November 9th, 2005
Categorized under: Commentary, Sports

Why I Dislike Notre Dame

If you don’t follow college football at all let me give you a little back story. It has always seemed to me that, our great nation, loves Notre Dame. Except, I have never, in my lifetime, seen a good reason for it. They are, at times, a good football team. But I haven’t known them to be great. I haven’t seen any reason to fawn over them. They are just another team except – they aren’t. They live in a special place in college football. This odd Catholic University isn’t in a conference like all the other “big” schools and they don’t have to play by any conference rules to earn their way into a bowl game. They just have to win. And, if memory serves, they only have to win 8 games to have an automatic birth into a BCS game (big money $$$).

Rumors have abounded for years that Notre Dame would join the Big East (why?) but after the defection of Miami, Virginia Tech (VT), and Boston College (BC) I think it is safe to assume Notre Dame will never join the Big East. In fact there is no real motivation for them to join a conference. If they did they would have to share that bowl money that gets handed to them with their less fortunate conference members and they would have to do a bit more to even earn a big Bowl Game invite.

Notre Dame is loved though. They have tons of fans from all walks of life from all across the country. It is this rabid, and seemingly inexplicable following that garners them their own TV contract with NBC so the whole nation gets to see every Notre Dame game. Heck, I hardly get to see any USC games and they are the #1 team in the land and haven’t lost a game in over 2 seasons!

A few years ago Notre Dame looked good, real good. They had just hired the coach from Stanford, Tyrone Willingham, and he went 8-0 to start his career there (I don’t know how that year ended). When I first saw it I though, well maybe there is something to this Notre Dame mystique. However, since then Notre Dame has been pretty average. And then, after 3 years of his 5 year contract Willingham was fired this past off-season and Notre Dame went to the Super Bowl champs and hired a ND alum Charlie Weiss (the Patriots Offensive coordinator at the time).

I was a little shocked by the firing of Willingham. Heck Notre Dame hadn’t seen success like he brought them in as long as I could remember – what did the Notre Dame leaders want? He seems they just wanted another Coach. This year Weiss started off admirably winning his first five games I think. Then, something strange happened. Notre Dame gave Weiss a ten year extension worth 30 million dollars. What gives? Willingham had a better start, against better competition but Notre Dame showed some restraint and left his contract alone, presumably to see how he did in the long run. But they didn’t do that with Weiss. Why not? And what college football coach really deserves a $30 million contract? That is absurd. Have Notre Dame’s TV ratings been so phenomenal since Weiss took over that somehow this was justified?

One of my favorite sports columnists, Jason Whitlock, recently wrote an article about this odd Coach contract hypocrisy at Notre Dame. He pulls the racist card out but not because of the firing of Willinghame, something he dubs as “shortsighted and unfair”. However, he does think the contract extension was. It’s a thought provoking read.

By the way there are only a few teams I always root against; Notre Dame, Florida State, and the opponents of Marshall and North Carolina State.

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  • Will
    How can you legitimately argue that Notre Dame is not one of the top 5 teams in America this season? First, I'd like to correct your inaccuracies: #1, they didn't win their first 5 games (they went 4-1 in those games, with a loss to Michigan State that keeps looking worse and worse as the season goes by), #2 Ty willingham's season ended 8-4 after an embarassing loss to Oregon State in the Gator Bowl, and #3 NBC's contract with Notre Dame only covers the home games, as was evident in their first game this year against Pitt that we had to order on Pay-Per-View. Now, with that out of the way, I am probably one of the biggest Irish fans around. Notre Dame has such a huge following that no one else but Notre Dame fans and alumni can understand. Notre Dame stands for respect, honesty, and greatness. We had two of the winningest coaches in college football history with Frank Leahy and Knute Rockne. Notre Dame turns down students with perfect GPAs because so many of the perfect students want to attend there. ND never has relaxed their academic standards to get better athletes. They have one of the highest student-athlete graduation ratios in the country, if not the highest. and they're not even an Ivy League school! Every year, when that ND schedule hits the presses, sportscasters and analysts can't wait to chew them up. at the beginning of the 2005 season, the Notre Dame schedule featured 5 Top 25 teams, 3 of whom were in the Top 5 at the start of the season. True, Michigan, Pitt, and Purdue have all been mainly flops this season, but there's was the forever great USC game in which we were 7 seconds and an illegal push away from beating the #1 team in the country. See, people don't understand that Notre Dame hires what they figure to be Notre Dame men. Ty Willingham didn't fit in with the Notre Dame system, and no one had the butterflies-in-your-stomach feeling when they hired Willingham that i know we all had when they hired Weis. You could just feel that someting big was about to happen at this beloved school, and a 9-2 record, better than Ty's first year turnout, has more than confirmed those thoughts. i guess you could call it mystique, but i have no doubt in my mind that Notre Dame deserves every point of that #7 ranking they currently hold. Everyone will see, because as Coach put it "I have a feeling that something big's going to happen and it's going to happen sooner than everyone thinks>" How true, Coach. GO IRISH!!! NATIONAL CHAMPS 2006!!!
  • This is the cool thing about Blogs. I didn't expect anyone to actually respond to this post and some guy I don't know at all comes in tooting the Irish horn.

