I can’t help but think that the only reason Harbaugh is getting a second interview, when he shouldn’t have gotten the first interview in the first place, is out of desperation. Obviously, he didn’t impress Guerro that much the first time around, or he would have been contacted sooner than later. At this point, if Chow hadn’t withdrawn his name, he probably would have gotten another interview. More and more, Guerro is looking like a chicken with its head cut off.

Can we start a www.dumpguerrero.com site, please?

Hey I’m with DigDog…

We need to get rid of INCOMPETENT GUERRERO’s stupid ass. Thanks a lot Peter Dalis for breaking PROP 209 in hiring this IDIOT to replace your sorry ass as the AD.

HELLO, IDIOT GUERRERO: HIRE RICK NEUHIESEL.

GO BRUINS!!!

Perelman is reporting that DG is going to interview Mike Riley…. Not quite the big name I was hoping for….

MIKE RILEY!!

Bay Area Bruin, you are nuts. no disrespect. Riley can coach. The guy belongs in the college game so disregard his stint in the NFL. Look at what he has done at Oregon State. Guy has turned around a dormant program and built a consistent winning team. Its tough enough recruiting kids to go up to Corvallis, a nothing town, but he has consistently won with his players, and kids respond to him and his coaching style. Buddy of mine played for him last 4 years and had glowing things to say about him and rest of coaching staff. Look at what there D has done past couple of years, ranking right near the top in many D statistics. I for one, would LOVE Riley on the Bruin sidelines. But, realism tells me that there is no way Riley is leaving Corvallis for LA. OSU is home for him and his family and that is his program that he has built.

Chris…..Yeah, Riley just quietly seems to get the job done. I live in Oregon half the year, and amazing as it sounds, the fans in Corvallis were chanting “Fire Riley” early this year. When OSU lost to Cincinnati the natives got restless.
One thing about Riley. His teams are always better at the end of the year than at the beginning. OSU alums up here claim that is because he continues teaching and working hard on technique, etc. as the season goes on. Bellotti takes a little heat up here because his teams start fast but have a recent history of playing poorly late in the season.

Hey, Dan Guerrero. I knew JD Morgan. I liked JD Morgan. I played for JD Morgan.

AND YOU’RE NO JD MORGAN.

Your approach in hiring a new football coach is HUMILIATING. It brings dishonor to a great athletic tradition and makes me ashamed to be a Bruin. I thought only Steve Lavin and Karl Dorrell could do that. I WAS WRONG.

Whoever you chose UCLA has already lost. We can kiss the next 2-3 years goodbye since recruits have long memories and don’t want to join a program in disarray. Right now UCLA football is in more disarray than it was immediately after the sterling, brilliant, typical Notre Dame disaster.

Guerrero, I hope that you’re looking for a twofer. A new head coach and someone to take your job and kick your sorry ass back to Orange County.

It is hard to get excited about Riley since we passed on him 5 years ago–I’ll take Neuheisel over him. Does Chancellor Block have time to waste interviewing candidates (e.g., Walker, Harbaugh) who have no shot (I hope) of getting the position?

Mark,

Yeah, and how pissed are you that we did pass on him? Look at what he has done in those 5 years and what we were stuck with with Dorrell.

Question, I thought I heard somewhere that Guererro wanted Riley but was overruled by the admin who wanted Dorrell…any of that right? just curious

There used to be a similar movement as DumpDorrell up north, only it was to fire Mike Riley. But I think its since been taken down and replaced with another one since it looks different from the old site.

It was a real mistake to bypass Riley five years ago. He was considered a promising, up and coming coach who built up the Oregon State program fron nothing to a decent team and who laid the foundations for the 11-1 Oregon State that barely missed playing for a NC. While Dorrell was a WR coach, Riley had been a NFL coach with the Chargers.

And, Riley desperately wanted the job. He turned down his alma mater, Alabama, because he wanted to coach for UCLA. His young family had put down roots in SoCal, and he didn’t want to disrupt that.

