A+ Rod

The Wolverine fan who send me last week's discussion on a new coach sends me this follow-up on Rodriguez:

I'm thrilled with the hire. I didn't really consider him as a candidate because he turned down an offer from Alabama last year to stay with his alma mater,and I just assumed he couldn't be pried away. Not sure if you know this (I didn't), but he's pretty much credited with inventing the spread option offense that's all the rage in college football right now. Did it while he was head coach at Glenville Stat, wherever the hell that is. It feels great to have an innovator as our coach.

The only question mark about him is the character of some of the players that he recruited to WVU--Adam"Pacman" Jones, for one. But the generally feeling about that is he won't have to take chances on people to get top talent to come to UM. Everything else seems to be a strong positive. This truly is the dawning of a new age for Michigan football. For the first time in almost 40 years, the coach won't be Bo or a Bo assistant. Though Rodriguez played for former Bo asst. Don Nehlen at WVU, so I guess there's still a tenuous connection.

John Bacon, who wrote the most recent Bo book, and worked closely with Bo for a year and a half on it, said a month or so ago, when the rumor was that Kirk Ferentz was going to be offered the job, that Bo thought the two best current college coaches (obviously current when Bo was still alive) were Kirk Ferentz & Rich Rodriguez. One more thing, he's not the first West Virginian hired to coach football at UM. The other was Fielding Yost.