A Fond Farewell
When it comes to sports we definitely have a “what have you done for me lately” mentality, but even after a very disappointing season for the Univesity of Michigan football team I am still a big Lloyd Carr fan. The core of Carr’s best years as the head coach at the University of Michigan were from 1997 through 2006. Over that time he won 96 games [77.4% of the games he coached], one AP National Championship, won or shared 5 Big Ten titles, and appeared in the Rose Bowl 4 times. His teams also went 5-5 in bowl games over that stretch, but three of those bowl losses were to arguably the best team in the country [USC twice and Texas once, all in the Rose Bowl].
The only frustration - outside of his embarrassing inability to field or simply sidestep the simplest of questions from the media, which is pretty minor in my opinion - was that the rubber didn’t quite meet the road on a couple of his football beliefs.
Carr believed his offenses needed to have a strong running game, but he was once quoted when his team struggled to run the ball as saying the team would “run or die trying”. The quote sounded a bit like being committed more to beating one’s head against the wall rather than hiring one of the best offensive coordinators who had a proven X’s and O’s scheme for succesfully running the football. When you coach at the all-time winningest football program you probably have your pick of several excellent candidates who could have improved Michigan’s offense. So that mentality was frustrating to say the least.
When Gregg Mattison left to become defensive coordinator at Notre Dame there didn’t seem to be enough of a priority placed on hiring a coach with a similar track record and in turn on recruiting top talent along the defensive line. That proved to be key factor in U of M’s inability to control the line of scrimmage in order to slow down mobile quarterbacks and spread offenses. The issue was finally addressed when instate talents like LaMarr Woodley, Terrance Taylor and Brandon Graham chose to come to Michigan and when Steve Stripling was hired to replace Brady Hoke.
The head coach made similar comments regarding the importance of special teams play, yet Michigan’s special teams units always performed as if they were poorly coached. It was a consistent problem that can’t be written off as an isolated incident. But even with these criticisms Carr was a very good coach.
His best traits were that he was able to be successful while running a completely clean program, and that he recruited players who largely made fans proud of the football squad. The players never planted a flag on an opponent’s 50 yard line after a big win, and they never gave up, even when the odds didn’t look good for the team in games like the 2003 game against Minnesota, the 2004 game against Michigan State and the 1999 game against Penn State - just to point to a couple great comeback wins. Oh, and who can forget Tom Brady and David Terrell’s performance in the Orange Bowl against Alabama.
The University of Michigan lost a very good football coach when Lloyd Carr announced his retirement. I’m glad he will be able to coach his final game during Mike Hart, Chad Henne and Jake Long’s final game. He seemed to have a very strong bond with all three seniors. Hopefully Henne and Hart will be healthy and they’ll be able to send their coach off to retirement with a bowl victory.
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Thanks for the link.
I don’t know what to say about Lloyd, but I believe you’ve found something of significance. If you’re the football coach at Michigan, I fully expect you to win 75 - 80% of your games. You only have one or two bona fide contenders, year in - year out in the conference.
Barry Alvarez put Wisconsin on the map. They’re legit. Ohio State is the real deal. That’s it. After those two, it’s an annual guessing game as to who will contend in the conference. With that said, Michigan should be looking at the OSU game with an undefeated or 10-1 or 9-2 record every single season.
That’s the expectation. It is fair? I think so. It’s Michigan and it’s the Big 10. The same expectations are held in Columbus.
Now, the other thing is that the Michigan coach is not expected to beat OSU every year - but he has to win his fair share. He’d have been better off - and he’d still have a job if lost two or three to Cooper and beat Tressel two or three times - but then again, if Cooper beats Michigan, Tressel is probably still at Youngstown State.
In the final analysis, Carr did a tremendous job, but he was replaced because of his inability to beat Tressel. Everything else is secondary.