"Blackness"

Interesting quote from a book that I'm currently reading.

"Too many affluent black youths mistakenly associate black identity with admiration of what is most self-destructive about the behavior of blacks with lower income."

Irrelevant

The echoes are all that is left of the mystique. Yes, Virginia, Notre Dame Football is irrelevant.

Over the 10 days, anyone with either a functioning auditory or visual cortex has been bombarded with the minute-by-minute sordid details of how ND has (mis)handled their search for a new Head Football Coach. Pundits and alums all have their theories on what needs to change: The Admissions Standards, The Offense, The Schedule. All of that is fine and dandy, but a comment from one of my dual-sport athletes (football/track) summed it up best. I asked him about what he thought about the Notre Dame program and he said, “Coach, no one any good that I know wants to go to Notre Dame!” This young man was a consensus Top 25 player coming out of high school that was recruited by every top program in the country. In other words, this young man’s unique insight to the rarefied air of elite college football recruiting confirmed what many others and I had suspected.

Notre Dame Football is played out.

Facts:

Notre Dame hasn’t won a bowl game in 11 years.

Notre Dame has won 1 National Championship in the last 25 years.

Notre Dame has hasn’t had a first-round NFL draft pick at a “skill position” (QB, WR, RB) since Jerome Bettis in 1993. 1993!!!

Given the above information, why is it such a mystery that ND has slipped from its lofty perch at the top of the college football mountain? Do you really think a 6’4” 18-year old wide receiver that runs a 4.3 40 yd dash really cares about all of the championships that ND won in the '60s and '70s? Heck, I’m 5’7” and couldn’t catch a cold, let alone a football and I don’t care! And let’s not even get into the whole academic thing. As I alluded to in a previous post, it’s all about the NFL, not the GPA with so many of these kids (and coaches).

“But they have an EXCLUSIVE television deal with NBC! How can they be irrelevant?”

The growth of satellite TV and pay-per-view cable packages has made it possible for basically any major team to be seen every week. The NBC deal is quickly becoming a white elephant.

Notre Dame has become a place for largely second-tier skill position players. This decline began near the end of the Lou Holtz era and continued through Bob Davie and still exists today. Why is this happening? I'll compare it to the business world.

When an industry leader in a competitive market fails to anticipate a fundamental change in the marketplace and make the appropriate strategic adjustments, things can get ugly very quickly and that company will lose it's commanding share of the market.

In recruiting terms: Kids don't want to be ugly, they want to be with the industry leader.

Notre Dame is Betamax.
USC is a DVD. A DVD being watched on a 52-inch "High-Def" plasma screen.

Bottom Line: Elite athletes win championsips. Notre Dame hasn't had either for quite some time.

Wake up the echoes.

Sanity Post #1

My apologies in advance. This post is purely for my own sanity. Writing helps me clear my mind of clutter, so bear with me (or click 'Back' on your browser-no hard feelings!).

Man, I am wiped out. I'm a complete zombie. I usually don't feel like this until the end of the indoor season (Mid-March), but this is a whole different ballgame. No enthusiasm for practice, no enthusiasm to write training plans for the next 6-8 weeks...ugh. It is kind of disconcerting because coaching has always been a "flow-like" activity for me. Time just flies by, everything is easy. Recently, however, that has not been the case. I can't even complain about my athletes. They have been great all semester. I'm just absolutely smoked. I have got to learn how to be more balanced...I think that is why I'm so prone to burnout. Unfortunately, me and balanced don't seem to get along very well. Must be the whole Type-A personality thing.

Maybe things will get better once we start competing. Hope so.

Spilling the Beans

Victor Conte tells all in this article on ESPN.com.

He details his involvement in highest levels of track & field, baseball and football. Anyone who had ANY thoughts that elite sport is clean, should think again.

This article simply confirms what all of us that are/were involved in Track & Field at the elite level suspected. If you want to get paid, you have to juice. All of us made different choices. Some chose to do it clean, some chose to cheat. I chose to do it clean. I ran fast, but not fast enough. Would I have made lots of $$ if I cheated? Yes.

Why didn't I? Because I knew that one day I would be a coach. How could I preach about accountability, integrity and sportsmanship knowing what choices I made in the past?

Despite the recent revelations about Marion Jones, Jason Giambi, and Barry Bonds, I fear that many young, gifted athletes will choose to cheat just like their heroes.

Ha ha ha...

