Is David Brandon the right man?

The recent coaching search fiasco at the University of Michigan has put University Athletic Director David Brandon firmly in the crosshairs of many Michigan fans. It is not as much the fact that Brandon dismissed Rich Rodriguez after three tumultuous seasons that irks Michigan supporters. The bumbling, borderline comical manner in which Brandon conducted the subsequent search for Rodriguez's replacement is the main reason behind the dissatisfaction within the Michigan community over the hiring of Brady Hoke. While it would be inappropriate to insinuate that Michigan fans are hoping for Hoke's failure, there is a strong feeling amongst many of , that's it? Brady Hoke...the San Diego State Guy? In the days following Rodriguez's ouster, Michigan fans were bombarded with assertions from the local and national talking heads reassuring us of the status of the Michigan head coaching as being one of the elite coaching jobs in college sports. Then the reports of interest from Jim Harbaugh, Jon Gruden, and other big-named coaches in the Michigan job. This all happened before Rich Rodriguez was fired. Then came...nothing. Jim Harbaugh was courted by the Dolphins( a huge sign that he was not coming here since Stephen Ross is the Michigan booster) and ultimately ended up moving down the road to San Francisco to make $5 million a year and have a legitimate chance at winning the NFC West next season. Jon Gruden is still in the broadcast booth, Gary Patterson is building a kingdom at TCU, and Chris Peterson really, really likes Boise. We are left holding ourselves at the altar like a jilted bride, when our knight in a shining white baseball cap arrived.

Les Miles entered the picture as a viable(at least in our eyes) candidate to restore the Michigan empire. He wasn't perfect. He chewed grass, he may or may have not have done something inappropriate with a fellow coach's significant other as a young coach here, he may not have any idea of what down it is or how much time is left on the clock, or even how many players he's supposed to have on the field, but damnit Les Miles has four 11 win seasons in six years with a National Title and an SEC title (or two?). On top of that he fulfilled the apparently mandatory requirement that the head coach of Michigan have some tie to the Bo Schembechler era. Les Miles was a former Michigan player and coach. The man even met his wife in Ann Arbor while he was a student. This was his chance to finish his coaching career in its rightful place. We would forgive him when he cost us a game against Purdue when we forgot to spike the ball as long as he could beat Ohio State 2 out of 3 years. He essentially would have been Lloyd Carr (1998-2003) with advanced clock management dementia. This could have been Les Miles's second chance at the Michigan job and it definitely was his last and he turned it down. He turned it down to make less money and have a lower buyout at LSU. The fact that a coach would turn down more money to coach at his alma mater and return to a school where he is on a constant hot seat for less money and a cheaper buyout is interesting.

Then came the swift hiring of Brady Hoke. Within hours of being rejected( or so we thought?) by Les Miles, Michigan had found their man. The obvious third( or last in the eyes of many fans) choice for the Wolverines was the former Ball State and San Diego State coach. He had a career record of 47-50 and some were skeptical of his ability to retain Denard Robinson. The Hoke supporters trumpeted the return of a "Michigan Man". The people against Hoke's hiring were not so much skeptical of the man himself( personally, I think we will be ok with him) but rather David Brandon's inability to prevent media leaks and internet gossip from being accepted as fact combined with the Athletic Department coating Schembechler Hall in secrecy sheets during the entire hiring process. I found it rather odd, that despite admitting to speaking with Jim Harbaugh and admitting to meeting with Les Miles, that David Brandon only offered the job to Brady Hoke. That is ridiculous and it is difficult to pull the wool over the eyes of such an educated fan base. Are we to believe that his conversations with Harbaugh and Miles were about Michigan's football program and that he didn't use that opportunity to at least gauge their interest? If he didn't at least ask Jim Harbaugh and Les Miles if they were interested then David Brandon should be taken to the Tri-Delt house and used as an STD petri dish. Something is fishy on State Street and it certainly isn't the BOX house. I think that we might have erred in hiring a private sector CEO like Brandon to be our AD. The two worlds are not alike. We have to think about hiring a coach that will fill up the stadium, pay off the stadium, and keep us winning big so we can continue to build genetics labs and new dorms. Brandon seems to have made a decision for the good old boy network of alumni and I think that if it is unsuccessful it will cause a huge rift between the old and young alumni.