If Hoke Can't Fix Michigan Soon, He May Have to Walk Back to San Diego

When Brady Hoke got the call from Michigan Athletic Director Dave Brandon to come back to Ann Arbor and take over the Wolverines football program in January, 2011, Brady told the press that he would have “walked to Michigan” from San Diego State.

With each week, with each disturbing performance on the football field, the Michigan fans are increasing in number who’d like to see Hoke indeed hit the road.

These are the times that try Michigan men’s souls.

Rich Rodriguez was given three years, taking over for the retiring Lloyd Carr, and by the end of Year Three he was holding hands at the annual Football Bust as schmaltzy music played. He all but pleaded for his job publicly. It was, frankly, pathetic.

The knock on Rich-Rod was that he was a square peg in a round hole. There wasn’t much “Michigan” about him. Rodriguez’s tenure was deemed an experiment gone horribly wrong.

Fine. You want a Michigan Man? Coming right up!

But the MM the football folks wanted, was Les Miles, the wildly successful coach at LSU. The fans wanted Les in 2007, as well, when Carr was in his last season. Miles, like Hoke, was a longtime U-M assistant (though under Bo Schembechler, while Hoke worked under Carr), before carving out his own legacy at Oklahoma State and then LSU.

Twice Miles was in demand by the fans, but not as much in demand by those making the decisions upstairs. And also not necessarily anointed by a segment of the alumni.

The first time around—about six years ago this month—then-AD Bill Martin didn’t even bring Miles in for an interview, nor did he fly to see Les. Instead, Martin basically told Miles that if Les was interested, he could fill out a job application like anyone else and get in line.

Miles, with good reason, felt offended.

The second go-round, after Rodriguez was let go, Brandon made a trip to see Miles in Louisiana, but it turned out be a cursory visit.

Michigan fans also wanted Jim Harbaugh, fresh off a run of winning at Stanford.

Harbaugh wasn’t interviewed.

But Brady Hoke was, and he jumped out of his skin at the opportunity. Hoke assisted Carr for eight years then ran the programs at Ball State, then San Diego State.

Hoke, while not the popular first choice, at least had some Ann Arbor pedigree.

He was a Michigan Man—a term that is beginning to be more laughable than serious these days.

Hoke, frankly, looked more like he belonged at Michigan, coaching football, than his predecessor. His name even sounded more like Michigan than his predecessor, if you want to be even more superficial.

To Rodriguez’s muscular build, good looks and Latino last name, Hoke offered a squishy body, a moon face and a name of a left tackle.

To Rodriguez’s mild manner and soft voice, Hoke’s demeanor conjured humorous comparisons to the late comedian Chris Farley’s satirical motivational speaker.

Then they started to play the football games.

And here, near the end of Year Three under Hoke, the Michigan football program is in no better shape now than when Rodriguez was given the ziggy. It may actually be worse.

There’s the quarterback, who was under enough pressure before the school saddled him with jersey no. 98—legend Tom Harmon’s old number.

There’s the offensive line, which despite having an All-American on it, too often collapses like a house of cards.

There’s the lack of playmaking on both sides of the ball.

There’s a bewildering lack of imagination in the offensive play calling and seeming inability to make adjustments on the fly—whether within a game or, more shockingly, within a season.

Michigan football, under Hoke, at this very moment is playing a brand that would make Schembechler spin in his grave.

There’s nothing smash mouth about what is happening with Hoke and offensive coordinator Al Borges’ offense.

There isn’t an Anthony Carter, a Braylon Edwards or even a Steve Breaston catching footballs.

There isn’t a Huckleby or a Morris or even a Biakabutuka carrying the pigskin.

And there certainly isn’t a Harbaugh or a Wangler or a Brady behind center.

This is Hoke’s mess now. The “Fire Rich-Rod” signs might pop up on eBay these days, but that rallying cry is no more. No one can play the “blame Rodriguez” card anymore.

The statute of limitations has run out on Michigan football under Rodriguez (who is doing OK at Arizona, if you were wondering).

This is on Brady Hoke, this season of degeneration. The embarrassing wins over Akron and Connecticut are all on Hoke. The bizarre win over Indiana is on Hoke. So are the feckless losses to MSU and Nebraska and the latest—a second half collapse in Iowa.

