Post by red518irish on Dec 21, 2007 7:33:59 GMT -5
The Blame Game and Rich Rodriguez
By Jude
2007/12/19
In the wake of former WVU Football Coach Rich Rodriguez's stunning and stupefying decision to accept the head coaching position at Michigan, varying accounts of the last hours of Rodriguez's tenure at WVU have surfaced, each shifting the blame for the break-up between the University and Rodriguez, but recent accusations made by boosters with regard to the behavior of the University and its administration are ill-advised, misinformed, and detrimental to the well-being of the WVU football program.
Bob Reynolds, former CEO of Fidelity Investments and big-time West Virginia University donor, placed the blame for Rodriguez's departure squarely on the shoulders of the University in this now-infamous Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article from yesterday.
Quote:
"I tell you what, I've never seen anything mishandled as much as this was. Here's a university that made a $200,000 decision -- it probably could've cost less than that [to keep Mr. Rodriguez] -- and it's going to cost them millions" in booster support, potential bowl money and revenue from football success.
"I've had calls from at least six major contributors to the program, and they're all done [donating] because they know the Mickey Mouse things that have gone on there," Mr. Reynolds continued. "I've been in business 36 years, and it's the worst business decision I've ever seen. I've been the COO of a 45,000-person company. When somebody's producing, you ask, 'What can I do for you to make your life better?' Not 'What can I do to make your life more miserable?' They have no idea how big this is. It's frightening."
Reynolds and others, including Earl G. "Ken" Kendrick Jr., "a part owner of the Arizona Diamondbacks and benefactor to the WVU College of Business and Economics" and Wheeling, W.Va., lawyer Dean Hartley, criticized the University for failing to cave to Rodriguez's new list of demands, made after Rodriguez had flown to Ohio to meet with Michigan officials and obviously holding an offer to become the Wolverines' coach in his pocket.
The article states that the donors all pointed to Rodriguez's key points of re-negotiation, which were made in "separate meetings with Athletic Director Ed Pastilong, Chief of Staff Craig Walker and, finally, late Saturday night with newly installed President Mike Garrison," in which Rodriguez requested:
Quote:
• 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.
This list did not include another demand that was made by Rodriguez, included in this Times-West Virginian article, that the University would be forced to build a suite for his wife and family, which was also rejected by the University.
This Post-Gazette article updating yesterday's story with regard to potential donor loss reports that:
Quote:
As of last night, there was an organized group of at least seven West Virginia donors who had informed university administrators that they would no longer make gifts to the school.
Such gifts come with escape clauses, enabling the discontented benefactors to renege on donations already pledged.
Robert Reynolds, a former Fidelity Investments chief operating officer, and Ken Kendrick, part owner of the Arizona Diamondbacks, already have withdrawn university-wide donations totaling roughly $12 million, which Mr. Kendrick called "the tip of the iceberg."
For their part, West Virginia University shot back with a press release later yesterday afternoon detailing a statement made by Stephen P. Goodwin, chairman of West Virginia University's Board of Governors, in which Goodwin declares that the University "went to the ends of the earth" to keep Rodriguez happy, including:
- Increasing his salary by 70 percent
- Increasing his assistants’ salaries
- Building a $2 million academic center for the team
- Starting construction on a $6 million locker room renovation
Reynolds closed his statement by saying that:
Quote:
There were some very minor issues that [Rodriguez] raised with the administration – and people were working on them. I think you will agree that the things that are being talked about are pretty minor in comparison to what has been done already.
But he clearly was looking for an excuse to leave—he looked last year and again this year.
But when he went to visit another team and then came back to campus with demands based on those minor issues, University officials simply told him they would continue to work on the issues. He was asked to focus on the student-athletes and the upcoming bowl game. There’s a long off-season coming up to work out those sorts of minor issues. Whoever comes in as coach will know that they can count on support from WVU on big issues and small issues.
Clearly, the University felt that it was at the end of its collective rope. And who could blame them?
Listen, we know that the world of collegiate athletics and the contracts signed by coaches is a crazy one. We know that.
But in case some of you have forgotten the recent history of contract negotiations with Mr. Rodriguez, let me re-educate you.
- June 26, 2006- After WVU wins the Sugar Bowl and finishes ranked #5 in the nation, Rodriguez signs a contract extension through the year 2012 following rumors that he is listening to offers from other Universities with regard to their head coaching positions. His salary is increased to over $1 million per season, and his demands of higher salaries for his assistant coaches are met, as well as promises to build a new student center for athletes.
- December 9, 2006- Rodriguez suddenly finds his heart all aflutter with another NCAA team, the Alabama Crimson Tide. Rodriguez goes to administration officials with a head coaching offer from Alabama in his pocket and makes a list of demands, despite signing a contract extension just SIX MONTHS EARLIER. The University steps forward AGAIN and meets those demands by giving Rodriguez another extension (this time through 2013) which includes an astronomical pay increase (up to almost $2 million), fulfilling promises to improve some facilities and begin construction on others, and increasing compensation to assistant coaches even further.
- December 14, 2007- Word leaks that Rodriguez, despite agreeing to a contract extension less than one year ago, has met with Michigan officials to discuss its head coaching vacancy.
