Five years ago, the University of Michigan football team was headed into its final game of the season 11–0 and ranked No. 2 in the country, facing 11–0 and No. 1 ranked Ohio State. “The Game” had become “The Game of the Century” and everything was on the line: a chance to beat archrival Ohio State; a national-championship-game invite; and an opportunity to put the capstone on Lloyd Carr’s Michigan career (one that had steadily lost its glow since his 1997 national title).

On what seemed like the precipice of greatness, however, the program instead fell into darkness with wailing and gnashing of teeth.

With eerie symbolism, legendary coach Bo Schembechler died the day before The Game. The next night, Michigan lost in heartbreaking fashion, 42–39, and then lost again to USC in the Rose Bowl, 32–18.

The following season, the Wolverines (ranked No. 5) lost to Appalachian State in one of the most stunning upsets in college-football history. This downward spiral was briefly interrupted by a 9–4 season and a win in the Capital One Bowl. But the next three seasons would prove to be perhaps the ugliest and most difficult in the long history of Michigan football.

And John U. Bacon found himself with the kind of access unheard of in modern athletics. The result is a remarkable book: Three and Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football.

Lloyd Carr retired at the end of the 2007 season and Michigan eventually hired West Virginia’s Rich Rodriguez. In one of those quirks of fate, a former student of Bacon’s worked for Rodriguez’s financial adviser. This connection led to the idea of Bacon’s writing a couple of articles about the spread offense coming to Michigan, and then maybe collaborating on a book.

It is the height of understatement to say things did not work out as planned.

For most Michigan fans (myself included), that makes this book particularly painful. It is like watching a replay of your car accident in slow motion, on repeat. You know both the ultimate end result and the final score of every painful game and yet you force yourself to read the excruciating details as you relive the nightmare.

But if you are simply a fan of college football, or interested in big-time college athletics more generally, it is a fascinating read. Ohio State fans might find it entertaining and strangely cathartic.

What happened? What went wrong? Well, just about everything.

Having lost the legend, and the glue that held the community together, the Michigan football community became unorganized, splintered, and ineffective. The search for a new coach was bungled; the eventual hire was undermined at nearly every turn; the media were hostile to a degree hard to fathom outside of Ann Arbor; the coach far too often failed to see the repercussions of his words and actions; a lack of recruiting, injuries, and poor decisions decimated the talent available; the offense eventually soared but the defense cratered; and ultimately the football team lost far too many games. End result: Rich Rodriguez was fired after going 15–22 in three seasons.

While Bacon is frequently critical of Rodriguez, the picture he paints is largely one of Michigan never giving him the chance to do what he does best: coach football. Athletic director Bill Martin’s incredibly bungled search for a new coach undermined trust and began the bad feelings that would be a source of constant distraction and disunity. Having failed to get the Michigan Man so many wanted in Les Miles, Martin and former coach Lloyd Carr seemed unaware that Rodriguez would need extra support if he were to succeed — support he never really received.

Carr, who refused repeated interview requests from the author, bizarrely called Rodriguez to encourage his interest in the job and then seemed to undermine him at every turn — including encouraging recruits to transfer and never really sticking up for the new coach or the team.

Rodriguez fatally assumed that, Michigan being Michigan, 1) the talent would be there and 2) the backbiting and lack of support that drove him away from West Virginia wouldn’t happen. Desperately wrong on both counts. Rodriguez contributed to this problem by never hiring a defensive coordinator that he could trust and work with (even a half-decent defense would have made a world of difference, as his team gave up leads and lost heartbreakers with soul-crushing frequency) and failing to grasp the impact of his words and actions off the field. He increased the bitterness by careless words and not working hard enough at building relationships.

The “Michigan Family” takes a beating as well. The story is full of petty jealousy and bickering that undermined a high-quality coach – and, by all accounts, a genuinely good person — and also the very program and institution that Michigan people claimed to love and support (and, in many cases, the employer who paid them large sums of money).

What strikes me as truly amazing, however, is the dedication and commitment of so many of the players despite the never-ending negativity and criticism. After a rocky start, and with a few exceptions, Rodriguez molded a team that fought hard and cared deeply for their teammates and their school. The same cannot be said of too many of the adults tasked with supporting them.

On Saturday, some who endured this epic soap opera have a chance for some redemption. If new head coach Brady Hoke can lead his team to victory in this edition of The Game (against a 6–5 Buckeye team mired in scandal) it would portend an end to the dark cloud hanging over Ann Arbor since that fateful day five years ago when the heart and soul of Michigan football passed away.

And maybe, just maybe, Michigan’s return to greatness can really begin.

Related articles

• ‘Three And Out’: A College Football Coach, Undone In Mythical Fashion (npr.org)

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Jeff Pearlman‘s biography of Walter Payton has stirred some controversy. Shocking, I know, in this culture of celebrity and shock marketing.  But I also thinks it raises some interesting questions. Do we really want to know the history of iconic figures?  In particular, do we want to know the ugly details of our sports heroes?  Obviously, there is a market for books that offer salacious gossip about the lives of the famous. But is there something wrong with publishing the unseemly details of the life of a football player that is a hero to many; someone that seemed to represent all that is good about professional sports?

