Bush was that good when he was 11 years old.
Wow. That AD search process didn't take nearly as long as ours. Dare I say that I am jealous of their efficiency?
Speed is part of efficiency but so is effectiveness. I'll take David Brandon, it was worth the wait even if it wasn't 30 minutes or less.
I like the reference...
with a few months of transition built in from Martin? Also, wasn't Brandon (maybe unofficially) a part of the committee that hired RR? He wasn't someone that had no current knowledge of the athletic department prior to being hired and I thought was a rather speedy hire, given the long timeline that Martin's retirement allowed.
Guess I should have put jealous in quotation marks... people don't seem to be getting the joke. :)
EDIT: Whoops, just looked up the quote again... Garrett said "envy" not "jealousy"... guess that why the negbombs are dropping like flies under the bugzapper on my cabins back porch. Oh well, nobody's perfect.
FWIW, I didn't realize you were jokng but I didn't think it was a neggable offense personally...
Meh. People are envious of me. Happens all the time.
I like how they said they would give it bach to the Heisman trust. Maybe they will give it back to Eddie George.
Has USC lost all sense of reason? What experience does Pat frickin Haden bring to the Ath. Dept.?
Not that I give a damn. SC can dwindle to the bottom of the Pac10 standings and I wouldn't care. I'm just curious why they thought Pat Haden, a TV commentator was their best choice.
Oh come now, hiring a football commentator to run your Athletic Department is not such a crazy idea is it? What could possibly go wrong?
Well baby I have it narrowed down to 2 job opportunities to better our family. Athletic Director at USC or Captain of the USS Titanic...
*RMS Titanic
Good catch-
USS just does not float here.
The guy played quarterback on a team that went to three straight Rose Bowls and won a share of two national titles. He was a Rhodes Scholar who studied at Oxford before coming back to play in the NFL. He has a law degree he earned after his NFL career. He is a long time partner in a private equity firm managing nearly half a billion dollars in capital. He has been on the USC board of trustees for some time as well.
Other than maybe the guy we just hired at Michigan, I can't think of too many people with anything close to the combined athletic, educational, and business success of Pat Haden to take the job.
don't you think?
And you'd know a lot better PurpleStuff, but my first impressions of him are pretty good. He seems to be at least SAYING all the right things. I'm sure some of the faithful aren't liking having the program goals (of being upright) compared to ND and Stanford, but while USC has had their shady ups and downs, they've not always been a completely corrupt program. Bo wouldn't have been as close to Robinson as he was if he thought he was an abject cheater; and obviously Larry Smith had Bo's approval. I don't know that emphasis on Women's Athletics will ease the donors, but he came off really well in his opening interviews to me. (Plus, really, he has such a low Athletic Director threshold to surpass there right now...anybody should look really good).
And how soon memory fades....it was only a few months ago that everyone was saying..."Brandon?? The Pizza Guy???" "We need someone with Athletic Director Experience", etc, etc. He was hardly the endorsed candidate of MGoBlog or it's community. I mean, he was my favorite candidate...and certainly he's proven to excel in all facets so far....but really, to have people knock a guy here because he doesn't have enough Athletic Department experience...Yeesh.
I just heard him on local radio in LA (something I can't remember ever happening with Garrett). It sounds like his (and the new president's) top priority is cleaning out the compliance department. His quote was something like, "creating a culture of compliance without sacrificing athletic excellence." He's also brought in JK McKay to be the assistant AD in charge of football. It looks to me like the plan is to watch Kiffin like a hawk to make sure there isn't a hint of impropreity (which I'm sure they don't think will hurt their chances of winning the NCAA appeal).
Some good things happened under Garrett's watch (including some great performances in the non-revenue sports), but it took him more than a decade to get the new basketball arena built and Carroll was pretty much his fifth or sixth choice. He made some awful hires (Bibby, Hackett, etc.), has sat on his hands during the complete collapse of one of the top baseball programs in history, and the incompetence in his office turned Bush taking money from agents into some of the harshest sanctions in NCAA history.
And since you mentioned Bo and jolly John Robinson, thought I'd post this from the latter's recent induction into the college football hall of fame:
http://insidesocal.com/usc/archives/2010/07/morning-buzz-546.html
if only for the "a USC man will run the USC athletic department" angle. When your programs seem to flaunt the rules and blame resultant penalties on the petty jealousy of others, should you really hire somebody based on his familiarity with your program and its tradition?
How can Pat Haden say with a straight face (like he just did on ESPN) that he thinks Kiffin is the right man for the job because he shares Haden's desire to win ethically.... Seriously, how can you keep a main coach from the Bush era on as head coach when all that crap when on...I guess apparently it was all McNair's fault...
With Pat Haden leaving the Notre Dame/NBC booth, who now will tell us that "As long as zebras roam the earth, Michigan is going to try to establish the run."?
I didn't know Pat Haden's history, but definitely didn't think he'd be a Trojan. I kind of feel like it'd be like if we had our own network and Spielman or some buckeye was the color guy. No matter how good he was, I'd still be a little annoyed having to listen to him.