- December 15, 2007- Rodriguez AGAIN goes to the administration to re-negotiate his contract, AGAIN holding a head coaching offer from another major football program. The administration tells him that everything he asked for has either been done or will be completed in the future.
- December 16, 2007- Rodriguez is announced as the new head football coach at the University of Michigan.
So to recap, Rodriguez either re-negotiated or attempted to re-negotiate his contract with WVU three times in 18 months, each time with an increasing list of demands. The last two times, he held a definitive offer from another major program as he entered those negotiations, essentially holding a gun to the University's head. "Give me what I want or I walk."
To what extent, exactly, is the University expected to tolerate yearly extortion by a coach during the course of re-negotiating contracts on which the ink hasn't yet dried? At what point is enough... enough?
Clearly, the administration has to walk a fine line with criticizing comments made by donors who contribute to the well-being of the University as a whole, as well as the football program.
But I don't.
Blasting the administration in the print media following Rich Rodriguez's decision to flee to Michigan couldn't possibly be more detrimental to the very interests these boosters claim to have in the program.
What is the purpose of these attacks? To embarrass the University? To ridicule the Athletic Director? Do these donors really think that painting West Virginia University and its administration as "arrogant, mean-spirited and intellectually bankrupt" as Kendrick did in the Post-Gazette will help the school in any way whatsoever, in finding a new head coach or in any other endeavor undertaken by the University in the near future?
And most importantly, do you really think that NOW is the time to withdraw your financial support for the University? They're going to need it more than ever! If these donors hope to sustain excellence both on and off the field at West Virginia University, withdrawing their financial support in its greatest time of need doesn't strike me as the most noble idea in the world.
Obviously, I've never given $12 million to the University. I don't know what its like to place that much of your own hard-earned money into a program and feel like it's going in the wrong direction. But I do know one thing about giving that much money to a university (or anyone, for that matter)- it buys you an open ear. Something tells me that these attacks, issues, and criticisms could have been brought directly to President Garrison and Ed Pastilong's attention without embarrassing the University and its administration publicly in the process.
But that wouldn't get you in the news, would it?
So no, I'm not familiar with what it's like to give that much money to West Virginia University. But I know what it's like to pay it tuition. I know what it's like to pay for season tickets and (much more minimal) Mountaineer Athletic Club donations out of my own hard-earned money.
And I know that trashing the school and its administration because you feel jilted that your precious football coach wasn't allowed to extort his way into his third contract extension in 18 months is just flat-out dumb.
There's no sense in throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
It's too bad that these guys have it the other way around.
By Jude
2007/12/19
In the wake of former WVU Football Coach Rich Rodriguez's stunning and stupefying decision to accept the head coaching position at Michigan, varying accounts of the last hours of Rodriguez's tenure at WVU have surfaced, each shifting the blame for the break-up between the University and Rodriguez, but recent accusations made by boosters with regard to the behavior of the University and its administration are ill-advised, misinformed, and detrimental to the well-being of the WVU football program.
Bob Reynolds, former CEO of Fidelity Investments and big-time West Virginia University donor, placed the blame for Rodriguez's departure squarely on the shoulders of the University in this now-infamous Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article from yesterday.
Quote:
"I tell you what, I've never seen anything mishandled as much as this was. Here's a university that made a $200,000 decision -- it probably could've cost less than that [to keep Mr. Rodriguez] -- and it's going to cost them millions" in booster support, potential bowl money and revenue from football success.
"I've had calls from at least six major contributors to the program, and they're all done [donating] because they know the Mickey Mouse things that have gone on there," Mr. Reynolds continued. "I've been in business 36 years, and it's the worst business decision I've ever seen. I've been the COO of a 45,000-person company. When somebody's producing, you ask, 'What can I do for you to make your life better?' Not 'What can I do to make your life more miserable?' They have no idea how big this is. It's frightening."
Reynolds and others, including Earl G. "Ken" Kendrick Jr., "a part owner of the Arizona Diamondbacks and benefactor to the WVU College of Business and Economics" and Wheeling, W.Va., lawyer Dean Hartley, criticized the University for failing to cave to Rodriguez's new list of demands, made after Rodriguez had flown to Ohio to meet with Michigan officials and obviously holding an offer to become the Wolverines' coach in his pocket.
The article states that the donors all pointed to Rodriguez's key points of re-negotiation, which were made in "separate meetings with Athletic Director Ed Pastilong, Chief of Staff Craig Walker and, finally, late Saturday night with newly installed President Mike Garrison," in which Rodriguez requested:
Quote:
• 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.
This list did not include another demand that was made by Rodriguez, included in this Times-West Virginian article, that the University would be forced to build a suite for his wife and family, which was also rejected by the University.
This Post-Gazette article updating yesterday's story with regard to potential donor loss reports that:
Quote:
As of last night, there was an organized group of at least seven West Virginia donors who had informed university administrators that they would no longer make gifts to the school.
Such gifts come with escape clauses, enabling the discontented benefactors to renege on donations already pledged.
