yow’s response to the column was revealing.
She sent an angry e-mail not just to Matt Vita, the sports editor of The Post, but to Emilio Garcia-Ruiz, the ex-sports editor who is now the Metro editor and to Marcus Brauchli, the executive editor. She allegedly copied me but somehow the note didn’t show up in my e-mail cue until six hours later—AFTER I’d been forwarded the note and had responded to her. Just an electronic foul-up no doubt.
Yow claimed I had my “facts,” wrong in the column—basically claiming that Friedgen was all for the coach-in-waiting concept and then singing Franklin’s praises in a way that implied that Friedgen would never have gotten a player to sign with Maryland again if Franklin hadn’t returned to the school. I wrote her back to say (A) Don’t expect an answer from Brauchli anytime soon because he probably doesn’t know Maryland HAS a football team; (B) what was she expecting Garcia-Ruiz to do, scold me for being a bad boy? And (C) I’d be more than happy to thrash out our disagreements on the issue but I felt pretty confident what I’d written was accurate. I also wasn’t the only person by any stretch to write or say what I wrote.
I never heard back. From that point on Yow, who used to love to stop me at Maryland games to point out to me that Gary had switched to a zone defense (wow, really Debbie, I never would have noticed) made a point of looking the other way whenever I saw her. Which was actually fine with me. I figured someone else could let me know if Gary switched to a zone.
What was most interesting was her behavior the night of The Children’s Charities Foundation banquet in December. I was seated at a table with the coaches who would be playing in the BB+T Classic the next day, including Gary and Villanova’s Jay Wright. Yow was at the next table. At no point during the evening did she acknowledge the presence of her basketball coach or say hello to him. Within seconds of his getting up to leave—I mean SECONDS—she raced back to our table to lavish a warm welcome on Wright. It was stunning.
Yow won’t be missed by many in College Park. She’ll have a certain honeymoon period at State because her sister Kay, who died in 2009 of cancer, was a beloved coach there for 34 years. My guess is that honeymoon won’t last terribly long.
-------
John recently appeared on The Jim Rome Show (www.jimrome.com) to discuss 'Moment of Glory.' Click here to download, or listen in the player below:
------------------------------
John's new book: "Moment of Glory--The Year Underdogs Ruled The Majors,"--is now available online and in bookstores nationwide. Visit your favorite retailer, or click here for online purchases
The party that everyone noticed took place at Verizon Center where The Washington Wizards officially welcomed John Wall as the new face of their franchise. The Kentucky guard was considered by everyone in the NBA the no-brainer first pick, the closest thing there was to a sure-fire star in this year’s draft.
Almost as important, the Wizards made several other moves to acquire players, notably the Bulls Kurt Hinrich, who should help them improve after their woebegone 2009-2010 season that was ‘highlighted,’ by their star player being hauled into court for gun possession and was suspended by the league in part for bringing the guns into the locker room, in part for acting like an idiot.
Wall comes across as a nice kid who has overcome a tough childhood to become a future NBA star. One thing he needs to do though is drop the campaign he unofficially began last night to wear number 11 for The Wizards. That number was retired by the franchise years ago because it was worn by Elvin Hayes, who played a major role in the team’s only NBA title in 1978 and was a key player during a five year stretch when the Washington Bullets reached three NBA Finals. Hayes was a truly great player. You don’t go pulling numbers from the rafters (figuratively) for anyone, much less for a 20-year-old rookie, no matter how heralded he may be.
If Hayes makes some kind of money deal with Wall to use the number it will be smarmy and gross. If he graciously says, ‘go ahead and wear it,’ it will be less so but still wrong. Wall should establish his own identity and find a different number. It isn’t as if he’s worn number 11 for 15 years someplace and is attached to it that way. He wore it for one year at Kentucky and (I assume) for a couple years in high school. Move on.
Speaking of moving on: While they were delighted in downtown D.C. to welcome Wall, they were just about as happy down Route 1 in College Park to wave bye-bye to Debbie Yow, who is leaving Maryland after 16 years as athletic director to take the same job at North Carolina State. To quote one Maryland person: “What are THEY thinking.”
Yow was perfectly competent at some aspects of her job. She balanced an un-balanced budget (largely through cutbacks but nevertheless she did it); she hired some solid non-revenue coaches and she kept the trains running on time for the most part in College Park. But she didn’t make a whole lot of friends among those she worked with. People came and went in the athletic department the way pitching coaches came and went when George Steinbrenner was still running the Yankees.
