There is little doubt that Grizzly coach Bobby Hauck is a hot commodity in national coaching circles.
And while he was one of the youngest head football coaches when he took the job seven years ago, let’s face it, he isn’t getting any younger and becoming a coaching veteran at the Football Championship Series level does nothing to enhance his market value at the next level.
Now while we are great friends – I would put him in the top four of UM football coaches I have worked with since that’s how many I have been associated with – he has never shared his future aspirations nor have I asked him to tell me what he thought about moving on.
Nor would I, because, you see, I think those are personal decisions influenced by a multitude of factors that the general public is not and should not be aware of.
While my journalistic curiosity causes me to be a little more than interested in Hauck’s future, I firmly subscribe to the theory that I am not entitled, nor should I be, to know where a coach is coming from in personal or family situations.
And while I’ve come to know a myriad of coaches in my business on far more than a professional level, if I know of behavior that is neither illegal nor unethical, even if I disagree with it, quite frankly it’s none of anyone’s business.
With cell phone cameras, bloggers, and a host of information distribution resources, there is little anymore that is private in any of our lives and, quite frankly, I get tired of it.
Now don’t get me wrong. If a player is arrested, no matter the circumstances, I want to know about it and, after doing my homework, want to tell you about it.
If there is a misuse or malfeasance in the halls of the Athletic Department, you have a right to know about it and I have a responsibility to discover it and write about it.
But I grow weary of a 24-hour news and sports cycle that initially reports innuendo, then proceeds to try to confirm what’s been rumored to have happened and brings a stable of paid “experts” forward to psychoanalyze something they haven’t yet been able to confirm.
Now mind you, where’s there’s smoke there’s usually fire.
And with the recent moving of a Federal Shield Law to the full Senate floor for consideration, there remains hope that the public, with their anonymity protected, will continue to talk to hacks like me.
But if we journalists were not in such a hurry to try to be first – which by the way the public cares little about and couldn’t tell you who or where they actually first heard anything from – we’d do a better service to our readers, listeners and viewers and restore credibility and trust in our craft.
What was it Walter Cronkite said: “Be first but be right!” Ask yourself where do you find that correction: In the same place as the story played? I think not.
Now Bobby, my good friend, which jobs are you considering?