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Full-Court Press
IT'S hard to imagine Jerry Jones walking into a room and showing Tom Landry the door. Unpopular decisions
often best"Coach, good of you to stop by on such short notice. Pull up a chair. Can I get you anything? Something from the bar, perhaps? No? Well, there's no easy way to say this, so here goes: Coach, I'm going to have to let you go."
When this decision was made in February 1989, it wasn't a popular one. In the Lone Star State, there is Colonel Travis, Davy Crockett, Jim Bowie and Tom Landry. And not necessarily in that order. Fans were stunned this Texas icon wouldn't be allowed to ride off into his own sunset.
Granted, the only head coach the Dallas Cowboys ever had was getting a little gray around the edges. And sure, America's Team was no longer a regular on Super Bowl Sunday. But letting go Coach Landry? Isn't that like firing God?
If you paid attention to local sports this week, you were inundated with stories, columns and television reports of Les Murakami's retirement as the University of Hawaii head baseball coach.
There's no question the Rainbows' program was built by Murakami, whose list of accomplishments during his 30-year career is long and distinguished.
He's won a thousand-something games, made 11 NCAA tournament appearances and has six Western Athletic Conference titles to his credit. Last year, Murakami was inducted into the ABCA Hall of Fame, and with the kind of talent he has seen come and go here, you could field a pretty good major-league ballclub.
Now, I know I risk being a chapter in Murakami's proposed best-selling book that promises to pull no punches on his detractors, but this story ends all wrong.
After seven long seasons of no NCAA appearances or WAC titles, Rainbows athletic director Hugh Yoshida was forced to give Murakami a farewell tour. Under the circumstances, Murakami and Yoshida made the best of it by reaching an agreement that allows everyone to save face.
Murakami gets his curtain call next season and Yoshida escapes without firing the man who will one day have Rainbow Stadium named after him. Perfect ending, right? Well, perhaps not.
THIS could have been avoided had Yoshida recommended some firm changes the latter half of the 1990s and Murakami had the wisdom to listen to him. If Murakami was to stay on, there had to be a new lineup for the assistants and recruiting needed to improve.
Instead, Murakami's undying loyalty to those closest to him blinded him to the fact that they were no longer getting it done. Not only were the Rainbows losing to the top mainland schools on a regular basis, but the long parade of WAC programs were having their way with UH as well.
Had there been some accountability here, maybe the program doesn't lose a million dollars; money now needed for repairs for a rapidly aging Rainbow Stadium.
Murakami used to say he had the cure for what ailed him -- winning. Unfortunately, too often that eluded him the past several seasons. Somewhere along the way, the best mainland players stopped coming, and more importantly, so did the ones close to home. What's left now is a team in transition, something Jones avoided by making a difficult decision.
Sure, there were those who questioned the Dallas owner's sanity for firing Landry and hiring Jimmy Johnson. He was what singer Don Henley would call a cruel dude. But sometimes when no choice is a good one, letting someone go works best all the way around.
Paul Arnett has been covering sports
for the Star-Bulletin since 1990.