Good Read: Why Rich Rodriguez Left WVU

MORGANTOWN, W. Va. — Before the death threats to his brother’s children, before the letters to the editor that rage against him in his local paper, before the destruction of his mailbox, and the printing of anti-Rod T-shirts, and the affixing of mocking posters to his gate at the end of his driveway, Rich Rodriguez was the most popular man in West Virginia.

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16 Responses to Good Read: Why Rich Rodriguez Left WVU

  1. Noah 12/24/2007 at 9:43 AM #

    I don’t see how any rational human being can argue with RRod’s decision. West Virginia is ridiculously poor. Now that mountaintop-removal is legal, it’s ridiculously ugly (unless you think coal slurry is attractive). As I type this, I’m in Southern Ohio. I can drive three blocks and look across the Ohio river and see W. Va (Huntington).

    I’ve got two words for the people of W. Va — hybrid vigor. Look at your kids. And look at your neighbor’s kids. And go to the mall and look at THOSE kids. Notice how they all kind of look alike? You are not labrador retrievers. There is no breed standard that you need to be shooting for.

    Michigan is THE winningest program in D1 football. They play in front of 109,501 fans every week. They’ve got national championships going back 100 years. It’s Bo. It’s Ned Yost. It’s the history of college football. It’s a fantastic school. Ann Arbor is always on those top ten best-places-to-live lists. It’s the Big 10, not some made-for-TV used-to-be basketball league.

    WVU fans now think that the coach THREW the game so he could take the UM job? Okay, go the mirror…say that out loud and take a good hard look at yourself. Now realize that THIS is why no one takes you seriously.

  2. choppack1 12/24/2007 at 10:02 AM #

    I don’t think there are a lot of fans who think he threw the game…I’m sure there are some, but there will be some like that every where that football is a passion. I think it’s the classic case of using a couple of isolated examples, so someone can say, “Look, those people are crazy over there!”

    What probably had a lot more to do w/ him leaving (or certainly making it easier for him to leave) was his relationship w/ the school president:

    “Rodriguez said in an interview Friday night at a Morgantown hotel that that was why he was constantly pushing the school to upgrade its facilities, to find more money for football operations, to budget more to pay his assistants.

    He thought the school was missing the big picture. Some in the school thought he was ungrateful.”

    I really find a story like this more sad for the WVa’s in the world than anything else. There are some coaches you just know that will leave your school at the drop of the hat. However, you don’t really expect it when the coach is from the area and from the school. Think about how we’d feel if Sid left us for UCLA or Kentucky.

    Oh well, it’s times like these when you find out where you really are in the hierarchy of things. If they had any doubts before, now they know.

  3. bTHEredterror 12/24/2007 at 12:57 PM #

    West Virginia and rational = incongruent.

  4. durhamwolf2 12/24/2007 at 1:22 PM #

    I go WW rafting every year in WV. I think it’s a great state and that RR is a turncoat. I don’t balme the WV fans feeling the way they do. Like State fans they are a proud bunch.

  5. PackerInRussia 12/24/2007 at 3:29 PM #

    I remember going skiing in WV (which is excellent) and people calling us rednecks, talking about “the sticks”, etc. because we were from North Carolina. Right.

  6. Noah 12/24/2007 at 7:44 PM #

    W. Virginia is a pit. They’ve ruined the prettiest areas. You want to know what 99 percent of the place looks like, rent “October Sky.” It looks like Bluefield and it looks like Cabin Creek. The whole place looks and feels completely hopeless…like one big meth lab.

    It’s the kind of place authors like Richard Russo write books about when they want to put the slacker hero in a used-to-be town and just marinate the novel in despair.

    Lewiston, Maine feels like this. Camden, NJ. Ironton, Ohio. Saginaw, MI.

  7. beowolf 12/25/2007 at 11:07 AM #

    Good heavens, noah, I have friends from West Virginia and your first post is as hopeless as the towns you describe in your second.

  8. Noah 12/25/2007 at 8:51 PM #

    The place smells like the bilge of a boat.

  9. beowolf 12/25/2007 at 11:25 PM #

    I refer more specifically to the inbreeding portion.

  10. tang79 12/26/2007 at 8:58 AM #

    To noah:
    I am From wv, ive been in ohio and that place is where all the sh– went when the world fell off its axis. Now rather Judgeing us from just what you can see, you should know the people , before making comments like that. now you say wv is ugly for destroying mountaintops, blame your president on that move, and by the way does’nt coal produce electricity, that heats your home. as for coach rod, I cant blame a man for bettering his family and hisself, and how long has it been since ohio was champs!! coach rod did not get the players there theey did, beliving in some one who they trusted and then walks away, some coach, NOAH, know the complete story before you waste everyones oxygen simply by opening your mouth.

  11. Noah 12/26/2007 at 5:58 PM #

    1) I do know the people. I didn’t f-ing come here this Christmas because it’s so g-d beautiful.
    2) He ain’t my president.
    3) Coal is just sh*tty oil. Build some nukes and stop littering the planet with mercury and soot. And since I get my power from Sharon Harris, no, coal doesn’t heat my house.
    4) Maybe you can tell me the COMPLETE story someday. I don’t speak retard, so I have no idea what that last bit was about.

    West Virginia sucks. The reason the white water rafting is so good is because even water can’t stand it here.

  12. Noah 12/26/2007 at 5:59 PM #

    Oh, and if anyone doubts just how HARD W. Va sucks…go to Beckley. And then realize that it’s a HUUUGE tourist stop. You know what it is? It’s a rest-stop where they sell jam. And people come here for vacation.

    “Look, Paw! They’se gots lights!”

  13. bTHEredterror 12/27/2007 at 5:54 AM #

    That was a set-up, that dude can’t be for real.

    Noah did you type that Silverstein-ian monologue for laughs?

  14. tang79 12/27/2007 at 7:52 AM #

    yeah noah you down wv for its coal pollution, but how many factories give off pollution every day, like where you live, at least we can name our steets, we dont have to number them. In wv we dont have to worry about watching our back walking down the street. wait a miniute, i have to go to the bathroom.

  15. tang79 12/27/2007 at 8:02 AM #

    im back and guess what NOAH i just took the BROWNS to the super bowl. and by the way you said build nukes, good one. if you took a poll alot more people from ohio are from wv.I did not get on this site to argue with anyone BUT DONT EVER DOWN MY STATE. just because you cant stand us dont judge us. and speaking of meth labs that is what the entire state of Ohio is. I have some really close friends in Ohio, I never talked about your state until you downed mine.Since you dont know the people from wv, you decide to down it exactly the way you do everything else.

  16. fastball16 01/01/2011 at 9:41 PM #

    so…who looking back (hindsight) who thought Rich should have stayed at WVU?

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