I’m not saying that Riley would have lead us to a NC, but he certainly was the better candidate than Dorrell when you looked at their CVs.

Right on DigDog! I won’t turn my back on UCLA, although with Guerrero at that helm my expectations for football are about as low as they can be.

However, there’s always hope. When I was at Ohio State, the football program was bad. We never beat Michigan while I was in school (tied them once-whoopee), and lost every bowl game we went to. It was horrible. Since then it’s been on a steady incline, and now the program is at the caliber it should be, and UCLA should and CAN get there too.

Very few people I talk to remember that Riley was a finalist 5 years ago. I hardly knew anything about him, but remember thinking he was shafted by UCLA - he must have thought he had a very good chance at the job to turn down Alabama - and he must have really wanted to coach here (despite what Doh!n wants us to beleive.

Even before the education received here at DD and at BruinsNation, I remember thinking, “Why go with inexperience over a proven coach that really wants to be a Bruin????”

I’ve got to believe our last 5 years would have been much better. I’ve got to believe the next 20 or so will be better with our prodigal son (though he’s a couple years older than me) returns and open a can (case) of whoopass!

Some of y’all need to relax. It is way too early for dumpdan.com or whatever else y’all think of. If DG gets a legit coach in here, I won’t care that we lose one or even two years worth of recruits, because a legit coach will eventually bring them in. Let’s be reasonable and realize that UCLA won’t probably be even in the PAC-10 championships talk next year. Even Ben Howland struggled his first year revamping the UCLA B-Ball program after the mess Lavin left us with. So just chill out and let DG do his job.

Of course if he fails to do this, I’ll join the bandwagon and we can start looking for DG’s replacement also.

HHM - mighty white of ya’ll, I do declare.

DigDog @ 9:42 pm:
Can we start a www.dumpguerrero.com site, please?

A great idea and a possible continuation of this site next week after the new coach is selected.

Great idea Dig Dog. I love it. We need an AD who moves with lightning not lard ass fat boy speed. DG must go now. The interviews are reminding me of the MBA textbook The Peter Principle. Bureaucrats and executives reach a level of their incompetence when they reach a brick wall, and cannot improve on the job. DG has reached such a level of incompetence right now, and the Chancellor is fast approaching The Blockhead Wall of incompetence.

Troy Aikman never beat USC. Rick Neuheisel did. Aikman never played in a Rose Bowl. Aikman lost to Nebraska in Lincoln and lost to Rodney Peete & USC twice. I was at all three games, and I was pissed. He also cost us a national championship when he could not score from the 5 yard line against WSU at the Rose Bowl in 1988. So there, Troy. STFU, you are just jealous of Rick Neuheisel. Stick to your corny announcing on TV.

I’ll put my money on Rick over Troy any day. Rick haa a genuine personality, do you hear that Troy? Rick can also coach. Can you Troy?

DG will only be fired for insubordination, if he grows too ambitious, if he does something illegal, or if he hurts a kid. Outside of that, DG will NEVER be fired at UCLA.

UCLA had Peter Dalis for 20 years, WHY ON EARTH would they fire DG for a bad football hire? Peter Dalis had bad football hires and bad bball hires, and his job was NEVER threatened.

THE UCLA administration is at the heart of this guys. There is no doubt in my mind that the UCLA administration is the one delaying matters and is meddling much more than normal because they simply don’t want football to be too big at UCLA.

All I need to know about Mike Riley is what I saw with my own eyes when he was running the Chargers into the ground. Out of sight out of mind.

Brent, I take it you live in San Diego like I do…and if you are a charger fan like me, then you know there is no way you can place all the blame on Riley for those years. The guy was a dead man walking in that situation. He had no talent surrounding him and it wasn’t until Butler/Smith came in, that there was a turnaround. Any coach would have struggled in that situation.

Even so, who cares how he did in the NFL. Look at his college resume and grade him on that.

