What A Great Guy: BC AD Defilippo Says He’ll Fire Jagodzinski If He Interviews w/ Jets (Updated 9am)

Future Opponents General NCS Football Tom O'Brien54

This probably will serve as a little insight as to why Tom O’Brien left Boston College for Raleigh:

ESPN’s Chris Mortensen is reporting that Jeff Jagodzinski will be fired as the coach at Boston College if he proceeds with his scheduled interview with the Jets on Monday. According to Mortensen:

“Despite the threat from athletic director Gene DeFilippo, Jagodzinski plans to do the interview with the Jets, the sources said. Those sources said that in the event Jagodzinski is fired, B.C. would promote offensive coordinator Steve Logan to head coach.”

One must suppose that this is part of the fun that comes along with the Boston College football program.  You may recall that Defilippo proclaimed a little over a year ago that

“[T]he fun is back in Boston College football. Tom did a wonderful job here, but nobody was having fun. The fun is back at Boston College.”

FanBlogs.com has the story with links here and describes Boston College as ‘going psycho ex-girlfriend’ on Jags. As the story develops you learn more and they take you to “Auburn crazy! Jerry Jones crazy!”.

According to the Boston Globe report linked at Fanblogs, Jags will likely not be back with the Eagles in 2009 — regardless of whether he interviews or not — because of the bad blood that has developed from BC’s position.
 The report states:

Unless something truly strange happens – and that can’t be ruled out given what’s already transpired – it would certainly seem unlikely for Jagodzinski to be back at BC even if he didn’t go through with the interview, given the level the confrontation has reached.

Fanblogs states the obvious when they say –

So… let me get this straight. Your head coach is 20-8 in three seasons, with two divisional championships… and you’re going to fire him… regardless?? OK… good luck with all that.

Then Fanblogs mentions our friend at EagleinAtlanta that doesn’t like SFN anymore because we would dare discuss things (from his blog) that reflect negatively on Boston College. I can only imagine how every site on the internet will be viewed by him after they discuss THIS STORY!

Let me just say this about potential replacements for Jags… who in their right mind is going to leap to go to BC after the administration has tried to blackmail their own head coach? I mean… this is some crazy sh*t. This is borderline Auburn crazy! We’re talking Jerry Jones crazy!

The only coaches who are going to seriously consider replacing Jagodzinksi are either died in the wool Boston College guys or those who are so desperate for a BCS head coaching job that they’re willing to take the risk, despite BC AD Gene DeFilippo’s crazy ex-girlfriend tendencies.

As a general rule, neither option is likely to work out in the long term, because the problem isn’t the coach. If BC wants to go psycho on somebody, they should start with Gene DeFilippo. He’s earned it.

Update 1/6: Past Tense?

The way that AD Defillipo phrases things is telling, IMO:

“I think Jeff Jagodzinski did a great job here,” said DeFilippo. “But I want a person who wants to be at Boston College and who wants to stay here a long, long time. I thought I had that person.”

Note that it is all in past tense — and it is no leap to come to the conclusion that it sounds like BC has moved on.

Future Opponents General NCS Football Tom O'Brien

54 Responses to What A Great Guy: BC AD Defilippo Says He’ll Fire Jagodzinski If He Interviews w/ Jets (Updated 9am)

  1. st8family 01/05/2009 at 12:46 PM #

    I’ve heard Logan interviewed multiple times in the past. He only went to BC to help Jags out. They are best friends. The ideal job for Logan (according to him) is an OC job in the NFL. That being said, if Jags is the HC in NY, who do you think the OC will be?

    The BC AD needs to go ahead and form a search party if he doesn’t want Spaziani.

  2. CStanley 01/05/2009 at 12:47 PM #

    With regards to Spaziani, I don’t think he wanted to move. He’ll likely stay or move on to somewhere else nearby.

  3. nav 01/05/2009 at 1:22 PM #

    I can understand both sides of this issue. The coaches in college seem to hold all the power. They jump ship all the time from college to college or college to pro with little to no repercussions. The student athletes get penalized for jumping ship, I feel wrongly in some cases, and the athletic departments get screwed by coaching searches, PR issues, and ongoing large raises to keep coaches(BMFD).

  4. VaWolf82 01/05/2009 at 1:59 PM #

    The coaches in college seem to hold all the power.

