les miles

The hire of David Brandon as Michigan's AD already put a stake through the heart of any dim chance Les Miles had at the head coaching job in Ann Arbor, but if it hadn't this should disqualify him($):

"I got called to coach Miles' office. I had no idea it was coming," Elliott Porter said of his being asked by LSU to 'grayshirt' this season and re-enroll next year. "He just told me that they didn't have room for me. I moved out of my dorm today and I am now back home trying to figure everything out. It's been a rough 24 hours." …

"I have to win a waiver, but it shouldn't be a problem," Porter said. "It's unfair how they told me at the last minute." …

"I want to be somewhere that I am wanted," Porter said. "I understand how things are going at LSU, and they didn't have room. To me what happened today wasn't fair. But it's how things go. It's a business. And I fully understand that now."

That's a Rivals article from the Tennessee site; Porter is thinking about signing with UT. Meanwhile, LSU is lying its ass off about the situation:

"Coach made every attempt to get him to stay but the young man wanted to leave," LSU media relations director Michael Bonnette said.

…every attempt except for actually giving him the scholarship promised six months ago. As an aside, one of the Google News hits for Porter is an irrelevant piece from New Zealand serendipitously titled "Slave labor system rotten to the core."

While that's a little over the top—those excitable Kiwis—this is a clear-cut case of a school signing too many kids and jerking one unlucky one around when too many qualify. Porter had a frickin' dorm room and is still trying to find a new place to land on August 4th. As Oversigning.com points out, college football is explicitly not a business. This is supposedly the reason the kids are amateurs, and anyone who gets the impression it is a business might take a huge amount of money from shady characters or enjoy a party in South Beach someone else is paying for. By allowing coaches to take chances like this the NCAA is degrading respect for its other rules.

More importantly, they're treating athletes like meat. By putting himself in a situation where there was a possibility he'd have to cut a kid in August, Miles has established that his job is more important than his word or the players he recruits. I'm not one of those guys who thinks Michigan's head coach has to be raised from birth by helmeted ascetics to learn the Chi Of The Iso in the Hidden Temple of Hardass, but that's a bridge too far for me. I'll be at the head of the mob if he ever gets hired by Michigan, which he won't so whatever.

Also, the usual: the NCAA needs to make LOIs binding for the school, too, for at least one year and preferably two. They can increase the scholarship limit slightly if necessary to compensate. No school should ever benefit from signing a kid to a LOI they do not honor.

Abbreviated.  A few site notes:

• The offensive UFR for Wisconsin is basically done and will go up tomorrow.
• Blog will be off Thursday and Friday for Thanksgiving; Wednesday will be light.
• I've said I'd do last-game UFRs before and not come through so this isn't a promise, but I do intend to UFR this Ohio State game and I have a vague idea to go back and do the Citrus Bowl against Florida; last year's OSU game can get screwed.
• This UV is abbreviated because I'll be on WTKA from 4-6. Please call in and be sane. 734 998-1050.

So happy together. Misopogon, who you may remember from such Russian novels diaries as "The Decimated Defense," "The Decimated Defense Part II," and "I Make Crazy Hennecharts" would like to trade in some his accumulated MGoGoodwill for material reward. Because he's a nice guy, he'd like that material reward to go to homeless families in Detroit. There's a diary post up about it; right now the donation system is pretty clunky—you call this nice lady—but I am hectoring them to set up a paypal account so the donations can be easy.

People: this is Mitch Albom's charity. I have a dream that Mitch shows up to this thing and he says "where did all this stuff come from" and Misopogon says "MGoBlog" and Mitch has this Christmas Carol-style conversion where he runs from blog to blog liberally spreading comments and goodwill. Do it for your country.

The Victors on an unusual object that makes noise. The thing on the left is a pipa, and it's pretty cool:

Marching band needs more pipa. Go comment flamewar!

Yeesh. I twittered about this but it bears repeating on the main site: holy mother of God, if Les Miles had done what he did against Ole Miss in a Michigan game blood would be spouting from my eyes and I would be groping my way to Ann Arbor Torch & Pitchfork only to find the shelves picked bare.

