The Fake Lonnie Finch

...watching Dunbar run for thousands of yards.

Oh, I somehow doubt there'll be a "huge, HUGE" change among the assistants if Canales is The Man. These coaches are working together very well. I've take a shine to them. I wish they were small enough to fit in my attache so I could carry them back and forth to the office with me.

Hmmm. Well, since Rice and Barber go about 215-220, I get it from seeing that he doesn't weigh in at 215-220. He may be as tall as Woodhead, but isn't built like him. And, he doesn't have Best's speed or agility. So, I'll revise...he wasn't big enough, strong enough, fast enough, or agile enough to play in the Big 12. Too bad for Longhorn fans that Mack Brown bought the hype on him. He'd be a good Division II/FCS back playing more with kids his size and speed.

I think Brett writes a good game. Therefore, I've constructed a little poem: Columns are columns, blogs are blogs; cheetos for children, milk bones for dogs. © 2010 The Fake Lonnie Finch I love the English language, so I use it every day in everyday situations such as these!

He wasn't big enough to play in the Big 12.

I agree with the thrust of what monkeypox has said. One of the players who gives Canales some love is Phillip Rivers, who may or may not play a little QB in the League. Besides, I like this whole coaching staff. The defense is turning in its best performance since 2004. In fact, I think we may be getting close to the 2004 squad in terms of sacks. And, here's another thing, Sports Fans...we could have a defense that gives up less than 300 points in a season for the first time since 2003. But, what do we have? A fan base that would throw what is turning out to be a pretty good coaching staff with good chemistry out the window. Well, not me, Mister! If this team wins Saturday, I say hire them all back. All of them. Even the young OL coach who has had to do some juggling this year with injuries. Bring them all back and have them recruiting as their pumpkin pie is settling in the stomachs. These guys are doing a whale of a job!

The problem here, again, is that the school found that Leavitt interfered with the the investigation and intimidated some of the witnesses. He was fired on three counts. Joel Miller did admit to fearing for his position on the team, as did others, and originally tried to cover to Leavitt. He stopped doing so in January of 2010. Leavitt and his attorney are fighting the windmills of their minds. He'll probably begin to realize this even moreso as schools question him and his agent, and he remains unemployed. As an athletic director, I'd be hesitant about hiring a guy in a pending lawsuit with student abuse as the main issue being led by an ambulance chaser. Bad publicity isn't worth it. Plenty of team win without coaches choking or hitting their players then lawyering up with doctor baiters. So, the official record - until such time as a trial court find differently, or Leavitt wises up and settles with the University under a no liability admitted term - remains that he grabbed a player by the throat and hit him twice for missing a block. Besides, we're not so desperate now that we've got to resort to hiring guys with unresolved legal problems. We're proving that an assistant with no prior head coaching experience can take a team rife with injuries and players he didn't recruit and win here. And, each win makes us less desperate. Hire us a guy who wants to coach football. Let Leavitt and Leach go play Ally McBeal.

Relax, dude. Not everyone in Texas gives a damn about the Longhorns; the vast majority don't. And, thus, not everyone wants to go there. Ditto, Texas A&M. In fact, it's probably for the best that those two schools contain student bodies and alumni bases composed almost solely of people with inferiority complexes.

I voted "I need to see more" simply to see if this thing keeps translating. Although, if we beat ULM, I'll be fully on board with hiring him and announcing it before the Kansas State game. In that manner, the kids would have some stability and not have the pressure of thinking they had to win to save a coach. Plus, it would give Canales and the coaching staff the ability to call recruits that week and say, "Hey, I know it's Thanksgiving weekend, but come out and see how we've got this thing rolling. We'd like you to be a part of it next year." I'm trying to beg out of a kid thing on Saturday so I can go to Monroe and see if it happens for Mike and the team. My two-year old has a birthday party to go to. It's putting me at odds with my wife. My deal is, the birthday party is not for our kid, but one of her preschool classmates. It's not like they need me there to pull it off. I'm trying to get her to agree to let me take the four-year old with me to the game and come back that night - just a day trip. If it were my kid's birthday, it would be different. But, this is someone else's kid and we're not involved in the planning of it. It's a show up at the appointed place and hang around type of thing. I'm fully confident that my wife can pull it off on her own.

Maybe as OC if he isn't hired here. The Longhorn fandom seems to have had it with Greg Davis.

I can't believe the Longhorns don't have a receiver or two to help out that quarterback. They've got no runner, no game breaking receiver, and no tight end threat. I don't see how that happens at a place like Texas. It happened at OU last year to some degree when they only had Ryan Broyles to throw to. But, this thing going on down in Austin is totally wheels off.

Up 17-13, about 1:30 left in the game, Arizona State has no time outs left. Stanford halfback runs for the clinching first down and has a clear path to the end zone, he stops running, sits down at the 5 yard line, and hands the ball to the ref. Game over. Rare. Classy. Wonder if any of it sank into Dennis Erickson across the sideline?

Watching the Oklahoma State - Texas game. Of Oklahoma State's defensive starters, none come from Oklahoma. Nine are from Texas. One from Mississippi. One from South Carolina. No matter who we hire the hill to climb in recruiting is high. Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, and Tulsa take alot of guys out of Texas. We need to get guys from these little states that their schools overlook - more Kevin Galbreaths, Patricks Cobbs, Michael Pruitts, etc.

I like the cut of your jib.

Done. T.Y. Hilton a ridiculous 159 rushing on six carries.

If he beats Monroe, take the interim take off. If not, put him in the mix with the rest of them.

I invented a new conference, the Sun West.

Great job punting. Outpunted the top punter in the Sun Belt this afternoon.

Yep.

I think he's 100% in control of it now. Passes to the tight end and U-Back again. After the pass to Prior, I was thinking about how much more this thing would be rolling if Micah Mosley hadn't been injured. If Canales gets the job, I'll be excited to see a full season of offense with the U-back fully involved.

Yes, John Shorter and Zach Olen...my RISD homies leading the way!

Canales matches Dodges' season high win total in three games. We will also not have a losing record in the road for the first time since 2004! A win next week, and we'll have our first winning road record since 2003. This team is different and better with Mike Canales as head coach, even with all of the injuries. At this point, you would be willfully blind to deny it. He's got this team not just believing in themselves, but performing. If he leads us to a win next week in Monroe, hire him.

This.

Right. By doing what any school would expect their head coach to do, some here are offended. And, yet, some of those same people didn't like the standoffish approach of Darrell Dickey. I like Canales' willingness to play the part, even without the guarantee of the job. I hope he can lead the team to beat MTSU and ULM to make a more solid, tangible case for his candidacy. But, I have no problem with him doing what he would otherwise be expected to do as head coach.

Again, assistants are also fired and find work again. Do you need very recent examples? Or, do you really believe that all fired assistants never find work again? The article is about coaches who have abusing players on their resume. Jim Leavitt falls into that category; Mike Canales doesn't. That is why Mike Canales is employed today, and Jim Leavitt is not.