Editor's Note: Thanks to Jonathan Chait, UM(s!) grad and gigantic dweeb, for the "inspiration" for this post. Ain't karma a pain in the butt, Jonathan?
In the entire history of American sports hype, has there ever been any fraud more grossly fraudulent than Michigan (sucks!) football coach Rich Rodriguez?
Rodriguez's wimpering Wolverines now stand at 2-4. This record is only the faintest indicator of just how awful Michigan (sucks) is. They have lost to a MAC team for the first time in school history. They lost to Illinois by 25 points and nearly placed Juice Williams on the Heisman watch. Michigan's only 2 wins came against Miami, but not the Miami that's any good, and a Wisconsin team that thought 19 points was plenty to beat the Wolverines and actually stopped paying attention to the game at all.
Just how bad is Michigan (sucks!)? Of the 119 teams in Division I-A, Michigan (sucks!) is 109th in total offense, 102nd in passing offense, and 100th in scoring offense. Michigan (sucks!) is so poorly coached that they don't even know how to properly hold a football. They rank 114th in turnover margin.
You get the point. I should stop now.
Ok. A couple more. This is the worst start for a Michigan (sucks!) football teams in 41 years. The last non-BCS conference team (excluding Notre Dame) with a losing record to defeat Michigan was Army in 1954.
This is not merely bad. This is ineptitude on a staggering, world-historical scale. Such a performance would be prima facie evidence for firing the coach even at a doormat program like Indiana. At a school like Michigan (sucks!), well... it's simply impossible to describe how awful this performance is. It's true that Michigan (sucks!) has suffered a dip in its talent level, attributable to poor karma going back to the days of Bo Schembechler. But if you go by recruiting rankings, Rich Rodriquez still has as much or more talent on hand than Toledo.
So, Rodriguez is obviously not a good coach - no good coach has ever underperformed so grossly - and he may well be a terrible one. So, why was he ever hailed as a good coach in the first place?
The giant edifice of fraud that is Rodriguez's reputation is actually a series of smaller frauds piled on top of each other. The foundational myth that he was a decent football coach. Rodriguez came from the West Virginia Mountaineers, who had just choked in a soul-crushing game to Pitt (coached by Dave Wannstedt. DAVE WANNSTEDT.). However, every coach and player associated with a team that assembles a winning record in the Big East is usually subjected to a certain level of hype, and Rodriguez is no exception. But Rodriguez was actually quite ordinary. During his eight seasons as head coach, Rodriguez won no more than 9 games in any single season until Pat White arrived on campus. And oh, by the way, Boston College, Miami and Virginia Tech left the Big East for the ACC during his tenure, before he really began winning, as well.
Having primed the national media to accept a mediocre performance during this "rebuilding year," Rodriguez enjoyed a tidal wave of sympathetic publicity to start the 2008 season.
This first season was seen as the start of a new dynasty. In truth, Michigan (sucks!) was bound to suck, given the abandoning of the program by so many Lloyd Carr recruits who didn't want to work with such a jerk. But Rodriguez's first team isn't even as good as their record suggests. Miami of Ohio has only won one game, against Charleston Southern. And Wisconsin just made Big 10 officials consider a mercy rule at home while suffering a slaughter by Penn State.
Coming into this year, Michigan (sucks!) was still picked to finish in the top 40. The difference between that predicted on-field performance and Michigan (sucks!) actual performance is a good measure of the difference between Rodriguez's reputation as a coach and his actual ability.
Being a head coach at Michigan (sucks!) involves very different skills - not blaming players, teaching basic skills, not getting out-coached by the staff of Illinois - than being a fraud in the Big East. Even good Big East coaches, like Dave Wannstedt, struggle outside of their league. Maybe Rodriguez did sometimes turn castoff recruits into solid cogs in the gimmicky spread offense, but at Michigan, he can't turn blue-chip prospects into unbroken pieces.