    I think that the power between the colleges and the coaches is pretty evenly split. Coaches leave for a better job and get fired before their contract is up at about the same rate. The only part of the contract that seems to really matter is the buyout clause.

  5. Gene 01/05/2009 at 2:54 PM #

    I was listening to a local (Philadelphia area) sports talk show, as I was running some erands this afternoon. They mentioned the Jags situation and were critical of the AD’s position.

    What they said, which got my attention, is if a BC coach leaves for a program with better resources, like Florida or FSU, BC shouldn’t hold the coach back because it’s a good thing for BC to attract coaches who get the attention of bigger programs.

    It’s just funny the disconnect between the BC fans and the national media’s perception BC’s athletics program.

    I think the AD needs to spend some time and invest some money in upgrades to their program, or else they’ll always suffer from the “small school” label.

    I can only imagine what Al Skinner could do with better facilities to showcase his coaching abilities, with regards to building a basketball powerhouse.

  6. WilmingtonWolf05 01/05/2009 at 4:06 PM #

    http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=3811319

    Thought you guys might find it interesting what Skip Bayless had to say about this…. Interesting the revisionist history put on TOB by this numbskull….

  7. WilmingtonWolf05 01/05/2009 at 4:14 PM #

    ESPN’s piece on this situation is interesting, in particular the video attached….

    Listen to Skip Bayless’ revisionist history about TOB and BC….

    Skip says that “He [Tom O’Brien] was really well liked there…”

    If I recall correctly, weren’t there websites to fire him at BC?

  8. Greywolf 01/05/2009 at 4:27 PM #

    ^
    I know where BC can find an AD who know fah-cility up grades. Perhaps a 3-way deal:
    LF to BC,
    Bro to NCSU and
    Mean Gene to UNX.

    BC gets their fah-cilities
    UNX gets a hard-ass who knows how to deal with BMFD
    NCSU gets the AD who know how to win the Chancellor’s Cup or whatever it’s called. 😉

    IMO it isn’t a matter of is Mean Gene right or wrong, he is clearly demonstrating he doesn’t have a fundamental grasp of managing executives, i.e., Head Coaches.

    I have no issue with Mean Gene holding Jags to his contract conditions, I do have an issue with the boorish and immature public airing of the challenge to Jags. I wonder how those who want our AD publicly humiliating our coaches for doing a poor job, feel about this. We should be so lucky for LF to pull a Mean Gene, because the BOT would have him packing and out of here on the next train.

  9. GAWolf 01/05/2009 at 5:02 PM #

    As soon as this story broke I told my wife that I bet there was a clause in Jag’s contract saying he promised not to leave for another coaching position for some period of time. There was no way a man smart enough to make it to a position in his career such as AD at a BCS college would go public with a threat such as this… or yet even make a threat such as this… unless Jags made some promise that would he would stay at least x amount of time if given the job.

    Who knows… that could have been the primary thing BC relied on in giving him the job. None of us were privy to the conversations leading up to Jags replacing TOB. Perhaps he made a big stink about loyalty and continuity and all that only to turn around and thumb his nose as he ran off and interviewed with the Jets.

    It’s easy to pounce on the AD, but we don’t know the whole story here.

  10. redfred2 01/05/2009 at 5:29 PM #

    I don’t have time to read the thread, and I’m sure it’s been discussed, but supposedly BC has a clause where Jaggs can’t talk to any NFL teams in his first three seasons. He’s in year two.

  11. Greywolf 01/05/2009 at 5:36 PM #

    No, we don’t know the whole story and we don’t have to know in order to appraise Mean Gene’s behavior in representing BC. We talk a lot about Jed, I mean Lee Fowler, embarrassing NCSU. THIS is the gold standard for embarrassing your employer. This relegates LF to Pikersville in the domain of embarrassment. Mean Gene, step to the head of the class.

    As for Jags, if he wanted to test the water to assess his value, all he had to do was call BMFD to find out how to hold a gun to Mean Gene’s head. 😉

  12. wufpup76 01/05/2009 at 6:03 PM #

    “It’s easy to pounce on the AD, but we don’t know the whole story here.”

