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Mike Leach’s life moved people. His sudden, shocking passing at age 61 has done the same. A parade of voices from lives he lifted, often by just picking up the phone, has come forward to pay tribute to a man who turned curiosity, non-conformity and an affinity for putting the football in the air into an art form all his own.
Alabama’s Nick Saban noted the unpredictable paths their conversations would take but warmly remembered a consistent destination: “They always made me smile.” Auburn’s John Cohen, who hired him at Mississippi State, described his friend as “a pioneer, intellectual giant, provocateur and fearless warrior.” That is an elegy as unique and powerful as the party of one it honors.
Now comes one of the most influential figures in the history of Auburn, the football program and the university, with a compliment as singular and unexpected as the many musings of the pirate-coach himself.
In the words of Bobby Lowder, “I wish we had hired Mike Leach.”
That is stop-the-presses stuff. That is an on-the-record comment from a quite private retired individual once known as the most powerful booster in college athletics. That is a sincere compliment from a former Auburn trustee and a forever Auburn man who understands what it takes to be successful at his alma mater like no one else.
Of all the wonderful things all the powerful people have said about Leach, there may be nothing more telling than those seven words. Lowder’s respect for him grew through the years, so much so that the clear-eyed former banker is moved to wonder what might have been.
Auburn head coach Mike Leach. Imagine. The very thought is as compelling as another alternative reality on the Plains that’s gotten much more discussion. Auburn head coach Kirby Smart.
You know that story by now. In 2012, Auburn interviewed Smart but hired Gus Malzahn. Four years earlier, Auburn wouldn’t return Leach’s calls and hired Gene Chizik. Because of the man and coach Leach was, this hypothetical is worth unpacking.
It’s no coincidence that Lowder’s influence was the strongest when Auburn hired, in order, Pat Dye, Terry Bowden and Tommy Tuberville. They happen to be 1-2-3 in winning percentage of all Auburn head football coaches who spent more than one year on the job - if you don’t count John Heisman at the turn of the 20th century and Mike Donahue at the dawn of the Roaring Twenties.
Bowden is first at .731, followed by Dye at .711 and Tuberville at .680. In terms of influence and lasting impact, it’s Dye on top by a mile.
When Tuberville left town $5.1 million richer in early December of 2008 after his so-called resignation, Auburn needed someone who could deal with the emerging force of nature at Alabama named Nick Saban. He was not yet a candidate for GOAT status, but his joyless murderball had ended Auburn’s six-game Iron Bowl win streak and Tuberville’s tenure with a vengeance 36-0.
There were the usual suspects mentioned as possible successors - Jimbo Fisher and Will Muschamp, the head coaches in waiting at Florida State and Texas, to name two - and some unusual ones as well. At one point during the search, Athletics Director Jay Jacobs seemed ready to offer the job to Buffalo’s Turner Gill. Earlier, unofficial feelers had gone out to several coaches, including Leach.
He was interested, Lowder recalled. Very interested. Leach was coming off an 11-1 regular season, the school’s best in 35 years, a mark the Red Raiders have not approached since. Despite that high water mark and his consistent success over nine years at a terribly difficult place to win, he was dealing with an antagonistic administration. Leach’s contract had only two years left, but as he wrote in his book, “Swing Your Sword,” key suits at Tech wouldn’t have minded if he left.
So he interviewed for the Washington job and made several calls to Auburn that, despite an early inquiry in his direction, were not returned. That did not stop him from engaging in conversation with the administrative assistant who took those calls because, as so many people have shared since his passing, Leach had much more than the gift of gab. He had a real thirst for knowledge of other people, places and things.
Lowder’s regret is that he did not play a role in that Auburn hire and did not go to bat for Leach. After Tuberville’s hire of offensive coordinator Tony Franklin flamed out earlier that season, there didn’t appear to be any appetite among the school’s decision-makers to hire a head coach from the same Hal Mumme/Air Raid tree. Never mind that Leach had just shared the Big 12 coach of the year award with Oklahoma’s Bob Stoops and the historically woebegone Texas Tech program had just shared the division title with big cigars Oklahoma and Texas. Instead Auburn hired Iowa State’s Chizik, whose team finished last in the other Big 12 division.
Lowder did not champion Chizik. Dye did.
A year later, the anti-Leach faction at Texas Tech got what it wanted, firing him for his alleged mistreatment of a player who had suffered a concussion, a charge the coach disputed immediately, publicly and passionately to no avail. A year after that, Chizik led Auburn to the BCS national championship.
Two years later, with the program in freefall, Auburn dismissed Chizik and brought back Gus Malzahn. His first game as head coach was a 31-24 survival against Leach, then in his second season at Washington State. As Malzahn noted in a heartfelt memory on Twitter, he and Leach tangled in his first and last games at Auburn. Gus won both.
“He was truly one of a kind, an innovator of the game and a great coach,” Malzahn said.
Well said by someone who authored some all-time great moments during his eight seasons as the Auburn boss. How might Malzahn’s career and the last 14 years at Auburn have been different had the right person returned Leach’s calls in December of 2008? How would the Auburn family have reacted to Leach and all of his idiosyncrasies? Would they have welcomed his unique ability to take the job seriously while making it clear there was life to be lived beyond the stadium?
Lowder said he believes “the Auburn people would’ve embraced him.” And then one of the most influential voices in Auburn history offered one more compliment to the legacy of Mike Leach. Had Auburn hired him in 2008, Lowder said, “I think he would’ve still been coaching here.”
Until he breathed his last after changing the game, doing it his way and leaving an impression on so many that had so little to do with football. So now we are left with a question that can never be answered but an alternative reality delicious in its possibilities: What if the pirate had planted his flag on the Plains?
Scarbinsky: What might have been if Auburn had answered Mike Leach
- Published: Dec. 15, 2022, 5:45 a.m.
