Did anyone else hear Rick Leach this morning?

I respectfully disagree that simply because Lloyd was a guest of Iowa fans in their private box that it somehow means he's "giving the finger to Michigan." Right after Barry Alvarez retired as head coach of Wisconsin, Lloyd invited him to Ann Arbor when UM played UW. Barry was on the Michigan sideline for the whole game, (it was covered by ABC and the sideline reporter talked to him). I don't recall anyone questioning Alvarez's allegiances at the time, (though there may have been some back in Madison). It was simply a nice gesture to be asked, and he accepted. In Lloyd's case, I think its much the same. Would Bo have sat with the Iowa fans? Probably not, but I'm speculating. How many of us have attended games in other stadiums, sat with our competition's faithful throngs, and cheered for Michigan anyway? Might not Lloyd have done the same? However he got to be the head coach at Michigan, he served as a football coach for decades, and still owes much of his livelihood to the institution. I would find it hard to believe that someone could so easily turn his back on Michigan after so long a career.

"as long as Lloyd is receiving a paycheck, and hold an office at U-M, he should not be sitting with the enemy." When Bo was Ad he had John Robinson over to his house for a chicken dinner. Is that allowed?

is Gary Moeller, who apparently is still invited to team practices once a week, still sitting in his regular box in the old press box. And Lloyd Carr is in another box. Look, I love Rick Leach and was his classmate. And Rick is doing a huge service to our program in defending RR. But as I look at the Freep hatchet-work by Michael Rosenberg, I don't see any evidence of "insider information" being leaked to support this series of attack-articles. Rosenberg has been able to write this garbage without any apparent input from Carr or anybody else. Indeed, I'd worry a lot more if any of these stories had the credible backing of someone like a Lloyd Carr making specific charges. But that's the garbage part of everything that Rosenberg has done! Rosenberg has got nothing so good. Rosenberg doesn't have any anonymous quotes that might be attributable to Lloyd Carr! All that Rosenberg has are things like the ambush interviews with the freshmen at media day, or the dubious exit interviews with anonymous ex-players. Like all of you, I see evidence of Lloyd Carr's antipathy. But I don't see evidence of any real subversion. I think it is actually giving too much credence to the garbage-sucker Rosenberg to link him too closely with Carr.

i am glad the intertubes were not around with Texas A&M tried to throw that million dollars at Bo. And, dudes, do any of you remember Bo coming to Moeller's rescue when old Gary went bananas? So, Bo must have been undermining Gary, right?

"At least Leach has the balls to say something and be heard. As crazy as his rants might be. He is standing up and being counted." At this point I discount what Leach is spewing, Leach comes across as the one with the axe to grind

sell newspapers benefit from this. heck, certain blog sites even benefit from this... just sayin....

Podcast is now up: http://www.wtka.com/index.php?fuseaction=home.podcasts_sel&id=2336

the game this saturday. meet at the Eagle biatches! We'll see who is right! CAW!

This thread, and Rick Leach on the radio this morning, is proof of another instance where sometimes there are just too many fora for people to say stupid shit about the football team you love. Let Lloyd do what he wants. Rich Rod runs the team now. Anything that gets in the way of me watching the boys on Saturday is useless. I was in Iowa City Saturday, and Lloyd being in a luxury box while I froze my testes off had no effect on my enjoyment of watching my favorite team take a veteran, highly ranked team to within 30 yards of a loss. And despite the whining here today, my enjoyment of the game, and this team, will not change. Now stop it and focus on what's important - the game. By arguing like this, you're just giving the Freep a reason to write another assfaced column, and giving Rick Leach a reason to go run off at the mouth at WTKA next week. GO BLUE.

Good for Rick. I'm not sure if Lloyd is to blame for sitting with Iowa people at the game, but I do think he is to blame for the Les Miles fiasco and for not being more publicly supportive of RR. Even if I hated RR, I would support him unconditionally because he is running the program that I love so dearly. To me, undermining RR is one of the stupidest things a person can do. Its counter productive.

