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Oh, Notre Dame. We need to talk.
You just fired Ty Willingham three years after he took over the job as head football coach. Sure, this wasn't a great year for Fightin' Irish football, but come on, let's be realists.
Let's remember that you hired Willingham only after you had chosen George O'Leary to replace Bob Davies. But then we found out that O'Leary had never earned a masters degree and he had never actually played collegiate football at UNH. Maybe it's not your fault. Lots of people lie on their resumes. I once wrote on an application that I was interested in "helping people," which is not true. Anyway, you lost O'Leary but you found Willingham, a turn of events that your athletic director called, "divine intervention." Did Touchdown Jesus tell you to fire him too? How come God never gets the blame for a mediocre season? Maybe he was too busy helping George W. Bush win an election to care about Notre Dame football in 2004. Maybe Notre Dame should switch to Islam.
You need to take a close look at the program Willingham inherited. Not a lot of great football players. Not when you compare them to the athletes at Miami or Oklahoma or USC, and I know you think you're supposed to compete with those schools. Willingham had to work with an admissions office that wouldn't make large concessions to athletes. You should be applauded for your stringent academic standards, but know that it makes it much harder to win. In the aftermath of the Willingham firing, I've listened to several Notre Dame players state their grievances. I was impressed with their devotion to Willingham but I was also impressed with their ability to articulate that devotion. But this isn't necessarily a sign of a good football player. Go out and get yourself some stupid kids. Take a page out of Ohio State's book and find the next Andy Katzenmoyer or Maurice Clarett. Let them take classes like Golf 1 and Receiving Illegal Gifts From Boosters 87.
Most importantly, Willingham inherited a program that was located on a Catholic campus in South Bend, Indiana. I've been to South Bend. On my list of potential spring break destinations, it ranks slightly behind Kabul and Fallujah. Imagine what these recruits coming up from Florida and Texas and California think. First they take a trip to one of those southern state schools:
They get flown in on a private jet that has nineteen year-old cheerleaders serving as stewardesses. They are received at the school by a couple members of the Longhorn Ladies or the Trojan Tramps or the Husky Whores, or whatever they're calling their pack of ridiculously hot undergrads who get actual course credit for escorting football recruits around campus. The hostesses take the recruits to a party where they do keg stands and girls offer to hook up with them just because they ran for 2,000 yards as a junior in high school. Most importantly, it's sunny and nobody's telling them that if they don't bring a national championship to South Bend, God will send them to Hell, which is, come to think of it, a lot like South Bend.
So when the recruit comes to Notre Dame:
They fly into Chicago where the wind chill is making it -4000 degrees. Celsius. They take a bus through the mills and into the prairies, wondering when the stewardesses in cheerleading skirts are supposed to show up. They arrive on campus and see a small church that has erected a sign that tells the recruit that abortion is a sin worthy of castration. (I've actually seen this sign. It really exists and it's scary.) This isn't what a recruit who has already knocked up his high school honey four times wants to see. The recruit is shown around campus. There are no co-ed dorms and girls aren't allowed to sleep over. The recruit plays some video games until bed time, which is at 10:30. If the lights in the room aren't out, you deal with Sister Ruth, who owns a very stiff ruler.
But don't worry, now one thing will make Notre Dame exactly like all those other schools: you'll have a white coach. Since Ty Willingham was the first black employee of the athletic department since the groundskeeper in Rudy, all those accusations of racism are going to resurface again. You might want to think about hiring Colin Powell or Connie Chung just to save face. I'm pretty sure they're both looking for work.
I'm not saying this was a racist move on your part. What do I know? Maybe the players were complaining about his coaching style (but it sure didn't sound that way in those interviews I saw). Maybe you're right and three years is enough time for a college coach to turn around a struggling program. (Even if his first recruits are only juniors, and his first real class, the one that he had all fall to write letters to, are sophomores.) But you obviously know more about the situation than I do. Just don't be too surprised when Willingham goes to the University of Washington and turns the Huskies into a top ten team.
Because here's the thing: any coach, regardless of race, can motivate a player of any color. But from an aesthetic standpoint, from the perspective of a prospective college athlete, do you think maybe a black player would like to play for a black coach? Especially in Indiana? It makes sense to me. So I don't call the move to fire Willingham racist, I just call it racially stupid.
Here's who might be interested in playing for you, Notre Dame: any white Catholic boy from the Midwest who gets 1200's on his SATs. Good luck recruiting a contender with those standards. There are about eighteen of those kids that exist. One's a quarterback and the other seventeen are offensive linemen. But maybe you could convert a few to wide receiver. I mean, with good coaching, anything's possible, right?
Notre Dame, I'm done with you. Good luck with everything. And to Ty Willingham, I think you should consider this a blessing in disguise. Go to a better program. One like Washington. If you are a great coach (and you still have to prove it), you'll find success. Call the firing by Notre Dame divine intervention.
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