Last Updated: October 25. 2011 11:47AM
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Three and Out': Part 2
Excerpt: U-M feared 'mass exodus' of players after Lloyd Carr retired
John U. Bacon
This second of five excerpts from "Three and Out" details the transition from Lloyd Carr to Rich Rodriguez as Michigan's coach.
Three weeks into the search for Lloyd Carr's successor, Michigan still didn't have a coach — or even a lead. On Dec. 10, 2007, Les Miles told athletic director Bill Martin and president Mary Sue Coleman he "would never say no to Michigan," but added that he could not negotiate with them until after his LSU team's national title game in January.
It will likely come as a surprise to most fans that Rich Rodriguez was first contacted by Michigan that evening by none other than Lloyd Carr. Rodriguez recalled that the 10- to 15-minute conversation was "very positive. He was definitely encouraging me to think about it."
The next day, Martin heard the first person to encourage him to think about Rodriguez, and that person was Lloyd Carr. (Carr did not respond to requests for an interview for this book.) That same day, someone leaked the story of Miles' resurrected candidacy to the press, which not only upset Miles, but effectively boxed him in.
Six days later, on Monday, Dec. 17, Michigan held a press conference to announce Rodriguez as the Wolverines' new football coach. Later that day, Rodriguez flew back to Morgantown, W.Va., to close out his business there. Before he returned a few days later, Carr suddenly called a team meeting. According to five players there, Carr told them he knew some had come to Ann Arbor to play for him, and some to play for Michigan. "But," he said, "you're here to play for Michigan."
"Of course," one player said, "every coach has to say that."
But not every departing coach has to say what Carr said next. He told them he wanted them all to be happy, and he recognized not everyone would want to go through the coaching change to come. So, he said, if any of them wanted to transfer, he would sign the form, since it requires the signature of the player's current coach.
'Mass exodus'
On its face, it seems like a simple, kind offer to look out for people he cared about — and, in fairness, that was probably part of his motive. But it was also interpreted by many of the players as a vote of no confidence in his successor before Rodriguez had conducted a single team meeting, a single workout, a single practice, yelled or sworn at a single player, or coached a single game. It was an invitation from Carr, someone they knew, admired, and looked to for direction — the man who had recruited them and promised their parents he would look out for them like a father — to execute a preemptive bailout, to transfer, to jump to the NFL, or simply to not come back for a fifth year.
Certainly that's how Michigan's former director of compliance, Judy Van Horn, read the gesture. When former director of football operations Scott Draper called over to compliance as soon as the players left the meeting — to give them a heads-up that a line of players might be asking for their transfer papers in a few minutes, and that Carr was prepared to sign all of them — the compliance officer alerted Van Horn. She told Martin of Carr's offer and said, "Bill, we just can't let this happen. It could be a mass exodus."
Van Horn then called Rodriguez. As Van Horn recalled, "Rich said, 'If a player wants to go, I don't want to make him stay. But I don't want Michigan to give any player a release until I've had a chance to talk with him.'"
That seemed fair, even generous, but Van Horn called the Big Ten office to make sure it would not be a violation of league rules. The Big Ten assured her Rodriguez's request was allowable, because he was not keeping anyone from transferring. Satisfied, Van Horn passed on Rodriguez's response to Scott Draper, who replied, "But Lloyd won't like that." The day raised more questions than answers, but no one questioned Draper's devotion to Carr. (Draper declined to be interviewed for this book.)
Carr's feelings aside, that was the policy created that day: Any player who wanted to transfer could do so, provided they talked with the new coach first. But even that low bar was too high for some players, including Ryan Mallett, who only spoke with Rodriguez on the phone before leaving Ann Arbor.
Little in common
There are about three dozen people who worked directly for both Carr and Rodriguez and know them well. Almost every single one of them told me, at one point, "Lloyd never liked Rich."
In many ways, their styles could not be more different. Carr came across as professorial, while Rodriguez was more comfortable as a good ol' boy. Carr was very private, even closed off. Rodriguez was open and outgoing. As early as the 2008 Capital One Bowl, Carr's final game, one athletic department staffer observed, "If those two were driving across the country together and couldn't talk about family or football, they wouldn't have anything to say to each other for 3,000 miles."
Carr was also no fan of the spread offense, which had tormented his team many times. In the last few years of Carr's tenure, he and his staff sponsored a fantasy camp to benefit U-M's children's hospital. In 2007, an adult camper asked one of Carr's assistants if they would learn about the spread offense. "The spread offense?" the assistant spat. "That's Communist football!"
Whatever friction might have existed between the two, it is simply impossible to square Carr's making an unsolicited call to Rodriguez to sell him on Michigan, and telling Martin that Rodriguez might be a good candidate, followed almost immediately by his offer to help any of his players transfer. It's even harder to square those actions with his new role as Michigan's associate athletic director, who was paid $387,000 a year to protect and promote the Michigan athletic department, football above all.
Excerpted from "Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football," by John U. Bacon, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC. Copyright 2011 by John U. Bacon. All rights reserved.
'Three and Out'
The Detroit News is publishing excerpts this week from John U. Bacon's new book, "Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football."
Monday: Bill Martin's coaching search
Today: Rich Rodriguez takes over
Wednesday: The NCAA investigation
Thursday: A watershed moment against Illinois
Friday: Finally a bowl, but no fight left
From The Detroit News:
Michigan Wolverines | Excerpt: U-M feared 'mass exodus' of players after Lloyd Carr retired | The Detroit News