She always had a bad relationship with the most important person at Maryland, basketball coach Gary Williams, and her relationship with football coach Ralph Friedgen went straight downhill just as soon as Friedgen stopped winning on a regular basis. She went from taking bows for hiring Friedgen—whose hiring she had little to do with—to acting as if she’d never heard of him and putting a ‘coach in waiting,’ in place which, even though she insisted Friedgen had ‘signed off on,’ clearly didn’t make the coach happy.
Her downfall—and believe me she’s getting out of town ahead of the posse here with a new president taking over the school on September 1—came when she thought she saw an opening to get rid of Williams in 2009 and the notion blew up in her face. The basketball program was struggling and Williams made the mistake of taking a frustrated public swipe at Yow when asked about some recruiting efforts that hadn’t panned out. Yow saw an opening and tried to pounce only to find that most Maryland people remembered what Williams had done to rebuild a fallen program into a national champion and also believed he could still coach.
Williams’ players rallied behind him to make the NCAA Tournament in 2009 and then had a very good year in 2010. Yow was forced to retreat. She even went so far as to “nominate,” Williams for the basketball Hall of Fame last month, an absolute grandstand play if there’s ever been one. Debbie Yow nominating Gary Williams for the Hall of Fame is the equivalent of Tiger Woods nominating me for The Pulitzer Prize. No one bought that act—especially Williams, who was as close to speechless as he ever gets when the subject came up.
There was also the botched attempt to get rid of Friedgen last fall. After failing to raise the money from boosters to buy Friedgen out, Yow let it leak that perhaps the money could come from state funds—an idea quickly shot down by Governor Martin O’Malley. So, she looked bad again and looked even worse because she had committed $1 million to James Franklin as the coach-in-waiting when no one on earth could see any reason to anoint Franklin.
I wrote a column on the football coaching situation last fall, saying that Yow had botched it with the Franklin deal and by not standing behind Friedgen, a Maryland grad who revived the program when he arrived before falling on some hard times. Yow’s response to the column was revealing.
She sent an angry e-mail not just to Matt Vita, the sports editor of The Post, but to Emilio Garcia-Ruiz, the ex-sports editor who is now the Metro editor and to Marcus Brauchli, the executive editor. She allegedly copied me but somehow the note didn’t show up in my e-mail cue until six hours later—AFTER I’d been forwarded the note and had responded to her. Just an electronic foul-up no doubt.
Yow claimed I had my “facts,” wrong in the column—basically claiming that Friedgen was all for the coach-in-waiting concept and then singing Franklin’s praises in a way that implied that Friedgen would never have gotten a player to sign with Maryland again if Franklin hadn’t returned to the school. I wrote her back to say (A) Don’t expect an answer from Brauchli anytime soon because he probably doesn’t know Maryland HAS a football team; (B) what was she expecting Garcia-Ruiz to do, scold me for being a bad boy? And (C) I’d be more than happy to thrash out our disagreements on the issue but I felt pretty confident what I’d written was accurate. I also wasn’t the only person by any stretch to write or say what I wrote.
I never heard back. From that point on Yow, who used to love to stop me at Maryland games to point out to me that Gary had switched to a zone defense (wow, really Debbie, I never would have noticed) made a point of looking the other way whenever I saw her. Which was actually fine with me. I figured someone else could let me know if Gary switched to a zone.
What was most interesting was her behavior the night of The Children’s Charities Foundation banquet in December. I was seated at a table with the coaches who would be playing in the BB+T Classic the next day, including Gary and Villanova’s Jay Wright. Yow was at the next table. At no point during the evening did she acknowledge the presence of her basketball coach or say hello to him. Within seconds of his getting up to leave—I mean SECONDS—she raced back to our table to lavish a warm welcome on Wright. It was stunning.
Yow won’t be missed by many in College Park. She’ll have a certain honeymoon period at State because her sister Kay, who died in 2009 of cancer, was a beloved coach there for 34 years. My guess is that honeymoon won’t last terribly long.
