Carr Was Almost a Spartan Coach

Submitted by Space Coyote on

Lloyd Carr was almost a Spartan at one point.  The article says how he was good friends with Perles and if Perles had gotten the job over Waters he would have hired Carr away from West Virginia.  Instead, Waters got the job and Lloyd became the DBs coach at Michigan under Bo.

Three years later Perles got the MSU job and offered the DC position to Carr, who eventually turned it down to stay at Michigan.

Pretty interesting stuff.  I never knew his connection to Perles.  There is more in the article, interesting read.

Link: http://www.lansingstatejournal.com/article/20110428/GW01/104280341/Duffy-Daugherty-Award-U-M-s-Carr-nearly-Spartan?odyssey=obinsite

WolverineHistorian

April 29th, 2011 at 5:47 PM ^

He'll go down in history as the only coach to beat JoePa 9 straight times.  God, it killed me to see that winning streak against PSU end in 08.  Then again, alot of winning streaks that ended in 08 also killed me. 

Against Sparty, he won 10 of 13.  1 of those losses was the Spartan Savings Time game.  And his first game also had some bad luck with the ref giving Sparty a favorable spot when it looked like they were short on 4th down and 2 on their game winning drive.  Should have been 12-1 against them. 

UM Indy

April 29th, 2011 at 4:11 PM ^

want to break out into the All in the Family theme song - Those Were the Days.  We owned Sparty.  Owned O$U for that matter.  Need to get back to that. 

I broke out my 100th anniversary of The Game t-shirt today from our win in 2003 and it literally makes me sick to think that was our last win over those bitches.

Tuebor

April 29th, 2011 at 4:48 PM ^

That was my first Michigan away.

Went with my Dad thinking we would get to see a great Michigan victory and then go the Rose Bowl.  It hurt when we lost.  I'll never forget the look on my Dad's face after the game when for the first time in my life I heard him say "F*ck you!" to the obnoxious OSU guy who was sitting behind us.

The Barwis Effect

April 29th, 2011 at 9:24 PM ^

The turning point was actually 2001, losing in Ann Arbor to a four loss OSU team (a team that finished with five losses including the bowl game) in Tressel's first year. That was a team U-M had absolutely no business losing to, and in the process, they allowed Tressel to become larger than life thanks to his "guarantee" 310 days earlier.

M-Wolverine

April 30th, 2011 at 1:13 AM ^

Navarre plays like a guy who needed at least one more year of seasoning, but still almost leads the comeback to win after a horrid first half. One that Henson wouldn't have had in all likelihood, so we win that game. Even with OSU probably winning the next year even with Tressel "discredited", Lloyd starts off 2-1 against him (and at worst ends 7-6 against OSU). Who knows what the recruiting ramifications are from that, and if OSU has the momentum in their second season to win the title. Without that, you've got a coach who starts off 1-2 vs. Michigan, and there's a lot of pressure going down after what they did to the guy before. 

In conclusion? Henson leaving to play baseball sucked.

Mr. Robot

April 29th, 2011 at 4:09 PM ^

Lloyd sure knows that. Might be the best decision he's ever made in his life. Waters turned out to be a crappy coach and Perles landed MSU is hot water for being a dirty cheating scumbag (natrually, MSU still worships him to this day).

Man do I miss Bo...

Waters Demos

April 29th, 2011 at 4:31 PM ^

natrually, MSU still worships him [Perles] to this day

I don't think this is entirely true.  Perhaps it is from an institutional perspective, but I haven't detected any reverence for him from most MSU folks. 

In fact, there has often been the opposite on account of his frequent efforts to bring MSU to his shitty bowl in Detroit. 

Mr. Robot

April 29th, 2011 at 8:25 PM ^

I guess institutionally is primarily what I am thinking.

The guy was fired after serious academic fraud was found to be happening under him and last I recall there were a few players who admitted that he encouraged them to use steroids. He went on to become a trustee, has a building or something named after him, and I seem to recall him being given some kind of award a year or two ago from MSU too.

All of that is pretty sad, but admittadely I don't hear genral MSU fans talk about him. Of course, I've never heard them talk publicly about Munn or Doughtry, either, so I'm not sure how much weight to put in that.

FrankMurphy

April 29th, 2011 at 9:46 PM ^

I think it's a bigger coincidence that if Carr had stayed at West Virginia just a few months longer, he would have ended up being Rich Rodriguez' position coach. Carr was the DB coach at WVU for about two weeks in 1980, and Rodriguez played there as a DB from '80 to '84. 

WolverineHistorian

April 29th, 2011 at 5:39 PM ^

Carr was also offered the head coaching job at Wisconsin in 1989 over Barry Alvarez.  He seriously considered it for a while but decided he was happy on the coaching staff at Michigan. 

This was back in the day where a shared Big Ten championship was considered a disappointing season for us so I can see why it would be hard to leave, even for a head coaching job. 

WolverineHistorian

April 29th, 2011 at 11:01 PM ^

Correct.  The lone loss being a last minute 3 point heartbreaker during 2005, the year of infinite injuries.  If Mike Hart is healthy, Carr is 7-0 against Alvarez. 

Alvarez's Badger teams couldn't do crap against Carr's defense.  Not even their Rose Bowl squads led by Heisman winner Ron Dayne could score more than 16 points. 

God, it feels weird typing that.  Remember the days of defense?