I think that's a little unfair.

I think there is a legitimate criticism is that he didn't understand the importance of ND football in the priorities of the university and may not have believed in the ability of ND football to play at a championship level. But I know plenty of alumni like Jack who also constantly discounted the pull of ND to make excuses for whatever failing coach was there.

His big missteps were in what I believe is the following order of importance (i) the 7-4-1 scheduling model, (ii) extending Davie, (iii) standing by Willingham after the 2004 season, (iv) failing to deliver Urban and (v) Weis's contract extension.

To counter ii-iv, he identified Gruden and had him at the finish line before administrative meddling botched that. That was a swing for the fences. And after he missed on Urban, I believe he paid Shanahan a visit. I don't know that he wasn't willing to go big in the way that Jack has never seemed to try. iv was obviously an immature panic move, but I do still kind of understand it. He was the hottest name in the country. There was legitimately going to be NFL buzz constantly surrounding him, and that could've hurt recruiting. (On the other hand, it could've helped recruiting.) And he may not have been close enough to trust Weis when he said he didn't want to bolt to the NFL without a meaningful agreement.

The biggest problem is the 7-4-1 model that both undervalued what ND was capable of doing against real reschedules and it alienated relationships with other teams from power conferences at a time when we needed to be preserving those relationships. It is the biggest reason why we felt vulnerable after the Big East shakeup. Now, however, I do question how much of that was him and how much was the pressure he felt to appease a BOT that I would argue no longer gets the place, or at least doesn't get the values that drew so many like me to once have the kind of devotion to the place that I frankly miss.

But in a bigger picture, he wasn't publicly a poor representative of the school. And he did show a commitment to making great hires in some sports. He hired a few good coaches who by all accounts were also good representatives of the school (Jackson, Brey, Clark). Clark was convinced to leave a top notch athletic department and was a big win. He identified a highly successful college coach and got him. Clark won a title. Jackson was pulled from his first NHL gig. Maybe the lockout had something to do with it. But he identified an elite college coach and got him. Brey was pretty much the profile of someone we were capable of getting at the time, and he elevated the program from the prior decade. White also raised funds extremely well to support many programs and lift them to a championship level during an arms race.

In hindsight, he was probably better than I gave him credit for when he left in 2008. I think he was hamstrung by his orders from above. That said, it's a fair argument that maybe we needed someone who got the importance of ND football to push back on certain initiatives at that time. However, an even worse result is when you hire an alumnus who doesn't push back on that BOT influence and who constantly makes excuses for performance. Thus, Swarbrick's tenures makes White's look a look better.