The ND Story Gets Even More Ridiculous!
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The Ancient Enemy
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- Joined: October 30th, 2004, 2:47 pm
The ND Story Gets Even More Ridiculous!
CAMP MAESTRO, Denton, Tx:
Notre Dame has probably reached that status where you either love them or hate them. Notre Dame haters have, over the past decade at least, loved every second of their debacles on the football field. The Irish faithful, however, have had to witness all of it, listen to all of it, and take it on the chin like a champ.
Those dukes have been down for quite some time.
Lou Holtz won the national championship in 1989 with Tony Rice and Rocket Ismail. After that, things went slowly downhill. Davie took over in 1997 and went 35 and 25 in five rough seasons. The fans were not impressed with Davie. His tenure was plagued with doubts, and there was a constant, weekly question of: "Was this the final nail?" After 2001, Davie was finally pushed out. The search was on for a new leader for the Irish, someone who would get them back to the national championship, and re-establish them as the top dog in the country. After many candidates said no, the Irish decided on Tyrone Willingham.
"I feel yer pain..."
Willingham did an okay job at Stanford, but nothing to shoot off fireworks about. From 1995-2001, he went 44-36, with a single Pac-10 title in 1999. With Willingham's "promotion" to Notre Dame, the media did a very good job of convincing the entire nation that Tyrone Willingham was the greatest football coach in the history of the NCAA. They overly hyped him, not only because he was the next coach at Notre Dame, but also because he was black. He was an African-American man that succeeded to the level of the head coaching position at the highest level of college football: Notre Dame. You can imagine what this did to increase expectations, and those were expectations that Tyrone Willingham simply could not achieve.
Seriously unemployed.
Willingham was dogged for the past two seasons, and was finally given the boot at the tail-end of this previous regular season. The Black Coaches Association went nuts, saying this was terrible for aspiring black coaches, and made no comment on Willingham's numerous 30-point losses, Notre Dame's complete lack of mental preperation against lower-caliber opponents, and Willingham's record of 21-15. The BCA also recently issued a statement saying that they want potential African-American I-A recruits to boycott the University of South Carolina, whom they feel did not do a good enough job of providing a fair search for the vacant head job left by Lou Holtz. With Holtz leaving, all South Carolina did, however, was quickly provide their players with the best availible candidate (not to mention hottest commodity), who happens to be one of the greatest college coaches of the twentieth century. But that of course clearly isn't good enough, and I think we all know why.
Hiring this man to get you to the top is clearly not a good idea, as he has never had any success in the college ranks.
But the BCA were not the only ones upset over Willingham getting sent off into the sunset with a kick in the pants. No, there people at the university who were a little less than impressed as well. The first one being the president of Notre Dame, Rev. Edward Malloy, who, over a week after the firing, made it known that he was "embarrassed" by the decision. "In my 18 years, there has only been two days that I've been embarrassed to be president of Notre Dame: Tuesday and Wednesday of last week." That is very interesting indeed, for a few reasons. Number one being the fact that he's the president of the university, and was basically saying he wanted nothing to do with the firing. Number two being the fact that Rev. Malloy felt it was a good idea to wait over a week to come out and say he disapproved of the firing. I guess he must have been really busy and didn't get around to saying he was against it. I mean, it's only the head coach at your university, and you can say all you want about Notre Dame's academics, or anyone else's, but football runs the roost. But hey, he must have been really busy. Maybe he was counting NBC's money, which would of course take over a week, in my estimations.
Inspirational.
It doesn't stop there, with the Irish speaking out. Chandra Johnson, the 50 year old assistant to the president, shaved her head in protest, and will reportedly never grow her hair back until Notre Dame wins a national championship. Being recently bald myself (not because of Notre Dame's firing) I hope that Ms. Johnson has a warm knit cap, because it gets mighty cold during the winter in the upper midwest. And she will fare well not to lose that cap, because she will need it for quite a long time. But she was not the last one to speak out. Irish board of trustees member Dave Duerson, who also played for the Irish, also spoke out. An Associated Press release had this to say: "Duerson said trustees were not consulted -- but should have been -- before Willingham was fired Nov. 30 after the Irish went 21-15 in his three years as coach." Okay. So, the president didn't do it or agree with it, his assistant didn't do it or agree with it, the "board of trustees" didn't do it or even get consulted, so that brings up the million dollar question.
Remember that board-game and television show "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?" I have a very good idea to make some money, and if anyone else is interested in this, feel free to contact me. My idea is to create a board-game about the Willingham firing. But why stop there? Why not extend this into a television reality series? The game and show will be called: "Who in the He** Fired Tyrone Willingham?"
This man may or may not have fired Tyrone Willingham.
Players of the game will of course follow the directions on the board and answer questions as they move along to victory. The show can feature recycled celebrities who go across the globe and find clues as to who in the he** fired Tyrone Willingham. At the end of the season, we will not reveal the answer, but rather have some sort of cliffhanger that drags into the second season, where former Poison lead-singer Bret Michaels will lead a new cast to seek the truth. Really, it's flawless. The entire show will then end, 2 or 3 seasons down the road when the ratings die off, and we will reveal the answer, which will be that the new Irish coach pulled strings to get him fired, in an effort to take the job himself. This will all be completely made up, and cause even more controversy. Then the ratings will skyrocket as my cohorts and myself escape the lawyers and cops who are chasing us around because we accused Charlie Weiss or Tom Clements of having Willingham fired. Everything will come to a ridiculous conclusion when we announce that Bret Michaels will have a wrestling match with the new Irish coach to determine the truth, and our fates as fugitives from the law. Hey, you want to be famous, you have to grab life by the horns.
