The Urban Meyer rumor. The Jon Gruden rumor. For almost each day of the week, there is a new rumor popping up regarding Notre Dame’s football program. On a very basic level, they are fun. They keep things moving on message boards, including BGI’s Rockne’s Roundtable.
The University athletics office makes it clear that there is nothing to any recent head coaching rumors, despite the growing speculation.
So far since the end of the season, BGI has been besieged with rumors from sources that are usually pretty solid and level-headed. Here are just a few samples:
*Lou Holtz will take over the program for two years and his son Skip will be the heir apparent.
*Urban Meyer will be coaching his last game as the head coach of Florida in the BCS Title Game and will be the Notre Dame Head Coach by the middle of January. Further, the reason behind Meyer leaving is that Tim Tebow has told Meyer that he is 100 percent positive that he will be turning pro.
*Charlie Weis is in such rough medical shape that he will step down after National Signing Day and will be replaced by former Tampa Bay Head Coach Jon Gruden.
Without having credible sources, or anybody willing to put his or her name to the rumor, proponents of said rumor use the parties’ failure to publicly deny the content as proof that the rumor “must be true.”
Obviously, that is some shaky logic. If Notre Dame addressed every rumor publicly, they would be calling press conferences several times per day. Notre Dame has well-trained individuals monitoring the news sources and while they are aware of what is being bandied about, they are not really in a good position to address everything.
As to the specific Jon Gruden rumor, Notre Dame’s silence is far from an indication that the rumor has any validity whatsoever.
“It’s ridiculous that this rumor has even gained the traction it has over the past few days. I hesitate to respond to it at all because by dignifying this ‘report,’ I set myself up to be forced to set the record straight on future rumors. But it’s obvious that some people out there are trying to sabotage our recruiting efforts and it’s unfortunate that their agenda has been published and reproduced in recent days,” Brian Hardin, Notre Dame’s Director of Football Media Relations, told BGI.
He is absolutely correct in that statement.
As for the other side of the rumor equation, Jon Gruden does not have a job, and any time his name is being mentioned, his agent smiles.
In the end, we at BGI and fans alike have to keep in mind that the spreading of rumors is not necessarily a victimless crime.