But don't worry, Michigan (sucks!) fans. In a few years, the Wolverines will return to mediocrity again, when Rodriguez's recruits (what's left of them) get to play for a coach who isn't horrible.
By Matt October 14, 2008 - 2:18 pm
Pleeeease let them go 2-10 or 3-9. Also, it’s a true pity how they lost their 2nd best recruit the other day.
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By DeepTeaKup October 14, 2008 - 2:56 pm
Domer, geez, too much to get into on this one (if this is in fact a serious post). Suffice it to say, you are essentially behaving like the worst of the UM blogosphere during the ND season last year. Your analysis is a tad shallow, which is suprising for you.
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By domer.mq October 14, 2008 - 3:02 pm
DTK,
I refer you to the source of my inspiration (linked in the post). Should I have titled to post, “An Open Letter to Jonathan Chait?”
Glad to see you’re still with the living.
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By Subway Domer October 14, 2008 - 3:03 pm
Fantastic. I don’t have enough cuss words in my arsenal that would describe DickRod.
Well done.
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By The Biscuit October 14, 2008 - 5:47 pm
This is pure brilliance, and just the first shot across the bows of the many asshat UM (sucks!) fans that will be fired this year. The Skunkbears will be lucky to win 3. Toledo is worse than Navy has ever, or could, EVER be.
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By The Biscuit October 14, 2008 - 5:50 pm
And DTK, you’d be right on in the ‘shallowness’ call if this was actually MQ’s. I am sure he struggled with writing something that is so moronic – but given that it’s a tribute to a barely-smarter-than-a-monkey, UM (sucks) fan, he hit the nail on the head. I call it genius.
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By DeepTeaKup October 14, 2008 - 6:13 pm
Biscuit, wasn’t sure if he was trying to just fire up the mgoblog audience, generate some more traffic during internet sweeps week or if he is just bitter that you were left off the BlogPoll.
Like I said, there a lot of things I could poke at in this post but I am not sure if domer was actually trying to generate a serious discussion on this topic or not.
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By DeepTeaKup October 14, 2008 - 6:26 pm
dangit, I am a moron. Missed the link at the top, nevermind everything I said. Well done domer, ERP workshops make DTK very dull and slow.
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By domer.mq October 14, 2008 - 6:58 pm
DTK, don’t feel bad. I moved the link to the top from the bottom after your comment.
But hey, thanks for reading the whole piece all the way through. Seriously, thanks. Thanks a lot.
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By The Biscuit October 14, 2008 - 7:09 pm
And thanks to your coach for sucking immense donkey balls.
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By DeepTeaKup October 14, 2008 - 7:48 pm
domer, it’s your fault for writing an article that far exceeds my two minutes attention .. what we’re we talking about again
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By DeepTeaKup October 14, 2008 - 7:49 pm
Biscuit, must have picked them up from Weis in the off-season (zing!!), wait that was lame
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By John October 14, 2008 - 9:11 pm
Dude, I’ve TOTALLY been planning to write a “Jonathan Chait is the Worst Amateur Sports Columnist in the Universe” piece in honor of the one-year anniversary of that article – which will be the day before the Ty Bowl, in fact …
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By trey October 15, 2008 - 12:41 am
Im sure a myriad of UM(s!) fans are going to come on here and think “you guys are just jealous about what happened last year and you’re losers for kicking us when we’re down”.
Yeah, so?
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By domer.mq October 15, 2008 - 10:06 am
trey,
They might, but they aren’t the target audience. The target audience will get it. In fact, given our reader stats, one particular target audience already got it, and that’s all I was hoping for.
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By The Biscuit October 15, 2008 - 12:08 pm
The ACLU West Membership gets it? Weird.
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By The Worst Football Analyst in the Universe « Upturned Earth || John Schwenkler October 24, 2008 - 3:30 pm
[...] But don’t worry, Jonathan. In a few years, your Wolverines will rebound from their current slump – perhaps when Rich Rodriguez’s recruits get to play for a coach who isn’t horrible. [...]
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