Arkansas Blog

I equate Orville's work with any sportwriter in the U.S. He was a gentleman, sports historian and despite his love for the hawgs could point out the warts when necessary. It doesn't surprise me that what he wrote back then proved all too true. Broyles was in many ways Machiavellian and allowed to stay far past his time. Wonder how the "so called captains" feel about the latest turn of events. I certainly would like to be the fly on the wall when they read this article.

Max, why no topic on Stanley Reed's comments in today's Dem-Gaz? Seems to shed a little more light.

"When people at the top mess up, I am furious." Me too, Orville!

How in the !@#$%^&* can you justify paying someone 3.5 + million to quit and then go to work for a competitor in less than 24 hours? Nutt should be laughing all the way to the bank and White should be looking for a way to get bought out of his contact!

Contract-rather than contact. I'm so mad I can't even type!

This is the press conference some Nutt-haters hoped for:

"Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen.

Today the University of Arkansas has terminated the tenure of Houston Nutt as head coach of the Razorbacks. In accordance with his contract, he will receive buyout compensation of approximately $5 million. Only $300,000 of this money will come from University funds.

I can say that during the course of negotiations over the last several days, Coach Nutt expressed a desire to resign; however, he conditioned his resignation on being relieved of the "golden handcuffs" in place on his contract. Further, he insisted on the freedom to coach at other schools in the SEC, and refused to sign a non-compete agreement that is probably unenforceable under Arkansas law.

Naturally, the University responded negatively to these conditions, which along with Coach Nutt's other demands, would have cost in excess of 3.5 million. Instead we have paid Coach Nutt $5 million and he is free to coach anywhere he pleases.

Out of deep concern for Arkansas fans, when faced with the options of (1) allowing Coach Nutt to stay under the terms of his contract; (2) buying him out for $3.5 million and the freedom to coach anywhere; or (3) firing him and paying $5 million, we of course made our decision based on our intense hatred for Coach Nutt, which we know is shared by our fans.

In the meantime, we have asked our lawyers to determine whether a covenant not to compete can be enforced across the expanse of the SEC West. We are hopeful that it cannot be enforced, in which case when intend to offer the open head coach position to Tommy Tuberville of Auburn.

Any questions?"

TAP.....

How are ya?

I didn't expect ya to open up on this topic.

I am trying to back away from this stuff....

I disagree however with your assessment of what we wanted to happen.

I don't think letting him get away with some of the stuff he got away with and then having to pay him to quit shows any marked intelligence on the part of the good ol boys.

But I do think another deal was cut on the level of the BoT to allow someone there more say in the new hire....that money was probably a payment to HDN to appease those unwilling to boot him and thereby off-set some of the power on that board to make room for the change.

Must be fun to have the where-with-all to broker at that level.

How great to read Orville's prose once again, even if it is from the grave. He was the best of the very best, and there will never be another sports wordsmith his equal, here or elsewhere. I take great comfort in the fact that OH has not had to witness the shameful conduct that has been on display during the past year. Not in a million years would he have condoned the mayhem. (I am also grateful that Houston Nutt, Sr., was spared it.)

What a prophet. The search "committee" back then should have simply been Orville.

Just for fun, and context, here's some of what Brummett (who was writing for the Democrat-Gazette at the time) had to say a few days after Orville's tirade:

Orville wrote that White dictated a "Mary Poppins" process. His column on the morning of Nutt's hiring declared, "Tommy Tuberville apparently will be the next head football coach at the University of Arkansas." Ouch.
Part of Henry's animus surely stems from the embarrassment of an errant report on a major event. Speaking from experience, I can say that sometimes an elaborate explanation of why one should have been right is easier than a simple statement that one was wrong.
There was a time when you could go to the bank with Razorback news provided by the voice of Paul Eells and the pen of Orville Henry. You knew Broyles was telling his agents exactly what he had the unchallenged authority to deliver.
But that time is ending, and people are reacting differently to the change. Broyles seems rather meek and pliant about the whole thing, I must say. Orville doesn't.

Hey BIGFAN!

I'm back because in my mind the Nutt saga is over. History. Ready now to get behind a new coach and staff.

Except there are some cardinal-clad Javerts out there who cannot seem to let this go.

Way I look at it, if the Nutt-haters are right, they get 2-for-1. First, they get rid of an incompetent idiot who squanders talent, can't recruit consistently when it counts, chokes in late-game situations, insists on running an archiac offense, under-achieves and can't win the big game.

Then, wonder of wonders, there is the BONUS of sabotaging a divisional opponent by sending Nutt across the river to waste talent, fail to develop that Texas QB transfer, choke in the big game, and run up the middle time and again against us so we can easily defeat Ole Miss for years to come.

So it's all good I guess.

Bottom line, Houston was willing to stay -- and would have stayed, I believe, had he not seen Ole Miss as a chance to have immediate success in a familiar league. I guess we will never know whether, had the University sought to block him from going to other SEC schools or made him make the golden handcuff payout, Houston would have shrugged his shoulders and gone back to his office to call recruits to assure them he wasn't leaving. Mr. Reed's comments in today's paper certainly make it seem possible.

Oh yeah, no one has more respect for Mr. Henry than I.

But if his "no-head-coach experience at this level" assessment was directed at any head coaching task other than long-term recruiting, then 8-0 -- and a non-coaching stumble from 9-0 in the first year (with someone else's players; hence the reference to recruiting) suggests Mr. Henry may have been off the mark, this one time, in assessing what was necessary to be a winning field general in the SEC.

BIGFAN, my fellow Hog fanatic -- if you don't pay him to go away, and he won't go away otherwise, then what, besides (1) keeping him or (2) firing him, do you suggest?

NOSTRADORVILEE!!