Wow! What can I say? Not that I really care. RG and his clan has always been a thorn in my flesh. On the other hand, if the car dealers stick to athletics and keep their illiterate noses out of education, I know there will be a lot of happy folks, including me!

RG has never been a Bower fan.There is a Fire Jeff Bower site on either Facebook or MySpace (I think Facebook) that has some interesting members.
Bower is a classy guy who is in a business where no one is safe. Football fanatics can turn on a person in a instant.
He's one of the lowest paid coaches in this division of the NCAA. It'll be interesting to see who gets hired and what the pay will be.
Hope Bower heads to greener pastures - preferably those that razorbacks graze on.

LVN wrote:

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I too hope Coach Bower is quickly hired by a school which deserves him. For Bower to go and Eustachy to stay is . . . well, it's wrong.

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Has the firing been confirmed?  I just heard a national wire service report that Bower had decided to retire.  Is that a face saving cover story?

Curmudgeon wrote:

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Bower's players went to class and graduated. For the most part he did not recruit thugs, although there were some risky decisions in recent years that worked out. He did not tolerate bad behavior. One can hope that approach will continue.

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You can hope, Curm, but frankly that's not how "successful" programs operate, and Richard Gianinni knows that.

Just to keep everybody on their toes, bear in mind that Richard Gianinni could not have done this without running it past Dr Saunders first. For the sake of paranoia, imagine this discussion:

G: I'm going to fire Jeff Bower.
S: Why?
G: Because a bunch of car dealers that contribute money told me to.

The factors that G cites (e.g., apathy, fractured fan base, etc) have as much, if not more, to do with the AD's job description than with the head coach. But if the AD kow-tows to the "big money boosters" (several of whom are MSU graduates), then the AD is "useful" in the overall big picture.

And remember, Saunders' appointment does not alter in any way my view of the "conspiracy" over the long haul. This is part of the plan.

First Ant at the Picnic wrote:

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Bower guided the Eagles to 10 bowl trips in 11 years. And the graduation rate of his players is nothing to sneeze about. His termination makes absolutely no sense to me.

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In a perverse way,  it does make sense.  It's all about money and kowtowing to wealthy athletic supporters (pun intended).  Two of my alma maters have unceremoniously dumped successful coaches,  with arguably disastrous results.  I realize this isn't a football board,  but these anecdotes and others like them should be instructive.

In 1987 Texas fired Fred Akers after a 10 year run in which he had the highest winning percentage in the history of the school,  a high graduation rate,  and no scandals.  The rap against Akers was that he never won a national championship,  employed a boring offense,  and was not a ****tail party schmoozer.  The two coaches who followed him were abject failures and both were fired (at considerable expense) before their contracts expired.  Presently Texas has a coach who wins games,  has one of the lowest player graduation rates in college football,  and within the past year had 6 players arrested for an impressive array of criminal offenses.  But he fills the stands, courts alums,  and brings in buckets of cash. 

More recently, in 2002 Texas A&M fired R.C. Slocum after 14 years as head coach.  He was the "winningest" coach in school history, ran a squeaky clean program,  never had a losing season,  but refused to kowtow to wealthy donors or relax his recruiting standards.  His highly touted successor was fired last Friday after a lackluster 5 year tenure,  reportedly receiving a 12 million dollar buyout for the remainder of his contract. 

I suspect the USM football program may be on the same slippery slope.

Yesterday Bob Stoops was interviewed on one of the ESPN sports radio shows--Mike Terico (spelling????) I think.   Even Stoops, at a football school like OU, said that fans must always remember that these players are kids in school.   In the context of talking about a playoff system for football, he said that most will never have a career in athletics--even coaching--and that must always be kept in mind.   Don't know if OU really does that, but I hope USM does.

AE is spot on. The "big money boosters" don't give a rodent's posterior about graduation rates -- in fact, they'd probably prefer it if universities could just hire professional players & dispense with the "student" in "student-athlete" altogether.

And as I've already said, some of those "big money boosters" are the same guys who brought us the "Thames era."  In fact, go down the roster of the so-called Circle of Champions & you'll see the same names that participated in the infamous Warren Paving group.

The more things change, the more they remain the same.  I do believe the "next level" for the USM athletic program is Division I-AA.   It would probably be a smart move.