Sports Illustrated writer Peter King weighs in with his thoughts:

When the furor over the Walter Payton biography Sweetness: The Enigmatic Life of Walter Payton surfaced last month, I told you I’d pass along my thoughts when I’d read it. Now that I have, I can tell you it’s terrific.

The painstaking detail is what makes this one of the best sports biographies I’ve ever read.

[...]

You pass judgment on whether a book about a beloved figure that both glorifies and tarnishes him should be written. My judgment is it should. Payton was a superstar, a public figure of national significance for 25 years. Were we demanding to know he used drugs and philandered and at times was a bad teammate with the Bears? No. But figures of renown are subjects of books all the time, and Payton’s life, as it turns out, is beyond interesting. It’s compelling. It’s most often riveting, particularly the parts about his formative years in the Deep South. It’s real history, not the gauzy stuff.

Oh. And the prologue of Sweetness … The first page of the book is jarring. It can’t get better than Pearlman’s meeting with Walter Payton. But the rest of the book lives up to the promise of the first page. It’s that good.

I am torn. It sounds like a fascinating book and full of great details about both Payton and the NFL, but I am not sure I really want to know the truth at this point. Perhaps I prefer to keep my unsullied view of Walter Payton. Perhaps I want to hang on to my icon rather than the real person behind it (flawed yes, but also compelling and real).

What about you? Do like to read iconoclastic biographies?  Do you prefer to keep your heroes on a pedestal?

Related articles

• Jeff Pearlman surprised at backlash: “I love Walter Payton” (profootballtalk.nbcsports.com)
• Ditka calls controversial Payton book “gutless” (espn.go.com)

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The sting is beginning to wear off from the heartbreaking Super Bowl loss of my beloved Pittsburgh Steelers – but that game is likely to haunt Steeler fans for a while.

Continuing my attempt at topical or themed reading, I decided to read an appropriate book in the two weeks leading up to Super Bowl XLV.

And one that was in the TBR pile fit perfectly: The Ones Who Hit the Hardest: The Steelers, the Cowboys, the ’70s, and the Fight for America’s Soul.

Steeler fans, those intersted in the history of the NFL and those with a connection to Pittsburgh will want to check this one out.

While at times the differing threads sit awkwardly together, and it is certainly a Steeler focused perspective, but I found it be an engaging and interesting read.

This was a perfect book to read during Super Bowl week. As the title indicates, the book weaves in threads of the Pittsburgh Steelers, Dallas Cowboys and the history of the industrial labor movement to capture the NFL in the ’70s.

For me the three threads varied in interest. Not surprisingly, I found the history of the Steelers absolutely fascinating. The authors do a great job revealing exactly how the Steelers ended up building the incredible dynasty of the 70′s by following Chuck Noll‘s careful plan (build through the draft, mold new players to the system, etc.). They also offer insights into the lives and personalities of the players and their relationship with each other and coach Noll.

It was interesting to learn about the background and personalities of Hall of Fame players like Mean Joe Green, Jack Lambert, Terry Bradshaw and Franco Harris. It was also interesting to read about how all these larger than life personalities came together – or didn’t at times – to play as a team.

You learn how Noll basically let Greene do what he wanted since he inspired and motivated the entire defense (not to mention struck fear into opponents). But when it came to the offensive side of the ball Noll struggled to trust Bradshaw and frequently lost his temper with the young QB. It really wasn’t until they won their first Super Bowl that Bradshaw had the confidence he needed.

While the labor history sections were interesting at times, and they provided a better understanding of the city of Pittsburgh and Steeler fans, it didn’t always seem to be going anywhere. At the end you felt like you knew more but were less clear how it all related.

The Cowboys section was equally interesting in terms of owners, players and coaches – the personalities and histories – but it just wasn’t as well developed and flushed out as the sections on the Steelers. The Cowboys were obviously a rival for the Steelers and they reflected a totally different mindset and culture so it makes sense to contrast the two teams and the authors succeed in highlighting the contrasting styles and teams. But it is clearly a Steeler focused book – which is fine with me but worth noting.

This is one of those books where the whole almost seems more than the parts. Not every section works, and all the threads are not neatly wrapped up by the end, but the stories along the way are so interesting that you don’t mind.

In the end what you get is a snapshot history of the NFL in the 1970s through the lens of the Pittsburgh Steelers and Dallas Cowboys with the labor movement of the steel mills as a background. For Steeler fans I think this is a must read – although those with a strong knowledge of the team in the 70s might already be aware of much of the history.

Anyone interested in the NFL or sports history, however, would find this a fascinating read.

