Instant Analysis
The Texas Tech Fiasco
Pete
Fiutak
In today’s edition of Coaches Gone Wild, we revisit a Kansas head man who verbally abused his players, a Michigan coach who wanted to make his bad team better by making them practice a bit more than normal, a Florida legend with a heart and a brain locked in a dead heat to see which will explode first, but is so inspired by one practice that he’ll stick around rather than go “focus on (his) family and faith,” and now, a wacky offensive wizard who punished a player who dared to suffer a concussion by sticking him in a guarded closet.
This is going to be a really, really interesting few weeks in Lubbock, Texas. Who knew that that Bob Knight era would pass without an incident, but Mike Leach, known for being more of a cerebral, goofy nut than a General Patton-type of dictator, is the one in hot water for allegedly making WR Adam James clean out a dark closet and be forced (again, allegedly) under guard to stay standing for three hours.
All this stuff from Leach to Mark Mangino to Rich Rodriguez is a soft kiss on the cheek compared to what the old school coaches used to do. Can you imagine the complaints that would’ve been filed against Bear Bryant and his Junction moments at Texas A&M? How about the stories of sweet ol’ Bobby Bowden when he took over at West Virginia? How many coaches have run their teams until they yacked their breakfasts out? Some might say that today’s players of gone soft and can’t handle the pushing around needed to get ready for the tough, physical battles to come on fall Saturdays, but there’s a difference between pushing players to a limit and coming up with cruel and unusual punishments.
It’s only fair to wait until the stories all get straight, but if this is true, it’s over and Mike Leach should be fired. Do not pass go. Do not collect the $400,000 a year until 2013 (which is what Leach would get for a terminated contract). Fired.
Let’s finally try to get something straight in this weird, skewed college football world; coaches aren’t as important as we’re all supposed to think they are. They coach college football. Period. Nothing more. If one isn’t getting the job done or is embarrassing the school, then flush him and go get another.
Players, students, and even professors deserve a second chance, but football coaches don’t. It’s not right, but these are the No. 1 representatives for their respective universities, and for good and bad, they’re the face attached to the schools
and they're the top public relations man. Try naming the top history professor at Texas Tech, or even the school president.
The football coach has to be above reproach and isn’t allowed to make a mistake like banishing a concussed kid to a closet. Texas Tech University is supposed to be bigger than a football coach, and if the Leach-James incident really is true, then that’s that. Whether or not you think James is soft for complaining about this, or if you’re a don’t-give-out-water-at-practice, old-time disciplinarian, in 2009
when we know so much more about the effects of injuries to the brain and
know that you don't have to act like a sadistic jerkweed to field a
successful team, you’re not allowed to do something like this, and
you're not allowed to embarrass your university.
Richard
Cirminiello
It sounds horrible on the surface, but let’s all take a collective deep breath and wait until all of the facts come out and both sides are heard before humming the death knell for Mike Leach. Still, things don’t look good for the old swashbuckler.
I like Leach. Always have. In an era of button-down, carefully-worded talking heads, he’s always been a refreshing departure. Quick with the witty quote and uber-engaging, he’s an entertainer with a headset. I spent time with Leach and his wife Sharon in the spring, and as advertised, they were delightful people. In short, I hope he hasn’t gone Mangino and squandered a career with eccentric behavior and player abuse. That said, didn’t you sort of get the feeling that one day Leach was going to butt heads with Texas Tech or someone within the family? The guy never follows a script and is the antithesis of the erudite University employee. He’s an XFL-type coach working with kids on a campus. Friction was inevitable, but it’s too bad it’s gone this way instead of, say, another testy contract dispute.
If Texas Tech has suspended its 10-year head coach just a few days before a bowl game, this cannot be good. Still, until everything comes out, it doesn’t make sense to start speculating about culpability and what comes next in Lubbock. In an era of heightened concerns regarding head injuries, the whole episode just seems to be too bizarre to not have more layers of explanation and clarity. At least that’s the hope.
Matt Zemek
1) A few years ago, the New York Times profiled Mike Leach in great depth and detail, documenting a quirky individual’s love of pirates, his unorthodox teaching methods, his ability to develop underappreciated players, and other traits that defined one of the more creative and thoughtful coaches in the United States. Leach’s ability to make the most out of the talent at his disposal in out-of-the-way Lubbock, Tex., enabled the Texas Tech program to become one of college football’s most overachieving outfits. Though overshadowed by the Texas and Oklahoma behemoths that dominate the Big 12 South, Leach – a colorful quote endowed with a fertile, supple mind – produced a highly successful coaching career instead of putting his law school degree to use. The world of football coaching is a largely copycat realm, but no one could accuse Mike Leach of employing cookie-cutter methods or hewing to conventional wisdom. This man provided fresh air and bold methodological madness to college football and, for that matter, the larger domain of American sports. He cut against the grain, stuck to his own idiosyncratic system, and thrived in the face of formidable Big 12 opponents.
It’s safe to say that Mike Leach was not the kind of person who figured to become the latest subject of the bowl season’s shocking new reality TV show, “Coaches Gone Wild.”
2) The shock of seeing Leach enmeshed in a Mark Mangino-like net of trouble is exceeded, improbably enough, by one thing: The realization that his attorneys (according to breaking news reports on Monday afternoon) acknowledged that Texas Tech wide receiver Adam James was indeed secluded for not practicing after suffering a concussion.
Given all the talk about concussions this season, and given the immense amount of public consciousness-raising connected to the treatment of Tim Tebow before this year’s Florida-LSU game, it’s sad and sickening that a concussed football player could be treated so badly by his coach. Perhaps this act of secluding Adam James wasn’t as severe as the James family (yes, the family including ESPN broadcaster Craig James) said it was, but even if a subsequent investigation reveals that Papa James slightly overstated his case, the confirmed and acknowledged fact that Leach did seclude Adam James is damning enough in its own right. Even if Leach did not place Adam James in an electrical closet, as has been suggested, the act of seclusion represents sufficient grounds for immediate dismissal. There’s no place in collegiate sports for such behavior from anyone in a position of both leadership and authority… and who, moreover, makes a hefty chunk of change for the privilege of coaching major college football.
If all this turns out to really be true and it's as bad as it appears,
then Leach should be gone before 2009 ends, and it’s not much of a debate now that the act of seclusion has been confirmed by Leach’s own lawyers.