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And in terms of running a clean program I agree.

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Lloyd gets a lot of credit for "running a clean program". And I suppose from the standpoint of "attracting attention from the NCAA", yes, Lloyd was always squeaky clean.

But consider that our starting TE (who took what, 4 holding penalties today?) beat up a kid (so badly that said kid needed to be hospitalized) because the kid made fun of him in class. Except Butler, in all his brilliance, actually beat the wrong kid: it was discovered later the kid he beat up wasn't actually the kid who was giving him [censored] in class.

The only reason Butler isn't in jail right now is because the kid dropped the charges. No one disputed Butler's role in the incident or the facts of the case.

Why was Carson Butler allowed back on the team this fall? If Lloyd is so squeaky clean, why were out-and-out thugs like Butler allowed to play?

Last year, news of Adrian Arrington arrest came right before the Iowa game last year in late October (incident involved his girlfriend and potential drunken abuse). But because Manningham was hurt, and we were undefeated and playing a big game, Lloyd didn't take any disciplinary action against Arrington and let him play against Iowa. In fact, IIRC, no one in the Michigan program made any mention of the arrest whatsoever (arrest was in early October), yet it's almost certain that Lloyd et al knew -- no, none of them commented on it until it became public knowledge via the news media two weeks later prior to the Iowa game. Again, the charges against Arrington were eventually dropped, but the way Lloyd handled the whole affair sure doesn't strike me as "clean".

I don't want to bash Lloyd. Every program has this kind of stuff going on, and surely, much worse. But let's not pat Lloyd on the back for the tight ship he ran, because for the last few years (at least), it certainly hasn't been true. His teams grew consistently more and more undisciplined off the field during his tenure, and Lloyd became more and more willing to look the other way when he felt like he needed to.

In addition to the off-the-field stuff, prima-donnas like Manningham openly skulked on the field when they weren't getting the ball, a true-freshman (Mallet) argued with coaches on the sidelines during games, Butler was consistently penalized for obvious and unnecessary holding penalties all year long. I don't think this team was 'undisciplined' on the field, and I don't put a whole lot of stock into things like "attitude", but if we're going to talk about what kind of ethics a coach runs a program with, then "behavior on and off the field" should be part of that conversation, even if the results of the game aren't effected. I'm not attributing the mediocrity of the 2007 Michigan team to a lack of discipline or a poor attitude. But if going to judge Lloyd by the standard of "the behavior and attitude of his players on and off the field", let's do it honestly. This team has it's fair share of thugs like Butler, and 'questionable attitude' guys like Manningham. Even Hart, who everybody (including me) loves and respects -- even he talked a lot of [censored] to the media about former alums like Harbaugh and some of our opponents like Michigan State.

Again, this doesn't bother me personally -- I even appreciated what Hart did in calling out Harbaugh -- but seeing that kind of behavior from players shouldn't elicit "boy, that coach sure runs a tight ship!" type comments. And I always hear about how "clean of a program" Lloyd ran. And I think there's some truth to that. But I think some of those comments are a case of unfounded back-patting from Lloyd apologists, looking to excuse alot of his teams' poor-on-the-field performance: "oh yeah, sure, I guess the team was woefully unprepared for a I-AA opponent, but Lloyd runs a clean program, and that's what matters!"; IMO, the last few years introduced a lot of legitimate questions about just how 'cleanly' Lloyd was running the program. Again, I'm not claiming Lloyd violated NCAA rules and that Michigan was doing anything SMU-like. Far from it. But I do think Lloyd's last few seasons were a a case of a guy who frequently lost control of his teams and his players conduct off-the-field, and when that happened, he was willing to look the way other way if he had to.

I'm not saying I would have handled things any differently than Carr did, or that I would want a Michigan coach to handle things different than Carr. I think you could make a case for tolerating Manningham's drama because of his talent, and letting Butler back on the team because the charges were dropped (and TE depth was so bad), and letting Arrington play against Iowa because it was a big game, we needed him, and the case was highly questionable to begin with. But let's not laud Lloyd for all his wonderful discipline and his clean program. He was completely willing to let his players do a bunch of questionable [censored] off the field, only to have them out there on the field on Saturday if we needed them.

And honestly, I'm *fine* with that. But I'm not going to turn around and then claim Lloyd was so squeaky clean in the process. AFAIK, he was generally an honorable guy with his recruits/was an 'ethical' recruiter, and he never aroused any suspicion from the NCAA (or anyone else) because of how his team was run from an NCAA rules/regs standpoint, and how he recruited high school kids, and how the boosters/recruits/players on the team interacted, etc. And that's all good. He's not Bobby Bowden or anything like that. But his record wasn't perfect if you look outside of the scope of NCAA rules and regulations and into other variables like "off-field behavior of players" and "attitude of players during games".