Dave Brandon needs to go - now!

Speaking in terms of being present at this interview.

Wow -- you can just hear that absolutely, 100% genuine tone in his voice there.

 

 

Heh.

 

 

My wife, who is an alum and the mother of two alums, but not a sports person at all, said at dinner just now, "I watched an interview with that Michigan Athletic Director you don't like."

"What'd you think?" I asked. My wife tells me what she thinks, and doesn't try to please me with her opinions. She usually tries to see the good side of people. I was interested in her take.

"He's so arrogant, no wonder you feel that way. He comes across as self-centered and awful."

So much for Brandon PR, eh? I'm willing to bet she is not alone in her unbiased reaction.

-what Brandon says.  Supposedly he is a hard nosed executive from the private sector and a successful business person. AND, last I checked (at least it was repeatedly beaten into my head over 30+ years of corporate life), where he came from one is judged by RESULTS.  So it is clear that the results Brandon is being judged by (top line) does not have any connection whatsoever to actually winning.  So here we are. He is happy, we are miserable, he is judged to be "highly effective" and we are wondering WTF happened to Michigan Football.

Is there any better distillation of why opposing fanbases all think we're arrogant?

I stand by what I posted the other day: I'm completely convinced we're getting epically trolled here. This just isn't reality anymore.

He has a very punchable face. Not that it's ok to just go around punching people in the face, but just looking at him makes me want to punch him.

I've gotta say, I largely find his answers pretty reasonable. Maybe not the most likable guy, and I don't agree with all of it. But the "AD must go!!" Movement falls flat for me. Seems driven by people who just don't like the guy. Rest is noise.

Remember how pizza delivery drivers used to be robbed, assaulted and murdered on a regular basis? I feel like Dave Brandon represents every victimized pizza delivery driver, and he's established the launching point of his campaign for vengeance at Michigan. Every stolen dime, every stolen pizza, every bloody nose, every jacked Toyota Tercel, every half-assed fifty cent tip will be avenged, one terrible football team and over-priced ticket after another...

We've underperformed? People expect us to win every game. Cumong man, that's so out of touch it's ridiculous.

Man, he spits mad hubris. The Athletic Department mad a monumental public mistake and he shows very few signs of remorse. As long as he's worked for public facing companies (ie Dominos), you'd thing he would know how to spin a positive light on a disastrous event to his stakeholders.

I can't watch it.  Just looking at him makes me nauseous now.

This is all I see and hear whenever Brandon talks at this point: http://youtu.be/zDAmPIq29ro

Sorry, double post.

Sarcasm in a situation like that rarely proves to be an effective strategey

You would think that Dave Brandon would have a better sense of the University of Michigan's role in upholding and conveying important values.  

I've been patient in my evaluation of DB.  He has repeatedly positioned himself, not as a caretaker of values, not being of service to the University, but as a self-important, whiz bang, schlockmeister-in-chief.  He has made his bed, and now he can "lie" in it.

I once noted here that "Maize is better than screaming-dayglow yellow."  That's a graphic example of his deficient sense of vision, in every sense of the word.

Someone send Schlissel a big broom.

At least they took time to come up with slogan for putting a doctor in the box. It's an "eye in the sky concept"--marketing angle covered.

I'm maybe a little different than most as far as having an opinion of the UM AD. I live nowhere close to Ann Arbor and will never hold season tickets. I'm a UM fan because my earliest memory of football in general and loving the sport is Charles Woodson with a Rose in his mouth and winning a national title. It was pure chance. 

As far as the AD, IMO, I shouldn't even know who they are. Obviously, I will know who they are but I have never heard a something about a Michigan AD that has been positive. From Martin out sailing to everything Brandon has done, it's been negative. The one thing I can say is that I have heard way more about Brandon than I ever did about Martin. That's not good. I don't like his smug attitude and his complete and total lack of humility. I watch football games on TV and I don't know exactly what it is but it isn't the same. 

