The usual weekly Lowlights Countdown will run as usual tomorrow. Today, we get something extra special. For those who don't know, Lowlights favorite, worst coach in the country and all around pinhead Mike Locksley was fired by New Mexico yesterday, finally. Today's special Lowlights Countdown is the Countdown of Locksley, and it will be hard to keep only 10 it was so bad.
10 The stupidity of the hire in the first place – Most people don't realize this, but many thought this hire was absolutely asinine in the first place. Locksley had never been a head coach and he had only been a coordinator for four years. Normally that might be time to give someone a chance. Of course, the head coach he was working under was Ron Zook (don't know why anyone thought this might work right there). In addition, Locksley was hired for his recruiting ability. Don't know about you, but I don't know of a ton of black people living in New Mexico. Strike one on recruiting. Locksley also had not recruited below the BCS level since a stint at Army in 1996. Strike two on recruiting. Locksley had no ties to the region or conference. Strike three on recruiting. So lets recap. A Ron Zook coordinator was hired for his first head coaching job because of his ability as a recruiter in an area that he had no chance to recruit to. What could possibly go wrong? See below.
9 Threats about surveillance video in a bar – Between his first and second disasters, Locksley got into an argument with a student newspaper reporter in a bar in Albuquerque. Locksley, hothead that he is (as we will see later in this list), allowed the argument to get heated. There were no punches thrown and no charges. Everything could have easily been swept under the rug despite the altercation and nobody would have heard a word about it. Then Locksley, already in hot water because of his other transgressions, went back to the bar. He threatened the bar owner and tried to 'repossess' the video of the altercation. Luckily for Locksley (and for this blog that got an extra season of entertainment out of him), the tape showed nothing and this scandal went away.
8 The grisly numbers of the tenure – Of course the on field action was just as bad. Locksley was fired with a career record of 2-26 including an 0-4 start this season. Of course it gets much worse when we delve into the numbers. Loss in his only game against an FCS team. 2-15 in conference play. Just 15.8 points per game on offense. More points given up during the 2010 season than the Lobos scored in his entire tenure. I could go on but the numbers only get more depressing from there.
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| Locksley looking confused as his team stinks the place up on Saturday. Photo courtesy Albuquerque Journal |
7 FCS Loser – I mentioned his loss in his only game against an FCS team on the previous entry. What I didn't mention was that it was Saturday. Locksley finally got his gimme game against Sam Houston St., a generally middling FCS program that occasionally makes the playoffs and has a really good team. Of course the Lobos didn't bother on defense (a defining trait under Locksley where the only teams they stopped were totally inept) and got to overtime. Once you get to overtime, anything can happen and New Mexico lost 48-45. I'm sure at this point any remaining fans in Albuquerque were not surprised though they are probably waiting for basketball season when Steve Alford's team is expected to challenge for the conference title.
6 Sexual Harassment and Age Discrimination, at the same time – When Locksley got to New Mexico, he of course wanted to bring his own people in. One of his mistakes was firing an athletic department employee who was 54. Of course it couldn't end that easily though. This is Locksley we are talking about. The woman sued over her firing saying Locksley had fired her so he could bring in a younger woman to help entice recruits. Oh boy here we go. The lawsuit was eventually dropped when the woman was given another job within the athletic department, but damage was done to Locksley's good name (this was the first incident of his tenure when he still had a good name).
5 72-0 – After the 1-11 debacle of an opening in 2009, there were hopes New Mexico would be better in year 2 under Locksley. Of course the schedule didn't cooperate. The Lobos were set to open against defending Pac-10 champion Oregon. Most (including me) looked at this game like the usual lamb being led to the slaughter game. Oregon would come out sluggish, then run over the Lobos before some garbage time scroing leading to a score along the lines of 52-14. What we got was oh so much worse. The Lobos looked like they had never watched film of Oregon's offense. They also looked like they hadn't bothered with off-season conditioning (though in Locksley's defense, Oregon does this to many teams). With star running back LaMichael James suspended, Oregon ran out to a 59-0 halftime lead. Then the expected garbage time came, and New Mexico still couldn't score. Final score: 72-0. No hope for the Lobos even though Oregon would go to the National Championship game.
4 Playing Punch Out with your assistants – Before the 2009 season, nobody really knew what we were getting with Locksley. Then the Lobos got steamrolled to open the season. Of course that's not the end of it. In a team meeting, Locksley got aggressive with wide receivers coach J.B. Gerald. He then punched him in the face. I'll leave the rest to the police report.
3 Losing to UNLV at home – The consequence of Locksley's punch out of his assistant was a 10-day suspension. Served during the season, this cost Locksley the home game against UNLV. No worries though. Even though New Mexico was winless, they were playing UNLV, the doormat of the league. The Rebels hadn't won a conference road game since 2004 and had looked exceptionally bad their previous three games, losing by a combined score of 157-64. Included in that was giving up over 700 yards of offense to Nevada. Of course, Locksley's Lobos continues to look like a disorganized mess (with or without him) and the Rebels actually played a decent offensive game to win 34-17 in Albuquerque. Since then, UNLV has fired its coach, lost to an FCS team (last week as well), generally looked awful and, of course, hasn't won a road game (best chance is later this season when they go back to Albuquerque).
2 New Mexico St. 2010 – I'm not chronicling the awfulness of this game on this blog for a 3rd time. New Mexico lost. The game was miserable. Watch the video highlights (if you can call them that) below.
1 Recruit arrested driving his car – The final straw on the tenure of Locksley happened over the weekend and it wasn't losing to an FCS team. No, it was something far worse. A friend of his son who identified himself as a prospective New Mexico recruit was arrested for DUI on the way to the game, while driving a car registered to Locksley. To start, the recruit is 19 and therefore underaged. This is a problem in the law sense even above the DUI. Then, the car is registered to Locksley. This is an NCAA violation. Finally, the game was a 4pm. I guess the kid found some people to tailgate with because otherwise this is mighty early for a move like this.
The factors involved here along with all the past history and the continued losing finally ended to the tenure of Locksley. It almost makes me wish he had gotten the Maryland job last year that he interviewed for (what the heck were they thinking unless it was just a we have to say we interviewed a minority coach interview?). Then, the comedy would have continued at another level and the smoking crater left at New Mexico could still be chronicled here.
All that said, good luck to Mr. Locksley in whatever he does in the future. He has given me much entertainment while writing about him the last few years.
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