Michigan's Civil War [Edit]

You may not have heard about the war of words between formerly-adored Michigan alumnus Jim Harbaugh and the University of Michigan.  But I have.  Basically, Harbaugh called out Michigan for having lax academic requirements for their football players.  He complained about the major he was directed into at Michigan when he was a student, and said that Michigan players don't get prepared for life after football. 

In response, both Michigan Coach Lloyd Carr and current player Mike Hart ripped into Harbaugh, a football hero and (prior to Tom Brady) possibly the most accomplished NFL quarterback in Michigan history. 

Carr called Harbaugh's comments "elitist" and "arrogant".  Mike Hart's words were a lot stronger:

"That's a guy I have no respect for," Hart said. "You graduate from the University of Michigan, and you're going to talk about your school like that, a great university like we have? To say that we're not true student-athletes? I don't know if maybe he wants to coach here and he's mad because he didn't get a job. … He's not a Michigan man. I wish he'd never played here."

Ouch.  It's basically unheard of for a current student-athlete to rip a decorated, prominent alum like
this.  And along comes Pat Forde, a writer for ESPN, asserting that Harbaugh is telling the truth.

As a Michigan grad, and having seen a bit more of the system from the inside than Forde, here's what I can tell you:

1. Michigan, like many schools, makes it easier for athletes to graduate by giving them every advantage possible, including tutors and majors that fit around football schedules.  They 'grease the skids' just like every other school iwth a strong football program;
2. Harbaugh is right...but he has been passed over for positions at Michigan, and thus is being self-serving;
3. the General Studies program is one of the more challenging majors at Michigan -- I know this because I knew people who were in it; and
4. Pat Forde's article is wrong, shows a complete lack of research, and was obviously written with a pre-conceived agenda in mind.

Let's look at Harbaugh's comments.  Is he right?  Are Michigan's standards too low? Are they robbing kids of a decent education in the name of football?  Well, that depends.  Should Michigan's standards be higher for football players?  Sure -- but so should every other school's standards for student-athletes, with the possible exceptions of the Ivies.  Stanford's standards are higher - and as a result, their football program sucks. 

And that's why Harbaugh's comments were uncalled for.  He has bashed several big-name programs as he tries to recruit for his new job as head coach of the lower-tier D-1 program at Stanford.  He is head coach there after being passed over for assistant coach openings at Michigan.  Now it sounds as though he's already making excuses for failing to succeed on the same level as the football powerhouses.  

Now let's look at Forde's claim that the numbers support Harbaugh's argument.  This seems to be his key evidence:

"All it takes to see that is a scan of the 2007 Michigan media guide. Only 30 players have listed majors, and 19 of them are pursuing degrees in something called "general studies." That's 20 percent of the team, and 63 percent of the players who have declared a major.

Yet a university spokesman said this week that less than 1 percent of the undergraduate student body is in the general studies degree program. The spokesman said there are fewer than 200 general studies students out of an undergrad population of nearly 25,000.

Only one junior has declared a major, according to the guide (in movement science). In 18 years of covering college athletics, I've never seen virtually an entire junior class without a major."

Well, Pat, why don't you come down to Michigan more often?  I didn't declare my major until halfway through my junior year.  You know why?  BECAUSE I DIDN'T HAVE TO.  I knew I was majoring in Psychology from the time I first set foot there.  I took classes accordingly. But I didn't declare until the school required that I do so.  

ESPN added this sidebar to the article: "After this story was posted on Wednesday afternoon, Michigan football spokesman Dave Ablauf sent an e-mail which said, in part, that Michigan students "don't declare majors until their junior year." He also sent along a university-generated "Academic Success Program" document which says that 20 of 25 Michigan seniors graduated last year."

In other words, you didn't re-print anywhere close to everything they told you in the email, and twisted what they did say to make it seem less powerful (and maybe to keep Pat Forde and your editors from looking like assclowns).  ESPN, your downward spiral continues.

Forde mentions that most football players are enrolled in "something called "general studies."  That "something" major is one of the most challenging at the university.  Though there is no foreign language requirement for GS majors, they end up taking a much broader classload of 300-level and above classes.  Some of the most successful, smartest students at Michigan end up in General Studies.

It's easier to major in general studies if you need a flexible schedule.  You don't have to restrict yourself to the class scheduling tendencies of a single department.  You can see how that might make GS a convenient major for, say, athletes. 

Everything that administrator told you in your article about GS was the truth.  I know that, the person you talked to knows that...in fact, only Harbaugh seems not to know that.  Maybe it's just laughable that a guy like him would pontificate on academics - I don't think Jimmy H. has made a name for himself in rocket science.  Wouldn't a few phone calls and interviews have told you this, Pat?  It's not like Michigan doesn't have a large student body and even larger alumni base to query. 
 
Apparently, Mr. Forde, your "18 years of covering college athletics" didn't teach you how to do basic research.  Or maybe you just didn't want to.  Was there some kind of deadline crunch that prevented you from getting to the truth, or was this the angle that ESPN told you to take in advance to piss off Michigan alums with completely uninformed bullshit.  Congratulations - you've managed to wring something new (and false) out of an old story. 

It's true that Mike Hart shouldn't be serving as a spokesperson for Michigan on this subject.  It's not his place.  But it also isn't Harbaugh's place to be making these comments.  I'm guessing that Harbaugh has now permanently blacklisted himself at Michigan.  No way do they ever hire him to even be an usher now.  As I said a long time ago in response to Jason Whitlock's dismissal of ESPN, there are some things you just don't say in public.  You don't bite the hand that feeds you, and you don't burn bridges.  

Harbaugh should have addressed his beef directly to Michigan administrators and donors.  One has to wonder why he didn't.  Former Michigan and NFL RB Jamie Morris asked Harbaugh: "If Bo (Schembechler) was still alive", would (Harbaugh) have badmouthed the program?  Harbaugh responded that the question was "irrelevant."  In other words, his answer was 'no'.  Harbaugh's claims to be channeling the spirit of Bo by speaking his mind and offering 'tough love' is a load of crock.  Bo pushed for change on the inside, and he got it.  He understood that you don't take your school to task in public.  That's not how real change happens.  And I'm sure that privately, Jim Harbaugh knows that. 

Now, Harbaugh's played himself.  Michigan (not to mention other top football programs) probably won't touch him after this episode.  And he's still got an almost-impossible battle at Stanford to make their program consistently relevant again.  Since Stanford is a stronger academic school than Michigan, it's pretty easy for someone there to rip into a school that is larger, lower-ranked and thus less-discriminating about the student-athletes that school lets in.  I noticed that Jimbo didn't bother to name any examples of football programs approaching Michigan's caliber that has higher academic standards for their players. 

Thus, one might say his comments are "elitist," "arrogant" and "self-serving."

As for Forde, I'm going to find it very difficult to take any of his work seriously from now on.  This is about as far from hard-hitting investigative journalism as it gets.  While it's true that Michigan's standards could be higher, it's also true that Michigan has better graduation rates than most D-1 football programs.  Things could be better, but they also could be much, much worse.  If anyone wants to beat the drum about the exploitation of college athletes, more power to them. But singling out Michigan is a pathetically poor choice of programs to select as an example of everything that's wrong with college sports.  

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