Rich Rodriguez recalls 'nasty talks and threats' from when he left West Virginia
West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez recalled what it was like leaving the program in the mid-2000s to take a job at Michigan.
“Yeah, if you think back about it, I mean there was a lot of nasty talks and threats and family got threats,” Rich Rodriguez said in an interview on the College GameDay Podcast. “It didn’t surprise me. At least they’ve got passion, right?”
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“The things that had bothered me were the things that came out that weren’t true or factual,” Rodriguez said. “I should have addressed it. I should have had a press conference or something, I think. Again, this is my opinion. I should have had a press conference explaining this is why I’m leaving. These are the concerns I have or this is the opportunity that we’re looking at.
“I just kind of wanted to move on and Michigan had told me to move on.”
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“I don’t think about it a lot, but I still have to think about it occasionally to learn from it,” Rich Rodriguez said. “This is it now for me. I’m not going to leave this opportunity. But I think I had to learn a lot from that experience, and I think I did learn a lot, not only from a personal standpoint but what this program had meant to the state of West Virginia. I’m like maybe the madder they were, the more upset they were, was because we were having success and we were so close to getting it done. And we were. We were close to getting it done.
“So maybe that passion was a good thing, not looking at it from a negative standpoint. At least I try to look at it from this view now. But the people have been real nice.”
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