All on Hoke now. This is his baby. This is the dream job he wanted. Now he’s being given the virtual heave ho. Talk radio is lighting up with the same names, but one in particular: Jim Harbaugh.

It’s Year Three and there’s essentially the same venom for Hoke as there was for Rodriguez—with the only difference being that it’s not because Hoke isn’t a Michigan Man. It’s that he’s the wrong Michigan Man.

The 24-21 loss to Iowa—after Michigan had taken a 21-7 halftime lead—has driven the Michigan maniacs apoplectic. They want blood—especially the Maize and Blue stuff that courses through Hoke’s veins.

The book on Hoke that is being ghost written by the U-M faithful—and it could be debated that this is simplistic and unfair—is that Hoke can out-recruit you but you can end around him on the field.

He can sell the kids on Michigan, but then he doesn’t know what to do with them once they get there. That’s the book.

It’s probably not fair. Hoke’s first season was an 11-2 delight, including a win over Ohio State. He is 2-3 against MSU and the Buckeyes, combined, heading into next week’s showdown against OSU in Ann Arbor. That isn’t awful.

But what is awful is the way the Wolverines are playing right now, and have been for several weeks running. Can you imagine the fit that Bo would have, if his team gave up sacks the way this squad is doing to Gardner?

And as for Gardner, the kid is regressing. He has the confidence of a teen boy with acne at the school dance. His offensive line is killing him, both physically and mentally.

Hoke will survive this season. He will get a fourth year at Michigan, unlike Rodriguez. But the seat is getting considerably warmer. Normally, that’s not a bad thing when the temps are dropping like they are now. But when you coach football at Michigan, you’d like that seat to be freezing, thank you very much.

Right now, Hoke, like his football team, can’t get out of his own way. If he doesn’t figure it out soon, he might be asked to walk back to San Diego—this time by people who actually matter.

Hard to Get More "Michigan Man" Than Brady Hoke

They might as well have held the press conference introducing new University of Michigan head football coach Brady Hoke in the Wolverines' locker room.

Watching Hoke, the "Michigan Man" that supporters of the program have been clamoring for, address the media today didn't seem quite right without a chalkboard behind him and a whistle around his thick neck.

The room should have been filled with the smell of sweat and Ben Gay, not ink and cologne.

The captive audience should have been made up of 19-to-21 year-olds, not pear-shaped reporters twice that age.

The first thing you notice about Hoke, fresh from San Diego State, if you didn't already know him, is that his motor has two settings: turbo and warp drive.

Hoke was introduced by athletic director Dave Brandon, and the new coach didn't step up to the podium, he annexed it. He all but jammed a flag with a maize block "M" into the dais. Then he started speaking.

Only, he didn't speak so much as he bellowed. Within minutes, I was looking around for the exit to the tunnel leading to the football field---and I was sitting in my office.

I wonder if these Michigan football-playing kids have any idea what they're about to get themselves into.

Hoke, for the duration of his presser, owned the room. He was Bob Knight at March Madness, Dennis Green after playing the Bears. There was even some Dickie Vs about him---Dicks Vitale and Vermeil.

Hoke pointed fingers. He slammed the podium. He made up words if he had to.

"This is MICHIGAN!" he said at one point, and for that moment I saw a guy named Bo with a blue baseball cap with a maize "M" on it.

Brady Hoke looks like a tough football coach. He sure sounds like a tough football coach. And he already has more hatred for "that school in Ohio"---Hoke's words---than his predecessor could muster up in three years.

Hoke coached Michigan's defensive line for eight seasons in a stint that ended in 2002, and listening to him, the subsequent eight years were spent just so he could find himself right back in Ann Arbor, this time as the Big Cheese.

Well, he certainly is big. Nothing about Brady Hoke is small---not his girth, not his passion, not his voice, not his enthusiasm. And certainly not his love for Michigan.

"I would have walked here," he said almost from the get go, referring to his rather conventional method of getting to Ann Arbor: by flying.

Hoke was like a fighter pilot, picking off questions from left to right, and in almost the same rat-a-tat way as the Red Baron.

Hoke, to those who think Michigan is on its way down, especially if they're "Michigan people": "Shame on them."

Hoke, on the rivalry games: "You want to win 'em."

