Sunday Night, Thoughts on a Fired Coach

I just finished and submitted a 37-page Marketing plan for one of my classes. I’d tell you all about it, except for a few things:

1. The plan was for a real business in the area, so a lot of the information is privileged;
2. Marketing is one of those bad habits people get into, and except for a rare few who use morals in their work, it’s not something I would want to encourage;
3. Proof-reading the paper bored me no end, and I wrote the dang thing, so I would be cruel indeed to inflict it on an innocent public.

It’s not enough I had to write it and send it in electronically; I also have to print up a hard copy on quality bond paper, and have it bound and mailed in to the professor. So, I am sitting here waiting for the printer to put out the product, which at “best quality” is taking longer than it did for Hillary Clinton to figure out that advocating drivers licenses for illegals was not a good way to win the Donk nomination, mush less the White House. So, I am plunking away at my keyboard while the printer does constructive work. Well, I also have to iron my clothes, but if there’s anything more boring than what I am doing now, it has to be ironing.

If you are still reading this, you must be as bored as I am. But, at least it’s free, except for the wasted time.

But to the topic. Earlier today, Baylor University’s Athletic Director officially announced the firing of Head Football Coach Guy Morriss. Morriss was 18-40 in five seasons at Baylor, which team lost all 8 of its Big XII conference contests, and frankly stunk up the place all season. That by itself could be a shame, except for a couple points which annoyed me and made me question Morriss’ integrity. The first part was the discovery early this summer, that Morriss had put his house up for sale. Well folks, you usually only do that if you figure you are going to have to move, and when a coach does something like that in advance of a season, it’s darn hard for me to believe he’s going to give his best effort into his job. Certainly, I watched his post-game statements with that fact in mind, and I did not like at all, what I heard and read. Also, this is a coach who promised, from before the season started, that the 2007 Baylor Bears were going to a bowl. When they reached 3-1, it might even have looked like a possibility, but a closer look at the season revealed that such a claim was hopelessly optimistic at best, and from what I could tell, completely dishonest in light of actual conditions. As the conference season got underway and progressed, Coach Morriss started becoming evasive about why his promise was not coming true, and worst of all, he started blaming the players for the losses, even when glaring errors in coaching became obvious. I could go on about the football side of things, especially my hope that Mike Singletary, College and NFL Hall of Fame Linebacker and legend to Bear fans, will be the next head coach of the Bears – pretty much no one else would have a realistic chance of recruiting real talent for Baylor right now, much less shaping the team into a winning program anytime soon. But as I read the news about Morriss’ firing, I did not feel any pleasure, not even a real sense that he deserved his dismissal. Part of that comes from having to acknowledge that I am a fan, not a professional coach, and the Big XII is a hard place to win – three of the top 5 teams in the AP rankings right now are from the Big XII, after all. I may have seen errors on Morriss’ part, but I cannot really say whether or not he was the right man for the job. I know in other places that sometimes someone enjoys success because of hard work someone else did before him. Also, I have to wonder what it is like, to work where every mistake you make is known to, and ridiculed by, countless thousands of people who can’t say they would have done better in that place.

So, Guy Morriss, while my farewell to you is not reluctant, it is sincere in my goodwill, and my thanks for your work.