Lloyd Carr should be doing cartwheels right now. A year ago, he was on the hot seat. Almost ten years removed from his National Championship, the Wolverine faithful had lost patience. If you would have said before the season that Michigan would be 11-1 and playing in the Rose Bowl, you'd have to picture Lloyd Carr grinning like a madman, knowing he's bought himself another three years in Ann Arbor. Alas, this is what the BCS can do to a man. It can make you make absurd proclamations about things over which you have no control:
"I can guarantee that at some point [we will have a playoff], it will happen."
It can make you say things that fly in the face of everything else you've said up until this point and will say for the next three weeks:
"Sometimes, in athletics, you get a bad bounce, and things don't go your way. And we have to move on from this."
And it can make you lie so obviously that the worst liars in the world would gather, assumedly at some sort of liar's convention, and proclaim you the lyingest liar of all the lies.
"There's a tremendous excitement about this game, about playing in the Rose Bowl."
We can't blame Lloyd for all of this. The BCS made him what he is. The interesting thing about this pattern of BCS coaching reactions is that its become clear that every post-season will include three very distinct coaches. The Silent Majority (the coach who has no reason to complain...this year), The Lobbyist (the coach whose team has a shot at the championship game but is in competition with another team) and the Grumpy Gus (the coach whose team is left out of the big game, either because of the Lobbyist or the BCS-in-general).
Let's take a look back, shall we, at some of the most famous incarnations of the three.
1998
The Silent Majority - Philip Fulmer, Tennessee
The Lobbyist - Bobby Bowden, Florida State (what a surprise)
The Grumpy Gus - Bob Snyder, Kansas State (more so because KSU was #4 in BCS but ended up in Alamo Bowl)
1999
The Silent Majority - Bobby Bowden, Florida State
The Lobbyist - Frank Beamer, Virginia Tech
The Grumpy Gus - No one (for once!)
2000 The Silent Majority - Bob Stoops, Oklahoma
The Lobbyist - Bobby Bowden, Florida State (welcome back)
Grumpy Gus - Butch Davis, Miami (ranked higher than FSU in both human polls AND beat the Seminoles head-to-head!)
2001
The Silent Majority - Larry Coker, Miami
The Lobbyist - Tom Osborne, Nebraska (still my favorite BCS screw-job, qualified for this game after losing 62-36! Fuck Osborne and his good-old-boys.)
Grumpy Gus - Mike Belloti, Oregon (#2 in both polls)
2002
The Silent Majority - Larry Coker, Miami
The Lobbyist - Jim Tressel, Ohio State (even though undefeated, OSU had doubters)
Grumpy Gus - Rose Bowl (when the Orange Bowl picked a Rose Bowl-like USC-Iowa matchup)
2003
The Silent Majority - Bob Stoops, Oklahoma (well, he had to do a little lobbying I suppose)
The Lobbyist - Pete Carroll, USC, Nick Saban, LSU
Grumpy Gus - Pete Carroll, USC (Pete was the first coach to claim the coveted "two-fer" honor)
2004 The Silent Majority - Pete Carroll, USC (where'd all that anger go, Pete?), Bob Stoops, Oklahoma
The Lobbyist - Tommy Tuberville, Auburn
Grumpy Gus - Tommy Tuberville, Auburn (And Tommy was the second)
Grumpy Gus Honroable Mention - Mack Brown, who whined like a little bitch to get voters to put Texas above Cal for the Rose Bowl. It worked and despite the outcomes, it was criminal.
2005 The Silent Majority - Pete Carroll, USC, Mack Brown, Texas
The Lobbyist - No one!
Grumpy Gus - No one! The BCS Works!!!
2006
The Silent Majority - Jim Tressel, Ohio State
The Lobbyist - Urban Meyer, Florida
Grumpy Gus - Lloyd Carr, Michigan (Ahhhh...all is right with the world again...)
BCS Source: NCAASports.com