Rick Neuheisel, man or myth?

[Leon Sandcastle]

Myth

I remember being so excited when Slick was hired. His charisma sucked me in. He played the electric guitar, took the kids tubing down Boulder creek, smiled at lot, and said the right things. The kids loved him. Amongst my circle of friends conversations would center around how all the top recruits were going to want to come here and have fun with Slick.

It didn’t take long before the missteps started to happen and our conversations moved to comments like “You know, Slick going to be a great coach someday, it’s just probably not going to be at Colorado.” I thought that he would learn by his mistakes, recognize his weaknesses, and hire the right people to make up for his shortcomings (discipline, structure, not doing stupid ****). All leaders have areas of weakness but the great ones recognize this and put strong people in place that will stand up to them, oversee the areas that they suck at, and help steer them from disaster. Slick never did this.

I was in attendance at some community event and Gary Barnett was the guest speaker. It was right before his second season and he opened his talk by telling a story. He told us about the first day of practice after he took over the program. He said all the players came out for practice carrying a towel. He watched as each player spread out their towel on the field before beginning stretches. He asked a player “What’s up with the towels?” The player told him that the field was wet and they didn’t want to get their uniforms wet. The player told him that Coach Slick always let them do this. Barnett stopped practice, collected all the towels and told the players they were soft and things were going to change. He knew then how big a job he had ahead of him. Now I’m no big Barnett fan, but Slick did leave a big mess behind. He did burn bridges as far as I’m concerned.

I know Embree and Slick are friends. I know his son played for him. I know that on some levels Slick would have something to offer. All this doesn’t change the fact that I would be pissed off if Embree doesn’t steer clear of that baggage laden bumble head.

He will make a great announcer.

Buffnik, I’ve read tons of your post and have a lot of respect for your opinions. Are you just trying to provoke discussion or do you really believe this has any chance of happening?

I hate to break it to you, but this never happened.

 

[sockdolager]

I hate to break it to you, but this never happened.

If your statement is correct does that mean that you were at that first practice? I quess it also means that Barnett fabricated that story to entertain all those Rotarians. Well I be damn.