Article on Steve Fisher
Today, ESPN has an article on Steve Fisher. He is in the bright lights again, with San Diego State having a 21 - 1 record and #5 ranking, having lost only to Arizona.
Needless to say, part of the article looks back to Fisher's time at Michigan. There are those who completely reject Fisher and believe he was directly responsible for what happened with the Fab 5. I am not one of them. Read it, and form your own conclusions.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:06 PM ^
hasn't been kind to Steve Fisher. I am old enough to remember when he helped pull that 89 team together. I don't think they win the title of Frieder was the coach. Things happened on his watch, and it cost him, but those players love him to this day.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:21 PM ^
Losing a coach during the season is an interestinganimal. There's really no middle ground when it happens. The team either loses every single bit of morale and utterly collapses, or they rally around each other and overachieve. The '89 was undoubtedly talented, so when they decided to go the latter route and pull together just in time for the tourney, a championship was, to be blunt, inevitable. Fisher was a great coach for that team and Michigan in general , but what won that title was Bo's stubborness forcing that team to find out in a hurry who they really were regardless of who was coaching them.
February 11th, 2014 at 4:44 PM ^
EXACTLY.... jhender85 is exactly right... Bo and his speech to them, got them over the top.... and that espn was just great to watch... I was a freshman in South Quad at the time.
February 11th, 2014 at 4:23 PM ^
There is *zero* chance we win the title with Frieder as coach. Frieder's success as recruiter was directly responsible for his failures as head coach.
February 11th, 2014 at 4:32 PM ^
February 11th, 2014 at 4:59 PM ^
Many years back I happened to meet a guy who played ball with BJ Armstrong in HS. Would have been '86 or '87. I forget precisely why, but he had the chance to play some friendly hoops at Crisler. Just screwing around. Also got to watch a couple of practices. He described to me how the big names on the team would blatantly ignore Frieder whenever it suited them. Saw a couple of players mock Frieder behind his back. He had little control.
Freider's reputation as a recruiter is well known. Don't know if it exists online, but after Frieder left I remember some recruiting letters getting into print. I remember reading a couple. Embarassing stuff. I know coaches pump potential recruits up but some of the stuff reminded me of how shameful Nixon & Kissinger were when they met Mao. And Frieder was writing this stuff to kids in *7th* grade.
He got stars to campus and then could never rein them in. Its why his best teams often showed up well for big games but snoozed thru many.
And that '89 roster shouldn't have been a surprise to win it all. They should have been favorites. I believe 9 guys on that roster logged 1K+ minutes in the NBA. Give those guys to Dean Smith for a year and they win multiple titles going away.
February 11th, 2014 at 7:07 PM ^
February 11th, 2014 at 7:23 PM ^
There were some stories about a few Frieder-era players that ran through my circles that would kill programs in today's social media environment. I don't hold much of a grudge, but we might be lucky the banhammer didn't hit the MBB program earlier than it did.
February 11th, 2014 at 7:23 PM ^
February 11th, 2014 at 7:25 PM ^
Have you ever read Frieder's autobiography Basket Case? It's an absolute trip. Frieder comes off as a total maniac, sometimes in an endearing way, but more often, not so much. Highly recommended, for shock value alone.
One of the chapters is a great, very creepy story about Frieder taking his first-ever recruiting trip to scout an 8th grader--Chris "Weber" (yes, it's spelled like that in the book). This came out when Webber was still in high school, so it's before the whole Fab Five thing. IIRC, Frieder isn't allowed to talk to Webber, so he has to wait for Chris to walk by a small window in a hallway door so Frieder can frantically wave at him.
Really, the whole book is just amazing.
February 12th, 2014 at 9:21 AM ^
Yeah, that's the kind of stuff I'm talking about. If it weren't in the context of hoops recruiting its a stunt that would attract the attention of law enforcement.
Frieder was a fractured soul that desperately needed affirmation from all the wrong sources. ASU gave him love and Frieder lost some of the drive he had here.