Robert Reynolds, a former Fidelity Investments chief operating officer, and Ken Kendrick, part owner of the Arizona Diamondbacks, already have withdrawn university-wide donations totaling roughly $12 million, which Mr. Kendrick called "the tip of the iceberg."
For their part, West Virginia University shot back with a press release later yesterday afternoon detailing a statement made by Stephen P. Goodwin, chairman of West Virginia University's Board of Governors, in which Goodwin declares that the University "went to the ends of the earth" to keep Rodriguez happy, including:
- Increasing his salary by 70 percent
- Increasing his assistants’ salaries
- Building a $2 million academic center for the team
- Starting construction on a $6 million locker room renovation
Reynolds closed his statement by saying that:
Quote:
There were some very minor issues that [Rodriguez] raised with the administration – and people were working on them. I think you will agree that the things that are being talked about are pretty minor in comparison to what has been done already.
But he clearly was looking for an excuse to leave—he looked last year and again this year.
But when he went to visit another team and then came back to campus with demands based on those minor issues, University officials simply told him they would continue to work on the issues. He was asked to focus on the student-athletes and the upcoming bowl game. There’s a long off-season coming up to work out those sorts of minor issues. Whoever comes in as coach will know that they can count on support from WVU on big issues and small issues.
Clearly, the University felt that it was at the end of its collective rope. And who could blame them?
Listen, we know that the world of collegiate athletics and the contracts signed by coaches is a crazy one. We know that.
But in case some of you have forgotten the recent history of contract negotiations with Mr. Rodriguez, let me re-educate you.
- June 26, 2006- After WVU wins the Sugar Bowl and finishes ranked #5 in the nation, Rodriguez signs a contract extension through the year 2012 following rumors that he is listening to offers from other Universities with regard to their head coaching positions. His salary is increased to over $1 million per season, and his demands of higher salaries for his assistant coaches are met, as well as promises to build a new student center for athletes.
- December 9, 2006- Rodriguez suddenly finds his heart all aflutter with another NCAA team, the Alabama Crimson Tide. Rodriguez goes to administration officials with a head coaching offer from Alabama in his pocket and makes a list of demands, despite signing a contract extension just SIX MONTHS EARLIER. The University steps forward AGAIN and meets those demands by giving Rodriguez another extension (this time through 2013) which includes an astronomical pay increase (up to almost $2 million), fulfilling promises to improve some facilities and begin construction on others, and increasing compensation to assistant coaches even further.
- December 14, 2007- Word leaks that Rodriguez, despite agreeing to a contract extension less than one year ago, has met with Michigan officials to discuss its head coaching vacancy.
- December 15, 2007- Rodriguez AGAIN goes to the administration to re-negotiate his contract, AGAIN holding a head coaching offer from another major football program. The administration tells him that everything he asked for has either been done or will be completed in the future.
- December 16, 2007- Rodriguez is announced as the new head football coach at the University of Michigan.
So to recap, Rodriguez either re-negotiated or attempted to re-negotiate his contract with WVU three times in 18 months, each time with an increasing list of demands. The last two times, he held a definitive offer from another major program as he entered those negotiations, essentially holding a gun to the University's head. "Give me what I want or I walk."
To what extent, exactly, is the University expected to tolerate yearly extortion by a coach during the course of re-negotiating contracts on which the ink hasn't yet dried? At what point is enough... enough?
Clearly, the administration has to walk a fine line with criticizing comments made by donors who contribute to the well-being of the University as a whole, as well as the football program.
But I don't.
Blasting the administration in the print media following Rich Rodriguez's decision to flee to Michigan couldn't possibly be more detrimental to the very interests these boosters claim to have in the program.
What is the purpose of these attacks? To embarrass the University? To ridicule the Athletic Director? Do these donors really think that painting West Virginia University and its administration as "arrogant, mean-spirited and intellectually bankrupt" as Kendrick did in the Post-Gazette will help the school in any way whatsoever, in finding a new head coach or in any other endeavor undertaken by the University in the near future?
And most importantly, do you really think that NOW is the time to withdraw your financial support for the University? They're going to need it more than ever! If these donors hope to sustain excellence both on and off the field at West Virginia University, withdrawing their financial support in its greatest time of need doesn't strike me as the most noble idea in the world.
Obviously, I've never given $12 million to the University. I don't know what its like to place that much of your own hard-earned money into a program and feel like it's going in the wrong direction. But I do know one thing about giving that much money to a university (or anyone, for that matter)- it buys you an open ear. Something tells me that these attacks, issues, and criticisms could have been brought directly to President Garrison and Ed Pastilong's attention without embarrassing the University and its administration publicly in the process.
But that wouldn't get you in the news, would it?
So no, I'm not familiar with what it's like to give that much money to West Virginia University. But I know what it's like to pay it tuition. I know what it's like to pay for season tickets and (much more minimal) Mountaineer Athletic Club donations out of my own hard-earned money.
And I know that trashing the school and its administration because you feel jilted that your precious football coach wasn't allowed to extort his way into his third contract extension in 18 months is just flat-out dumb.
There's no sense in throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
It's too bad that these guys have it the other way around.
