CC: A thread for people who still support RR

When I watched West Virginia in the 2006 Sugar Bowl, and then throughout the rest of Steve Slaton's  and Pat White's careers there, I (along with a slew of other people, I know) got the impression that this was a special coach. West Virginia had one of the best offensive lines I've seen, and their defense was undersized, but everyone single one of them had the will power to come up and hit you. I thought he was one of the last smash mouth coaches around, someone who taught the fundamentals first and correctly, built his players up, and then proceeded to run right over you. I still think that he has it in him, but none of that has come to fruition here. 

for three straight years but for me, that Gator Bowl game stomped out any remaining light at the end of the tunnel.  RR and his staff had five weeks to prepare for a middle of the pack SEC team and we got destroyed.  I am just not buying the youth card anymore.  Denard was making the same decision-making and mental mistakes that he was making during the Iowa game.  I hate to compare to the Carr era but all of our past QB's seemed to have gotten better as the season went on.  The five or six Fr or RS Fr that rotate in on D have played in just about every game this season.  However, I believe their progress has either stagnated, or possibly even regressed, throughout the year.  Our guys did not appear well coached or prepared in any facet of the game.  The offensive playbook was no bigger in this game than it was for Notre Dame.  I can go on and on ad nauseum.

 

I appreciate your steadfast loyalty.  And I really like RR as a person and I truly wanted this to work out.  But I love Michigan Football too much to continue down this path of mediocrity.

Rich is a great coach, he is a great father and husband.  He is also a great human being.  No one can seriously be critical the way he holds himself off the field.  The work with Motts's the Mealer family and others has been a standard for other coaches to reach. 

Unfortunately, the other side of the job has not been so hot.  The results speak for themselves.  We can't beat Penn State, Michigan State, Iowa, or Ohio State with Rich as coach.  We aren't competitive against most of the better teams in the Big 10.  Take emotion out of this, and the conclusion is easy, it is time to move on.

The spread offense is a viable system.  I think it can work and the results on the field are for the most part in agreement with it.  The problem is not the spread it is the coach.  He has brought this on himself.  He struck out twice when hiring defensive coordinators, and the results have been terrible.  Those who say keep Rich but fire all the defensive staff, that is an option, but do you really want Rich to hire any more defensive coordinators?  If  not, who hires them and who do they report to?  If it is left to Brandon to hire the defensive staff, Rich truly is a lame duck, and that will hurt recruiting even more.

I am resigned to the fact that we need a new coach.  Who it is, I don't know, but I do trust Brandon to hire the best person available to lead us going forward.

Thanks Rich, sorry it didn't work out, and I know you will be successful wherever you end up.

Go Blue!

For Rich Rodriguez.  No reason to preach to the choir in this post.

 

However, I will throw this out: if Rich is fired, I will get in anybody's face who says that he was a bad hire on the simple basis that three years is not enough time to judge a college football coach.  If he's fired, we'll never know how good or bad he was.  If somebody else leads to team to 9-10 wins next year, which I think is highly likely, I will credit Rich and not whoever that guy is.

I say yes

To let go of a brilliant recruiter like Rodriguez would be a big mistake

ONE MORE YEARS

I had something approaching a knock-down, drag-out argument with my uncle this Christmas, who wants RR gone yesterday.  He had the usual Drew Sharp sound bites about how RR chased off Ryan Mallett, how he installed this offense that doesn't work in the Big Ten without regard for personnel, etc. etc.  He wanted Harbaugh, naturally.

My question to him - and to everyone else - is this: What the hell do you think Harbaugh's going to do?  Either he's going to install a new offense without regard for personnel and chase off one of the most talented QBs in Michigan history, or he's going to keep this offense that people seem to think doesn't work.

Greg Robinson must go, there's no doubt in my mind about that, nor anyone's, I'd guess.  Rich Rod needs another year.  The question is not about what happened, the question is about what will happen.  I can see no reason why Jim Harbaugh or anyone would necessarily improve things in 2011.  There's no guarantee of this at all.  We know how coaching changes go: decommitments, new systems, the works.  And if a new coach comes in for 2011 and he doesn't make things better right away, he's just being handed the same rebuilding job as if we'd fired RR after 2011 as before it.  Firing RR because we're ANGAR over the way things have transpired is the wrong reason.  Ask yourself if you can guarantee improvement under a new coach in 2011.  Or rather, whether you can say with 100% certainty that any new coach (not Harbaugh, because there's no guarantee of landing him) would do better than RR would.  If not, then stay the course, because we can't afford this constant turnover.

but that performance in the Gator was pathetic.

No preparation, disorganized, lack of fight, etc. Now, it may have been tough to get guys to buy in with the whole scenario, but if the team can not put up a better fight for their coach than what I saw, what is the point?

I like the guy. I like what he stands for. I like what he didmformthe Mealers. I like how he gives guys like Denard a chance and pushes kids like Tate to make better choices (even if they choose not to.) I like how he sits kids that might have concussion like symptoms. I like how he is trying to be a Michigan man despite all the negativity. I like how he doesn't do negative recruiting. I also think he has so much against him that it is almost as goodf or him as it is for Michigan to move on. I will continue to support him no matter where he coaches and truly hope the best for him. Call the defensive side of the ball bad luck or bad hiring but it is what it is. Call the practice gate whatever you want and the Freep all the bad words in the world. Call the injuries to the secondary ill-timing. Call the poor recruiting classes lloyd's fault. Call it the perfect storm but none-the-less it may just be best for RR and Michigan.