ESPN Radio has just reported that Utah head football coach Urban Meyer is going to....FLORIDA!

What? I thought it was a foregone conclusion that Notre Dame fired Coach Willingham so they could get Meyer. Interesting.

Notre Dame just lost their Golden Boy. Once again, Notre Dame has bumbled a hiring. First, George O'Leary with the phony Master's Degree and now losing Meyer.

ESPN's Chris Mortensen reported that the 'Golden Droners' were extremely arrogant in their interview with Meyer. Shocker!

Couldn't happen to a nicer school.

The Clear, The Cream, The Craziness...

The San Francisco Chronicle has reported that Barry Bonds and Jason Giambi testified to a Federal Grand Jury that they had taken performance enhancing drugs including Human Growth Hormone.

Victor Conte will appear on 20/20 tonight and apparently "out" some very prominent Olympians regarding their used of banned substances.

I think we are witnessing the apex of the pharmacological-based doping era. I think that the revelations and admissions will continue to a point where this time will be considered a watershed moment in elite sport. Fearing detection and embarrasment, athletes, coaches and mad scientists will begin to reach into the "final frontier"- Genetic Engineering. This will be the doping program to end all doping programs. The "Uber-Athlete" will dominate. Whoever has the best molecular biologist wins. To me, that is truly scary.

Seems like a far cry from the 19th century when drinking coffee prior to competion was considered "bad form".

Welcome to the 21st Century.

Recruiting

Have a recruit coming to campus today. Always fun...until you start to run behind schedule...

Ah, the joys of recruiting. Coercing a Joe Smith to come to your University. Kind of scary, when you stop and think that your livelihood depends on the whims and decision-making capabilities of a 18-year old who is probably more concerned with getting their hands on "Grand Theft Auto-San Andreas" than where they are going to spend the next 4 years...

On a positive note, though, this recruit is one of the "rare" student-athletes. Great athlete, great grades, wants to major in Aerospace Engineering and work for NASA. I can dig that. I'm really looking forward to meeting him and his parents. If only more kids would understand the opportunity AND leverage that their athletic gifts give them. This kid has a rare insight and long-term view that most kids I talk to lack.

I'll let you know how things go.

The Myth of the Student-Athlete

The New York Times has an excellent article about the state of ‘big time’ college athletics. The basic premise is that the ‘big-time’ programs should create their own professional league. I’ve had similar thoughts to this in the past. For example, there is really no need for a school like Lafayette College to be in the same NCAA Division as UCLA! The educational and athletic missions of those two institutions couldn’t differ more. Too disparate a comparison you say? OK, can someone explain to me why Vanderbilt and Auburn are in the same conference?? Let’s end the hypocrisy and recognize big time college athletics for what they are: Businesses. Hmm…so what does that make the “student-athletes”? Employees.

The thing that strikes a chord with me, however, is that despite all of the rhetoric from the schools about the athletes “opportunity to get an education”, the majority of these kids simply want to do the bare minimum so they can stay eligible and play. For the small number that actually values the education and wants to excel academically, the task they face is a daunting one. The amount of time consumed with practices, meetings, and film study in addition to their normal coursework is often too much to handle. Factor in that many of the athletes are coming to college woefully under prepared, and you have a recipe for failure or at best, mediocrity. Coaches and colleges know this, yet continue to mine the high schools for the next "difference maker".

Anyone who has spent time in or around a major collegiate athletic program knows what I'm talking about. The athletes are simply cogs in the machine. Two such machines will do battle this weekend at the Orange Bowl in Miami: The Miami Hurricanes vs. The Virginia Tech Hokies. The winner claims the ACC Championship, but more importantly, an invite to the Nokia Sugar Bowl with an estimated payout of (in your best Austin Powers voice) $14-$17 million dollars.

I guess that is why so many college programs don’t blink when they offer seven-figure compensation packages to prospective coaches.

I guess they think it’s just good business.

Intro

Well, here is my first foray into the blogosphere.

I’m hoping that this blog will be a place for me to give organization to my thoughts and occasionally provide a forum for my opinions. Most of those opinions tend to be about race, education, athletics, and how they all interact.

A little about me: I’m a wanna-be intellectual trapped in the body of a coach that works for a major college athletic program. I have delusions of grandeur about switching careers into something more interesting/challenging (law, academia), but for the mean time, this blog will have to do....

So please bear with me as I figure this thing out...

Away we go...