Three and Out (38 page)

Otherwise, Martin says, “there was a lot of small talk, and some football talk. There was tension.”

Although stilted, it would be the longest conversation between the two since Carr had called Rodriguez in December of 2007 to sell him on the job.

After the chilly pleasantries were dispensed with, Carr sent the first volley. “Tell the people in your camp to quit attacking me in the press,” he said, as Rodriguez remembered it a couple hours later. The catalyst for this was undoubtedly Rick Leach's public lambasting of Carr on the radio that week for sitting with Iowa's coaches and dignitaries—people Carr had known for years—in an Iowa stadium luxury box, instead of sticking with the Michigan contingent. Leach, who had no more media training than Rodriguez or Martin, quickly suffered a backlash.

“I don't have a camp,” Rodriguez replied, “and whatever they're doing, they're doing on their own. Rick Leach speaks for himself.”

Rodriguez ticked off all the reasons Carr shouldn't feel any threat from him, including Carr's five Big Ten titles and Michigan's first national championship in a half century. What Michigan football needed now, Rodriguez said, was Carr's unambiguous support. “When the
Free Press
came out with this story,” he told Carr, “saying how hard we are on the players, we could have used you speaking up.”

Carr said nothing.

“You're either all in or you're not,” Rodriguez continued. “You're either inside the Michigan family or you're not.” But the closest he came to accusing Carr of anything more than silence was this: “Somebody inside the department is talking to the press and doing us harm.”

The suggestion was that, if there were moles in the department, Carr most likely knew who they were, and Rodriguez would appreciate it if Carr told them to knock it off. As Rodriguez recalled, Carr remained silent at that, too.

Walking back down the hill to their offices, Martin asked Rodriguez, “Why don't you ask him to talk to your team before the Penn State game?”

“Because I've got my team right where I want them,” Rodriguez replied. “Gary [Moeller] comes to practice every Thursday—he's a regular—and we're not even asking
him
to talk to our team.”

This little exchange might be more telling than the strained conversation over lunch. It displayed the blind spots of both men. Martin was naïve enough to think Rodriguez would have no problem asking Carr to speak to his team after that ice-cold lunch, and that the clearly reticent Carr would accept. Likewise, Rodriguez failed to take advantage of what the Michigan family could do for him by declining to invite respected and supportive Michigan Men to address his team.

The latter echoed Rodriguez's refusal to visit the M-Club for their Monday luncheons during the season, too, which every coach had done going back to Schembechler's early days. The club's members are not, as a rule, the big money donors or power brokers—the VIPs tended to live in the suburbs or on the coasts—but their passion and loyalty were unequaled, and they served as opinion leaders for the Michigan community. It was, in many ways, an ideal setting for a new coach: a home crowd, with a strict no-press, everything-is-off-the-record policy. Further, it would give Rodriguez, an effective public speaker and a genuinely likable guy, a platform to earn some brownie points with the faithful. Here was help he could have used, in a format in which he could excel.

Yet Rodriguez typically sent Dusty Rutledge in his stead. When a patron asked Rutledge why Rodriguez rarely came, he said, “Would you rather have him here or recruiting next year's class?” It was a good point, especially because Rodriguez was the lead coach for both the offense and the special teams. Ultimately you could argue getting even one blue chipper outweighed a season of speeches, but it robbed Rodriguez of the support he would need when the
Free Press
story hit. A few hundred influential character witnesses and amateur PR workers couldn't have hurt during an investigation that would drag out for a year.

Back in his office, reflecting on the day's events, Rodriguez said, “Well, that didn't accomplish a whole lot. We're going to extend an olive branch one more time—ask [Carr] to be the honorary captain for Penn State—and then when the season ends, that's it.”

Nothing, of course, could help Rodriguez more than winning another football game. With center David Molk finally returning from his broken foot and many pundits calling the upcoming Penn State game for Michigan, there was good reason to hope. Once again, the incentives were many: a 2–2 Big Ten record, bowl eligibility—and proof to the rest of the nation they were back.