-------
John recently appeared on The Jim Rome Show (www.jimrome.com) to discuss 'Moment of Glory.' Click here to download, or listen in the player below:
------------------------------
John's new book: "Moment of Glory--The Year Underdogs Ruled The Majors,"--is now available online and in bookstores nationwide. Visit your favorite retailer, or click here for online purchases
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Bobby Bowden deserved a better ending than this; Friedgen gets another year
Bobby Bowden announced his retirement yesterday—sort of. He showed up on some kind of video with reporters not allowed to ask questions. No doubt Florida State wanted it that way because the school was afraid that, under questioning, Bowden might break the golden rule of big-time college athletics and tell the truth.
As in this truth: the man who made Florida State football matter got shoved out the door by an impatient president, board of trustees and fan base when all he wanted was to coach one more year. He said just that on Saturday, that he’d like to coach in 2010 and then turn the job over to Jimbo Fisher, who FSU put right up against Bowden’s back a couple of years ago hoping he might take the hint and allow himself to be shoved out the door.
Great coaches are great competitors. They don’t just say ‘thanks for the memories,’ the first time things go wrong and ask someone to shut the lights out in their office for them. Five years ago when the president of Penn State and the chairman of the board of trustees went to Joe Paterno’s house to talk to him about stepping down after going 26-33 over a five year stretch he threw them out of his house. He’s 50-13—that’s not a typo—since then.
The great ones should orchestrate their own exit. Bowden certainly earned that right.
There’s no need to recite his record here; the national titles, 10 win seasons, bowl trips. Or the fact that Florida State was absolutely nowhere in college football before he arrived and grew to be one of the four or five truly elite programs under Bowden. Was his reign perfect? Of course not. Even now, FSU is appealing an NCAA ruling that would take away 14 of Bowden’s 388 victories because of an academic scandal that football players were involved in. He’s had players in trouble—so has Paterno and every other college coach who has coached in the big time for longer than 15 minutes.
That’s the reality of the big time game: the pressure to win and win and win sometimes causes even the best coaches to take great athletes who may not be great people. The ugliest incident I ever saw at a Final Four involved a player recruited by Dean Smith, who coached with more class and dignity for 36 years than anyone I’ve ever met in the college game. Even the best make mistakes.
There’s no doubt Florida State has slipped in recent years. It certainly hasn’t slipped to 3-9 the way Notre Dame did under Charlie Weis or below .500 the way in-state rival Miami—the once vaunted U—did a few years back. Bowden will coach in his 27th straight bowl late this month. But 6-6 is a long way from all those consecutive 10 win, top-five seasons. FSU lost about three games in the ACC in the 90s after it joined the league. I used to say the ACC consisted of Florida State, the seven dwarfs and Duke—which aspired to be a dwarf. Now it’s pretty much 12 dwarfs. THAT Florida State is long gone.
What made Bowden special went beyond winning. He was—is—a good man, a very good man. He was always accessible to the media. Nowadays, getting time alone with a big-time college coach in-season is all but impossible. If you jump through 18 hurdles and promise to be nice or if you bring a cameraman with you there’s a chance you can get 10 minutes.
When Bowden began to build FSU into a power, you could pick up a phone and call him almost any time. I remember years ago when he took his team to play Pittsburgh, which was ranked No. 1 with Dan Marino at quarterback at the time. (Bowden played more tough road games in those days than anyone. Heck, even this year he played—and won—at Brigham Young. How many BCS schools will schedule THAT game?). I was covering the game and arrived in Pittsburgh on Friday afternoon for FSU’s walk-through hoping to grab a few minutes with Bowden. It had been a last minute decision to send me up to the game so I just showed up. No one stopped me. I just walked in.
When I told Bowden what I needed he said, “look, unless you’re in a big rush, why don’t you come back to our hotel and we can talk in my room. It’ll be more relaxed back there.”
Which it was. Bowden wrote my whole story for me. I still remember George Solomon, the Post sports editor back then (a Florida grad) saying after reading the story, “God Bless Bobby Bowden, he makes us all into good reporters.”
Bowden deserved a better ending than this. He deserved the ending HE wanted, not the ending some suit with a title wanted because it will take some pressure from the alumni off him. Serious question: Does anyone think that Jimbo Fisher is going to make THAT big a difference next season? As for the long term—recruiting—Fisher can tell every recruit that he’ll be in charge beginning in 2011, that Coach Bowden has already announced that 2010 will be his last season.
