Turtledroppings.com – Maryland Football And Basketball Blog

If you are squeamish like me, you may want to skip this post.  Late Sunday night a car hit a deer in front of my house.  The deer suffered a fatal injury yet still managed to gallop (or fly) 30 yards up my driveway before finding its final resting place.  As luck would have it, we had to leave very early Monday to take our son to the Dr. Office two hours away in Philly.  Following a suggestion from a friend, we called Department of Natural Resources to see if they could do anything with it while we are gone and though DNR was sympathetic, they’re ultimate response was “Sucks to be you”. 

So there I was as the sun was setting Monday evening with a rope and my lawn tractor.  After sitting out all day the vultures had pretty much had their way with the poor thing.  Eyes were gone, stomach ripped open, and of course the obviously unhealed car damage.  As I tied the rope around its neck and front legs to drag it to a more respectable resting place way back in the woods, I did about all I could to not throw up. 

But you know what, that was nothing, what I’m about to write now sickens me even more than that.  

It may not be breaking news anymore but earlier this week Ralph Friedgen, yes OUR Ralph Friedgen, the man who took Maryland out of our bowless  depression and took us to the Orange Bowl said that he burned his Maryland diploma.  And to add insult to injury he now says he is flying a Georgia Tech flag, and though he is interested in how the kids are doing, he isn’t so interested in the University of Maryland.  

I can’t say that I blame him.  Whatever happens in this new regime, the way things ended with Friedgen was pretty amateurish.  And for someone who turned our program from a perennial loser into a contender, and is pretty much responsible for every positive Maryland Football memory I have, this is inexcusable.  Maybe that isn’t even the word.   Maybe sad is a better choice. 

Coaches do come and go, and transitions are never easy, even when they are designed to be (right WVU?).  But boy do these quotes just open some old wounds from last winter.  Part of me wants to say “Screw him, if he isn’t’ with us, who needs him”.  But another part of me is crushed that the current administration not only fired the 2010 ACC Coach of the Year, but did it in a way that makes him want to burn his diploma. 

It’s like seeing someone give Santa Claus a wedgie on National TV.  He deserved better.

 But no, we had to hire a coach to put more people in the stands, to create buzz, to take us from “Good to Great”.  Well I’ll give Kevin Anderson one thing, Monday morning everyone in my office wanted to talk Terps Football, but it wasn’t for a good reason.  

I can’t not be a fan, and I can’t not care about Maryland Sports, but damn am I bummed that this past year hasn’t worked out better.  Granted it is still early, and we have to give Edsall his time, but so far the results have been mixed, and I fear are about to get worse.  And I’m getting the feeling Kevin Anderson is in over his head.  However, I have said it once and I have said it again, I’m perfectly happy being wrong.  I just keep having this nagging feeling that maybe just this one time, I may actually be right. 

Regardless it never should have come to this.

This entry was posted on Friday, September 30th, 2011 at 3:30 pm and is filed under Maryland Terps Football. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.