By
Mike Leach’s life moved people. His sudden, shocking passing at age 61 has done the same. A parade of voices from lives he lifted, often by just picking up the phone, has come forward to pay tribute to a man who turned curiosity, non-conformity and an affinity for putting the football in the air into an art form all his own.
Alabama’s Nick Saban noted the unpredictable paths their conversations would take but warmly remembered a consistent destination: “They always made me smile.” Auburn’s John Cohen, who hired him at Mississippi State, described his friend as “a pioneer, intellectual giant, provocateur and fearless warrior.” That is an elegy as unique and powerful as the party of one it honors.
Now comes one of the most influential figures in the history of Auburn, the football program and the university, with a compliment as singular and unexpected as the many musings of the pirate-coach himself.
In the words of Bobby Lowder, “I wish we had hired Mike Leach.”
That is stop-the-presses stuff. That is an on-the-record comment from a quite private retired individual once known as the most powerful booster in college athletics. That is a sincere compliment from a former Auburn trustee and a forever Auburn man who understands what it takes to be successful at his alma mater like no one else.
Of all the wonderful things all the powerful people have said about Leach, there may be nothing more telling than those seven words. Lowder’s respect for him grew through the years, so much so that the clear-eyed former banker is moved to wonder what might have been.
Auburn head coach Mike Leach. Imagine. The very thought is as compelling as another alternative reality on the Plains that’s gotten much more discussion. Auburn head coach Kirby Smart.
You know that story by now. In 2012, Auburn interviewed Smart but hired Gus Malzahn. Four years earlier, Auburn wouldn’t return Leach’s calls and hired Gene Chizik. Because of the man and coach Leach was, this hypothetical is worth unpacking.
It’s no coincidence that Lowder’s influence was the strongest when Auburn hired, in order, Pat Dye, Terry Bowden and Tommy Tuberville. They happen to be 1-2-3 in winning percentage of all Auburn head football coaches who spent more than one year on the job - if you don’t count John Heisman at the turn of the 20th century and Mike Donahue at the dawn of the Roaring Twenties.
Bowden is first at .731, followed by Dye at .711 and Tuberville at .680. In terms of influence and lasting impact, it’s Dye on top by a mile.
When Tuberville left town $5.1 million richer in early December of 2008 after his so-called resignation, Auburn needed someone who could deal with the emerging force of nature at Alabama named Nick Saban. He was not yet a candidate for GOAT status, but his joyless murderball had ended Auburn’s six-game Iron Bowl win streak and Tuberville’s tenure with a vengeance 36-0.
There were the usual suspects mentioned as possible successors - Jimbo Fisher and Will Muschamp, the head coaches in waiting at Florida State and Texas, to name two - and some unusual ones as well. At one point during the search, Athletics Director Jay Jacobs seemed ready to offer the job to Buffalo’s Turner Gill. Earlier, unofficial feelers had gone out to several coaches, including Leach.
He was interested, Lowder recalled. Very interested. Leach was coming off an 11-1 regular season, the school’s best in 35 years, a mark the Red Raiders have not approached since. Despite that high water mark and his consistent success over nine years at a terribly difficult place to win, he was dealing with an antagonistic administration. Leach’s contract had only two years left, but as he wrote in his book, “Swing Your Sword,” key suits at Tech wouldn’t have minded if he left.
So he interviewed for the Washington job and made several calls to Auburn that, despite an early inquiry in his direction, were not returned. That did not stop him from engaging in conversation with the administrative assistant who took those calls because, as so many people have shared since his passing, Leach had much more than the gift of gab. He had a real thirst for knowledge of other people, places and things.
Lowder’s regret is that he did not play a role in that Auburn hire and did not go to bat for Leach. After Tuberville’s hire of offensive coordinator Tony Franklin flamed out earlier that season, there didn’t appear to be any appetite among the school’s decision-makers to hire a head coach from the same Hal Mumme/Air Raid tree. Never mind that Leach had just shared the Big 12 coach of the year award with Oklahoma’s Bob Stoops and the historically woebegone Texas Tech program had just shared the division title with big cigars Oklahoma and Texas. Instead Auburn hired Iowa State’s Chizik, whose team finished last in the other Big 12 division.
Lowder did not champion Chizik. Dye did.
A year later, the anti-Leach faction at Texas Tech got what it wanted, firing him for his alleged mistreatment of a player who had suffered a concussion, a charge the coach disputed immediately, publicly and passionately to no avail. A year after that, Chizik led Auburn to the BCS national championship.
Two years later, with the program in freefall, Auburn dismissed Chizik and brought back Gus Malzahn. His first game as head coach was a 31-24 survival against Leach, then in his second season at Washington State. As Malzahn noted in a heartfelt memory on Twitter, he and Leach tangled in his first and last games at Auburn. Gus won both.
“He was truly one of a kind, an innovator of the game and a great coach,” Malzahn said.
Well said by someone who authored some all-time great moments during his eight seasons as the Auburn boss. How might Malzahn’s career and the last 14 years at Auburn have been different had the right person returned Leach’s calls in December of 2008? How would the Auburn family have reacted to Leach and all of his idiosyncrasies? Would they have welcomed his unique ability to take the job seriously while making it clear there was life to be lived beyond the stadium?
Lowder said he believes “the Auburn people would’ve embraced him.” And then one of the most influential voices in Auburn history offered one more compliment to the legacy of Mike Leach. Had Auburn hired him in 2008, Lowder said, “I think he would’ve still been coaching here.”
Until he breathed his last after changing the game, doing it his way and leaving an impression on so many that had so little to do with football. So now we are left with a question that can never be answered but an alternative reality delicious in its possibilities: What if the pirate had planted his flag on the Plains?
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