| Page 2 of 2 < |
Lame-Duck Coaches Face Cloudy Future
|
TOOLBOX
   Resize
COMMENT
 Discussion Policy
 CLOSE
Comments that include profanity or personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed. Finally, we will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or privacy policies or any other policies governing this site. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions. You are fully responsible for the content that you post.
Who's Blogging  |
A 31-7 loss at Louisville that year dropped Miami to 1-2 and, after a summer marred by several off-field incidents that required police involvement, provided impetus for the talk of Coker's firing. The discussion grew louder after an on-field brawl during an Oct. 14 game against Florida International that led to the suspension of 13 Hurricanes players. On Nov. 7, defensive lineman Bryan Pata was shot and killed near his campus area apartment.
By then, the fervor had developed a high-pitched volume.
"The toughest thing about the whole deal that I detested was that it becomes more about the coach than it does [about] the team," said Coker, now an ESPNU analyst. "You just look at all the negative comments and the 'Is he going to be back? Is he not going to be back?' and all those things, not from anybody that really has any credibility, but from the things you read and the things you see. And the players are aware of that. They watch ESPN. They read the newspapers."
Despite being aware of the growing public turmoil surrounding his job status, Coker said he always felt he was coming back the next year, right up until he was fired the day after a win over Boston College ended a 6-6 regular season.
One element Coker did not have to endure was his boss making public statements about -- and drawing even more attention to -- his standing in the program. Robinson learned this week he is not so fortunate.
"It isn't working out," Gross said in a telephone interview this week. "It's very disappointing. [Robinson] has some work to do out in front of him."
With Gross's disparaging statements on record, Robinson won't be able to claim ignorance of the tenuous status he held as Syracuse's football coach during the 2008 season. Much like Roof, Robinson will be left only to acknowledge his profession's most sobering truth.
"Did I see it coming?" Roof said. "I knew we needed to win more football games."