Probably not worth it's own thread, but this is there anybody out there for whom RR is their 2nd choice?  

I'd like to get JH because he's seemingly available and I think he's a badass recruiter and motivator.  I think it would be cool to have someone willing to talk some smack to Tressel and back it up on the field.

But if JH isn't available, I'd love to see what RR does next year with an improved defense and kicking game.  I'm certainly not happy with the results so far but I can't help looking at Oregon and Auburn and thinking we'd be crazy to move away from the spread.

 

....an important fact to note .....the players never gave up on RR - Neither should we. Rich Rod needs to be given a chance to reap the reward of his struggles in year 4. With a entire new defensive staff, that is. 

But I believe in RR, he is a Winner who has had to put up with so much unnecessary bullshit. 

I want to read thru this all but other obligations are pulling me away. But before I have to leave, I shall co-sign this in support of RR

a thread in which anti-RR posters could have easily ignored has instead been hijacked by troll-level mockery and "i'm smarter bc i think we need to fire RR" level discourse. color me stunned (it's the one in the box next to Sienna and Forest Green).

that there is so much animosity built up--so many latent and overt problems--that he doesn't succeed anyway. Without the support of the institution. . .

I'm far less certain, after Saturday, that Michigan really does win a lot of games next year, either. At this stage people are going to hate RichRod even if he wins.

Of course, we don't win right away with Harbaugh either, IMO (nor do we necessarily GET HIM, as many previously warned) a good reason to keep Rich. 

Kind of ironic that the RR supporters (of which I am still BARELY one) are all here whining about the treatment they have received from this board the last few days. This is the first time in 3 years that any anti-RR post has been considered acceptable on this board. Previously anyone who posted the slightest criticism of Rodriguez ended up in Bolivia. Now that the tables have turned, the same people who were being close-minded and reactionary about the smallest criticism are crying foul about being forced to back up their opinions with something more than "Just wait until next year!"

if less than 11 wins fire him

One more year, please.

In the emotional post-bowl meltdown, I posted that we should shake hands and depart in an amicable divorce / annulment. Now after thinking about it, I'm Ok if RR stays, but he has to do three things:

1) Wholesale D staff changes... shit maybe bring in all those d-coaches from Florida let go by Muschamp (Austin, Heater, etc). Maybe they bring a couple of those 4/5 star immediate impact freshman with them.

2) Sacrifice a O or D staff member to bring in an honest to God special teams coach, even if its for one year. Go throw SEC money at one of those NFL special teams guru coaches who instantly change the special teams performance in one year.

3) Come out and give a Patton like speech / press conference where there's no Josh Grobin, a real Mike Gundy like defense of himself, the programs, and the progress. our adversaries smell weakness, and damn it, our coach is projecting that too. RR needs to just come out, balls to the wall and say this is Michigan football, I'm the head coach, my players are all in, I've made mistakes but I'm correcting them, and if you don't like it, then drop some Bo quote in there about team, toughness, or something. Show you project an image of  someone in control, who's invested in Michigan and the history, and not some detached, wishy-washy-about-stuff and I'm an X & O geek who just has a aw shucks mannerism.

Problem is, I don't know if RR will do all three. #1 I think is going to be forces on by Brandon and I hope RR agrees. And frankly, I don't know if RR has the emotional fortitude tank to do #3. If that's the case, then a Harbaugh hire is really the only option. Hoke ain't going to unify the fan base or have enough gravitas to command the respect from players. Peterson or Patterson would be seen as similar hires to Rodriguez ('outsiders' with an oustanding history but questionable committment to Big Ten / Michigan history).

Ultimately, that is the soul-searching question that needs to be answered. There are a lot of reasons to think that the players on the team are talented and deep enough to be competitive next season, since almost the entire offense returns and the defense actually has an experienced, somewhat talented 2-deep. With next year's schedule, a team of this talent should have the following (expect some gray area in this list since I don't have each team's scouting reports for next year):

--5 games (Western, Eastern, San Diego, Minnesota, and Purdue) that are essentially cupcakes

--3 games (Notre Dame, Northwestern, and Illinois) that could be competitive but are as of now favored by Michigan

--2 games (Michigan State and Iowa) that are toss-up but winnable

--2 games (Nebraska and Ohio State) that should at least be competitive even if it turns out to be a loss

With the above schedule, 9-3 isn't an unreasonable expectation as a lower bound for a team that is truly improving and can compete in the conference.

However, the team was also supposed to get better against MSU (NTMSU) after getting healthy from injuries; no one needs to hear how that went, as the defense was the defense and the offense, while gaining over 300 yards of total offense, did not score any points after the first quarter. Special teams have also continued their abysmal performance. As of right now, my straw-grasping has yielded the only laughable excuses for these phenomena:

--Bowl games can bring out the worst in a team after having not played for over a month, along with some excuse for playing in the opposing team's backyard taking away from the players' focus

--Bad (special teams) coaching, not bad (head coach) coaching

So... I don't know. Since I truly feel it is too late to start a coaching search, Coach Rodriguez should stay for another year. Still, recruiting is a concern going forward if there is no publicly-made support from important Michigan figures, Dave Brandon being the most important. Since I firmly believe "When in doubt, always resort to blind faith," I have complete support for Coach Rodriguez's every action as head coach of Michigan football.