While being an athletic department administrator requires oversight of dozens of disparate arenas, managing coaches certainly ranks as one of the most testing responsibilities. The difficulties surrounding when to make coaching changes was outlined in this space a few weeks ago, and coaches recently in the news again provide another reminder of the human resource challenges for athletic departments.
News this past week broke of the University of Arkansas initiating an investigation into head women’s volleyball coach Robert Pulliza after allegations of bullying were received by school administrators. Pulliza is accused of intimidation in a letter signed by “extremely concerned Razorback parents,” with graduates and current team members confirming the letter’s contents.
Also, while not coming to the forefront as a result of letters from parents (although there certainly were some written afterwards), Clemson head football coach Dabo Swinney was the subject of criticism for his extended interaction with punter, Andy Teasdall. Teasdall, who did not convert on a fake punt in Clemson’s ACC Championship game against the University of North Carolina, found himself on the receiving end of a sideline tirade from Swinney, which, some argue, was unnecessarily prolonged and aggressive.
These particular stories seem to be more examples of the conflict between society’s current push to create inclusive, safe spaces for individuals and coaches’ need to critique, often times in harsh (sometimes in overly-harsh and inappropriate) tones. Mix-in today’s twenty-four-hour sports news cycle, the omnipresence of social media, and the advent of cell phone cameras and video, and universities often are increasingly put in tough positions regarding their coaches’ behavior.
While some situations are clear transgressions of propriety (Rutgers men’s basketball coach Mike Rice, Jr. comes to mind), it seems many, if not most, complaints about coaches fall in the gray area between deserving of censure and tough love. It is the responsibility of ADs to navigate these choppy waters. Take the coach’s side, and one might be accused of being complicit in bullying. However, swing to the opposite end and censor or reprimand a coach, and a school can unjustly punish or lose a valuable leader.
Examples of walking this fine line abound. Bobby Knight, during his tenure as men’s head basketball coach at Indiana, was a brilliant innovator but renowned for his “fiery” temperament, a situation the university always had to handle carefully until eventually relieving him of his position. Current Texas Longhorns baseball skipper, Augie Garrido, is one of the most successful college baseball coach in history, but a quick internet search for him produces rant videos that might give some pause while invigorating others.
The public’s reactions to the growth in visibility of some coaching practices has been expectedly mixed. While some call for censure of Swinney, others decry the “softening” of America and its youth. When Knight was fired from Indiana, thousands of students marched in protest of the move, burning the school president in effigy. And more recently, Mark Richt, head coach of the University of Georgia football team and staunch supporter of a non-humiliation philosophy on his sidelines, was fired for not winning enough football games, despite inspiring and shaping his players as young men in a fashion too rare in college athletics.
Ultimately, the line of propriety for coaches varies from school to school and situation to situation. Sometimes, established coaches get more leash than their younger counterparts, while other times newer administrations might seek to take their department in a different direction than the past. What is certain, however, is that a confluence of factors is putting a stronger spotlight on coaches’ behaviors that previously went unreported (and certainly unfilmed). Whether this is better or worse for student-athletes and universities is up for debate; either way, athletic departments must be prepared to continue doing arguably the hardest job for administrators: handling its human resources.
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