In the two weeks since the Iowa game, still more drama swirled around the program. From Leach's outburst to Martin's retirement to suspending Cissoko for missing class to the NCAA investigation, Rodriguez's options for surviving the experience were becoming narrower by the day. He had only one way out: He had to win games, and fast.

*   *   *

Forcier looked good against the Nittany Lions, not forcing anything. But when PA announcer Carl Grapentine told the fans a man was down on the field—and it was center David Molk—they let out a collective “Oooh.” They understood immediately.

Everyone assumed Molk had refractured his recently healed right foot. But on the sidelines, a team of four orthopedic doctors began testing not his right foot but his right knee—touching it here and there, seeing where it hurt and what Molk could and couldn't do. The same man who had not missed a single play the previous season had suffered his second serious injury just minutes after coming back from his first—and the two were, amazingly, unrelated.

Moosman moved back to center, and Michigan marched all the way to the end zone. 7–0 Michigan, just 3:49 into the game.

After Michigan's opening drive, Rodriguez walked past the offense's benches. “Tempo, tempo, tempo!” he said, rolling his left hand over and over. “Keep it fast! Make them play
your
speed—they can't keep up!”

Greg Mathews nodded. “They weak, man, they weak!”

But Penn State's offense needed only four plays to tie the score 7–7.

Just when it looked like the two teams were poised for another classic battle, the Wolverines seemed to forget everything they did right on their first drive. Forcier looked rough, from his inconsistent drops to his missed reads; no one seemed capable of blocking anyone; and the receivers ran sloppy routes. When Forcier did manage to get them the ball, they often dropped it.

For the next twenty minutes, Michigan managed only four first downs.

In the waning minutes of the half, down 19–7 but facing second-and-goal, Forcier dropped the snap, fell on it, and lay there while the clock was running. By the time he got up, he had to spike the ball to set up the field goal, which cut Penn State's lead to 19–10 at the half. For anyone keeping count, which included everyone on the Michigan sideline, the Wolverines were two botched snaps from going into halftime down just 17–14.

Of course, such would'ves, could'ves, and should'ves marked Michigan's last three games: a lot of almost. They were slipping backward on the Bowden scale, from winning close to losing close.

At halftime, Rodriguez steamed over Forcier's lack of game awareness. “Where's the sense of urgency!” he asked. “Get up! He's got to get rid of the ball sooner, too. Throw the seam hitch every time. Every time! He's open!”

Rod Smith, who exhibited the patience of Job with his young quarterbacks, told Forcier, “Quit being a robot and start being a football player. Trust yourself!”

Meanwhile, in the next alcove over, the normally cool Calvin Magee blasted the tight ends: “Catch the fucking ball! Catch. The. Fucking.
Ball
!”

*   *   *

Just four plays into the new half, however, the Lions invaded Michigan's end zone again to go up 25–10, then 32–10.

The game was over, and everyone seemed to know it except Brandon Graham, who charged in to block a punt, then raced to recover it not once but twice. He was playing for his school, he was playing for his teammates, he was playing for his future. He simply would not stop.

But it didn't matter. Two plays later, Michigan fumbled it back. The Michigan sideline, normally as active as an ant colony, had lost all life. With seven minutes left, the football staffers started packing the trunks. They are the vultures of college football. When you see them circling, you're done for.

After Penn State finalized the deal 35–10, the cold, wet Wolverines trundled back to their locker room.

“I thought I had you prepared, and I was wrong,” Rodriguez said. “That's on me. We can't beat teams without playing our best. And we were not at our best today. We just made too many mistakes to win. We've got to get it right—in a hurry.

“I don't want to feel this feeling anymore. I don't like it for the seniors. I need every one of you to get back to your best. I know everyone in this room is
all in
for Michigan. So get in here. ‘All in' on three.”

“ALL IN!”

*   *   *

In addition to covering the slaughter,
The Detroit News
ran a postgame story with the headline
LLOYD CARR PRAISES RICH RODRIGUEZ.