February 12th, 2014 at 5:20 AM ^
history has been extremely kind to steve fisher. the punishment for what happened on his watch essentially burned a huge program to the ground for the better part of a decade, but he skated scot-free.
the things that happened under his watch were, in my opinion, worthy of show-cause status from the NCAA. i lived in the same apartment complex as webber during his sophomore season, and let me tell you, there was no doubt - none - that something was going on. fisher either aided it, or chose to ignore the fact that it was happening.
his 'geez, i had no idea' stuff is offensive, but i guess he's at least consistent.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:17 PM ^
I always liked Steve Fisher, beginning with his improbable run in the 1989 tournament. Great recruiter, and a great in-game coach. And seemed like a genuinely nice guy and remarkably humble compared to many of his peers. Obviously he had too big of a blind spot when it came to the Ed Martin fiasco, and bears responsibility for much of the fallout. But that doesn't make him a bad guy.
Do we know whether he and Brady Hoke ever formed a relationship at SDSU? I'd be curious to know if they became fast friends, kept their respective distance, or some other result.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:32 PM ^
There are really only scattered references in SDSU news items and the San Diego area media to them talking about one another, but the impression I was getting from those articles that it was at least cordial and complimentary. Indeed, when Hoke signed his extension in 2010, Fisher praised how he had changed the perception and culture of Aztec football. At least officially, it was a good working relationship, but given how both of them seem to be, it might make sense that they were on good terms.
February 11th, 2014 at 7:44 PM ^
Speaking as a San Diego resident, there was nothing much ever made of their relationship, or the various Michigan connections. Never heard anything bad by any means, but I don't recall hearing anything of note in general. I will say, though, SDSU fans still hate us for stealing Hoke.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:19 PM ^
"That same investigation did not identify any direct ties between Martin's scheme and Fisher. But it still stained the coach's legacy, especially after the school forfeited 112 victories."
This is demonstrably false. For one, Fisher forged comp ticket request forms to get Ed Martin into Crisler. I could go on, but really, the author might want to actually read the NCAA's findings before making a loaded statement like that.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:29 PM ^
February 11th, 2014 at 3:39 PM ^
February 11th, 2014 at 3:50 PM ^
While it's true that Fisher personally intervened to stop some of Martin's more egregious attempts to provide illegal benefits to Michigan's players, there's no way an assistant coach during the Frieder era didn't know where the cash was coming from to buy those guys' fur-trimmed coats and fancy cars. He knew there was money funneling in, whether or not he wanted to actually confront it.
Remember, this was bigger than the Fab Five. Webber was the only player implicated from that group. There were five more who came after, another who didn't end up at Michigan (Voshon Lenard), and pretty solid common knowledge the whole thing stretched far into the early 1980s.
Steve Fisher was/is a nice guy and a great coach. But this was a career assistant thrust into the spotlight, who turned around and won a championship, and then turned in a couple really marginal recruiting classes and tournament flameouts. He needed a win. Enter the Fab Five.
I really think the guy was just completely overmatched by a big-name job that had a really toxic environment around the program. So it's no surprise he's done well at SDSU, away from the pressure and the hangers-on. I wish him well. But despite the "aw, shucks," down-home Indiana routine, he knew what he was doing.
February 11th, 2014 at 4:30 PM ^
The Fab 5 was really only his SECOND full recruiting class. The class that started in 89-90 was already pretty much set by the time he took over. Sure, his 90-91 class stunk, but then the Fab 5 came the next year. As for his tournament loss in 1990, losing to Loyoly-Marymount when they are playing in the wake of Hank Gather's death and hit 5,000 3-pointers was hardly enough to put him on the hot seat after '89.
February 11th, 2014 at 4:55 PM ^
I remember watching that game, and just thinking this was out of reach very quickly. Not often a team scores 115 points and still loses by 34. I think it is still the combined points record game at 264 points in one game.
February 11th, 2014 at 5:01 PM ^
ok... however i gotta chime in here... during the fab five run i was a senior and 5th year senior, and was trying to go to all the ncaa tourney games... i ended up seeing many of the good ones, like in lexington, and then later in new orleans, with my student tickets...
but the earlier games, i was desperate to go but couldnt get tickets...so i snuck in practice once, and was waiting for it to end so i could ask coach if there was any way i could buy any extra athletic dept tickets...but i got caught by asst coach dutcher about ten minutes into watching practice from the stands, and had to wait by the exit door, and wasnt allowed to watch the rest of practice.... when practice was over, i asked coach fish, and he told me to call the registry hotel in st.paul at a specific day, to see if there were any tickets available, that i could buy, of course.... so i did... i ended up speaking to him in hotel room... he told me he could not get tickets, but hopes that i still find a way to go anyway and thanked me for the support.
the reason why i shared that TRUE account was because coach fisher was an insanely nice human being... you could just feel it... he reminded me of peter sellers character gardner in the film 'being there'..... and it felt quite genuine that he was trying to help me here...
and if he doesnt know that martin was playing loanshark in that detroit subculture, then as far as fisher knew, he would have been simply trying to help a fan/booster, go to the games..... take this as food for thought when anyone knocks coach fish.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:25 PM ^
This quote from Fisher is in the article:
"I know that I did a good job in every regard," Fisher said. "I know I didn't cheat. Was firing fair? I was the leader of the team, the captain of the ship. I think had they wanted to they could have worked through it, but they didn't want to."
Maybe this is out of context, but it seems that he is taking zero responsibility. Fine, there is nothing to show that he paid any players. But, to quote Everyone Murders, "his blind spot" allowed it to go on. He didn't do enough to protect his players or Michigan's program. He did not do "a good job in every regard."
February 11th, 2014 at 3:32 PM ^
It sounds like we could have had one in basketball. He looks pretty good when they only lob a few softballs his way. Let him answer questions about forging Perry Watson's initials or all the perks and access he gave Ed Martin and see how he comes off.
I won't take anything away from the job he's done at SDSU, but his legacy will always be tarnished by his actions here.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:40 PM ^
Interesting and impressive how much the Fab 5 have grown up since then (with one notable exception).
February 11th, 2014 at 3:43 PM ^
and/or forget the problems that happened under the watch of Coach Fisher? No, but there's plenty of evidence I've read over the years that indicates the problems leading up to those violations date back to the Frieder years. Fisher just wasn't attentive and forceful enough, for whatever reason, to put his foot down and put a stop to it.
At this point, nearly 2 decades after Fisher left, I will say this: Fisher and his Aztecs will be the team I'll root for if and when Michigan falls in the NCAA Tournament.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:51 PM ^
You do realize Fisher was Frieder's right-hand man during that period, right?
February 11th, 2014 at 4:08 PM ^
but how much can one man do to keep an eye on problems while busy hitting "rewind" on the VCR?
/s
February 12th, 2014 at 5:34 AM ^
well, i assume he can, since i'm pretty sure fisher wasn't the only coach in the ncaa that watched tape. he's the only one that had a booster giving his players hundreds of thousands of dollars, though.
February 11th, 2014 at 3:59 PM ^
February 11th, 2014 at 4:05 PM ^
For the millionth time, Goss cleaned house of everyone who was there when the scandal was happening. Ellerbe had been there for all of about five minutes. It was his first year. He had head coaching experience. And he had zero connections to Michigan, Detroit basketball, Ed Martin, etc. It wasn't necessarily a controversial hire at the time, for those of us old enough to remember. Hell, Dutcher was attached to Fisher at the hip as it was (and is still with him).
Hindsight is 20/20. Now we know that Ellerbe won for a year with Fisher's players, then slowly pissed it away while his players were still taking cash. But standing where Michigan was in October 1997, pretty much the 11th hour as far as the season was concerned, what else were they supposed to do?