    ^True. Caught an espnews piece on the story and one of the “sources” indicated that Jags looked them square in the eye and gave his word to be loyal for x number of years

    You could say DeFilippo should know better than that, but at the same time I don’t have a problem w/ DeFilippo and BC trying to hold him to his signed contract / word. As has been said, a “loyalty clause” could have been one of the big reasons why Jags got the job … All that said, BC has really screwed up the PR side of all of this – chances are that this story was going to leak anyway, so maybe they should’ve gotten their side of the story out there a little more quickly

    Egg on the face for everyone

  13. Gene 01/05/2009 at 6:27 PM #

    Eh…still plenty of time to do damage control…call a press conference get BC’s side of the story out in public, in an official capacity and say we expected Jags to honor his commitment to us and pin the blame on him for backing off his signed agreement.

    What’s really an issue for BC is the preception their school isn’t a major BCS program and just a stepping stone to bigger and better things.

  14. wufpup76 01/05/2009 at 6:49 PM #

    ACC Now has an update on the story where they link to an article from the Boston Globe

    http://blogs.newsobserver.com/accnow/bc-ready-to-fire-jags-promote-spaziani

    From the Globe article:

    “Although there had been various reports stating that a clause in Jagodzinski’s contract prohibited any contact with NFL teams for his first three seasons — the coach is in the second year of a five-year deal with a total compensation package of more than $1 million per season — sources at BC said yesterday that no such clause existed, although there was an understanding that Jagodzinski, who was hired two years ago to replace Tom O’Brien, would refrain from seeking other jobs for at least three seasons.

    The crux of the issue was not the contract, but the failure by Jagodzinski to tell DeFilippo about the contact with the Jets. DeFilippo learned of the situation between the Jets and Jagodzinski Saturday afternoon when a reporter asked him if any contact between the coach and team had been made. DeFilippo, who had asked Jagodzinski earlier about the matter and been told that published reports of an imminent meeting were false, was then informed that a meeting had been set up and that Jagodzinski had not told him the truth.”

  15. wufpup76 01/05/2009 at 6:54 PM #

    ACC Now has an update on the story where they link to an article from the Boston Globe …

    Sorry for the duplicate post where I have one in “moderation” mode, admins – I keep forgetting that it’s apparently not kosher to provide exterior links when commenting with the most recent update to WordPress

    Anyway, from the Globe article:

    “Although there had been various reports stating that a clause in Jagodzinski’s contract prohibited any contact with NFL teams for his first three seasons — the coach is in the second year of a five-year deal with a total compensation package of more than $1 million per season — sources at BC said yesterday that no such clause existed, although there was an understanding that Jagodzinski, who was hired two years ago to replace Tom O’Brien, would refrain from seeking other jobs for at least three seasons.

    The crux of the issue was not the contract, but the failure by Jagodzinski to tell DeFilippo about the contact with the Jets. DeFilippo learned of the situation between the Jets and Jagodzinski Saturday afternoon when a reporter asked him if any contact between the coach and team had been made. DeFilippo, who had asked Jagodzinski earlier about the matter and been told that published reports of an imminent meeting were false, was then informed that a meeting had been set up and that Jagodzinski had not told him the truth.”

  16. GAWolf 01/05/2009 at 7:01 PM #

    Everyone knows coaching contracts these days are hardly worth the paper they’re written on. That goes both ways, and hence goes the development of contractual buyouts BOTH WAYS.

    As someone who participates daily in the world of handshakes and gentleman’s agreements, I can tell you that few things in this world are as infuriating as people who beg for something with promises they know they’re willing to break. That obviously assumes Jags begged AND he made such a promise, two things I can’t guarantee. However, for a reaction like this I would bet that’s how it went down.

  17. redfred2 01/05/2009 at 7:39 PM #

    “Skip says that “He [Tom O’Brien] was really well liked there…”

    If I recall correctly, weren’t there websites to fire him at BC?”

    I see that as a plus in public perception for BC there. It also means that, at least back then, that their AD was smart enough not to bring out the broad brush and paint his own BC fanbase as a bunch of lunatics.

  18. GAWolf 01/05/2009 at 8:24 PM #

    That Boston Globe article makes most sense. That’s about the only justification for BC’s stance. 1: The gentleman’s agreement that was complete bullshit and 2: the lying about the meeting.

    Thus the emotional aspect of this whole scenario. This from the beginning was not your typical coaching carousel contract issue/job shopping.

