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Hickey: Rob Vaughn’s Maryland departure shows B1G baseball success still comes at a price
By Alex Hickey
Published:
Baseball remains the lone sport where Big Ten fans can experience how the other half lives.
When a football coach arrives in the B1G, he has arrived until the school no longer wants him. Witness Kirk Ferentz (in office since 1999) and Pat Fitzgerald (2006).
Coaches don’t leave for other college jobs, with the occasional exception of Wisconsin. Several of Barry Alvarez’s successors have been dismayed to discover that the school makes decisions for the football program and not the other way around. But with the big bucks shelled out to hire Luke Fickell from Cincinnati, even the Badgers may be adjusting to the times.
The storyline is similar in men’s basketball.
There is the occasional freak occurrence, like Bill Self leaving Illinois to take the Kansas job in 2003. But the Big Ten is long removed from the 1980s, when it was decidedly less surprising to see Lute Olsen leave Iowa for Arizona or Bill Freider leave Michigan for Arizona State.
It is a destination league. If a coach leaves, it will be for the NBA or the rarest of blue-blood opportunities.
Big Ten baseball, on the other hand, shows that there is one thing that speaks louder than money: weather.
Maryland coach Rob Vaughn is leaving for Alabama after leading the Terrapins to back-to-back conference titles and regional appearances in the NCAA Tournament. That makes this the second straight year that the Big Ten’s best baseball coach has left for greener pastures. A year ago, Michigan coach Eric Bakich left for Clemson.
And when we say greener pastures, we do mean it literally. The outfield grass can actually grow during the first 2 months of the season at Alabama and Clemson. And until the college baseball season itself changes, the Big Ten’s best and brightest will inevitably head south or far west when the opportunity arises.
You can’t buy it all: Or, weather always wins
There is a certain level of irony to it all.
The Big Ten is at the pinnacle of the college sports money-making mountain. But because of climate, there is virtually no chance to turn baseball into a revenue sport. Which means in baseball alone, Big Ten teams are more akin to a MAC football or basketball program than their power conference peers.
It’s a bit charming, in way. Although those involved probably use less enthusiastic language.
Much like those smaller schools, success comes with a near guarantee of a coach departing for a program where it’s easier to sustain it. Indiana’s Tracy Smith was the last Big Ten coach to reach the College World Series before Bakich, and he parlayed that into a job at Arizona State. (Ironically, Smith was fired at Arizona State and ended up replacing Bakich at Michigan.)
Big Ten baseball diehards have to live in the present in order to appreciate any great season.
For Maryland fans, there must be some level of bemusement over the circumstances behind Vaughn’s departure.
The Alabama job was only open because Crimson Tide coach Brian Bohannon reportedly advised a gambler to bet against his team because his ace was scratched from a start against LSU. And the gambler was only caught because a six-figure bet on a regular-season college baseball game waves more red flags than a May Day parade in 1970s Moscow.
Cruel world when a team can lose a championship-caliber coach simply because another program’s coach is a stinkin’ idiot.
But if it wasn’t Bama, it was going to be somewhere. Vaughn’s name was also linked to the Central Florida opening. And, even though UCF is moving to the Big 12, perhaps only in baseball would someone contemplate a move from Maryland to UCF without batting an eye.
That’s what happens when you can’t fight the weather. Though in Maryland’s case, one wonders if the tiny dimensions of Turtle Smith Stadium are also a factor.
It’s hard to convince pitchers to play in a bandbox, and Maryland has what amounts to a college Coors Field without a humidor. Even though Maryland’s offense traveled in each of the past 2 postseasons, the Terps just didn’t have enough arms to get through a regional.
A coach can’t be blamed for not wanting to fight that frustration.
Solving that problem falls to Vaughn’s successor, Matt Swope. The former Terrapin player has earned the promotion after 10 years as an assistant coach.
As a Maryland lifer, maybe Swope will even prove an exception to the rule. He’s never been anything but a Terp as a player or coach. None of the aforementioned coaches worked for their alma mater, and that pull may prove key for Maryland.
Because if Swope does keep the wins coming, a program in a warmer clime will eventually take a swing at him. That’s just way the world goes ’round in Big Ten baseball.
Alex Hickey is an award-winning writer who has watched Big Ten sports since it was a numerically accurate description of league membership. Alex has covered college football and basketball since 2008, with stops on the McNeese State, LSU and West Virginia beats before being hired as Saturday Tradition's Big Ten columnist in 2021. He is an Illinois native and 2004 Indiana University graduate.