Synopsis

There’s a reason you like sports more than politics.It’s because sports make sense and Washington doesn’t. In sports, you have to play by the rules, but in Washington they constantly change the rules to reward special interests they like and punish those they don’t. In sports, referees know how to stay out of the action; the players are the stars. But in Washington, congressmen, senators, and bureaucrats think they’re the stars, and that regulation, not freedom and competition, makes America work. In sports, players know you win or lose as a team, but how many politicians think of “Team America” rather than their petty self-interests?

No one knows sports and politics better than George Allen. The son of a Hall of Fame football coach, and a college quarterback and rugby player himself, Allen has also been a United States Senator and Governor of Virginia. He’s seen the worlds of sports and politics close up, and he knows which one he prefers— it’s the same one you do, because sports work and Washington doesn’t. In What Washington Can Learn from the World of Sports, Allen blends sports anecdotes—memorable, funny, and nostalgic—with the political issues we face, drawing out the principles of sports that have real world applications to our national life and politics.

So I have to credit Michael Rosenberg for coming up with a new angle to approach this classic subject.  His book, War As They Knew It: Woody Hayes, Bo Schembechler, and America in a Time of Unrest, uses the backdrop of the protest movement in the era of Vietnam and Watergate to situate this sports rivalry within the culture and history of the time.

This allows him to portray the players and coaches as human beings with opinions and emotions beyond the football field while reminding the reader that the university, and the surrounding community, obviously had to deal with a lot more than just the success of the football team.

But while this background is interesting – the different levels of political agitation on the Ohio State versus Michigan campus for example – what really makes the book shine is Rosenberg’s portrait of Woody Hayes.

By placing Hayes in this historical context and by connecting his work as a coach with his unique personality and background – his inspirations, dreams and deep seated beliefs – Rosenberg captures Hayes as a multidimensional person rather than simply as an icon or caricature.

Rosenberg highlights two figures, among others, who made an impact on Hayes life: General George S. Patton and Ralph Waldo Emerson.  And at key moments in the story we see how these influences made Hayes the man he was.  Military history and tactics were never far from Woody’s mind and he regularly used the language of war to describe football.  This is interesting but not shocking or hard to understand.

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But Rosenberg’s use of Emerson quotes to flush out why Hayes might have acted the way he did or had the attitude he did jump out at the reader.  It is hard to believe that a Transcendentalist poet/essayist would best capture the mindset of the famous coach but Rosenberg makes a strong case that this is one of the most effective windows into understanding Hayes’ life.

Rosenberg also helps show how Hayes was a traditionalist in an age of upheaval and conflict.  He frequently visited the troops in Vietnam and supported the war until the bitter end.  He became friends with Richard Nixon and was upset when the president resigned; l seeing that act as cowardice in the face of your enemies.

Of course Hayes is most known for his temper on and off the football field.  Rosenberg discusses the theatrical nature of his temper when trying to reach his team – and how this seemed to decrease in usefulness over time.  He also makes note of the role diabetes may have played in his temper; including the actions that led to his being fired.

Hayes, however, always saw himself as a teacher.  He was deeply read in history (particularly military history) and was engaged with politics and current events.  Even in the era of student protests and anti-war demonstrations he continued to reach out to young people and he was always ready to decry what he saw as an assault on the traditional values that made America great.  Hayes may have been increasingly at odds with the spirit of his age but he never stopped wrestling with it and attempting to make an impact.  His competitive drive and energy drove him to never quit trying.

Hayes was clearly an incredibly unique individual who burst onto the college football scene and left an indelible imprint.  But he was also a product of his time and time eventually passed him by; or caught up with him depending on your perspective.  There seem to be some parallels with his friend Richard Nixon in this.  Both men built impressive careers before being brought down by poor judgment.  And both men attempted to live out the remainder of their lives so as to not be defined by those infamous acts; with mixed success.

Rosenberg covers the other side of the field as well, but Bo Schembechler doesn’t stand out quite like Hayes.  The iconic Bo really develops after this “Ten Year War” period.  Sure, the personality is there but it doesn’t quite blossom until after Hayes recedes.  But this history is a neccesary foundation for understanding the events that were to come.

The other character who stands out in the book is Michigan athletic director Dan Canham.  Canham was a critical figure in the development of modern college sports and in many ways made Michigan football the marketing giant that it is.  It seems off that this influential figure is not better known outside of sports historians.

War As They Knew It is much more than a sports book.  Sure, it is a fascinating story about one of college football’s greatest rivalries and the coaches who put it on the map.  But it is also a valuable look into the time period through the lens of college athletics.  You don’t have to be a fan of Michigan or Ohio state football to enjoy the story because the characters and events involved transcend sports.

Of course, if you are a fan of either program and their legendary coaches this is a must read.  And really anyone interested in the history and development of college football would do well to check it out.  You will come away with a better understanding of how the schools became the dominant programs in the conference and even the nation at times.  And you will understand better the men behind these programs as they faced each other in intense competition on the field and dealt with the tumultuous times outside the stadium and practice field