February 11th, 2014 at 5:11 PM ^
"for those of us old enough to remember"
GEE, maybe that's why the first thing I wrote was a question?
February 11th, 2014 at 7:38 PM ^
Ellerbe was a very disputed hire. Ellerbe had zero credentials -- he had never recruited or been on the staff of a "BCS" program. If you want proof, ask yourself, what did he do AFTER the UM job? Yes, he's VP at a construction company in Vegas. Great hire.
Let's call it straight: Goss, an African-American, wanted to hire a black head coach. He only interviewed black candidates. That's fine, I literally had no problem with that at the time, it was a moral stand for him and entirely a proper idea. But, Goss layered other "requirements" on the job, and it screwed him.
The obvious candidate, and who wanted the job, was Cazzy Russell. He was a very successful coach in the CBA, or whatever they called it in those days. Former Man of the Program, fit Goss's "look," had successful coaching experience, would have been a great hire at the time. No one would have second-guessed hiring Cazzy.
But... Goss also thought he was running Harvard, er, strike that, Yale. He had some high-minded ideas of "righteousness" and "fairness." He said at the time, he couldn't hire a coach -- literally a month or two before the season started, it was like September or something -- who had to leave another program, and thus breach ties or promises to someone else. In other words, any candidate with a job at another school or, even, professional organization, wasn't "available" for the job, in Goss's mind, because it would mean he'd be hiring a guy who was breaching a contract.
So, that ruled out Cazzy. Crazy as it sounds, for the dumbest of reasons. How different would history have been?
That left Goss in a box, he could hire only a Michigan staffer, or someone unemployed. He went to Ellerbe. Personally, I think he should have looked for someone unemployed, anyone, it would have been a better hire.
Goss was a COMPLETE DISASTER. He oversaw the trainwreck situation that was Jamal Crawford that, of course, led to himself being fired. He had that huge disaster with the department's website - letting himself get talked into a for-profit site by a guy who was a personal friend (and who'd declared bankruptcy 2 times). Goss was Mr Nice Guy, no question about it... and was a former Bo player... but when it came to being an AD, he (1) had no ability to be practical, (2) had no sense of finances, (3) had no backbone, and (4) no clue what he was doing. Otherwise, great AD.
Soooo... Ellerbe was a hugely bad hire and we all knew it at the time.
Anyone remember the game at Dook ... it was, what, 32-2 in the first half? Why Ellerbe wasn't fired at halftime of that game, I have no idea...
February 11th, 2014 at 4:16 PM ^
In light of the scandal, Dutcher would not have been a smart hire due to his close association with Fisher. An external hire was also not an option given the timeframe. Appointing Ellerbe as interim coach was the only viable option at the time.
The decision to question is the promotion of Ellerbe to permanent head coach. He had a good-but-not-great season with a team that Fisher had assembled, and he was a train wreck in his only other head coaching gig at Loyola. A little more diligence might have steered the process away from Ellerbe and toward someone more qualified.
February 11th, 2014 at 7:39 PM ^
Cazzy Russell wanted the job. See my earlier post above.
February 11th, 2014 at 7:51 PM ^
Are you asserting Cazzie Russell would have quit his head coaching job on the spot in October 1997 and gotten himself up to Ann Arbor to start the season five minutes later?
And if you're going to knock the Ellerbe hire on racial grounds AND the fact that he'd never been a head coach at a "BCS school" (a pretty stupid way to gauge basketball prominence, when you look at the makeup of the NCAA tournament every year), you're going to then assert that Cazzie Russell was actually the guy for the job with his two years of experience at the Savannah College of Art and Design, preceded by a minimal high school job?
Revisionism at its best. Really, a fine work of fiction.
