Welcome (back) to the Friday Feedback. It’s been a long time since we gathered under this roof for this occasion. I don’t even know where to start today, but I think the best and most appropriate point is where it all began. Check the comments — and the range of content across two days — to see where we started both fundamentally and emotionally. You know where it ended, but just revisit the beginning and the early phases of the story’s development.

In the same ways we revisit the blog posts from December 2007 and on to crack open the time capsule and see what in the world happened as Rich Rodriguez ditched WVU and WVU battled back — if you haven’t, you should; it’s what established us here — we’ll look back on the past two weeks to review another seismic shift.

And this is where I begin some housekeeping …

I really want to steer clear of the way the story was covered and how the media kind of doubted and turned on the media like no other time I’ve witnessed here, but I was dragged into it by some people.

Look, some things were written and reported, both early and late in the story, that blow my mind. I mean, I was shocked by how removed some stories were. The totality featured many of the negative traits that give this profession a bad name and a dirty profile. This job is built on trust — that is, who I trust, who trusts me, who you trust — and I hope you took notes on your end as to where you can go and who and what you can can trust now.

If not, you can look at mine.

And speaking of you, I hope you pardon this humblebrag. I did a lot of television and radio recently — only said “No” to one and I’ll give you a guess who that was — because I felt it was right to stand with the story and stay ahead of it. There was nothing to hide from, never. Anyhow, there are candid conversations over the phone and through text or email before and after these spots and many, many people had nice things to say about the reporting, but many, many people also said how much they enjoyed the blog and the smart and funny and fair and equal contributions from the commenters.

I always try and I always feel like I come up short, but I can’t thank you folks enough for that. I can’t. We’re even approaching a consensus civility among the contributors. Again, there is no right or wrong in what you put below the posts. There may be popular and unpopular, but I think we understand we can put anything on the table. If it tastes like crap, don’t eat it, but don’t insult the cook, either.

Also, many thanks for putting up with some slow times before the story broke. I tried to explain it before, but I was working on something entirely different before and that evolved into two more totally different stories and one that was far bigger than we ever expected. Those things take time and detail and the collateral damage was seen in vacancies here, as well as in the newspaper.

And guess who has a few days off next week?!?!

Onto the Feedback — which will begin with last Friday’s post announcing Stewart’s resignation. I have a rear view mirror, but I can only see so far. As always, comments appear as posted. In other words … eh, this is kind of sad.

The 25314 said:

The king is dead, LONG LIVE THE KING!

Touching.

Michael said:

Stewpidity reveals its Cupidity and the Reign of Error endeth.

I didn’t see that in any newspaper Saturday.

Bill said:

I really cant believe the number of idiots in the media bringing up Rich Rod today. Watching PTI right now. I used to respect these guys. I also cant believe the number of people actually seeing Stew as the victim here.

I cant wait until we start blowing up the win column to make all these people shut their yappers.

… actually, I can make a very good argument for the return of King Richard of Ann Arbor.

Birch said:

Ahem…Billy was a good recruiter, and a decent coach. He was one of us. He was a man who loved squinting… and Tommy James and the Shondells, and as a reader he explored the battles of Franco-Prussian War, from Brandenburg to Pomerania and… up to… Silesia. He died, like so many young men of his generation, he died before his time. In your wisdom, Lord, you took him, as you took so many bright flowering young men at Columbus, at Ann Arbor, at Lubbock. These young men gave their lives. And so would Billy. Billy, who loved Tommy James and the Shondells . And so, William F. Stewart, in accordance with what we think your dying wishes might well have been, we commit your final mortal remains to the bosom of The WVU Sports Blog with Mike Casazza, which you loved so well. Good night, sweet prince.

Farewell.

S.D. Smith said:

P-Rod speculation on ESPN where they advertise Weed prominently. Coincidence?

You think about that.

Cheers, Holgerson. I’m for the West Virginia coach whoever it is and I’m glad it’s you. And thanks for spending a few seconds reading this comment when you could have been out…nevermind.