Hoke, on the game against Ohio State: "It's the most important game on the schedule" (and repeated for emphasis).

Hoke, on his program: "Everyone will be fanatical in their love for Michigan."

Hoke gave the most boisterous, motivational press conference of any new coach that I've ever seen around these parts.

Now we're about to see if he can actually coach.

Hunch? He'll be fine. And so will Michigan.

Frankly, Michigan hasn't had a coach with Hoke's personality since Bo Schembechler, and Hoke might even one-up Bo when it comes to being bombastic. At least Bo came up for air, as I recall.

Hoke only stopped talking long enough to take requisite swigs of bottled water.

Gotta keep yourself hydrated when you get out there, boys!

Sorry. Hoke just has that effect on guys, I guess.

For anyone who fantasized about Jim Harbaugh or Les Miles standing up there today, take heart. Michigan didn't do too shabby. At least, not on first blush.

A word now about Harbaugh, the former U-M quarterback who the fan base coveted, but who took the job with the San Francisco 49ers of the NFL instead.

Harbaugh is 47. You really think he'd have looked at Michigan as a destination job? You think he was coming here to coach for the next 20 years, until he earned a gold watch?

After a couple years, tops, Harbaugh's name would start to be mentioned on an annual basis, in connection with just about every NFL vacancy du jour. He'd have been another Nick Saban.

Just ask the folks in East Lansing's basketball nation how annoying it can be when your coach is always rumored to be on the move.

U-M fans would have fallen in love with Harbaugh, then would have been forced to watch helplessly every winter as his name would be connected with every NFL city from Jacksonville to Houston, from Cincinnati to Denver. Every. Single. Year.

Always there'd be the dreaded feeling that Jimmy Harbaugh would flee to the NFL. Is that what Michigan fans really wanted?

No offense to Brady Hoke, but I dont' see the NFL banging down his door, ever. But that's not a put-down.

Hoke is a college coach, pure and simple. He's as collegiate as they come, and he'll stay that way. More important, he's as Michigan as they come.

Being the head coach at Michigan has long been Hoke's dream. His former boss, Lloyd Carr, started asking Hoke in 1998: What do you want to ultimately do in college football?

Why, be the head coach at Michigan, Lloyd, Hoke would answer.

"This is where I want to be," Hoke said today. "I don't want to go anywhere else."

Just about every reporter who introduced him or herself at today's presser before asking their questions gave Hoke the same greeting.

"Welcome back."

Hoke is back, no question. Back to his one true college football love. Back to the girl who knocked his socks off for eight years---the one who he never truly got over after he left in 2002.

The Michigan football fan base got what they wanted. They got a Michigan Man.

Let the healing begin.

With Rodriguez Gone, Time Now for Michigan Football to Heal

On December 17, 2007, Rich Rodriguez stood in front of the gathering of media on the campus of the University of Michigan and made gallows humor about himself.

The question was, to paraphrase, "What's it like, knowing that you're the third choice for this job?"

It was widely known that Michigan, making a mess of its search for a new football coach to replace the retiring Lloyd Carr, had botched things with fanbase favorite Les Miles, and had been rejected by Rutgers coach Greg Schiano.

That left U-M with Rodriguez, who was in the midst of a messy divorce from West Virginia.

Rodriguez smiled sheepishly at the podium and said, "Well, I wasn't my wife's first choice, either," and the room broke out in guffaws.

It was pretty much the last time folks could laugh so easily with Rodriguez at Michigan. Laugh at him? Sure. But not laugh with him.

Rodriguez is gone, fired by Michigan after three years that Athletic Director Dave Brandon correctly called "full of turmoil."

"I don't think Rich Rodriguez has had a good night's sleep in the three years that he's been here," Brandon said today in announcing Rodriguez's getting the ziggy.

Brandon's words ring true, but with some explanation.

No football coach has ever gotten a good night's sleep---not while he's been employed, anyway. The life of a football coach at the major college or pro level means putting in 12-18 hour days, sleeping on a sofa in the office. Sometimes they wake up to find the film projector still running.

But what Brandon meant was that Rodriguez, ever since arriving in Ann Arbor, had been dealing with, again in Brandon's words, "One thing after another."

This was a mercy kill. Brandon shot the horse. After letting his coach twist in the wind, Brandon finally put him out of his misery.