February 11th, 2014 at 4:06 PM ^
Fisher was a great coach and a nice guy, and I don't believe he ever intended to engage in any shenanigans, but he didn't run a tight enough ship while he was here. As the head coach, it's your job to spot rogue boosters and prevent them from getting that close to your players. He was more than just a fall guy, he was directly responsible for the lack of oversight that led to the Ed Martin scandal.
February 11th, 2014 at 4:51 PM ^
February 11th, 2014 at 4:56 PM ^
February 11th, 2014 at 5:13 PM ^
You're right. Michigan has moved on, and in a good way. Beilein is a great coach. Fans need to let go.
OTOH . . . we all have a past, and it isn't the end of the world to remember our past. Hopefully, we learn from it. And in this case, ESPN's article largely focused on what Fisher is doing NOW, and has done at SDSU. To me, at least, it was an interesting article. I also wish him well, and hope he wins every game he is coaching, with the exception of facing Michigan.
On that last: wouldn't that be a media dream: for Michigan and SDSU to face each other deep in the tourney. You know that would get lots of coverage, and re-hash things to the nth degree.
February 11th, 2014 at 6:39 PM ^
to ignore the post.
February 11th, 2014 at 5:01 PM ^
The question I've always wondered (and will probably never get to see answered) is, how many Ed Martins are out there? How many programs have been dirty all along but have just never gotten caught? I'm sure it's a fairly large number. I don't really mean this as a defense of Fisher (some of the things he did, like forging Watson's initials, make him look bad regardless) but I wonder just how difficult it is to run a clean program and succeed.
February 11th, 2014 at 5:06 PM ^
I'll agree that Fisher had to take the fall. He was the head coach, and Ed Martin's escapades happened before, during, and after Fisher's time at Michigan. I can understand the need Goss felt to "clean house."
I'll go further. There are some coaches who are very, very aware of the shenanigans going on with boosters and others. There are coaches we all know who are pretty slimy. I would not put Fisher in that category. I believe that Martin and Webber et al deliberately kept Fisher out of the loop. Because of his responsibilities, he had to be held responsible. But I simply don't believe that Fisher was complicit.
Now, Bando has mentioned deliberately forged comp tickets for Martin. I wouldn't dispute what Bando has said. What I'd be curious about is how seriously this infraction was viewed at that time. I have deliberately forged my wife's name on a check. I have been involved with other deliberate forgeries. In some contexts, it isn't a big deal.
Let me use an analogy from my student days. I remember kegs of beer flowing in the halls at South Quad, and marijuana at Markley, where the resident advisors were complicit and aware of what was going on. Technically, they could probably have been expelled, and the RD punished, and maybe the University staff responsible also disciplined. Here's the thing though. In the late 70's, alcohol and drugs were culturally acceptable in Ann Arbor. My guess is that in 2014, an RA or RD who allowed this to happened would be punished much more severely. My point? I think the culture for at least some things when Fisher was here was much more laid back. Live and let live.
At the end of the day, I'm happy for Fisher at SDSU, and I'm happy for Beilein at UofM. I just think that Fisher is much better than, perhaps Calipari, or Pitino, or Tarkanian, etc., and that he gets too much grief for events that were way out of control long before he arrived.
February 11th, 2014 at 8:33 PM ^
You said it so much better than I did way upthread. Yes, Steve Fisher could have done much better in that part of his job that he for some reason chose to all-but-ignore: namely, the task of keeping things on the straight and narrow. But no way do I group him anywhere near the sleazeballs of coaching that deliberately cut every corner and break every rule that they can get away with. Coach Fisher's self-assessment in that article might not sit well with those of us who have a need to blame him for the nearly 2 decades that followed of "wandering in the wilderness", but I myself have no problem cheering for the man and his continued success at SD St.
IMO, He's a good man who suddenly fell into the right situation in1989 and made the most of his opportunity, a man who gave us the ride of our lives for a few weeks, and who tried to ride the crest of that wave over the next several years at U of M. Unfortunately, though, his surfboard splintered and eventually fell apart because he didn't take the time to keep it in good repair.
