chad carr

Okay. Time to go, guys.

Asked directly if he spoke to Dave Brandon over the last 48 hours, Hoke says, "There's no question about it."

— Ace Anbender (@AceAnbender) September 30, 2014

Ain't nothing to f with. God bless the Daily.

Your 1 a.m. press release will make it into our paper. So damn proud to work at the @michigandaily: pic.twitter.com/TmbXBjrBUX

— Alejandro Zúñiga (@ByAZuniga) September 30, 2014

From the paper:

“What I can tell you is we would never, ever, put a guy on the field when there is a possibility with head trauma. We won't do that.”

He later added the following in the same press conference:

“We would never, ever, if we thought a guy had a concussion, keep him in the game.”

More than 12 hours later, at 12:52 a.m. Tuesday, a statement released by Athletic Director Dave Brandon confirmed sophomore quarterback Shane Morris had indeed suffered a “probable, mild concussion” resulting from a helmet-to-helmet hit in the fourth quarter of Saturday’s game against Minnesota.

Small actions. There is a petition that anyone with a uniqname can sign that has hit 4200 signatures already. And there is a Diag rally calling for Brandon's firing at 6 PM.

This is very depressing. As you probably noticed on Saturday, Lloyd Carr's grandson has an inoperable brain tumor.

If you're inclined to pray, keep Chad in your thoughts.

All the wrong stuff. Maize and Brew:

"Without the benefit of replays." Apparently the 20 million dollars worth of scoreboard on each end of the stadium wasn't quite enough. Besides the fact that everybody in that stadium saw the replay, the bigger question is how in the world did anybody not see the hit? Even assuming every coach turned away from Shane the moment he let go of the ball and nobody saw the hit coming, shouldn't the team neurologist have his eyes glued to Shane? After all, on a passing play concussions will come either at the QB or the WR, but given his ankle injury and Michigan's offensive line concern I'd say QB was much more likely. Plus shouldn't all team health staff, medical or training, be looking at the limping QB under center? For Dave Brandon to say nobody saw the hit on the field means he either believes it or believes we will believe it. That makes him a liar, an idiot or both.

Andrew Kahn talked to the guy who does concussion stuff for the Jets and Giants:

“It was obvious to anyone who saw him in the aftermath of that hit that he was not right,” says Kenneth Perrine, a clinical neuropsychologist at New York Presbyterian/Weill-Cornell Medical College and the consulting neuropsychologist for the New York Jets and New York Islanders, where he evaluates players with concussions. “At the very least he could have sustained a concussion.”

More reactions. Spencer Hall:

if you are one of the 10 people whose primary beef is to claim it's irresponsible to say that Morris had a concussion, you have internalized the language of the law, reaching insane abstraction in defense of the indefensible. Morris took the crown of a helmet to his chin, then was visibly disoriented while having serious difficulty standing. An MMA ref would have stopped this fight cold. That's how bad this looked: an MMA event would have taken better care of Morris than a collegiate athletics staff did on Saturday.

But sure, point to the man on fire. Tell someone you don't know that man's on fire. You did spy the application of gasoline. You did see the striking of a match and the ignition of a flame on a person's body. But you don't know the fire was what did the damage, do you? Did you establish this with medical personnel? Did you obtain a record of that? Fire's done a lot for us as a species; indeed, we would be long dead without it. Don't just slander fire like that. And who can say the person applying the match knew what he was doing, for sure? Did you ask them if they have an understanding of gasoline/fire relations, chemically speaking? Prove these things, or say nothing.

Spencer's coming up for the Penn State game, by the way, so… yeah. That'll be quite a piece.

Jane Coaston:

I am an extremely loyal person. Too loyal. Especially to Michigan.

Hoke demurred to protect a player dismissed from the university for a violation of the sexual misconduct policy, and I didn't really say anything, because apparently I'm only a feminist until it gets awkward and uncomfortable. Brady Hoke explained away losing in a dipshit manner to opponents less hamstrung by idiocy, and I sighed and tried to move on, because I'm a Michigan fan.

Maize and Blue Nation with the clutch Lebowski embed:

Either Hoke is lying, or Dave Brandon chose not to include Hoke in his meetings with all related parties. One might be attempting to separate themselves from the other here, but its not going to work. This is on both of them. Hoke is Brandon's guy. That can't be undone.

The Daily:

Even 24 hours later, Hoke didn’t acknowledge the possibility of a head injury, referring only to Morris “further aggravating an injury to his leg” in a statement to reporters. He added he is “confident proper medical decisions were made.”

They very clearly were not.

Whether Hoke witnessed what occurred on the field or not, it’s his job to know everything that goes on around his football team, with the health of players at the forefront of those responsibilities.

