What's the matter with Michigan?

As I watched Rich Rodriguez gently sobbing at a press conference Monday, it struck me that the University of Michigan football program might not be headed in the right direction. In situations such as these, it’s easy — and, more often than not, appropriate — to blame the man who cries on live television. But I thought it accurately captured Rodriguez’s plight: He’s college football’s answer to those Estonian mail-order brides you hear about on “Dateline,” the young, good-looking ones who marry retired army colonels they end up slowly poisoning with wiper fluid. Two years ago, Rodriguez was the hottest coach in America. Now he can barely string together a sentence in a public setting. Which raises the question: What’s the matter with Michigan?

APTom Brady

I spent 36 hours in Ann Arbor several years ago for a Wisconsin-Michigan game. On the whole, it was a fairly pleasant experience, but I couldn’t shake the feeling I’d spent the weekend at my grandmother’s house. It was vacuum-sealed to prevent anyone from discovering that the past was not the present. Cute girls wore seemingly new Jim Harbaugh jerseys; a pair of freshman claimed to be on-the-record saying Tom Brady should’ve started over Drew Henson. They could name the entire Ohio State roster but less than 10 other players in the Big 10. They proclaimed Michigan the best academic school in the Big 10 and then denied that Northwestern was a member.

Rich Rodriguez’s problem wasn’t that he was an outsider; it was that he was the wrong kind of outsider. He challenged Michigan to think in terms other than nostalgia. Not even Stanford head coach Jim Harbaugh — a true Michigan man — had the capital to challenge the Ann Arbor simulacrum, a fact that became clear in 2007 when Lloyd Carr blasted Harbaugh as “arrogant” and “self-serving” after the former Big 10 Player of the Year said his alma mater steered players toward easy majors. Harbaugh would be the perfect replacement for Rodriguez, save for the fact he actually lives in the real world. Michigan doesn’t need a coach — it needs a curator.

Follow me on Twitter: RayGustini

Comments

Add a Comment