February 11th, 2014 at 6:13 PM ^
OK, I will dispute that.
There were people authorized to sign other's initials, as I recall, he said whoever, could put his initials, SF, as the one authorizing comped tickets.
What is the source of the forgery claim?
Fisher's NCAA defense was that Ed Martin should not have been classified as a booster, which I think is true. He did NOT give money to kids to go to UM. He gave Webber money for years with zero attempted input into where he went to college. I believe he also gave $ to kids who went to Mizzou.
February 11th, 2014 at 6:25 PM ^
gave money to almost every prominent Detroit high school basketball player no matter where he was going.
February 11th, 2014 at 7:19 PM ^
Have you read the NCAA report? It wasn't other people forging Fisher's name, it was Fisher forging other people's handwriting and initials on comp requests (Perry Watson's, secretaries, etc.). What rational explanation does the boss have for forging an underling's handwriting?
And for the idea that Fisher thought Martin wasn't a Michigan booster, yeah, no. Even by the most liberal interpretation of "booster" under NCAA guidelines, Martin unequiviocally qualified. This was a guy who got comp or special-arrangement-purchased tickets to almost 100 Michigan basketball games during the first three Fab Five seasons. Then got more (including the ones for which Fisher forged the request forms) in the next few years. Not a booster? Not a chance. And the "he gave money to kids who went to other schools" thing is a red herring as well. One isn't restricted to being a booster at just one school.
It's amazing to me how many people have such strong opinions about Fisher, the scandal, Ed Martin, etc., and have clearly never actually read the findings in the case.
February 11th, 2014 at 7:48 PM ^
I hve mixed emotions on Fisher. I still love that fact that he had exactly as many NCAA Championships after six games as the "Legendary Tom Izzo" has now: one.
His decision to hire Perry Watson, who delivered Jalen Rose and Chris Webber but also brought a remora with him named Ed Martin, was the beginning of the the seediest era in Michigan basketball. Either he was complicit or he used the "ostrich approach" to what was going on around him.
As for SDSU, can anyone here really imagine them having a Big Ten Conference record over .500? Didn't think so...
February 11th, 2014 at 8:16 PM ^
February 11th, 2014 at 9:01 PM ^
John Beckett was a veteran sportswriter for the old A2 News during the '80s and covered the UM basketball team during that time. He wrote this in the immediate wake of Fisher's firing:
"Everybody was duped by Fisher nice-guy attitude
October 12, 1997
By JOHN BECKETT
ANN ARBOR NEWS
ANN ARBOR - From the very beginning, Steve Fisher seemed too good to be true.
Fisher became Michigan's basketball coach on a March day in 1989 that seemed about as turbulent as hoops could get at U-M. Who would have guessed that such a cherubic figure would depart from U-M eight seasons later as a gaunt, haggard, graying man at the center of turbulence that, by comparison, makes his debut seem rather tame?
In 1989, just a few days before the NCAA tournament, Wolverine head coach Bill Frieder flew to Phoenix to accept the job as head coach at Arizona State. Bo Schembechler, then U-M athletic director, decided that if Frieder wanted that job that badly, there was no way he would be allowed to coach the Wolverines in the tourney. So he named Fisher, a U-M assistant for seven years, as interim head coach.
During the next month, Fisher became everyone's darling. The Wolverines won six consecutive games and U-M's only NCAA championship. Fisher, with red cheeks and boyish enthusiasm reminiscent of Ron Howard as Richie Cunningham, captured the fancy of basketball fans and media throughout the country.
Schembechler removed the "interim" designation after the Wolverines claimed the NCAA crown.
To truly appreciate how far Fisher fell, one has to recall the terrific heights he scaled during the first part of his tenure at U-M.
Although he failed to guide the veteran, talent-laden 1989-90 team to a repeat of its national title, Fisher was back in the Final Four just two years later with the Fab Five. The next season, 1993, Fisher advanced to the NCAA championship game for the third time.