Go Mountaineers!

I’m serious. I can make a case and you might even agree with me.

JP said:

In an interview with Holgy yesterday, Mike Leach declined to take the bait of Jack Arute’s suggestion to join the staff. I doubt Leach is interested in being an assistant. Too much ego.

Yeah, that was interesting. He’s got to get back in the game. I wonder if he really thinks a head coaching job is his next job.

pushthebutton said:

What does this mean for the future of @stuffstewsays?

Oh, it was active up to the capstone Friday night. The bigger question, for me, is what happens to this guy?

LP said:

Best part of presser by far was Mickey telling OL he was blind and OL cracking a little smile.

Eh, it took up like three minutes of a nine-minute press conference, so I disagree.

r said:

It’s my hope that Huggy mentors Holgorsen on how to be responsible. You may fall over and hit your head but don’t drive.

It’s happening.

jtmountaineer said:

Be…sure…to…drink…your…Kent State? Ken State?

This doesn’t taste so good, I gather. Also, I wonder if this clever comment is lost on some.

SheikYbuti said:

This particular mystery should have remained undiscovered in favor of a more interesting one. The Golden Flashes should provide a modest RPI boost, a la Oakland or Cleveland State, but given the buildup of a few weeks ago, I was sort of expecting Curly Neal and Meadowlark Lemon.

I’ll take the blame here … it’s the right thing to do. I turned a January quote into something bigger than it needed to be. This was supposed to be a story about how the schedule comes together, but we created something else. I’m guilty of making my obsession your obsession. The whole thing changed when WVU defined who is and is not a mid-major and a lot of the popular picks were removed from the conversation. KSU isn’t bad, though.

philip said:

luck had too much faith in a man’s capacity for withstanding pain without complaint. i know i did.

Right, but let’s be honest: Part of this is on Luck, too. A small part — and we have to assume this was all his idea — but a still a part. I keep going back to this: If WVU in December considered the transition and the worst-case scenario, I’d have to think what (allegedly) happened is beyond what they envisioned as the worst case. If they knew then what they know now …

Dave said:

The “right thing to do” would be to state why the change was made.

Why is the change made? Did Stewart do something to make the change necessary? If so, he needs to own it.

If not, then he needs a reprieve because his reputation is at stake.

Agreed, but I’d stop short of granting the reprieve. The press conference was oddly muted when compared to the one in December when Luck laid out why Stewart was done. The prepared statement Friday tied a lot of hands, and that may have to do with the agreement the two sides signed earlier in the day. I also wonder if the administration side worked in concert with the athletic department side. The statement came from Stewart Hall, not the Coliseum. Perhaps Luck was surprised by what it said. We’ll figure that out eventually.

oklahoma mountaineer said:

The saga of this coaching change is a textbook example of leadership failure…..the failure really doesn’t occur in June, but rather November 2010.

Oliver Luck is not happy with the coaching quality of the WVU staff. He calls Stew into his office and gives him two alteratives under threat of termination for cause resulting from the practice sanctions on his watch.

Has Stew looked overmatched as the Head Coach of this program at times? Absolutely

Does Holgerson have the potential to raise the fortunes of the team offensively, and potentially, as the Head Coach? Absolutely

The problem is not the solution, but the path to get there. You tell a man he’s not measuring up, then task him to “train” his replacement. You can spin that publicly, that he’s ready to move on, and that is some what acceptable.

Luck chose not to do that — saying that the change is because he is not capable of leading WVU to a national championship. At that point, failure was all but assured. Luck created an enemy for himself and Holgerson by stripping Stew of his dignity in a public manner.

Regardless of the subsequent events, he ensured bad blood for the remainder of Stew’s tenure. Stripping a man of his dignity causes him to do things he normally would not even consider.

Do I think Stew did what he is accused of? Probably.

Do I blame him? Not really — he is human and it was naive of Luck and, really us, to think him capable of maintaining the professionalism necessary to make this transition successful.

Do I think that changes needed to be made on the coaching staff starting at the top? Yes.

