Farm System . . . . Doh!

Watch the presser of Bill Martin and Rod on Mgoblue.com if you get a chance. It was choppy for me, probably b/c so many were watching it. But if you get a chance to watch it -- please do. It is worthwhile. Among other things both Bill Martin and RRod took pains to avoid any discussion of the search process, or when he was first contacted by Michigan. My only point here is that, unlike the basketball hire where Bill Martin made it known that he had filed away Johnny B's name for future reference, Bill claims no such intent this time. Mmmm. Not so much, because, well, like yeah: Rodriguez > Schiano > Miles > English > Hoke > Debord. So, ok, I guess.

This article is damning. Of the supposed list that contributed to Rod's departure (not that he wouldn't have gone anyway) some may have been in WVU's control:

• Allow at least an additional $100,000 in bonus money for his assistants.

• Allow scholarship players to retain possession of textbooks at the end of each term, which meant they could have sold them, as apparently happens at other programs.

• Waive a $5 ticket fee for each high-school football coach attending Mountaineer home games, a fee that generates an estimated $5,000 for the university each season.

• Hire seven graduate assistants and a new recruiting coordinator, to ease the duties performed by secondary coach Tony Gibson.

So, ok you can understand this reaction:




But after Beilein, now Rodriguez, and this:

Mr. Hartley said he found it "amazing" that in the last year, WVU lost its basketball coach, John Beilein, to Michigan; the head of the Mountaineer Athletic Club, Whit Babcock, who was instrumental in last December's rally that kept Mr. Rodriguez, to Missouri; the swimming coach, Sergio Lopez, after winning the Big East title, to a Jacksonville, Fla., high school swimming program; and women's soccer coach, Nikki Izzo-Brown.

the natives are way beyond restless. Worse yet, that 2.5 million buyout for Beilein which Michigan lawyers negotiated to 1.5 million -- that's going to be close to what the Rod buyout is after taking into account that only 2 million of the 4 was due by fall 2008, and the remainder in 2010, compounded by WVU's possible failure to live up to its obligations of the contract which may negate in part the buyout in the first place:

Some of the items discussed were part of the contract extension signed Aug. 24, more than eight months after the details were first hammered out last December. Mr. Rodriguez's representatives maintain that university administrators agreed to other requests that haven't been met, though they decline to publicly specify them. In short, it means Mr. Rodriguez might contest the $4 million he owes WVU to buy out his contract, by claiming the university acted in bad faith or fraudulently.

Not like we needed any more help. And, the WVU donor, they're not particularly happy about their status:

"Maybe we should be a farm system," Mr. Hartley added, "until our coaches get good enough that they can coach at Michigan."

Ed Pastilong, How Do You Feel: