You could fit all of the people who believe Kyle Whittingham will reignite Michigan football inside of a thimble.
Michigan is running out of reasons to give Whittingham a second season.
He hasn’t fixed anything and somehow managed to make a bad offense worse.
No matter how many scapegoats Whittingham benches or fires, he’s provided no evidence he’ll spur improvement.
Under Whittingham’s watch, Michigan is in a state of retreat.
“It's not one step back, it's three steps back,” Whittingham said of Michigan’s offense after a 15-6 loss to Michigan State.
Whittingham said before the rivalry game this would
be Michigan State’s “Super Bowl.” Is it wrong if the Spartans treated it that way? Michigan treated it like a throwaway game and lost to an opponent that was 2-6.
Whittingham was supposed to be a bridge to whomever comes next. Well, the Wolverines need to get on with whatever comes next, because the bridge is buckling, and Michigan is slipping toward irrelevance. The one thing Michigan cannot afford to be is irrelevant.
Ask Nebraska or Florida State about that.
More losses await Michigan football
The Wolverines (5-4) have three ranked opponents left. Their record should come with an asterisk, considering the phantom second involved in beating Western Michigan. If they lose each remaining game, they’ll finish 5-7 for the first time since 2014. Brady Hoke coached that team. Hoke wasn’t invited back the following season.
Michigan should consider itself fortunate it didn’t have to pay Sherrone Moore to disappear last year. Moore’s moral turpitude took care of the buyout. That cost savings could be applied toward sending Whittingham off with a nice retirement package, as Michigan pursues a fresh start with a new athletic director and a new president.
The arguments to retain Whittingham for a second season have nothing to do with the coach, and everything to do with the lingering dysfunction and transition inside of Michigan athletics.
Why would Michigan football retain Kyle Whittingham?
Myth 1: Michigan has a lame-duck athletic director, so it can’t replace its football coach.
Athletics director Warde Manuel is on his way out, and incoming president C. Cybele Raver has not hired Manuel’s successor.
The C-suite transition might be the best argument to keep Whittingham, but I’ll let you in on a secret: Athletic directors sort of stink at hiring coaches anyway. If they were hiring savants, tens of millions in buyout bucks wouldn’t get flushed across the country each season.
Also, sometimes, a lame duck finds a nut.
UCLA and Kentucky made strong hires in the previous coaching carousel with athletic directors who were on their way out. Martin Jarmond, with the help of a search group, hired Bob Chesney to UCLA. Months later, UCLA fired Jarmond.
At Kentucky, Mitch Barnhart retired months after hiring Will Stein.
Michigan’s situation is somewhat different than that of UCLA or Kentucky, because Manuel’s exit was announced months ago.
College athletics leaders are a bit like U.S. senators. Sometimes, they think more clearly when they’re on their way and not so focused on keeping their job.
If Raver didn’t want Manuel near a coaching search, then Michigan’s new president could make the hire herself, or she could organize a small group to lead the search, with the help of a contracted search firm.
Or, wrap up the athletic director search within the next couple of weeks, and task that AD with installing a new coach sooner than later.
Myth 2. Michigan’s new president needs time to evaluate Whittingham.
If Raver reviews the film of the Michigan-Michigan State game, that ought to be all the time she needs to appreciate how bleak the situation is. It’s not as if Michigan is coming up aces on the recruiting trail, either.
As ex-Florida athletic director Jeremy Foley used to say, what must be done eventually should be done immediately.
If Raver has watched Whittingham’s Wolverines, she surely knows Michigan will need to fire him eventually. Is inconvenient timing enough reason to wait?
Myth 3. Whittingham needs more time.
No, he doesn’t.
Curt Cignetti needed one year to jumpstart one of the nation’s worst programs. This year's two remaining undefeated teams, Utah and UCLA, are led by first-year coaches.
College football’s microwave era is here. Waiting a year won’t make a bad meal taste any better.
We’re not talking about a cub coach who might grow into the job. Whittingham is a veteran of 22 seasons. He thrived at Utah, where he fit better than he’ll ever fit Michigan, but even the Utes realized at the end of his tenure they were better off moving on.
Nobody looks at an old plow horse and thinks, “Give it another year, and he’ll win the Derby.”
He’ll still be a plow horse, and Michigan needs a thoroughbred.
Michigan needs a transfer quarterback, too. Money helps, but top portal quarterbacks tend to get multiple high-dollar offers. Who would want to play for a rock-fight master who’s never developed a quarterback into an NFL Draft pick?
When will Michigan admit: This experiment isn't working, and won't work
I won’t knock Whittingham’s heyday. At his best, he was exactly what Utah needed.
He’s not at his best, and he’s not at Utah, and Michigan remains broken. Another year with Whittingham won’t fix that. It’ll just delay the inevitable coaching search.
I don't blame Michigan for hiring Whittingham when Moore's tenure ended in disgrace. It needed to hire someone who wouldn't embarrass the university off the field.
I would blame Michigan if it wasted another season with a sunken coach.
If Michigan talks itself into retaining Whittingham, it'll be because the timing of a coaching change wouldn't be ideal.
In the meantime, Michigan will continue to idle, and nobody will believe the coach at the wheel is the answer to the problems.
Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network's senior national college football columnist. Listen to his podcast, "College Football Unfiltered." Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on X @btoppmeyer.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Michigan football must face reality. Kyle Whittingham is not the answer