“Former football coach Lloyd Carr appeared on the Michigan radio broadcast during the first quarter of Saturday's Penn State game, praised Rich Rodriguez's spread offense, reiterated he's not a candidate for U-M athletic director and proclaimed his love for Michigan.

“Carr, who has been criticized by some fans and former players for not being publicly supportive of Rodriguez, spoke highly of the new coach and the program, and singled out freshman quarterback Tate Forcier for being ‘simply outstanding in every game.'”

On the same day, Drew Sharp of the
Free Press
wrote a column titled, “Lloyd Carr's Support Won't Save Rich Rod Forever.”

Sharp asked about Rick Leach's recent comments.

“I'm not going to worry about stuff like that,” Carr replied.

 

26   THE CONTINENTAL DIVIDE

The trouncing, coupled with Molk's second injury, a quarterback who was not taking coaching, and a team that had seemingly become timid, had all conspired to foul Rodriguez's mood more than usual by Sunday.

“Game evaluation,” Rodriguez said a few minutes before noon, with all the joy of a high school teacher reading off names for detention. “Quarterbacks.”

“Tate got sixty-five snaps, worst fucking game he played this year,” Rod Smith said, his patience finally failing him.

“Does he ever come in to study film?” Rodriguez asked. The answer: not much. Same as most of the players.

Rodriguez then provided the reason. “Guys are so paranoid about going past their [NCAA allowable] hours, they're afraid to come in here to watch film. We've got plenty of time under twenty hours. They can all afford a couple hours a week to learn their assignments, study their opponents, learn what the hell is going on. And I'll bet you straight up every goddamn guy at Penn State was in the film room this week, learning every damn thing about us that we
weren't
learning about them.”

When your team is in a tailspin, you have two options, neither great. You can try to calm the players, to take some pressure off—which risks not bringing the necessary intensity to the next game. Or you can crank it up another notch, in an effort to stop the slide
now—
which risks them getting rattled and not playing their best.

Rodriguez, not surprisingly, opted for the latter. That meant everyone's margin of error—from his coordinators' to his assistants' to his players' themselves—had just been cut in half. He had taken this tack before, of course, and almost always gotten good results, but no one was going to get any breaks that week, and only a freshman or a fool would have expected any.

But there was a method to his madness. He knew his team was young, inexperienced, and struggling to learn new systems. He also knew that, on some deeper level, they were fragile. So while he gave them no quarter, he focused every one of his criticisms not on ability or even performance but on toughness, focus, and effort—all the things even freshmen could control, every play.

Redshirt sophomore Mike Williams, for example, had been struggling at safety, which created tension between Rodriguez and Greg Robinson. Although Rodriguez would have pulled Williams himself if he was the defensive coordinator, he was reluctant to pull rank on Robinson, for whom he felt a great deal of respect. But that didn't mean he would get a free pass. Not that week.

When Robinson graded Williams, he said, “His eyes get him in trouble more than anything. He doesn't know what to watch for and gets sucked in.”

Rodriguez grunted but didn't interject until much later, when they broke down a special teams play featuring Williams. “I'm telling you that guy cannot tackle,” Rodriguez said. “Or he simply
will
not—take your pick. And that possibility pisses me off more.”

After every player had been graded, Rodriguez said, “Here's my impression: We looked poorly coached.

“On defense, we were tentative. We had a lot of technical errors—higher than it's ever been—with everyone either doing their own thing or not listening to coaching. On one play, Stevie [Brown, a senior] lined up at three or four different places. He had no idea where he was supposed to be. And we had twelve guys out there on a field goal block.

“Same thing on offense. We had more MAs than we've ever had, and it wasn't a very complicated defense we were going up against. First play of the game, Moose goes the wrong way. Our center, first play! Later he snaps the ball off Tate's chest and says, ‘I couldn't hear anything.' Then don't snap it!

“We didn't play with a sense of urgency. I can't explain that. We played soft, as a team. That's embarrassing to me, more than anything else. We got punched in the mouth and didn't respond.