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Dr. Saturday

Tue Feb 17 11:31am EST

Breaking: Mike Leach blows his deadline, and nothing happens

By Matt Hinton

Because it's out there and there hasn't been an avalanche of substantial news the last couple weeks, I've relayed some of the juicier bits of the well-documented, unusually contentious contract negotiations between Mike Leach, his agency and the Cap'n's employers at Texas Tech. But as theater -- or, more appropriately, soap opera -- the passing of the university-mandated deadline for Leach to sign an extension Monday is beyond lame. And I'm grading on an offseason curve.

After the nation's pundits pored over a series of document leaks, petty grudges, brazen grandstanding and a bizarre public relations campaign, Leach didn't sign the extension ... and he's still the coach at Texas Tech. He'll be the coach for at least two more years under his existing deal, at which point he'll be the winningest coach in school history by a comfortable margin. Far out speculation aside, he can't conceivably be fired barring an utter catastrophe, and here's why:

That's a record to rally around -- Tech students are literally rallying for Leach this morning -- but not for any specific end. Unless the bottom falls out of the on-field product, on a steady rise over the entire course his first nine years, Leach is the coach. Presumably, however poorly the two men get along with each other, Gerald Myers is the athletic director. Literally, nothing has changed, except that the process will have to repeat itself sometime before 2011.

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