Back in 1980 I was sent to Alabama to do a story on Bear Bryant. Believe it or not, Bryant wasn’t that old—66 at the time I think—but he had lived a hard life and looked more like 100 when I sat in his conference room with him. It was pretty clear to me that he didn’t know the names of too many players and wasn’t terribly involved in planning for that week’s game against Notre Dame.
“My coaches do the coaching,” he said. “I’m pretty much the CEO around here.”
It’s harder to do that when your bosses have told your number one assistant that the minute you are out the door, he’s in charge. I’m not implying that Fisher is disloyal to Bowden, I’m just saying that the term used is ‘coach-in-waiting.’ Is there anyone out there who ENJOYS waiting?
Bobby Bowden deserved a lot better than he got from Florida State. He certainly gave them a lot better than the people in charge deserve.
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Different school, different situation: Maryland announced yesterday that Ralph Friedgen would remain as coach even after going 2-10 this season. The reason for Friedgen surviving is simple: Maryland hasn’t got $4 million on hand to buy him out. Governor Martin O’Malley made it clear last week he didn’t want state funds spent on a buyout and there’s no big-time booster who is going to step up to spend that kind of money on football, which just doesn’t matter all that much at Maryland as long as the basketball team is playing well.
Maryland AD Debbie Yow named James Franklin as coach-in-waiting last year—which was a mistake for the same reason it is always a mistake to name a coach-in-waiting. Yow gets all bent out of shape when anyone says she made a mistake (on anything) but she did. She’s tried to paint the picture of Friedgen practically begging her to name Franklin because he is (according to Yow) the greatest recruiter of, oh, the last 100 years. One local columnist here in DC today said Friedgen was Yow’s first big hire, that she went out on a limb to hire him nine years ago. Wrong on two counts: Yow’s first big hire was Ron Vanderlinden who she was pretty much forced to fire after five years. And she hired Friedgen because a group of Maryland football alumni, led by Boomer Esiason, pretty much threatened to withdraw support from the program if she didn’t. She loved taking bows when Friedgen was winning but was more than ready to throw him overboard when things began to slide.
Yow probably would have liked to have pushed Friedgen out the door but couldn’t—not because he’s a big guy but because he has a big contract. Personally, I’m glad. I think Friedgen (and the great James Franklin) have made some recruiting mistakes that have brought about four losing seasons in the last six but he’s a good guy and a good coach and I’m glad he gets another chance with a more experience team next year.
Yow did the right thing for the wrong reasons. Florida State did the wrong thing for the wrong reasons.
As in this truth: the man who made Florida State football matter got shoved out the door by an impatient president, board of trustees and fan base when all he wanted was to coach one more year. He said just that on Saturday, that he’d like to coach in 2010 and then turn the job over to Jimbo Fisher, who FSU put right up against Bowden’s back a couple of years ago hoping he might take the hint and allow himself to be shoved out the door.
Great coaches are great competitors. They don’t just say ‘thanks for the memories,’ the first time things go wrong and ask someone to shut the lights out in their office for them. Five years ago when the president of Penn State and the chairman of the board of trustees went to Joe Paterno’s house to talk to him about stepping down after going 26-33 over a five year stretch he threw them out of his house. He’s 50-13—that’s not a typo—since then.
The great ones should orchestrate their own exit. Bowden certainly earned that right.
There’s no need to recite his record here; the national titles, 10 win seasons, bowl trips. Or the fact that Florida State was absolutely nowhere in college football before he arrived and grew to be one of the four or five truly elite programs under Bowden. Was his reign perfect? Of course not. Even now, FSU is appealing an NCAA ruling that would take away 14 of Bowden’s 388 victories because of an academic scandal that football players were involved in. He’s had players in trouble—so has Paterno and every other college coach who has coached in the big time for longer than 15 minutes.
That’s the reality of the big time game: the pressure to win and win and win sometimes causes even the best coaches to take great athletes who may not be great people. The ugliest incident I ever saw at a Final Four involved a player recruited by Dean Smith, who coached with more class and dignity for 36 years than anyone I’ve ever met in the college game. Even the best make mistakes.
There’s no doubt Florida State has slipped in recent years. It certainly hasn’t slipped to 3-9 the way Notre Dame did under Charlie Weis or below .500 the way in-state rival Miami—the once vaunted U—did a few years back. Bowden will coach in his 27th straight bowl late this month. But 6-6 is a long way from all those consecutive 10 win, top-five seasons. FSU lost about three games in the ACC in the 90s after it joined the league. I used to say the ACC consisted of Florida State, the seven dwarfs and Duke—which aspired to be a dwarf. Now it’s pretty much 12 dwarfs. THAT Florida State is long gone.