Those are accomplishments most college coaches only dream of. For Fisher, they seemed to become almost routine.
He was too good to be true.
But even then, there were signs that not all was right in Wolverine Land.
First of all, there was the Fab Five. Many fans saw them as the embodiment of a new, young, rebellious attitude on court. Long, baggy shorts. Black socks. Cocky. Swaggering. Strutting.
Others saw them as virtually obscene. Not cocky: crude, these people said. Too much swagger. Too much trash talk. Yeah, these guys could play, but they didn't behave the way Michigan fans expected their athletes to behave.
Meanwhile, there were troubling incidents. Each one, at the time, may not have seemed like much. But slowly, they began to add up and form a pattern that made some begin to wonder about Fisher.
He hired Donnie Kirksey, a hanger-on to Juwan Howard, to work at his basketball camp, even though Kirksey had minimal, at best, credentials. There were reports that Fisher paid Kirksey an outlandish fee; Fisher denied those reports but refused to say how much he did pay Kirksey.
Fisher hired Perry Watson as an assistant coach amid grumbles from around the Big Ten. Fisher had timed Watson's hiring to get a full season's worth of unofficial recruiting from him, and Watson's hiring was tied to Jalen Rose's decision to play at Michigan, some conference coaches contended.
Then came Beergate. And a summer camp scandal: Fab Fivers, and other U-M players, had been paid to do little more than sign autographs at camps and tournaments. Although U-M officials downplayed the incidents, the NCAA judged them significant enough to re-interpret its rules regarding summer camp jobs.
Meanwhile, Fisher was winning a lot of games - overall, his record was 184-82 - but he wasn't winning championships. His Wolverines never won a Big Ten title. They made early exits from the NCAA tournament in 1995 and 1996. The highlight of their 1996-97 season was winning the postseason NIT - an acceptable accomplishment for most programs, but hardly what people had come to hope for from Michigan.
When Maurice Taylor rolled his vehicle in the wee hours of a Saturday morning in 1996, the incident caused some people to say more loudly what they had been talking quietly about for some time: Fisher did not have the control over his players that a coach should have, either on or off the court.
In the end, that was Fisher's undoing. Michigan athletic director Tom Goss apparently became convinced that Fisher lacked what the NCAA calls "institutional control" over his basketball program.
How did such a nice guy - for that is the description so commonly applied to Fisher, especially early in his career - come up so short?
Was he too nice for his own good? Too trusting?
After the 1989-90 season, I had a talk with Fisher. After five seasons covering U-M basketball, I was moving on to other things. Before I did, I told Fisher that one of his players had told me that "golden handshakes" - boosters slipping players money after games - were sometimes happening in the Wolverine locker room.
I didn't have enough on-the-record sources to write about it, but this player was one I trusted, and I thought Fisher should be alerted.
Fisher's reaction was mildly angry disbelief. He would never believe U-M boosters or players would do such things, he told me.
An example of Steve Fisher's naivete? I don't think so. Steve Fisher was not that naive. Steve Fisher is an intelligent man. More likely, I think, was that if Fisher didn't know about such goings-on, he was perfectly content to continue not knowing.
The media - myself included - made a fundamental mistake in covering Steve Fisher from the beginning. We bought into his "nice guy" image immediately and maintained it even when we should have known, or at least suspected, differently.
We should have known, and remembered, that college basketball and/or football coaches can't be that nice and that successful, too. When Fisher almost immediately pushed the media back more than an arm's length, when he closed practices and restricted access to his players, we should have been more suspicious.
We could have paid more attention to the lack-of-control pattern that emerged ever more clearly as the Fisher Era went along.
Of course, the same can be said of the U-M athletic department; of Fisher's bosses.
None of us should be surprised at Fisher's downfall. We all should have known that he was too good to be true."
Aside from whatever responsibility he had for what happened at UM, it's undeniable that he's done a tremendous job at SDSU. He's a damn good basketball coach.