I went to Iowa State. Huge fan, season tickets, the whole works. It's a completely different situation. Our AD isn't all that different than Brandon as he's not nearly as abrasive and is much more part of the fanbase, but in terms of ideas and goals, he's the same. The improvements he has made to facilities and revenue, not to mention keeping us in the Big 12 have been unbelievable-literally. Five years agao we would have never guessed we would be where we are at in terms of those things. The huge difference he has has to create gimmick and publicity. He put up billboards to get UI fans worked up. He has some little brother in him. He needs to though. For us, any attention has been good attention because otherwise no one would pay attention. For Michigan, you just need to be in charge to be in charge as Brian would say. Brandon doesn't realize he has something that runs itself. 

That you would be that naive? You couldn't even send a coach to a press conference with accurate info let alone the fact that you didn't even release WHEN shane was diagnosed. Ah yes, we're the naive ones Dave. Apologies we could not read the tea leaves. What a douche bag

I think they both had good intentions and are both generally good Men who are Michigan through and through. However, they're are both incompetent at their jobs and need to go.

he is getting more and more influence.  

I feel that, whether he knows it or not, Brandon is facilitating a civil war between students and student athletes as well as between alumni and athletic alumni. He's been going around rallying the different teams behind him. These student athletes then go out and not just sing his praises about the support and facilities they get from him but also how wrong everyone else is to vilify him. On the other side, you have the students, fans and alumni who are being charged ever increasing ticket prices and seat licenses to fund these scholarships and facilities. But in the midst of that increase, they are being disregarded and disrespected by this very same man. This group (myself included) is more than willing to expose his behavior towards them. Every "St. Brandon" story from the athletes is going to be met with a DB story (and I don't mean his actual initials) about his sarcasm and snarkiness. Brandon's personality is completely incapable of reducing the toxicity of this environment. I'm sure he truly believed these interviews would humanize him, but he is just not coming across well at all.

By far the most informative, in my opinion, was the uninterrupted channel 7 interview. 

There's been a lot of confirmation bias active on various reactions to Brandon's comments and conduct during these. 

While I think that Ace's compilation of snippets does not paint a fair picture of the content, I also think that it is probably impossible for 5 or so minutes extracted from something like an hour of content to fairly present things. What Ace's work will hopefully do is create enough interest for people to take the time to watch all three in their entirety. 

Prior to Saturday's events, I've said that I consider Brandon to be a mixed bag and that I wouldn't mind his replacement. So I am not particularly a Brandon defender. That said I think that most of the trashing of Brandon's appearances is largely unfounded and stems from peoples predisposition to dislike Brandon. 

Because I believe that there is no possibility of misinformation surviving the current level of media and administration scrutiny and that Brandon know this, I tend to take Brandon's statements about who knew or saw what when as truthful. Misdirection about any of that costs him his job and his reputation across the entire country. So If I view his handling of these interviews in that light I come to the conclusion that he handled them pretty well. 

He behaved staunchly under pressure. The guy was a CEO not a politician so it is natural for him to be sensitive about having his integrity kicked around on the national stage. Yeah he was perhaps a bit defensive on that topic, but I doubt anyone here, without polticial experience, would have done much better. 

His timing of when he spoke to the media was also very corporate. First identify the problems as completely as possible, develop solutions, then release a statement, then convey the information internally and get feedback from the appropriate internal people and groups and internal liasons, only then speak publicly.

His explanation for the 1 am news release is entirely believable. I'll bet they were desperate to release that statement all day, but were scared shitless about making a mistake. I can imagine the frustration as getting to specifics strung out and required pulling in an ever expanding set of people. I'll bet they debated whether to wait for business hours Tuesday or release the statement immediately for quite a while. 

We can debate whether or not the simple fact that Saturday's events occured demand Brandon's firing, but in my opinion nothing about his conduct in these interviews should embarrass anyone at Michigan. 

 

To be fair, wasn't it Brandon that started the "Our Pizza Sucks" campaign?

they are terrible people, but this fanbase bears deep shame if we put up with this shit.