Mike Leach FIRED according to ESPN

[RedStar]

I didn't know about this. How did Cutcliff mesh poorly with the UM culture?

For sure. They were looking for a reason to fire him after his first year, but he just kept winning. He was the most successful coach they had in years, but he never took to the Oxford way of life. He didn't really mingle with alumni and was more of a bluejeans wearin' kinda guy. Keep in mind that he was 40-22 before his final season at Ole Miss that ended 4-7. The surprising thing is that the Ogre did find a way to fit in, and if he had found a way to beat MSU in his final season, he would have been around for another year. Oxford thinks very, very highly of themselves.

 

[kfo9494]

Went to the Texas Tech Scout Board.
They are going to need the national guard if Adam James goes back to school.
For his safety, he will never attend another class in Lubbock.

 

[RedStar]

Agreed - unless the case is already being tried in the court of public opinion...

That started the second ESPN began their propaganda. They should have realized there'd be a backlash. They've only been in business for 30 years.

 

[Giant Squid]

Went to the Texas Tech Scout Board.
They are going to need the national guard if Adam James goes back to school.
For his safety, he will never attend another class in Lubbock.

He must be having an amazing time travelling with the team on their bowl trip!

 

[bayoutider]

Employers need to be very cautious when the fire an employee who is suing them.

Imagine Apple or Dell or Ford have a woman that is being sexually harassed by her boss yet HR does nothing. The woman files a suit against her company.

If that company fires her then they give her the right to sue for wrongful termination AND they come off with a lot of bad publicity. I think it would be pretty costly for a company to do this especially for cases that may have a lot of visibility.

You are absolutely right. As a former employer of both union and non union workers I know that there is a right way and a wrong way to fire someone. When you have someone handed their pink slip you better have all your ducks in a row. We used a documented process of verbal warning, written warning, second written warning and gone.

 

[jps1983]

I agree - he seems to have been wronged by his employer. But, just as he made a poor decision in his dicsipline, he made a poor decision is allowing his lawyer to talk him into this legal action - unless his aim was to prompt the firing (in which case my estimation of his lawyer's abilities just went through the roof :biggrin2

Since I went to law school at Tech, I saw his lawyer, and he's a good attorney. The thinking was probably a win-win for Leach. If he goes for the TRO, he gets a day in court to get his story out there and would at least get a chance to coach his team in a bowl game (even if denied, he had the chance to go back and coach) OR the school goes ahead and fires him w/o cause (even though they say there is) in which case Leach gets a lot of $$ from the AD that didn't want him. That's a win-win for Leach, even though his players get the short end of the stick. The AD and the James family are probably not going to be in public in Lubbock for a while. The undergrads at the school are kinda crazy.

 

[GeorgiaTider]

And Tiger Woods says, "Thank you". :biggrin:

^^^This.

 

[NYBamaFan]

That started the second ESPN began their propaganda. They should have realized there'd be a backlash. They've only been in business for 30 years.

You are conservative and believe in individual responsibility. James made a mistake. Leach followed it up with a mistake. James will be held accountable for acting like a "rat" for the rest of his life. Leach deserves to be held accountable for his reaction to James.

To shift the blame from Leach for his bizzare behavior onto ESPN, James or anyone else is absurd, IMO. As Coach Saban says - you can control your actions, but you cannot control their consequences. Sometimes they get away from you...

 

[BAMAHD]

Same thing - you do not take your employer to court if you want to keep your job in any profession (unless you are union :biggrin...

You guys dug up the end zone at Giants stadium yet.

 

[NYBamaFan]

You guys dug up the end zone at Giants stadium yet.

No, but I have read a number of articles about it already... :biggrin:

 

[RedStar]

You are conservative and believe in individual responsibility. James made a mistake. Leach followed it up with a mistake. James will be held accountable for acting like a "rat" for the rest of his life. Leach deserves to be held accountable for his reaction to James.

To shift the blame from Leach for his bizzare behavior onto ESPN, James or anyone else is absurd, IMO. As Coach Saban says - you can control your actions, but you cannot control their consequences. Sometimes they get away from you...

And this is where we disagree. I don't see what Leach did as an absurd, or cruel form of punishment, and I'd be willing to bet a majority of people agree. Punishing a kid with an attitude problem by putting him in a dark room (with a bike, trainers, water, air conditioning) for a few hours isn't absurd. Even if he had a concussion, he was actually following the Dr's orders. Keep him out of sunlight? He did. Have trainers and medical personnel there to check on him? He did. Have water in case he was thirsty? He did.

To take away a coaches ability to discipline his players is absurd. Esp. when he was following Dr's orders.