Bluebruin makes a great point….why is Block so heavily involved in the ENTIRE process? I don’t know about you, but in most hiring situations — whether in sports or business — it’s my experience that the President interviews the person that the Search Committee or AD or GM — RECOMMENDS for the job. Maybe the President interviews TWO finalists. It my opinion, they are hoping to find someone cause they really DON’T WANT TO HIRE NEUHEISEL. In my mind, RN probably gave the best interviews and has most experience, but DG doesn’t care for him because he is a bit of a loose
canon and Block is worried about the NCAA stuff. Problem is he’s the best candidate, but they really would prefer not to hire him!

Mike Riley isn’t leaving Oregon State for UCLA. He is doing well in Corvallis, and he grew up there. Frankly, at best UCLA would be a lateral move.

I had heard on the radio that Aikman was pushing for Neuheisel, who was his QB coach. Now he’s “stumping for Harbaugh”? What to believe?

Mike Riley…..Bruinsnation has a nice little piece on Mike Riley up right now. Some good points are made. What I have to add may not blow your skirt up, but living in Oregon talking to football people, going to games, and reading the Eugene Register Guard and Corvallis Gazette on a regular basis has given me an opportunity to weigh what is reported in the LA press against what I hear and see locally.
First, Oregon State is at a distinct disadvantage to the U of O when it comes to recruiting. The U of O is the fair haired child in the state. Oregon State has a relatively small pocket of in-state fans that are located primarily in the Salem area. Portland is split and everything south of Corvallis is Duck country. For the most part. Oregon State’s recent success in baseball has literally shocked most Oregonians. The U of O was so envious that they decided to add baseball to their list of competitive sports after being without a baseball team for over 25 years.
Oregon recently received a $100 million dollar gift from Phil Knight so they could build a new basketball arena. Oregon has Autzen Stadium with sky boxes and an attached indoor practice field and ultra-modern training center. Oregon State has Reser Stadium….yes, they had to accept the Reser name as part of the corporate sponsor contingency.
Oregon has a nice connection with Concord De La Salle high school in California. Each year they manage to pluck a few guys from that perennial No. California football powerhouse who end up making an impact at the college level. Oregon State has no such recruiting pipeline.
Mike Riley has managed to build a successful program by grabbing in-state high school kids that Oregon took a pass on. If he does get a high profile kid in Oregon it is usually because the kid’s father went to OSU. Plus, the kids Riley gets are usually of great character. If they step out of line, they are gone. Being a gangsta in Corvallis is kinda like being a turd in a goldfish bowl.
Finally, Oregon State offers a much more limited range of majors than the liberal arts oriented U of O.
In spite of the above limitations, Riley has managed to field a competitive Pac-10 entry most years. His teams always seem to improve as the season progresses.
One caveat. Riley is a mild mannered, non-demonstrative, unemotional sideline coach. Karl Dorrell is a raving madman by comparison. You will never see Riley throw his headset down ala Jeff Tedford after OSU beat him this year. If you want a coach that yells and waves his arms and gets in player’s faces, Riley isn’t your guy.
One more thing of note. Riley gained TONS of respect in state after last year’s Oregon State Sun Bowl win. Oregon State played Missouri and the game was a shoot-out. Oregon State scored with a couple seconds left in the game and trailed by one point. Did they do the Terry Donohue thing and kick the PAT for the tie? Nope. Riley very calmly went for it with Bernard blasting up the middle for the two points and a one point win. All the while, Riley stood there with his arms folded like he was waiting for a bus or something. Very impressive.

One more thing on Riley. He is a defensive minded coach. Oregon State ranked #2 vs the run this year with a less experienced defense than we had at UCLA.

One more one more thing on Riley. Do I personally believe he gives us a greater chance to win the Pac-10 than Neuheisel? No.

I’m sure you all know by now, but if you haven’t — just announced — IT’S NEUHEISEL!!

I have been a UCLA fan for over 60 years and attended UCLA graduate school in 1980. Even before RN was considered a candidate, I thought he would be the best HC. UCLA made a mistake the first time they didn’t hire him several years ago. If anyone else get hired, I will know for sure DG wants a losing football program.
Rita