It's time now to heal the Michigan football program.

Brandon couldn't keep Rodriguez, not after the way the season, Rich's third, ended with three straight blowout losses, including a New Year's Day Massacre to Mississippi State, of all schools.

Not after a 15-22 overall record, including an amazingly bad 1-11 vs. ranked teams, and---this is the real wince-inducer---an unsightly 0-6 against Michigan State and Ohio State.

Not after scandal and players bolting and a defense that was the worst in the 131-year history of Michigan football.

Not after seeing the fans and alumni becoming polarized---those in Rodriguez's camp, and those who wanted him gone. Never in recent memory had a football coach at Michigan incited such a love-hate reaction amongst the faithful.

Let the healing begin.

This is, already, Brandon's defining moment as AD---and he's been on the job less than a year.

But Brandon has a chance for a freebie here. Rodriguez wasn't his man, so it made it easier for Brandon to can him. The freebie part to this is that, unless he hires Tweedle Dee or Tweedle Dum, Brandon can buy himself some time by picking anyone whose name isn't Rich Rodriguez.

So the AD already can't lose.

After the loss to Mississippi State, any remaining fence sitters certainly had to be shoved onto the side of "fire RichRod." Though there are still some steadfast, stubborn Rodriguez supporters, the overwhelming sentiment was to run him out of town.

So Brandon will bring in a new coach, and that man will be welcomed much more graciously that Rodriguez ever was.

It's not always what you know, or how much you've won. It's who you're following.

Rodriguez followed Carr, who had continued the Bo Schembechler lineage which began nearly 40 years prior.

The new coach will be following Rodriguez.

See the difference?

I once asked the late Mark "Doc" Andrews, formerly of Dick Purtan's radio team and a damn good sports announcer in his own right, if he was interested in throwing his hat into the ring, in the wake of the news of Ernie Harwell's firing by Bo Schembechler in 1991.

Would Doc want to be considered to be the Tigers' new radio voice?

"I won't follow Ernie," Doc told me. "But I'll follow the guy who follows Ernie!"

Good point.

Remember how Harwell's successors, Rick Rizzs and Bob Rathbun, were treated in Detroit?

Brandon needed to heal Michigan's program, and the first step in that healing process was to fire Rodriguez, the deserved lightning Rod (pun intended). With Rodriguez gone, Brandon can bring Wolverine Nation together again.

In a perfect world, the next Michigan coach will stay for 10 years or more, returning stability to the program, and placing it back where it belongs---as a Top 10 program annually.

Michigan's been lucky in that regard. They hired Bo, an unknown from Miami of Ohio, and that turned out really well.

Bo stayed as coach for 21 years (1969-89), and by that time there was no shortage of solid candidates to succeed him, from within.

The university went with longtime assistant Gary Moeller, who had strayed briefly for a failed fling as Illinois coach before returning to Michigan. Moeller worked out well, too---until his infamous drunken incident at the Excalibur restaurant in Southfield.

But that was OK, because Michigan again had a capable replacement at the ready in Lloyd Carr, who himself had almost become head coach at Wisconsin a few years earlier.

Carr stayed for 13 years (1995-2007).

Yet Michigan blew it when Lloyd retired, by offending top candidate Les Miles, LSU's coach and a former Michigan player and assistant, by suggesting to Miles that he interview for the job, like he was just another candidate.

Miles told Michigan to take a hike---pun not intended this time.

Ironically, Michigan has another chance at Miles. With the news that fan favorite Jim Harbaugh doesn't see himself as Michigan's coach, Miles may again be in play. Bill Martin, the AD who botched things with Miles in 2007, is gone.

Miles could be had, if Brandon plays it correctly.

It's my opinion that Les Miles, despite his quirkiness and occasional unorthodox strategies, would excite the alumni most and sell more luxury suites than Brady Hoke of San Diego State would, the other most-mentioned candidate.

We'll see.

Regardless, Brandon must play healer now. He has to bring as many people as possible back under the tent. The AD is a smart guy. He has the tools, and the resources (he hinted that money would be no object in hiring a new coach) to put smiles back on the faces of Michigan football fans and alumni.

Firing Rodriguez was the tourniquet that U-M's football program needed. Brandon's choice as RichRod's successor is the surgery.