Poll: 35 percent of U-M fans want Rodriguez replaced

Submitted by BlueinDC on

35 percent Michigan football fans would like to see Rich Rodriguez replaced as head coach, a new poll found Thursday.

Just over a third percent of self-identified U-M fans said they want Rodriguez replaced as coach, while 32 percent said they would like to see him continue as head of the program. 33 percent of fans said they were unsure.

Rodriguez suffers from a slightly lopsided favorability rating as head coach. 20 percent of Michigan fans say they have a favorable opinion of Rodriguez, according to a Public Policy Polling (PPP) survey released Thursday. 38 percent have an unfavorable opinion of Rodriguez, while 42 percent were unsure.

If Rodriguez were to be replaced as coach, Stanford Coach Jim Harbaugh favored by Michigan fans among several replacement options that were tested.

64 percent of Michigan fans said they would want to see Harbaugh replace Rodriguez. 23 percent favored LSU Coach Les Miles, and three percent favored San Diego State University Coach (and former U-M assistant) Brady Hoke named as the replacement. Nine percent were unsure.

The poll, conducted Dec. 3-6, has a 4.9 percent margin of error for the sample of self-described Michigan fans. You can find the full results here.

Updated 12:36.

ChasingRabbits

December 9th, 2010 at 12:28 PM ^

There are some people who have an unfavorable opinion of RR but they don't want him replaced?  huh?  20% favorable but 32% want him back?  12% just want him back because?

Strange poll.

jared32696

December 9th, 2010 at 12:28 PM ^

Q1 Do you consider yourself to be a Michigan or

Michigan State fan, or are you not a fan of

either school?

Michigan ......................................................... 33%

Michigan State ................................................ 34%

Not a fan of either school ................................ 32%

 

Everyone that was interviewed, aren't all U of M fans. Shocker there. Gte your facts straight

CompleteLunacy

December 9th, 2010 at 12:35 PM ^

 

(Michigan fans only) Would you like to see Rich
Rodriguez continue to be Michigan’s football
coach next season or would you like to see him
replaced?
Would like to see him continue ....................... 32%
Would like to see him replaced ....................... 35%
Not sure .......................................................... 33%
Nice try though. Questions Q2-Q4 all clarify that Michigan fans are the only ones considered. Why? Because the results would be meaningless if they considered everybody. Does an MSU fan want RR to stay right now? Given their 3-game winning streak against us, that's probably a "yes".
 
Not sure .......................................................... 33%(Michigan fans only) Would you like to see Rich
Rodriguez continue to be Michigan’s football
coach next season or would you like to see him
replaced?
Would like to see him continue ....................... 32%
Would like to see him replaced ....................... 35%
Not sure .......................................................... 33%

 

spacemanspiff231

December 9th, 2010 at 3:36 PM ^

Even if the poll didn't clearly state that the responses were taken from Michigan fans, are you really so naive to think that every Michigan fan wants Rich Rod as head coach?  Outside of the MgoBlog community, you should realize that many, MANY don't.  To be honest I'm getting extremely sick of people like you that have more support for Rich Rod than they do for the Michigan football program itself.

BiSB

December 9th, 2010 at 12:28 PM ^

A plurality of Michigan football fans would like to see Rich Rodriguez replaced as head coach, a new poll found Thursday.

The political nerd in me would like to point out that a 35-32 spread (with 33% undecided) with a 5% MoE does not typically constitute a plurality.  That is a statistical dead heat.

CompleteLunacy

December 9th, 2010 at 12:40 PM ^

What does this statistic compare to? It's not like we had numbers before hand. How would they compare to a question like "Should Lloyd Carr resign?" posed after The Horror? Or for a team like Texas, whose coach went 5-7 this year? There's simply nothing you can really say about it, other than the fact that not a majority of UM fans want to see him gone...it only seems that way because the 35% are probably the most vocal in displaying their displeasure.

Smikal

December 9th, 2010 at 12:30 PM ^

absolutely nothing. All results were within the margin of error. That hardly shows a plurality.

 

Unless we're having fun with numbers. If thats the case, 100% of respondants at the time of this post thought this was a pile of thinly veiled crap. However 72% of said respondants were water (by mass). The rest was protein, I guess.

MGoCards

December 9th, 2010 at 12:30 PM ^

Also, 32% of fans want him to keep the job.  The rest are unsure. The 3% difference is well within the margin of error so we're not sure that there's precisely a plurality. 

For what it's worth, I think there was some skepticism about PPP in the past but they were on the better side of average in Nate Silver's pollster ratings. Their methods and results seem pretty strong, at least for the political races. 

CompleteLunacy

December 9th, 2010 at 12:41 PM ^

Absolutely nothing. They're not sure probably because they aren't AD's or football coaches, and have no real say in the situation. All this survey proves is the situation is as far as we can guess 50/50 at this point for keeping him and firing him. It may be very different for DB...but we don't know that if it is.

Section 1

December 9th, 2010 at 12:39 PM ^

What news-source provides you with most of your information about the Michigan football program?

  • Newspapers
  • Radio
  • Television
  • Internet (non-broadcast, non-print media sites)
  • Other

I'd like to see the cross-tab data on that one.  Because if your main source of information about Michigan football and Coach Rodriguez is "Newspapers," I don't see how the vast majority of that cohort would not conclude that Rodriguez needs to be fired, like, uh, last year.  I suppose one could probably say the same about "Radio."

turd ferguson

December 9th, 2010 at 12:38 PM ^

It's funny that women are so hot for Les Miles. There probably aren't very many women in their sample (and they don't report sample size for the crosstabs), but still:

men - 75% Harbaugh, 10% Miles
women - 48% Harbaugh, 43% Miles.

The question was, "If RR was replaced, who would you most like to see as Michigan's football coach next season?"

StephenRKass

December 9th, 2010 at 12:39 PM ^

I'm glad that this whole process is in DB's hands, and not just a popularity contest. Again, I think next year will provide the necessary data for a long term decision.

BiSB

December 9th, 2010 at 12:41 PM ^

If you look at the crosstabs, you will find that the bluehairs favored removing him 44-18, while younger respondants favored keeping him.

Of course, when 62% of your sample is age 46 or older, that makes a big difference.

Raoul

December 9th, 2010 at 1:00 PM ^

You obviously didn't even bother to look at the full survey results. PPP did an earlier survey in May 2010, and the number who want Rodriguez replaced has increased significantly:

A May PPP poll found that 51% of Michigan fans wanted to see Rodriguez continue as coach while only 20% hoped to see him removed. Since that time support for him continuing has declined by 19 points while support for him leaving has increased by 15 points.