Bret Michaels' incredible abs may be the only ones who know the true answer.
Notre Dame has probably reached that status where you either love them or hate them. Notre Dame haters have, over the past decade at least, loved every second of their debacles on the football field. The Irish faithful, however, have had to witness all of it, listen to all of it, and take it on the chin like a champ.
Those dukes have been down for quite some time.
Lou Holtz won the national championship in 1989 with Tony Rice and Rocket Ismail. After that, things went slowly downhill. Davie took over in 1997 and went 35 and 25 in five rough seasons. The fans were not impressed with Davie. His tenure was plagued with doubts, and there was a constant, weekly question of: "Was this the final nail?" After 2001, Davie was finally pushed out. The search was on for a new leader for the Irish, someone who would get them back to the national championship, and re-establish them as the top dog in the country. After many candidates said no, the Irish decided on Tyrone Willingham.
"I feel yer pain..."
Willingham did an okay job at Stanford, but nothing to shoot off fireworks about. From 1995-2001, he went 44-36, with a single Pac-10 title in 1999. With Willingham's "promotion" to Notre Dame, the media did a very good job of convincing the entire nation that Tyrone Willingham was the greatest football coach in the history of the NCAA. They overly hyped him, not only because he was the next coach at Notre Dame, but also because he was black. He was an African-American man that succeeded to the level of the head coaching position at the highest level of college football: Notre Dame. You can imagine what this did to increase expectations, and those were expectations that Tyrone Willingham simply could not achieve.
Seriously unemployed.
Willingham was dogged for the past two seasons, and was finally given the boot at the tail-end of this previous regular season. The Black Coaches Association went nuts, saying this was terrible for aspiring black coaches, and made no comment on Willingham's numerous 30-point losses, Notre Dame's complete lack of mental preperation against lower-caliber opponents, and Willingham's record of 21-15. The BCA also recently issued a statement saying that they want potential African-American I-A recruits to boycott the University of South Carolina, whom they feel did not do a good enough job of providing a fair search for the vacant head job left by Lou Holtz. With Holtz leaving, all South Carolina did, however, was quickly provide their players with the best availible candidate (not to mention hottest commodity), who happens to be one of the greatest college coaches of the twentieth century. But that of course clearly isn't good enough, and I think we all know why.
Hiring this man to get you to the top is clearly not a good idea, as he has never had any success in the college ranks.
But the BCA were not the only ones upset over Willingham getting sent off into the sunset with a kick in the pants. No, there people at the university who were a little less than impressed as well. The first one being the president of Notre Dame, Rev. Edward Malloy, who, over a week after the firing, made it known that he was "embarrassed" by the decision. "In my 18 years, there has only been two days that I've been embarrassed to be president of Notre Dame: Tuesday and Wednesday of last week." That is very interesting indeed, for a few reasons. Number one being the fact that he's the president of the university, and was basically saying he wanted nothing to do with the firing. Number two being the fact that Rev. Malloy felt it was a good idea to wait over a week to come out and say he disapproved of the firing. I guess he must have been really busy and didn't get around to saying he was against it. I mean, it's only the head coach at your university, and you can say all you want about Notre Dame's academics, or anyone else's, but football runs the roost. But hey, he must have been really busy. Maybe he was counting NBC's money, which would of course take over a week, in my estimations.
Inspirational.
It doesn't stop there, with the Irish speaking out. Chandra Johnson, the 50 year old assistant to the president, shaved her head in protest, and will reportedly never grow her hair back until Notre Dame wins a national championship. Being recently bald myself (not because of Notre Dame's firing) I hope that Ms. Johnson has a warm knit cap, because it gets mighty cold during the winter in the upper midwest. And she will fare well not to lose that cap, because she will need it for quite a long time. But she was not the last one to speak out. Irish board of trustees member Dave Duerson, who also played for the Irish, also spoke out. An Associated Press release had this to say: "Duerson said trustees were not consulted -- but should have been -- before Willingham was fired Nov. 30 after the Irish went 21-15 in his three years as coach." Okay. So, the president didn't do it or agree with it, his assistant didn't do it or agree with it, the "board of trustees" didn't do it or even get consulted, so that brings up the million dollar question.
Remember that board-game and television show "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?" I have a very good idea to make some money, and if anyone else is interested in this, feel free to contact me. My idea is to create a board-game about the Willingham firing. But why stop there? Why not extend this into a television reality series? The game and show will be called: "Who in the He** Fired Tyrone Willingham?"
This man may or may not have fired Tyrone Willingham.
Players of the game will of course follow the directions on the board and answer questions as they move along to victory. The show can feature recycled celebrities who go across the globe and find clues as to who in the he** fired Tyrone Willingham. At the end of the season, we will not reveal the answer, but rather have some sort of cliffhanger that drags into the second season, where former Poison lead-singer Bret Michaels will lead a new cast to seek the truth. Really, it's flawless. The entire show will then end, 2 or 3 seasons down the road when the ratings die off, and we will reveal the answer, which will be that the new Irish coach pulled strings to get him fired, in an effort to take the job himself. This will all be completely made up, and cause even more controversy. Then the ratings will skyrocket as my cohorts and myself escape the lawyers and cops who are chasing us around because we accused Charlie Weiss or Tom Clements of having Willingham fired. Everything will come to a ridiculous conclusion when we announce that Bret Michaels will have a wrestling match with the new Irish coach to determine the truth, and our fates as fugitives from the law. Hey, you want to be famous, you have to grab life by the horns.
Bret Michaels' incredible abs may be the only ones who know the true answer.