Former Miami Hurricanes players spoke to the Miami Herald about the state of the UM football program and how it can be improved.
Their feedback:
— Running back Albert Bentley, who was on UM’s first national championship team (1983) and later played for the Colts and Steelers:
“We need more players. We have some great players, but we don’t have what we had in the past. When I was here my senior year, I’m playing as hard as I can every down because I know I have five or six NFL running backs sitting on the bench behind me waiting to take my job.
“We have to get back to where we’re getting top-level recruits. We have them, but we need more of them. Head coaches recruit. [Enough top players are] not coming here, and that’s what we have to change.”
Bentley, asked about Manny Diaz, said: “Myself personally, I see kids — and everyone makes mistakes — maybe their effort doesn’t look like the level it should be at. They’re making mistakes, and it doesn’t seem like there are consequences. I was too afraid to mess up because I knew how good the kids were behind me and I knew they’d get a chance.
“On the field of play, when you go out and you’re supposed to block a guy and you don’t block him, your backup should get a chance. It works negatively two ways: 1. It tells the guy he can make a mistake and there are no consequences. 2. It tells the guy behind him he can make a mistake and I’m still not going to get a chance; he can play like crap and I’m still not going to get a chance.
“Now, they just stay in the game. They drop a ball, they miss a block, and they stay in the game.”
— Wide receiver Eddie Brown, a former first-round pick of the Cincinnati Bengals who also played on UM’s first championship team:
What “Howard [Schnellenberger] started years ago at our school, should be [the approach] right now. Start here in Florida first [for recruits] and then move up to other cities. It takes a recruiter to recruit from here… We need to get the right players.”
— Former running back Stephen McGuire, who won national titles at UM in 1989 and 1991 and is now a retired New York City police officer, has a concern about dismissing Diaz:
“If you bring in a new coach, you’re going to set the quarterback [Tyler Van Dyke] back another couple years with a new offensive coordinator. What do you do? Do you bring in a new coach and tell him to keep the same offensive coordinator and that he can’t bring in his own guy? Now you’re going to cause problems. He’s not going to be happy.”
So is it better to keep Diaz as coach?
“Maybe. Because the offense is good. The offense is scoring points. And Tyler Van Dyke is excellent. So if you get rid of Manny and bring somebody else in, now Tyler Van Dyke has to learn a whole new system. And you’re probably going to lose more recruits, because they’ll probably go elsewhere. Then, we’ll be back to the same situation again.
“You can’t keep changing coaches all the time because it’s not good. It doesn’t build stability.”
— Canes 4 Life leader Gerard Daphnis, the former UM tight end, said: “I would hope whoever comes in as the new AD makes it a priority to have a relationship with the former players. More things can get accomplished with all of us together than apart. We will never do anything to hurt our university.”
— Former UM standout linebacker Jessie Armstead, who’s a special assistant to New York Giants general manager Dave Gettleman, traveled from New York to attend the event at Shula’s Hotel in Miami Lakes.
“We need to find out if they want to go back to the old Miami Hurricanes or do you want to be that team that is maybe 7-5 and gets to a bowl game and be that kind of university,” Armstead said. “That’s one thing we have to get established from the beginning. If they don’t want to be [a consistent championship contender], it doesn’t do us any good to promote and try to get that old University of Miami atmosphere.
“If they come back and say they want to be 7-5 and getting to a bowl [is OK], then that’s what they want and then we’ll be a school that sits back and enjoys bowl game festivities.”
Armstead said “that name of the University of Miami is so strong when it comes to college football. It has withstood 20 years of not winning a championship. We’re at a crossroads right now.”
Armstead would be curious what UM chief of staff Ed Reed thinks, but says “Ed can’t say too much because he wouldn’t want to end on bad terms.”
— Former UM defensive back and ex-NFL player Earl Little, who now coaches on the Plantation American Heritage staff: “We need to get it back to where it was in the 80s, 90s, early 2000s. For whatever reason, we got away from that, seeing guys on the sidelines. That’s important for the young guys to see a Ray Lewis, Warren Sapp, a Mel Bratton, Michael Irvin.”
Little said Gino Torretta, AC Tellison and Alonzo Highsmith should be considered for the athletic director job.
“We’ve given everyone else opportunities; why not give our own opportunities?” Little asked. “We have three guys that are qualified to do the job that can lean on their degree and go all out 24 hours.”
It’s unclear if any former player will be seriously considered, though Torretta is very well liked by one key UM administrator, and several UM trustees would like to see Highsmith have a significant role.
— Former UM assistant coach Don Soldinger also says Highsmith would be a good choice for AD.
“You need someone that knows Miami,” Soldinger said. “Miami is different than any place in the country. The one guy that has been to every school in the country, East Coast to West Coast [as an NFL scout and executive], is Alonzo. And he’s no bull [bleep] guy. He’s a straight shooter. He’s a winner.
“Would he be good for the AD role? He doesn’t have the experience. [But] I think he would be.”
Soldinger, incidentally, said UM has “got some pretty good players, young players. Whoever comes in here has got a pretty good nucleus.
“We’re all sitting here criticizing, and there are a lot of things to criticize. What should have happened is when [FSU] completed the fourth-and-14, they should have let them score [with just under a minute left]. Tyler Van Dyke would have taken them down and tied the game or won the game because he’s that kind of player. That’s the mistake they [UM] made. Let them put the ball in his hands with some time. I was at Miami and all we did was win. And if we even came close to losing, we would get criticized.”
— Former UM player Daniel Levine (1990-93), now a Boca Raton-based insurance broker, said: “I’d love to see the former players have a voice or at least be a sounding board for some of the things that go on in the university. A lot of us were successful players and we’ve had successful careers afterward. I think we’ve hit success on many levels. And therefore we would be a good sounding board.”
Bennie Blades met with UM officials recently, and Bratton said six more players will request a meeting with the new athletic director after that job is filled.
— Stephen Moser, a former receiver and special teams player on UM’s 1983 national championship team who owns his own marketing company, All Branded:
“We have recruited the right kids but haven’t properly coached them. Case in point: Anthony Chickillo. I played with his father Tony. Tony was a senior when I was an underclassman. Sophomore year, Al Golden decides he’s going to put 40 pounds on him and line him up inside shoulder. This is a genuine five-star edge rusher. Why would you cut his legs off? Let him do what he does. They went to a 3-4 instead of what you’re supposed to do in Miami football….
“I love Manny, but Manny was not ready for the job. You miss a block, you miss a tackle, you fumble the ball — ‘Go to the bench. I want the next kid in.’ That was the way it was for 20 years. We’ve lost that.
“There was something that Howard [told] us: ‘I don’t care what your name is. I don’t care what kind of a star you were in high school, this is a whole new slate, and you can go from first team to scout team in a matter of one practice.’
“That was the mind-set. It’s not just Manny per se, but he’s dealing with a very different attitude of the kids today, that they’re privileged. But you’ve got to be able to find a way to really communicate with them. If Nick Saban is doing it, if Lane Kiffin is doing it, if Mario Cristobal is doing it, you’ve got to find a way to be able to do that. ‘It’s my way or the highway. I am the head coach. You play for me.’”
