Some might say I have it out for University of Michigan football head coach Rich Rodriguez.  They could have a point; I have friends that are somewhat close to the West Viriginia University program, so in some sense I guess I feel a connection to the school, and he just generally has a history of acting like a slimeball.

But I may not be the only one that isn't too thrilled with the coach known as Rich-Rod.  During the Ohio State spring football preview luncheon this past Wednesday, Ohio State coach Jim Tressel took a few questions from the audience.  While Tressel isn't known for taking shots at others, he seemed to toss a barb Rodriguez's way in response to one of the queries:

"Is there a gentleman's agreement between Big Ten coaches that once a player verbally commits to a school, the other coaches are supposedly hands off?"

This was Tressel's answer, after about a one-second pause.

"I guess only between the gentlemen."

Speculation is that this was directed at Rodriguez, who signed a recruit named Ray Roundtree that had already given a verbal commitment to Purdue - an action that prompted Purdue coach Joe Tiller to call Rodriguez "a guy in a wizard hat selling snake oil".  Clearly old Rich-Rod is not endearing himself to his new compatriots.

Sadly, this isn't it for his issues this week.  Following a pre-trial hearing concerning WVU's efforts to recover the $4 million due to them per their former coach's contract, Marv Robon, one of Rodriguez's lawyers, made a statement I have a feeling he's going to regret, if he doesn't already (hat tip to Sports by Brooks):

“It’s like back before the Civil War when slaves had the right to buy their freedom. A penalty of $4 million is almost like a slave from Africa trying to buy his freedom in America. I think it’s an outrageous amount. It’s just not fair and it’s not related to any damages the university is suffering.”

I've tried writing about five different responses to address the sheer ignorance and stupidity of this quote, but I think it's best to just let the quote stand on its own and let the reader absorb it for him/herself.  Either way, I think we can agree that anything related to $4 million is completely unrelated to slavery.