Apologize to Ty?  No Way. George Streeter

I’ve been bothered by the recent number of people, mostly sports talk show hosts and their callers, who have complained about the “unfair” firing of coach Tyrone Willingham by the University of Notre Dame. These talking heads also believe that ND owes an apology to coach Willingham for his premature dismissal. An apology? Are you kidding me? Is that how soft we have become as a society? Since when does any employer have to apologize for firing an employee who wasn’t performing up to standards?  Since when is it acceptable to go 21-15 over a three year period at Notre Dame?

Notre Dame athletic director Kevin White learned his lesson when he kept Bob Davie around for five years while the program slipped into mediocrity. Davie was actually given an extension the year prior to his firing after leading ND to the Fiesta Bowl. Why was there no outcry when Davie was fired? Was it fair to give him an extension and then fire him a year later after a poor season? Sure it was. That’s how it works at Notre Dame. Win now or get fired.       I don’t seem to recall anyone calling for an apology during Charlie Weis’s first two seasons at ND, seasons in which the team went a combined 19-6 and made two BCS bowl appearances. No, the outcry comes three years into Weis’s tenure when his team has struggled to a 1-5 start. Just for the record: Willingham’s University of Washington team is a stellar 2-3.  Why wasn’t anyone calling for an apology when Weis’s first Irish team went out to Seattle and beat Ty’s UW team by a score of 36-17? In all honesty, it was Willingham’s inability to recruit that has put Weis and the Irish in this current mess. The talent in ND’s junior and senior classes, Ty’s final two recruiting classes as ND head coach, have been compared to the talent at a MAC school. Good luck beating the Michigan’s and USC’s of the world with that kind of talent, or lack thereof.

I don’t seem to recall anyone calling for an apology when Weis delivered back-to-back top-10 recruiting classes, something Willingham failed to do at ND. I didn’t hear anyone complain when Jimmy Clausen, the #1 ranked player in his high school class, committed to play for Weis and the Irish. Anyone who knows anything about college football knows that you need strong upper classes to be successful. Hell, that’s true at any level (unless you’re talking about college basketball, which only employs players for 2 years).  Imagine taking a high school junior varsity team and having them play a full varsity schedule: that wouldn’t turn out too well. That’s what I compare the 2007 Fighting Irish to. They’ve got lots of talent in their freshman and sophomore classes, but severely lack talent in their upper classes. Who is to blame for that?  You guessed it, Ty Willingham. Yes, I know it is Weis’s job to develop these players and get the most out of them. I know he may not be doing a superb job of that, but it’s like the old saying goes: “You can polish a turd, but it’s still a turd.”      This whole situation boils down to two things: wins and progress.  Ty failed to make significant progress and he failed to deliver enough wins;  that’s the reason he was fired.  It’s like that at any major college: if you win you stay, if you lose you get canned.  It’s just that simple folks, it’s just that simple.

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