Rich
Rodriguez and West Virginia settle
RichRod to pay $1.5 million back to WVU, Michigan to pay $2.5 million
By
Pete Fiutak
Just over a week ago, all of Spain took to the streets in celebration of
the first time their soccer team had won the European Cup. A few days
later, the sangria continued to flow as its hero, tennis star Rafael
Nadal, beat Rodger Federer to win the Wimbledon title in arguably the
greatest tennis match ever played.
Not to be outdone, the entire state of West Virginia celebrated in
unbridled joy and unmitigated glee on Wednesday as former head football
coach Rich Rodriguez caved in and agreed to pay back the $4 million
buyout clause put in a contract he signed just over a year ago.
July 9, 2008 will now hold a sacred place in the hearts of West
Virginians everywhere, and now, finally, the long, dark, national
nightmare is over.
Alright, so Rodriguez giving back the dough really isn't that big a
deal, but it finally puts an end to one of the most boring sports
stories, that had nothing really to do with sports, in the last several
years. And now everyone can focus on just how screwed Michigan might be
this year on the field.
According to the University of Michigan, Rodriguez will pay back
$500,000 a year to West Virginia over three years staring in 2010, while
Michigan will pull out its pocket change and throw $2.5 million WVU's
way. At the end of the day, Michigan and Rodriguez are paying to make
this all go away, while Rodriguez is looking to move on and focus solely
on being the head man for the Wolverines.
For West Virginia fans spurned at the defection of their once-favorite
son, the $4 million is a symbol. They wanted Rodriguez to pay for
turning his back on their program, while showing that even if you're a
West Virginia man, places like Michigan are still bigger.
And that's the little kicker that underlies how this all finally got
resolved. It was a simple business transaction, but it was basically
Michigan throwing money at West Virginia and telling it to go away. The
Wolverines stole the Mountaineers' girlfriend, and then gave them money
to go play in the arcade.
Oh sure, no matter how many yachts you need to water ski behind, losing
$500,000 a year for three years will sting Rodriguez. While the giving
back of $1.5 million is tough enough, it'll be sure to always stick in
Rodriguez's craw that he feels he was in the right. He, and worst of
all, his family, had to undergo the worst side of ugliness that sports
sometimes brings out of people who call themselves fans, and it ruins,
permanently, what should go down as one of the great eras in the history
of West Virginia sports.
Former head coach Don Nehlen did wonderful things with West Virginia
football, but on a national scale, the program was known for having
inflated records against average schedules, and for getting pantsed by
real teams when the bowl season came around. Rodriguez changed all of
that.
He gave the team the belief and the gameplan to walk into a Georgia home
game in the 2006 Sugar Bowl and come away with a stunning,
program-defining/changing win. To put it another way, West Virginia had
lost 11 of its previous 12 bowl games going back to 1984, and now it has
won three straight.
There's talent, coaching, and attitude of a national title contender,
and for West Virginia fans who saw their beloved team come
so-achingly-close to playing Ohio State for the whole ball of wax last
year, Rodriguez leaving for Michigan was the end of the dream, whether
they want to admit to it or not.
Can Bill Stewart really pull a Larry Coker and be the nice old guy from
out of nowhere who can lead the team to a national title? That remains
to be seen, but if Rodriguez was at the helm, it seemed like it was just
a matter of time before the Mountaineers finally got to the BCS title
game. West Virginia was going to be a major player every year with
RichRod at the helm, while Stewart, even with the great coaching staff
he has assembled, is a bit of a wild-card.
Hopefully, Mountaineer fans can finally achieve a sense of peace rather
than shaking their fists in vindication. Hopefully they can look back on
the RichRod era and realize that it really was a lot of fun. For
Rodriguez, it's over. He's a true Michigan man now, and now the real
work begins.
If paying back 500K a year for three years seemed bad, just wait until
the 2008 Wolverines struggle against Utah in the season opener.