What made Bowden special went beyond winning. He was—is—a good man, a very good man. He was always accessible to the media. Nowadays, getting time alone with a big-time college coach in-season is all but impossible. If you jump through 18 hurdles and promise to be nice or if you bring a cameraman with you there’s a chance you can get 10 minutes.
When Bowden began to build FSU into a power, you could pick up a phone and call him almost any time. I remember years ago when he took his team to play Pittsburgh, which was ranked No. 1 with Dan Marino at quarterback at the time. (Bowden played more tough road games in those days than anyone. Heck, even this year he played—and won—at Brigham Young. How many BCS schools will schedule THAT game?). I was covering the game and arrived in Pittsburgh on Friday afternoon for FSU’s walk-through hoping to grab a few minutes with Bowden. It had been a last minute decision to send me up to the game so I just showed up. No one stopped me. I just walked in.
When I told Bowden what I needed he said, “look, unless you’re in a big rush, why don’t you come back to our hotel and we can talk in my room. It’ll be more relaxed back there.”
Which it was. Bowden wrote my whole story for me. I still remember George Solomon, the Post sports editor back then (a Florida grad) saying after reading the story, “God Bless Bobby Bowden, he makes us all into good reporters.”
Bowden deserved a better ending than this. He deserved the ending HE wanted, not the ending some suit with a title wanted because it will take some pressure from the alumni off him. Serious question: Does anyone think that Jimbo Fisher is going to make THAT big a difference next season? As for the long term—recruiting—Fisher can tell every recruit that he’ll be in charge beginning in 2011, that Coach Bowden has already announced that 2010 will be his last season.
Back in 1980 I was sent to Alabama to do a story on Bear Bryant. Believe it or not, Bryant wasn’t that old—66 at the time I think—but he had lived a hard life and looked more like 100 when I sat in his conference room with him. It was pretty clear to me that he didn’t know the names of too many players and wasn’t terribly involved in planning for that week’s game against Notre Dame.
“My coaches do the coaching,” he said. “I’m pretty much the CEO around here.”
It’s harder to do that when your bosses have told your number one assistant that the minute you are out the door, he’s in charge. I’m not implying that Fisher is disloyal to Bowden, I’m just saying that the term used is ‘coach-in-waiting.’ Is there anyone out there who ENJOYS waiting?
Bobby Bowden deserved a lot better than he got from Florida State. He certainly gave them a lot better than the people in charge deserve.
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Different school, different situation: Maryland announced yesterday that Ralph Friedgen would remain as coach even after going 2-10 this season. The reason for Friedgen surviving is simple: Maryland hasn’t got $4 million on hand to buy him out. Governor Martin O’Malley made it clear last week he didn’t want state funds spent on a buyout and there’s no big-time booster who is going to step up to spend that kind of money on football, which just doesn’t matter all that much at Maryland as long as the basketball team is playing well.
Maryland AD Debbie Yow named James Franklin as coach-in-waiting last year—which was a mistake for the same reason it is always a mistake to name a coach-in-waiting. Yow gets all bent out of shape when anyone says she made a mistake (on anything) but she did. She’s tried to paint the picture of Friedgen practically begging her to name Franklin because he is (according to Yow) the greatest recruiter of, oh, the last 100 years. One local columnist here in DC today said Friedgen was Yow’s first big hire, that she went out on a limb to hire him nine years ago. Wrong on two counts: Yow’s first big hire was Ron Vanderlinden who she was pretty much forced to fire after five years. And she hired Friedgen because a group of Maryland football alumni, led by Boomer Esiason, pretty much threatened to withdraw support from the program if she didn’t. She loved taking bows when Friedgen was winning but was more than ready to throw him overboard when things began to slide.
Yow probably would have liked to have pushed Friedgen out the door but couldn’t—not because he’s a big guy but because he has a big contract. Personally, I’m glad. I think Friedgen (and the great James Franklin) have made some recruiting mistakes that have brought about four losing seasons in the last six but he’s a good guy and a good coach and I’m glad he gets another chance with a more experience team next year.
Yow did the right thing for the wrong reasons. Florida State did the wrong thing for the wrong reasons.
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