It’s too bad that the era will be remembered for this……Stew is a better man that he was a coach…..and this tarnishes this regardless if you are for him or against him.

I will think he did his best for the school up to the point when his dignity was stripped of him by the failure of his boss and the school.

Nothing wrong with that.

rekterx said:

I’m pretty sure that Ollie and Stew will have little more, if any, to say about things. Maybe an interesting angle will emerge from here or there over the summer. But my gut says it’s time to get into summer mode. In other words, “What in the world are we going to blog/talk about?”

I think we shrug our shoulders and understand that it is time to move on. This, obviously, has been a “real” story, (and you, Mike, did a very good job), but it strikes me as being largely over at this point

I’m trying to move on, honest, but I still have some unanswered questions and until Luck returns and FOIA requests are granted, they’ll remain unanswered. I think it’s fair to pursue these angles, too — namely, what, specifically, prompted the change?

Dave said:

Landon wrote that neither Stewart or his wife were sources.

So who were the sources?

More housecleaning in the near future or are we just going to blame Stewart for all the problems and let it drop like the coin toss?

That Mrs. Stewart theory is ridiculous. Always was. I wouldn’t say the story is known or over, either. And remember, WVU was curious before the Herald-Dispatch column. That only added to their problem. I have my ideas where to go with this. I’m not done.

Jeff in Akron said:

Mike: The only thing left that I really would like to know is who was Landon’s source? If not Stew or his bride, than who?

And if it’s a fellow coach, somebody in the MAC, or some one in WVU AD’s office that remains actively employed, will they continue to help generate negative news stories going forward?

Bottom line question…does a fox remain in the hen house and will Luck contiunue trying to ferret him / her out?

I’m on it, honest. I have leads, too.

Karl said:

I’ve found this to be a fascinating story from so many perspectives. Beyond all the football and administration stuff that Mike mentioned above, a few more angles took on lives of their own:

* The Media War: It’s been very interesting to see the fault lines separating the WVU beat writers laid bare like this. It started when Mike dropped that bunker buster on the Herald Dispatch but grew way beyond. Look at all the reactions to Dunlap’s disclosure, not just from fans but other media members, and how he dealt with it. It’s never fun for members of the media to get in pissing matches with each other, but this was was WWIII. It could make for some awkward times out on the road and press conferences this year. Also interesting, the divided perspectives on the story — look at the difference between what Bogaczyk has to say about Stew’s departure today vs. how Hertzel saw it. Also, observing how the Gazette and others treated this as a non-story initially, and then how they recovered after it became very clear they were wrong.

* Behind the Scenes Via Social Media: I only happened to start a Twitter account a few days before all of this and the timing couldn’t have been better. Reading all of the back-and-forths between current players, alumni, media and fans gave you a look into this story well deeper than what the papers could report. You got a personal feel for how this situation was affecting real lives — including the media members, national and regional.

I’d have to think there are teaching points at the journalism school to come out of this episode. It’s been a new school v. old school battle, for starters, but, again, some people and some places really botched this. That’s not old v. new. That’s a far simpler lesson.

Lee in Dayton said:

Mike, I’m with Jeff in Akron and Wayne and would like you to stay on the story. I’m concerned about ongoing conflict between factions within the Athletic Department and greater WVU athletic community (read: boosters) that may continue to work to undermine Luck’s efforts to modernize & improve WVU athletics (your buddy Mike Leach talked about this on the radio today). I see this whole head football coach incident as a battle in a larger war for control of my alma mater’s sports programs and figure a little media spotlight might be helpful.

Agreed. The main story continues in one direction and toward the eventual end. This topic you’re presented is a branch to sprout off the original story. It’s a lot like where we started: Holgorsen is made to leave a casino … what is WVU’s internal and public reaction? Look where we are now.

JP said:

The Bill Stewart era reminds of the time I ate a bunch of eggrolls. Bill was hired in a hurry without much aforethought, just like when I ate those eggrolls.

