Tue Nov 17, 2009 4:59 pm EST
Revenge of the obscure coaches: Sanford goes out swinging at UNLV
We had the slightly awkward pleasure last week of catching Tommy West's "Howard Beale" moment on his way out of Memphis, in which the just-fired veteran lamented his role as the "seventh straight coach" UM had shown the door after failing to "give 'em a level playing field." UNLV's Mike Sanford -- certainly no stranger to on-camera outbursts -- took a day off to cool his head after getting the chop on Sunday, but still wanted to make it clear for reporters at his exit interview Monday that the Rebels' struggles are definitely not his fault (emphasis added):
"This is not a coach issue," Sanford said in his news conference Monday at the Lied Athletic Complex. "This is a system, infrastructure, commitment issue that I am concerned about.
"There's been more of a football commitment made at Reno from a facility standpoint than there has at UNLV. Our locker room is the worst locker room in college football.
"If people really want to win here, if they're going to hold the football coach and the football coaching staff here to a high standard, they need to put their money where their mouth is. I don't believe that's ever been done here. I don't believe it was done one bit during the time I was here."
It's hard to argue: Sanford's 9-14 mark over the last two years is roughly average for Vegas over the last three decades; the Rebels haven't had a winning season since 2000, haven't had back-to-back winning season since 1979-80 and have finished higher than a tie for fifth place in the Mountain West only once in a decade (a tie for third place in 2000). Sanford is the fifth straight Vegas coach to leave with an overwhelmingly losing record since the mid-eighties.
I'm sensing a theme for the next month: "Beleaguered coaches blame lack of resources for horrible records." To which you can only reply: Other teams are winning the Mountain West and Conference USA on MWC and C-USA budgets, aren't they?
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Hat tip: Bruce Feldman
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10 Comments
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Does anyone get the sense that BYU and Utah probably have larger football budgets than Wyoming and New Mexico?
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Your argument implies a premise that is contradicted by what the UNLV coach said. "Other mid-level teams can win games on medium sized budgets; UNLV is a mid-level team, therefore they should win games too." That argument is only valid if UNLV has similar facilities, which, if the UNLV coach is telling the truth, is not the case.
The decline in the quality of your posts since you quit SMQ is staggering.
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Wyoming Athletics Budget 2009: $11.6m
(source: http://uwadmnweb.uwyo.edu/AcadAffairs/policystatements/budget_primer.pdf)
San Diego St. Athletics Budget 2009: ~$27m
(source: http://goaztecs.cstv.com/genrel/051307aab.html)
UNLV's Athletics Budget 2009: ~$24m
(source: http://www.lvrj.com/sports/45463032.html)
Utah's Athletics Budget 2005: $24.2m
(source: http://www.sao.state.ut.us/reports/05UofU-NCAA.pdf)
University of Michigan Athletics Budget 2008: $80.1m
(source: http://www.regents.umich.edu/meetings/06-08/2008-06-X-15.pdf)
As a disinterested party (shock: I don't give a crap about UNLV), the reality of the matter is that UNLV football is underperforming compared to other schools. Utah, BYU and Boise State were, notably, finalists in the 2009 Excellence in Management Cup - an actual real award - so maybe they are the outliers. Regardless, school budgets don't seem to be the controlling factor within conferences - just between conferences.
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As my mother-in-law would say, someone needs to embrace the power of positive thinking.
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Heck, even San Jose State - a school which debated for years whether they should even *have* a football program - went to a bowl game in the last five years.
At a school like UNLV, which has a national profile (even if it's based on ancient basketball history) the school should be able to be good every once in a while, even with a sub-standard infrastructure.
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I think that gets at what Matt is saying: UNLV has a budget similar to all other MWC teams, so their budget isn't exactly an excuse. They're underacheiving for some other reason.
As a Vegas native, I would blame the searing hot weather, the Vegas party atmosphere at UNLV and the teeming apathy at the school and in the community for UNLV football before I'd blame the resources. They could paper every billboard on that side of I-15, get themselves a great local TV deal and I don't think many more people would care. UNLV is just not an attractive destination for football recruits and never will be.
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