When the reporting of a story kills the story

I don't know if it was ultimately the case with Rich Rodriguez and Alabama, but it kind of sounded like it.

 

Who was the Bears assistant who went to interview for the Cardinals job, heard on the radio that he'd been named coach -- before formalizing his deal -- and turned around and went home?

 

Dave McGinnis, which led to Michael McCaskey being kicked out of the front office by his mom. Except you mixed up the teams. The Bears were the ones who wanted to hire him.

 

You're right, Doc. No wonder I couldn't successfully Google it up.

 

The Tribune had a nice photo of an empty podium the next day. A nadir for the franchise.

Whatever happened to McGinnis?

 

McGinnis balked and flew home because he saw the news release, which naturally had been prepared in advance, on someone's desk.

 

He's the assistant head coach and linebackers coach for the Tennessee Titans.

 

You're right that it was N.C. State's Dick Sheridan, but the job was Georgia -- replacing Vince Dooley, no less. At least that's what I was able to deduce from this excerpt from a feature on Ray Goff, the guy who actually got the job, from Scout.com's Dawg Post.

Thanks for jogging my memory enough so I could look it up on Google.


The mad scramble at Georgia was a result of Vince Dooley’s stepping down after being a successful head coach at Georgia for 25 years. Dooley stepped down in the middle of December 1988, and conventional thinking was that a replacement had already been lined up – it may have been. But it didn’t work out that easy for Dooley, who, as Athletic Director, was trying to find his own replacement. The later it went in December, the more difficult he found it to replace himself. The most logical choice, it seemed, was winding down his career and he was not willing to make the trip back to Athens for his swan song.

“Everyone’s top choice, even mine, was Erk Russell,” admitted Goff talking about the long-time defensive coordinator under Dooley. “He was offered the job, but he didn’t want to leave Georgia Southern because he knew that he was only going to be down there for another year or two, and I think he was just kind of ready to get out.”

At that point Dick Sheridan, the head coach at NC State at the time, was offered the job.

“As I understood it, Coach Sheridan actually took the Georgia job,” Goff said. “But from what I was told, he wanted to talk privately with his football team – they were playing in the Peach Bowl that year. Word got out before Christmas that he was offered the Georgia job, and that he was going to take it. Well, he called a press conference and turned it down.”

Many thought Sheridan was just leveraging the Georgia job for more money in Raleigh.

Russell is still a legend at Georgia – the team honored him after his death last September. Sheridan coached at NC State until he resigned after the 1992 season and has been in private business in the Carolinas since.