Art Thiel vs. Steve Kelley in the Great Willingham Debate

Exactly one week after the Times' lead sports columnist, Steve Kelley, came out in favor of firing Tyrone Willingham, the P-I's lead sports columnist, Art Thiel, says firing Willingham would be a colossal mistake. And he makes his case quite forcefully:

If [Willingham or Todd Turner are fired], the UW will be a fine national example of the worst in college athletics: greed, ignorance, impatience and a complete perversion of the university's mission statement.

Thiel takes us back to the disastrous choice of Rick Neuheisel as head coach (one of the finalists was Gary Pinkel, now doing ok at Missouri), and writes:

Some of the same people who supported the Neuheisel selection are now clamoring for Willingham's head.

To these people, a question must be asked:

What the hell do you know about college football coaches?

Yowza.

Kelley's argument was that Jim Mora, Jr., is a better guy to lead the program than Willingham. Wrote Kelley:

Seahawks assistant head coach Jim Mora is the answer that Willingham hasn't been. Mora would bring the stability Willingham hasn't brought...He would pump up the volume at Washington. He would inject a level of excitement that Willingham can't. He will bring more energy to recruiting.

Mora could spend the next 20 years at his alma mater, chasing all of Don James' records and making the Huskies a Pac-10 player again.

Mora understands the culture of the Northwest in the same way USC coach Pete Carroll understands the culture of Southern California. And he can coach defenses.

Maybe the two columnists could settle this with a punt, pass and kick competition? Or danceoff? Or seeing who could survive the Sonics drinking game?

Personally, I think firing Willingham would be a mistake, but I might advocate it if the Huskies could get Navy coach Paul Johnson. Here's how Johnson responded to a reporter who brought up a fan's complaint that he (Johnson) blames the players when he loses, and takes the credit when he wins:

If you could ever find one time that I said we won the game because of brilliant strategy I will kiss your butt at city dock and give you two days to draw a crowd. Find it and bring it to me. Tell that guy that if he wants to talk to me I live at [address given but deleted for the transcript] I will be right there. Come ring my doorbell and I will be glad to talk to him.

Hey, if the games aren't entertaining, at least the post-game press conferences would be.