    Will, I'm glad you really like ND and are willing to stand up for them. But let me counter some of your points just in case you come back and read this:

    1. Yes, I seriously do not think ND should be in the top 10 let alone in the top 5 in the country. Who, exactly, have they beaten during those 9 wins? A close game does not a win make so please don't get too caught up by the USC close game. Hell, Fresno St was close to USC but they still lost, just like everyone else.

    2. Yeah, it probably was embarassing losing to Oregon State in the bowl game. That was kind of funny. If you guys beat Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl this year that will be good for you. Ohio State has a pretty sad offense but at least they are a solid squad so a win there is worth something.

    3. I couldn't find any reference to a 2002 bowl game between Oregon State and Notre Dame. The first Bowl Game I can find with Notre Dame. They didn't play in a bowl game in 2001-2002. They did play against NC State in the 2003 Gator bowl. The Woflpack did embarass the Irish that year (28-6) but the Irish were still a ten win team.

    4. the 2002 team finished at 10-3 I believe that was Willingham's first season as a coach there. (2002,2003,2004) were his 3 seasons as a coach. This year they are currently 9-2 I don't really see much difference - if Weiss wins this year he will be 10-2 or if he loses 9-3. How is Weiss better and already worth a contract extension?

    5. How didn't Willingham fit in with the system? I thought you guys prided yourselves on winning - 10-3 sounds like winning to me. In fact did he have a losing season? Did he miss going to a bowl game?

    6. Good luck with the National Champs dream for next year. I doubt it will happen but anything is possible. Your QB this year played great. Will he be back next season (I think he is a SR but he might have a year of eligibility left)? What about Samardzija? He has been pretty impressive this year.

    ND is a fine school. I don't have anything against it as an academic institution, however, I think it is constantly overrated based on their past exploits (much like FSU was this year). I think preseason rankings should be dropped and they shouldn't even rank a school until they have done something. Maybe have rankings after week 5. At least then the schools will have a basis for their ranking beyond history.
  • Will
    Okay, so I was a little off on my stats, but to all those people out there who think more than 3 teams can beat Notre Dame, I wish I could say put your money where your mouth is, but that's not going to happen, so moving on. Brady Quinn and Jeff Samardjzia are both juniors, and along with a redshirted Rhema McKnight and Chris Frome, Anthony Fasano and Darius Walker all returning next year, I believe ND is the team to beat. And like I said earlier, no one but Notre Dame fans and alumni will understand why Willingham was fired. Ty is a fine gentleman, I have nothing bad to say about his character, but he's just not a Notre Dame guy. Weis went to ND, its in his blood. He cares about the school and the team alike. That's something that can't be taught. All I'm saying is that Notre Dame earned their prestige many eons ago with the likes of Knute Rockne, Frank Leahy, Ara Parseghian, and more recently with Lou Holtz. Lou was the last TRUE ND guy we had, and oh how I miss those days. They have had some bad seasons in recent years, but now we finally have a guy who we feel special about and who will undoubtedly lead us back to the promised land. ALL HAIL COACH WEIS.
  • Jim
    Funny to see a fool with totally unaccurate stats in his blog be critical of Notre Dame. Learn the facts and be knowledgeable before tooting off. ND isn't gauranteed a BCS by 8 wins. It is based on their ranking not # of wins. Also didn't know the TV contract. Admittedly didn't know or even bother to check how Tyrone's 1st season ended....wrong about starting off 5-0 in Weis' 1st year, and wrong about the $$$ paid to him. Is there anythign you actually knew was correct before your mouth opened up? Probably not. Good thing you're not a journalist.....then again....maybe you are....it would explain a few things....
  • Looks like I hit a sensitive spot there bub, is that why your ranting in indignation because someone had the gall to question all might ND.

    I'm pretty clear in my BLOG that this is all my opinion. This isn't a news article; but an opinion.

    Your right, they aren't GUARANTEED a BCS birth with 8 wins - but it is highly likely. Whether I like it or not it is ND and due to their huge fan base having them in a bowl game is worth alot of money. 8 wins are all they need to be bowl eligible and if they are eligible I believe (again, this is my opinion) that they will get an invite to, most likely, a BCS bowl (as opposed to some lame duck bowl like the GMAC Bowl). Their popularity (and thus the $$ involved) basically guarantees them a BCS birth even if the rules don't.

    Ty's first season ended at 10-3. Pretty good I'd say. His second season sucked (5-7, with four of those losses by 26+ points). His final season was 6-5; for a total record of 21-15. (How you like the facts - do they make you feel better?)

    Your right, Weiss didn't start as well (he lost his first game) yet they still gave him a contract extension. Coupled with this tidbit I missed - that you were so generous to bring to my attention - it makes his contract extension look even that much more suspicious.

    Exactly what is your problem with my comment other than it questions ND's popularity and the $30million contract Weiss received?
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