Washington State head football coach Mike Leach is one of the most entertaining figures in all of college sports. He isn’t shy about sharing his opinions on a wide variety of topics, from other teams and coaches, to current events in football, and even professional baseball. He’s a true curmudgeon who does things his way.
Although he’s only 55 years old, his intolerance of football “politics” and anything resembling bureaucracy is reminiscent of someone 30 years his senior. In short, Mike Leach should be awarded a PhD in giving absolutely zero fucks.
I adore head coach media appearances as they give us, mere mortals, a window into the minds of these enigmatic creatures. There’s nothing better than watching Jim Harbaugh make a room full of media personnel feel uncomfortable and profoundly idiotic for asking questions (a.k.a. doing their jobs). His mind games are sublime. I also appreciate Bill Belichick’s dry sense of humor and long-winded rants about tablets or installing additional stadium cameras.
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Likewise, I take delight in Mike Leach’s brutal honesty and how he marches to the beat of a different drum, except that he probably hates drums because he’s secretly 85 years old and drums are loud. He doesn’t sugar coat anything and he isn’t afraid to directly call out other teams, coaches, or entire conferences when he feels it is warranted. It’s admirable because so few head coaches do this.
Prior to last weekend’s game against Arizona State, Leach took aim at the Sun Devils for stealing signs (which, by the way, they do) and called for the PAC-12 to investigate the legality of their practices. ASU’s head coach, Todd Graham, took exception to this and, during the post-game handshake, told Leach that his comments were “chickenshit.” Leach, unsurprisingly, was unfazed by Graham’s assertion because, again, he gives exactly zero shits what you think of him.
Remember when the SEC got all bent out of shape about satellite camps earlier in the year? Leach had a solution to the problem: “Those in the SEC that don’t like them need to quit being such big babies.” Pacifiers and blankets for all.
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Mike Leach has little tolerance for anything that is the slightest bit impractical. For instance, the way in which WSU selected its team captain is a little unorthodox but very efficient. Usually, teams select a handful of captains for these coveted leadership positions based on a player vote.
Not Leach.
In a recent press conference, he explained that “we really only need one guy” and “all the guy really does is the coin toss.” Failing to see the connection between leadership and the ability to stand at midfield and haphazardly guess which side of a piece of metal will land face up, the Cougars selected one team captain. And by “the Cougars selected” I really mean Leach selected because, “One of the most screwed up things about this country is the fact that, in order to do anything, in order to cross the street, we always have to have a committee.”
Democracy is overrated. Got it. The 85-year-old that secretly inhabits Leach’s body is proud of that comment and wants you to get off his lawn.
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Leach went on to describe his criteria for selecting the lone team captain:
- “Smart enough to call either heads or tails.”
- Actually, that’s it.
Ultimately, he decided on running back Jamal Morrow because Morrow almost won The Price is Right and Leach “figured that Jamal Morrow is a lucky guy.” I hope Morrow puts that on his resume in the future: “Guy that was smart enough to call either heads or tails. Also: lucky guy.”
We gleefully learned this week that Mike Leach also has opinions about the outcome of the World Series, because obviously. He has opinions about everything.
“There are some teams — the Cubs are one of them — where there is just too many Cubs fans. And they’re one of those teams that for whatever reason, I guess it’s because people like the way their uniforms look or something, that every yuppie with a BMW or with some special attachment to his computer or some designer set of jeans or something like that is a Cubs fan and refers to them as ‘my Cubbies.’ And any time you say ‘my’ before your team, well, then that’s dubious. OK? And ‘my this, my that.’ Come on, now. So you get my Cubbies. You don’t get my Indians. You get ‘my Cubbies,’ OK? And I think there are too many out-of-the-woodwork people that like them that like them because they like the uniforms. Don’t know the first thing about baseball. Probably have never even attended a Cubs game, but that’s just going to be their team so they have something to talk about over the coffee machine and the cooler. So as a result I’m going against the whole wave of probably seven-eighths of America, I want the Indians. Me and the city of Cleveland.”
In fewer than 200 words, Leach managed to call out yuppies, BMW drivers, people who like the colors red and blue, people who own laptops, people who wear designer jeans, bandwagoners, and people who use possessive pronouns in front of team names. Efficient.
Mike Leach is a welcome change to a sport that is saturated with coaches reluctant to express their opinions for fear of creating controversy or being fined. For better or for worse, Leach is direct, honest, opinionated, polarizing, genuine, and entertaining. He keeps the PAC-12 interesting, especially since Jim Harbaugh and Chip Kelly left the conference. I say it’s time we form a committee to make his PhD in giving absolutely zero fucks happen.
