Dear Coach Rod:
I’ll never forget my 2nd time ever in the Big House. It was September 24, 1994. I was a freshman. I won’t go into the details, but I have a feeling you’ve seen this “Miracle at Michigan” clip before. Twenty years later, I can still recall the feeling of my heart being ripped out that day – along with 110,000 other fans.
In my 4 years at U of M, I attended nearly every home game and many of the road games. In fact, my senior year, my roommates and I went to every single Michigan game (home & away) – including a road trip to Pasadena. To this day, the Big Game (at the Big House) was the best game I’ve ever seen in person. I remember rushing the field, running laps around it with thousands of other fans and the soon-to-be Heisman Trophy Winner, Charles Woodson.
Big 10 Champs. Rose Bowl Champs. National Champs. Not a bad way to finish my “career” at Michigan.
Since I graduated in 1998, I’ve been back to the Big House many times, including 2 shutout victories over Notre Dame. I’ve been to the Rose Bowl twice, watched Michigan beat Florida in the Gator Bowl, and even saw a few Michigan victories in South Bend. Those games I was unable to attend in person, I watched on TV. It’s rare that I miss a Michigan game. Over those years, I’ve seen some amazing Michigan games as well as some not-so-great games (think: App State).
Through think and thin, good and bad, I’ve been a Michigan fan. My license plate reads UOFMICH. I have a Block “M” tattoo on my right wrist. My dog wears a Michigan collar. Suffice to say, I bleed Maize ‘N Blue.
When you were hired in 2008, I was thrilled. Any coach who could take WVU from so-so to a perennial BCS team, was more than okay in my book. I remember Coach Nehlen saying, “When you coach at West Virginia you walk on water in West Virginia, but when you coach at Michigan, you walk on water, period.” I was pumped. I could not wait for the 2008 football season to kick off. We lost Boren to OSU (good riddance), Henne, Long, Crable, Hart, Manningham, and Arrington to the NFL. Ryan Mallet bailed. You were left with a decimated team. That being said, our expectations were still high. We’re MICHIGAN!
I don’t need to tell you what transpired over the next three years – you lived it.
I can honestly say, as frustrated as I was with our record over your three-year tenure, I was always a Rich Rod fan. Always. I defended you. I believed in you. I watched how the Michigan players grew to love you, how they believed in you, how they bought into the system. As painful as many of those games were to watch – some of them live – it was clear your kids were playing their asses off. They never gave up. They never made excuses. They played hard. They were well-conditioned.
However, our record on the field was all that mattered.
While the process was not pretty, I could see improvement. We were getting there. We were close – very close – to becoming a BCS team again under your leadership. When Brandon fired you in 2010, I stood by his decision. While not necessarily fair, it was the right call. Success at Michigan is determined by wins. I know you understand that. I’m not sure there is a more competitive coach in all of college football than you.
When Coach Hoke was hired, I was equally as thrilled. He did not disappoint in his first year. After all, he inherited a team that had improved every year since 2008 – a team that you recruited, a team that you coached, a team that you believed in and one that believed in you.
Last season reminded me a lot of your last season as Michigan’s head coach. The only difference was that the close games your teams lost, Coach Hoke’s won. With all due respect to Coach Hoke, there is no doubt in my mind that if you had been the coach at Michigan last year, we would have also had double-digit wins. I’m “all in” with Coach Hoke and pumped to see where this team will go as we approach the 2011 season.
It’s 10:38PM MT on Friday night as I type this sentence. My wife is asleep. My 2-year old daughter is asleep. Me? I just finished John Bacon’s book, Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football.
On behalf of the Michigan Football Family, I want to offer my sincerest apologies.
From Day 1, you never had a chance. From the buyout to the silly Free Press allegations (followed by the NCAA “investigation”) to the way the local media and many of the Michigan alumni treated you, to the decimated team you were handed, you were fighting an uphill battle – one that would take more than three years to overcome.
Thanks to John Bacon, I now know the truth. I now know that you really were “all in.” I now know that you gave it your all – and then some – in your three years in Ann Arbor even when obstacle after obstacle was placed in your way. You never gave up. You never let the Michigan players give up. You trusted your coaches and bat for them at all costs. You were able to somehow put tough losses behind you and get the troops fired up for the next game – each and every week. Lesser coaches, lesser men, would have given up. Not you, Coach Rod.
Did you make all the right decisions while at Michigan? No way. However, you are human. You are sincere. You care. It’s a shame that you can do 99 things “right” and make one “mistake” and that’s what the media picks up and runs with.
As you told you told the players in your final team meeting, “Remember, life’s a lot easier if you’re a good guy. Doesn’t mean it’s always fair, doesn’t mean things always go the way you want. But being a good guy still matters.”
Coach: You are a good guy. You are a Michigan Man.
I’m not sure if you’ll ever read this post, but if you do, thank you for pouring your heart into this team, this University, for three years. I wish you the utmost success as you begin your career in Arizona. I hope expect to see the Wildcats in a BCS game within a few years.
Yours truly,
DJ Waldow, U of M Class of 1998
GO BLUE
ALL IN