And so it is the position from all four of us on The Michigan Daily Football Beat that Hoke be fired immediately.

The Mood hits an all time low:

The Hoover Street Rag imagines a way in which Hoke could have given a non-repulsive press conference:

Good afternoon, everyone.  After the game on Saturday, I watched the footage of Shane taking that shot to the head.  I'm embarrassed to say that I didn't catch that live, and I didn't see him stumble afterward.  That's on me.  We as coaches need to be aware of our players' safety at all times, and I failed there.

As a staff, we should have immediately gotten Shane out of that game, regardless of whether he wanted to come out.  Shane's a tough kid and a fighter, so of course he wants to stay in, but it's our job to sit him down there.

MVictors:

But why was Hoke hung out to dry and not told this was all happening?  This isn’t just a “medical report”.  If Hoke was told this was all happening, at the Monday presser could have talked about his responsibility and perspective on Saturday, but then he should have added, ‘..but we’re reviewing everything that happened to understand what mistakes (if any) were made’ and that the ‘details will be coming soon’, etc. etc.

Nick Baumgardner:

On Monday afternoon, Brandon allowed his head football coach to step to a press conference podium in an absolute no-win situation. Hoke was unprepared, unsupported and left there to face live bullets.

Alone.

On Monday afternoon, Brandon threw Hoke -- a man he hired in 2011 -- under the bus, and hung him out to dry.

Hoover Street Rag:

…the statement comes about 24 hours too late. If that statement is issued at 12:52 AM on Monday morning, there's grumbling and some side-eye. At 12:52 AM on Tuesday morning, everything has changed. Michigan has been put under the microscope on not just ESPN, but has crossed all the way over to Good Morning America. You've promised the media a "medical statement" that never really showed up, unless this is it. And you've sent your head football coach up to his press conference to stand there and look like someone's idiot cousin you wouldn't trust to run a doughnut shop, let alone a multi-million-dollar football program where young men risk their health and safety on a daily basis.

To be fair, this may be the case. Brandon's statement says that Morris was diagnosed with a concussion on Sunday. Brady Hoke didn't get in touch with his injured quarterback to ask how he's doing? Or Shane Morris didn't know he has a concussion? Neither of these seem reasonable, and one is more plausible than the other.

HSR again:

My one-year-old's still figuring out this whole language thing, but she has a couple of sentences figured out. Her first sentence was probably "Go dog go," which she uttered in order to request the book of the same name. Lately, she has been saying "Are you OK?" a lot. These two sentences are apparently enough to make her a qualified medical professional for Michigan football:

NATALIE: Are you OK?
SHANE MORRIS: I'm fine.
NATALIE (pointing Shane onto the field): Go, dog, go!

The hundred-million dollar elephant in the room. Stephen Ross on Dave Brandon:

"He's probably the most qualified athletic director in the country. I think he's terrific," said billionaire real estate developer Stephen Ross, a UM alumnus who has given the university $310 million in recent years.

This is a problem. It's a lot less of a problem than when the article came out just hours before the Minnesota game—Ross may like Brandon just fine but have we shown you these other guys who aren't flamingly incompetent?

Also in the room, Brandon's terrible contract:

Michigan signaled its approval of Brandon's work when it gave him a new contract in July 2012 that pays him a base salary of $900,000 in 2014-15. The six-year deal is through 2018, and pays him a $5.55 million base, and he can earn up to $1.3 million in deferred compensation through 2018. He gets fringe benefits such as free tickets, use of two cars, a golf club membership, and travel reimbursement for his wife.

Brandon's contract stipulates that if he's fired without cause prior to Jan. 1, 2016, the university must pay him his remaining base salary and his remaining deferred compensation. Firing him after that date reduces the payout to 50 percent of both the remaining base salary and deferred compensation.

100% guaranteed until 2016. Unbelievable. What possible reason would you have to do that?

BTW, that article includes the credulous claim that Brandon was a "finalist" for the NFL commissioner's job, something that is not true.

Cheaper. Hoke's buyout is a chump change two million, at least:

If he’s not -- if he’s fired by athletic director Dave Brandon, or the university board of regents, or U-M president Mark Schlissel or any of the above -- it will come at a heavy cost.

According to Hoke’s contract, signed on March 28, 2011, he will be owed $2 million to buy out the remaining two years (2015, 2016) left on his contract.

That's nothing compared to Weis/Ferentz level buyouts.

Much better shirt repping. This guy understands his apparel:

Etc.: Center Ice on the new blueliners. Bacon's on every radio station in the country today; here's his appearance on Here and Now yesterday. Headsetssssss. We're in the New York Times so I guess that coo—oh it's about the concussion. Also the Daily Mail.

Might?