    If I had an employer and I did those two things I would expect to be fired much less threatened with such. I’m all for looking to gain a better position, but there’s a decent way to go about it and a shady one.

    Not to mention, assuming Mass is a right to work state he can be fired at will for no cause. Obviously there might be a legal battle there on the contractual issues, but he could have just said… get out.

  19. redfred2 01/05/2009 at 8:32 PM #

    I never thought I’d say this, but ND is winning a competitive athletic event, beating G’town on the hardwood, and I am happy as hell about it!

    That would be my TWO LEAST FAVORITE BB programs losing in a period of just over 24 hours.

    Now if ND could just play again, maybe right after this game is over.

  20. Alpha Wolf 01/06/2009 at 8:18 AM #

    I wouldn’t wipe my rear end with a thing Skip Bayless says. Seriously.

    GAWolf has an interesting point of view in this – that Jags made promises he is no longer willing to keep. True, that would infuriate an employer in an ordinary circumstance. But would firing a coach just before signing day be cutting off the program’s nose to spite its face?

    Since GAWolf is a top management type of fellow, I would be interested to hear his take on this: which would be more important – business continuity or enforcing a handshake deal? And that’s a serious question…I’d like to hear what you think.

  21. LKNpackfan 01/06/2009 at 8:56 AM #

    What’s interesting to me is – who leaked?
    The only person with a reasonable motive, who is self-involved enough and who could only gain from the situation, is Steve Logan.

  22. GAWolf 01/06/2009 at 7:57 PM #

    Top Management is relative in a small business. I also go to Sams and pick up cleaning and office supplies.

    The question you make is valid as to where the utility of a hard line crosses over into the world of being detrimental to the cause. When emotions get involved the ability to make the right decision there becomes tough. It’s the entire image of this situation being highly irrational that makes it obvious to me that it’s a highly emotional situation. What makes an otherwise savvy business man highly emotional? The feeling that someone is attempting to take advantage of him by neglecting promises not only made but heavily relied upon. It’s the shiester-effect, I guess.

    It’s much easier to deal with an honest man who comes to you and tells you he’s torn about his previous promises and this new opportunity. That situation *might* be able to be resolved amicably. The guy who says “f it”, goes back on his promises, and then LIES to you about doing it to cover his own ass…. that’s not only infuriating but it creates a toxic working relationship forever. Cut the cord for better or worse. That relationship can NEVER EVER BE COMPLETELY REPAIRED.

    Honestly, assuming the rumors are true and I were the AD I would have just fired him after going through the proper channels. I would have made no threats, public or private. The damage is done whether he stays or goes. If the rumor is true, Jags is a liar and his word is worthless. If Jags set up an interview and then looked him in the eye and lied about it when confronted… he’s not the guy I want to work over, for or with. He’s certainly not the guy I want shaping young peoples’ futures at my University.

    So… yes… it might be cutting off the face to spite the nose. But, if the nose is cancerous you’re going to have to cut it off and likely all the skin around it anyway. Kick the face, and save the body.

    It’s sort of like keeping a player that demands to be traded. I’ve never understood that. Let the goon go. He’s poisoning your locker room. Once a productive working relationship is poisoned, there’s no decision to make really.

  23. GAWolf 01/06/2009 at 8:09 PM #

    Lake Norman: Good point. I’m a conspiracy theorist by nature, and that is a great, great question. I don’t get interested in too many sports “dramas” but this one really intrigues me. I can’t wait to watch it unfold and then read about what really went down.

  24. Greywolf 01/07/2009 at 1:37 AM #

    “It’s sort of like keeping a player that demands to be traded. I’ve never understood that. Let the goon go. He’s poisoning your locker room. Once a productive working relationship is poisoned, there’s no decision to make really.”

    Or holding a player to a LOI who no longer wants to come to your school?

  25. GAWolf 01/07/2009 at 9:17 AM #

    Sort of. Now that I think about it though, you can’t let word get out that you’re soft on commitment. And that’s what’s happening here. Perhaps my analogy isn’t as perfect as I first thought. This situation is extremely interesting to say the least. It’s as much a peak into the digression of human morals as it is just the dynamic of college football coaching contracts. Would this sort of thing ever have happened as late as the 60’s? I guess college coaching is such big business and big money that the money has corrupted a once gentlemanly pursuit.

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