 

[rizolltizide]

Whatever.

Let it be said.

:biggrin:

 

[PaulD]

The question now really is, were Leach's actions serious enough that the school could legally fire him for cause. That's not going to be an easy case for the school to make. I think most everyone can read between the lines and see what's really going on. This firing was less about the treatment of the player, and more about the discontent between Leach and the Tech administration.

The contract has a provision that "Coach shall assure the fair and responsible treatment of student-athletes in relation to their health, welfare, and discipline." I'm sure that TTU said that's what he violated. I'm also pretty sure that he will sue (or at least threaten to sue) for breach of contract. I'll be quite surprised if sometime in the future on page 6, we'll read that they settled.

 

[WishIwasInBama]

You are conservative and believe in individual responsibility. James made a mistake. Leach followed it up with a mistake. James will be held accountable for acting like a "rat" for the rest of his life. Leach deserves to be held accountable for his reaction to James.

To shift the blame from Leach for his bizzare behavior onto ESPN, James or anyone else is absurd, IMO. As Coach Saban says - you can control your actions, but you cannot control their consequences. Sometimes they get away from you...

I disagree with some of this. yes both Leach and James were wrong in one way or another but there is different points of view out there as to the reason of the punishment. now i am not saying anyone has to agree or not with one or the other but there are a lot of media outlets running with the James is a trouble maker story and that was the reason for the "punishment" but ESPN is running with daddy's story of his son was mistreated solely because he had a concussion. I blame ESPN for that if for nothing else than to only publish the story of your employee makes you seem that your not treating this subject objectively and they are in fact influencing public opinion in James's favor. These types of story's just make me believe that College football will be covered much like politics, you will go to ESPN to get the NBC news version and somewhere else to get the Fox News version.

 

[NYBamaFan]

And this is where we disagree. I don't see what Leach did as an absurd, or cruel form of punishment, and I'd be willing to bet a majority of people agree...

Cool - we can agree to disagree - but plenty of people agree with me that his punishment was bizarre and needed to be addressed. In fact, while the talk shows are split on whether or not Leach deserved to be suspended for it, most agreed that is was irrational and bizarre.

Most importantly, his employer believed that...

 

[RedStar]

Cool - we can agree to disagree - but plenty of people agree with me that his punishment was bizarre and needed to be addressed. In fact, while the talk shows are split on whether or not Leach deserved to be suspended for it, most agreed that is was irrational and bizarre.

Most importantly, his employer believed that...

I'll even admit that it may have been a bit bizarre. But not bizarre enough to warrant anything more than a comment such as "what a weird guy." Certainly not bizarre enough to become such a huge news story. It wasn't cruel, especially in regards to his injury, which is why it was such big news in the first place.

Either way that's not a legitimate excuse for firing someone.

 

[WishIwasInBama]

Cool - we can agree to disagree - but plenty of people agree with me that his punishment was bizarre and needed to be addressed. In fact, while the talk shows are split on whether or not Leach deserved to be suspended for it, most agreed that is was irrational and bizarre.

Most importantly, his employer believed that...

I completely agree that it was bizarre, but if putting a kid in a dark room gets you fired then I just wish my dad was a senator cause my Drill Sergeant did some things to me in basic training that should get them life in jail

 

[bamatex82]

Cool - we can agree to disagree - but plenty of people agree with me that his punishment was bizarre and needed to be addressed. In fact, while the talk shows are split on whether or not Leach deserved to be suspended for it, most agreed that is was irrational and bizarre.

Most importantly, his employer believed that...

What is so absurd about the punishment? It's no different than having your child put his nose in the corner. Leach did not endanger James in anyway, shape, or form.

 

[BAMAHD]

The only ones ive seen calling it irrational and bizarre are James ESPN buddies, And when they talk you can tell their tongues are tied and they cant say what they want.
The biggest mistake Leach made keeping around and allowing a KNOWN bad seed to tear his team apart.

 

[NYBamaFan]

I'll even admit that it may have been a bit bizarre. But not bizarre enough to warrant anything more than a comment such as "what a weird guy." Certainly not bizarre enough to become such a huge news story. It wasn't cruel, especially in regards to his injury, which is why it was such big news in the first place.

Either way that's not a legitimate excuse for firing someone.

This is only news because Leach refused to apologize when asked to do so by his employer.

Someone from Lubbock just said that Leach's challenge to the suspension was that there was nothing in his contract that allowed for a suspension. He said that the legal challenge probably led to the decision to fire him immediately, as the suspension might have been overturned on that basis... :conf3: