RR to AA?

Rich Rodriguez is going to Michigan. All I can say is thank God, perhaps ESPN will quit making up stories about Les Miles leaving LSU for Ann Arbor. It's one thing for Kirk Herbstreit to announce on the day of the SEC Championship that Miles is leaving - and be completely wrong. It's another thing for ESPN to report, two days after he signs an extension with LSU no less, that Miles lied when he denied he was leaving, and will in fact be going to the Wolverines. Would you be surprised if Stuart Scott came onto SportsCenter tonight and declared that Rich Rodriguez's real name is Les Miles, and that the embattled Tigers coach is in fact going to be Michigan's head coach?

Furthermore, there has been great praise from media darlings about Michigan pulling off a great hire. Whether this comes to fruition is not can be debated. Personally, I think you are looking at a situation like what you have in Florida - you can expect the spread offense to work in most cases, until you match up with a team with the same talent and speed as you have. Florida finished this year 9-3 under the vaunted attack of spread option guru Urban Meyer. His National Title from last year was the result of his defense (a defense recruited by Ron Zook, by the way). The Wolverines may find out that the "greatest hire in Michigan history" might become the next Bill Callahan of college football.

Still, you gotta give the folks in Ann Arbor credit. Not many schools are willing to plunge into the athletic department of another instiution so brutally as Michigan has with regards to West Virgina in the past 8 months. They have taken their highly regarded football coach this week, and just a few months back, lured John Beilien from the bench of a budding Mountaineer basketball program. My how the college world has turned, when folks in Michigan are picking through the boondocks of Morgantown for the next great coach.

As for fans of West Virginia who feel betrayed, angry, upset, hurt, cheated, or any of the like - I have one word for you. Pittsburgh. You might be losing a coach able to manage a high score spread attack, but when it comes to the biggest of big games, he'll always come up short. In the illustruous West Virginia career of RR, the best win of his program was - Louisville in 2005?

Come to think of it, has Michigan dropped the ball with this hire? I bid they have indeed, and RR will be back coaching his flag football offense in a subrate conference befor the end of this decade.