Removing the personal aspect, Coach Chow’s dismissal is appropriate

Despite the fact that sports are ideally a meritocracy featuring a scoreboard to clearly identify winners and losers, the phrase “that’s not fair” frequently makes its way into our arena. Whether it’s Duke being robbed of a conference win when Miami’s oft-illegal miracle play was ruled a touchdown or just about anything the Patriots do to win football games, this feeling that the result doesn’t quite give a fair representation of the events crops up all the time.

While I can’t say I’m happy to see him go, I also can’t say that the dismissal of Hawaii head coach Norm Chow is an unfair one. Coach Chow has been around football for 50 years as a player and coach. He obviously knows the game, understands the college process and has logged countless miles analyzing every aspect of the sport. He’s built high-powered offenses and propelled numerous quarterbacks to prestige, fame and fortune.

But the numbers finally spoke louder than all of that.

I was able to talk story with Coach Chow during the team’s spring practice at Vidinha Stadium a few years back and rather than just ask the typical “how does the team look?” questions, I wanted his take on the quarterback position at the pro level. At the time, Robert Griffin III and Colin Kaepernick were bringing the read-option into the NFL limelight. I wondered if it signaled a shift toward what NFL teams may be looking for from college quarterbacks and if the game was changing in front of our eyes.

“Football is cyclical,” he reminded me. He talked about the popularity of the Wildcat offense and the Tampa 2 defense, each of which were successful for a short time before being widely solved and mostly discarded. “That’s what makes this game — whether it’s college or the NFL — that’s what makes it so exciting, is that you have a chance to study it and try to do new things.”

He was right. Not to say it’s completely or even mostly their fault, but Griffin and Kaepernick will each be watching from the bench this week in favor of more traditional dropback passers. He had a feeling that the high value of NFL quarterbacks and the rest of the league’s ability to adapt would take that element of the game out of vogue. He could sense what was on the horizon by looking at the football landscape.

But the numbers still spoke louder than that foresight.

Given three-and-a-half seasons, Hawaii compiled a 10-36 record under Chow. Things seemed to be on an upswing toward the back end of last season as the ‘Bows won three conference games and finished 4-9 after a 1-11 mark in 2013. But despite what appears to be a more talented team this year, UH is 2-7 and 0-5 in the Mountain West. They’re just 4-25 in conference during Chow’s tenure and after a pair of late blown leads against New Mexico and Nevada, this past week’s 58-7 shellacking at the hands of Air Force was too much for him to survive.

While defensive coordinator Tom Mason spoke up for his departing head coach and said he was “shocked” by a decision he didn’t understand, that seems a bit naive. He sees how hard Chow works every day and knows the struggles he’s faced just to remain on the sideline every week, but this was just a matter of when, not if. No matter how beloved, few coaches can survive the lack of on-field success Hawaii has endured. And though he received a heartfelt welcome in his return four years ago, Coach Chow wasn’t so beloved anymore.

There are knee-jerk firings that can seem unfair — Lovie Smith with the Chicago Bears or Lionel Hollins with the Memphis Grizzlies come to mind — but this doesn’t fall in that category. Yes, Hawaii does face challenges that few other state universities encounter, but a strong program has existed here very recently. The right leader could make that a possibility again.

Whether or not that person ever makes it to the UH sideline, well that’s another issue altogether.

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David Simon can be reached at dsimon@thegardenisland.com.