Pretty quickly, things started feeling a little peculiar, a little off, and as time went on it kept on going downhill, like losing 24-3 to East Carolina, blowing it in Boulder, 19-15 to sPitt, giving away the Gator Bowl to Bobby Bowden, losing to Syracuse on homecoming and blaming the defense for the UConn loss.

Then, the inevitable happened. Time for a change. In reponse, Stew goes off the reservation and my stomach rebels against all that cabbage. The aftermath is rather gruesome but afterward, it begins to feel better and all is again right with the world.

In retrospect in makes me wonder what I was thinking.

You know, I wasn’t sure how to wrap up my feelings on things until JP ordered up the egg roll comparison. A thousand thank yous.

Sam said:

How about decent coach, decent guy?

I understand the desire to poll fans (because the outcome will almost certainly produce results that justified the behavior of those answering the poll) of these things, but I’d love to see one explaining what those people would have done if they were in Stewart’s shoes. I find it impossible to believe that most people would have done anything but what Stewart did, especially given how chummy the media and coaches get when the media supports the coach.

I can’t condone what he’s alleged to have done. I can’t think of a worse thing for a guy to do, short of NCAA violations … which, by the way, also happened on his watch. I get it must have been difficult to work in position in which he was put, but he was also put there and asked/ordered not to do exactly what has apparently happened. Everyone seems to forget this:If Stewart was so uncomfortable, he could have resigned and still gotten his money. He was essentially given a victory lap and, if everything alleged is true, he responded by giving people the finger.

pushthebutton said:

Bill Stewart’s story is that of… well it’s a story about love, deception, greed, lust and…unbridled enthusiasm.
Unbridled enthusiasm you ask?
Yes, that’s what led to Billy Stewart’s downfall.

You see Mike, Billy was a simple country boy. You might say a cockeyed optimist,
who got himself mixed up in the high stakes game of NCAA Football and national intrigue.

Certainly, there was room for a Seinfeld comparison, too.

Gordo said:

I’ve been thinking about this the last few days. What happens if Holgorsen continues to in his ways and let’s say is forced to part ways with WVU? How does that look for Oliver Luck? Does that validate what Bill Stewart was supposedly doing?

Lots of people are thinking about that. Remember what I said above about the worst-case scenario? What you propose would be the worst. And I’d think a conversation would quickly begin about whether the house should be cleaned thoroughly.

Josh24601 said:

Behold the Chariot of Holgomotion.

Dana got a jeep, by the way.

Karl said:

The Labattsmmobile

Does that mean the bat signal will be replaced by this?

Eric said:

I hope he can coach like he’s dyin’, too.

Oh, yes. Dana went sky diving and you had some fun.

overtheSEC said:

He should have asked Luck for one of those nice golden parachutes they gave Stew this past weekend,

I’m just going to let these roll and nod my head …

glibglub said:

At least, from what I gather, no one from the athletic dept. or coaching staff tampered with the chute. I take it as a sign of healing.

glibglub said:

Also, Bruce Irvin jumps from the ground into airplanes.

pknocker40 said:

I hear tomorrow he’s playing laser tag with the Swedish Bikini Team.

Wayne said:

The winners of the laser tag match get Miller Lite in plastic bottles.

wvu304 said:

When Bruce Irvin lands in water, he doesn’t get wet. The water gets Bruce.

The Artist Formerly Known as EER96 said:

Was Stewart Holgs’ guide? Did they have a parachute-in-waiting?

Wayne said:

When Holgs jumped he had to trust his wing man. You think about that.

Drew said:

According to Chuck Landon, the plane was actually a flying casino called “Stakes on a Plane” and Holgorsen didn’t jump, he was thrown out of it.

ffejboc said:

This story is quite possibly the biggest, plumpest softball that Casazza has every offered up…

SheikYbuti said:

Dave Ryan: “Rich, what do you think of the special teams’ play today?”

Rodriguez: “It ain’t all that f’n special.”

AnxiousEER97 said:

Rodriguez: “I can’t evaluate that play until I have a chance to review it on film.”

Enjoy the weekend!