For those who missed it: LSU recovers an onside kick and drives to the Ole Miss 31 with around a minute left. Miles doesn't make the classic mistake a lot of coaches do and settle for a near 50-yard field goal from your college kicker, as Randy Edsall did earlier in the day, but wild blitzing from Ole Miss confuses the LSU QB and sacks and whatnot ensue. Before fourth and twenty-two there are 27 seconds left on the clock; there are 9 left when LSU uses its last timeout. LSU completes a bomb and then spikes the ball despite snapping it with one second left; in the aftermath Miles says he doesn't know who called for the spike.

Er:

New Les Miles theory: he makes a lot of correct decisions for the wrong reasons. Reasons like "my brain has a vas deferens."

The spike's not even the worst part, the worst part is the inexplicable timeout fiasco. Miles on that:

"Timeouts were being called verbally, but I didn't relate to the official apparently, and that was a mistake. We didn't know [the timeout] hadn't been called."

Has anyone ever seen this late in a game? Sometimes you'll see a coach not get the attention of an official in time—Like (sigh) Jim Tressel on Saturday—but when there's 30 seconds left the official has got to be expecting the TO call and waiting for it. Given the statement about the spike I'm a little leery of that explanation.

Of course, Rodriguez keeps pulling Forcier for Denard Robinson. That was basically waving the white flag on Saturday, but Forcier had coughed up four turnovers at that point. So… yeah, more understandable than whatever that was from Miles.

Death Star-sized LSU message board TigerDroppings is openly campaigning for a coach switch based on Terry Foster's extremely informed blog post about Rich Rodriguez's lack of job security…

Michigan coach Rich Rodriguez survived Bill Martin and Ohio State. He has survived President Mary Sue Coleman. But there could be one more hurdle.

Can he survive disgruntled big time boosters if they decide to withhold cash?

This story is not over. Despite claims otherwise I expect a few more cards to be played before the bowl season begins. The money men and women are not happy with Michigan's two-year record of 8-14. They are not thrilled to see Michigan finish last in a very mediocre Big Ten.

…in unrelated news, newspaper advertising has fallen almost $8 billion this year. There is literally nothing anyone can say that will stop uninformed speculation by Official Journalists about Rich Rodriguez getting fired.

Meanwhile, AnnArbor.com has a positive article on the fans' opinion of Rich Rodriguez. Freaky. Their highly unscientific, 683-vote poll currently has Rodriguez support running 2-to-1 in favor.

Wha happened? Jon Chait has an article on the Wolverine about what happened to the defense that's worth your time, though I disagree that the defensive line was a major problem except in certain situations where Craig Roh was overwhelmed by Wisconsin and a couple other teams. Probably 80% of the team's weakness against the run can be laid at the feet of the linebackers and safeties, as the frequent rotation at the end of the year indicated. No one was pulling Ryan Van Bergen off the field in favor of a walk-on.

Etc.: Jim Leavitt is a weird dude. Eye on Sports Media does a two-parter on Michigan opening up the press box to certain bloggers, including this site.  BONUS: part one's title is piratey. Boring details on the AD search.

1. It's over, obvs. LSU AD said as much.
2. Martin did not talk to Miles' agent this morning.
3. Top remaining candidates: Schiano, O'Brien(?!?!?), and someone I didn't hear. No mention of Kelly or Tedford.
4. I want to die.
5. Not really.

Update: Tenuta says he hasn't even spoken to Miles:

Tenuta said Saturday he hadn't spoken with Miles and wasn't sure what was happening.

"I don't know yet. I really don't," Tenuta said after his first practice in his interim role. "There's been rumors before about me going a lot of places."

Way to go, Herbstreit!

WTF?

Sources close to both Les Miles and the LSU administration report the coach has reached a multi-year contract extension with his current school and will remove himself from consideration as the next Michigan coach.

A release will be forthcoming within the hour.