I heard Leach's comments this morning and found the whole thing troubling. He sounded a little loopy, saying that someone needs to investigate why Carr was in an Iowa box. As many have posted, who cares where Lloyd sits or if he has friends at Iowa? It was a game, not war, and it's not "treason" for Lloyd to "fraternize with the enemy." He also sounds a little paranoid about leaks from within the program. I haven't read Rosenberg's article, and I wont. But it sounds like he put in a FOIA request for records of the "average team GPA" for past seasons and found out there weren't any. That doesn't mean that someone's minions are leaking information. But Leach sees a campaign against Rodriguez, and he seems to want to implicate Carr in that campaign. Maybe he's right. But he should have a lot of very clear evidence of that before dropping innuendoes. And he should present the evidence when he makes his charges. It's kind of crappy for him to say, "there are bad people out there who have it in for Coach, and they will get their due in the end." That sort of thing creates hysteria and dissention about Carr and unnamed others, which is the same kind of conduct that bothers him when Rodriguez is the victim of it. I think there probably are a lot of people in the Athletic Department and elsewhere who have it in for Rodriguez. It seems likely that some of them are Lloyd loyalists. But that does not mean that Lloyd is behind an anti-Rodriguez campaign. Or that Lloyd deserves to be condemned for where he sits at a road game. It was also crappy for Webb to take that call from Leach and then not follow up with a question or two, asking Leach to say more about what he was talking about. If an ordinary caller dropped bombs like that, Webb would ask for proof or say that the caller shouldn't make unsubstantiated charges. Leach should not be exempted from that standard.

I heard the entire Leach call and it is not the first time that he has sounded anti-Carr. If he is correct or not about LC, I don't know, but he shouldn't be talking like that if he doesn't have proof. Later in the program WTKA had a lawyer guest (don't remember his name) who stated that he has talked to LC several times and he is very supportive of RR and the program. I think LC is a class act and I have always felt that he has remained silent out of wisdom. He knows that anything he says can and will be somehow twisted around to sound like criticism of RR. It is a can't win situation. If I were LC I would have also taken the silent approach and if I were RR I would be glad that the previous coach is keeping silent and behind the scenes.

Has anybody actually FOUND the article that Leach referenced? I can't find it. Leach spoke to my class last year, and it was clear he personally has an axe to grind with Lloyd Carr. However, you have to love that he is defending Rich Rodriguez as much as he can- he has a ton of faith in what RR can do here.

First, some basic facts, some which are obvious and some which are not: 1. There are people - powerful people - behind the scenes working to sabotage Rich Rodriguez as UM's head coach, for a variety of reasons. 2. The finger has almost universally been pointed at Jim Stapleton, and there is plenty of motive and opportunity on his part. He was critical of Bill Martin when Amaker was fired, his wife is a Free Press employee, and he is conveniently a regent at the university that employs one of the men that got turned down for the UM job and was not retained by RR. 3. An insider at one of the premium sites basically said in no uncertain terms last week that Ron English was responsible for connecting several of the "anonymous players" to Rosenberg to help the hit piece. 4. The Freep's FOIA request into the academic/GPA issue was very specific, to the point where one can't help but wonder, "What made them ask for that? Why did they think it was something to look closer at?" 5. There have been a couple people in the last few days, whose credibility I cannot attest to, who basically echoed what Rick Leach said today before he said it, that Lloyd Carr is part of this conspiracy (honestly, there is no better word for it at this point). There really is no way for this to be proven, and as I said, I don't have a clue about any sort of credibility these people have. 6. Per one of the insiders whose word IS pretty close to gospel, the wheels are in motion to strike back against the Free Press, using methods that don't involve simply unsubscribing and protesting their advertisers. Overall, I appreciate what Rick Leach is trying to do. It's time to stop sitting back and taking this shit and fight back, but sooner or later names will have to be named. Leach going on the radio and ranting about Lloyd Carr sitting with Iowa people in Iowa City doesn't really help our side at all, it just stoops Leach down to the level of the people who are gunning for Rodriguez and Martin - throwing around serious allegations without proof isn't going to win this battle.