Weis, Willingham and the looming hypocrisy at Notre Dame

By Jon Wilner
Sunday, September 23rd, 2007 at 12:25 am

Each week, with each miserable performance, with each blowout loss, with each new record for futility, Notre Dame gets closer to a perception problem.

Actually, it could turn out to be a perception nightmare:

The belief, supported by fact, that Notre Dame treated Tyrone Willingham, the only black coach in school history, differently than the white coaches who came before him and after him.

The Irish aren’t in their nightmare period yet, but they’re on a collision course.

A quick review:

Willingham was fired after three years despite having a better record than two of his predecessors (Gerry Faust and Bob Davie) had through three seasons — and they were given five years.

The Irish Nation responded by saying that Willingham had to go because of all the terrible losses: blowouts at the hands of Michigan, Florida State and especially USC.

OK, fine. But here were are in Charlie Weis’ third year, and not only are the losses mounting, so are the blowout losses.

In three years, Willingham lost eight games by 20 points or more.

So far, Weis has lost six games by 20 or more, and with USC on the schedule, it’s pretty safe to say he’ll get a seventh (and possibly several more before the season ends).

Should I even mention the combined score of Weis’ last two Michigan games? (Wolverines 85, Irish 21.)

Or that Notre Dame is 0-4 for the first time in school history?

Or that is has lost six games in a row dating to late last season (and that all six have been by at least 17 points)?

So here’s where the looming hypocrisy comes into play: There’s a very good chance that Weis will finish this season with a similar record and comparable number of bad losses as Willingham … But will the Irish fire Weis? No chance.

And when they don’t, that’s gonna look bad — really bad.

******

The Irish Nation will defend the decision to keep Weis by blaming his third-year woes on Willingham’s bad recruiting and by noting that Weis’s recruiting classes have been highly rated.

I see two problems with that:

1. You never heard Irish fans say that Willingham’s woes in Year Three were due to Bob Davie’s bad recruiting.

2. It’s not all about recruiting rankings. Just check the numbers:

* The last five Notre Dame recruiting classes have all been rated in the top-30 by scout.com. (That’s two Willingham classes and three Weis classes.)

* Only one of Georgia Tech’s last five classes has been top-30, and remind me again what happened in the opener.

* Only one of Michigan State’s last five recruiting classes was ranked in the top 40, and we all know what happened Saturday.

So it’s not all about recruiting rankings, Irish Nation.

The services can be wrong, the college coaches can be poor evaluators — we know Weis can call plays, but can he assess talent? — and, of course, the players can get injured, lose interest, lose confidence … whatever.

To say that Weis deserves to stay and Willingham deserved to go — despite comparable resumes — because of where Weis’ recruiting classes have been ranked … well, that’s a pretty flimsy argument, as the GaTech and MSU results indicate.

******

Look, I don’t think Notre Dame is a racist institution and I don’t think the people in charge are racists.

But unless Weis gets the Irish turned around immediately, Notre Dame will have to deal with the perception that it treated Willingham differently than it treated Faust, Davie and Weis.

In fact, that’s already becoming a story — a national story.

As most Hotline readers know, I wrote about this issue in January (here’s the link)

Then New York Times columnist Selena Roberts chimed in. (Scroll down to page 35.)

Then, within the past few weeks, espn.com’s Pat Forde ripped the Irish not once, but twice.

And now, the big kahuna, ESPN, has joined the fray.

Last Thursday’s edition of “Outside The Lines” examined the parallel tenures of Willingham and Weis and wondered whether Weis would be treated as Willingham was.

(Full disclosure: I was a guest on the show, and to anyone who saw it, or will see it: you’ll understand why I have no past, present or future in TV.)

So at this point, the media microscope is starting to focus on Notre Dame, Weis and Willingham — and that’s not the best news for the Irish.

If the losses keep mounting, especially the bad losses, then the story will continue to gain steam.

What happens to the Irish this season, and how the university deals with Weis going forward, could create a very uncomfortable situation for Notre Dame.