Last week, Locksley gave fans a delusional post-firing interview that yet again embarrassed everyone involved with the Lobos.
The smug, no-emotion attitude that we have been graced with for the past three years was on display as he shared his thoughts on his tenure with KRQE sports director Van Tate.
I firmly believe that a team’s success, or lack thereof, can always be attributed to its coaching.
In the interview, Locksley said he could sleep at night knowing that the team — which won 2 games and lost 26 in the time he was the head coach — is now better than it was when he first took over.
In the ’08 season, the team was 4-8. Last time I checked, four wins in one season is much better than two wins in a two-and-a-half year career.
He said he came into the program with good standing, character and reputation, and that his reputation was the only thing tarnished after his firing.
To say that he has good standing now is a lie.
His first action as a head coach and role model was to have his secretary, Sylvia Lopez, sue him in May ‘09 because he allegedly said she was “too old,” and she felt this had caused her to be fired. A group of team members soon followed Locksley’s superb moral standing by getting in a bar fight downtown the following month.
The headlines kept rolling in. In September ’09, Locksley one-upped his players by allegedly choking and punching his wide receivers coach, J.B Gerald, during an altercation at a meeting.
Locksley must have learned from his mistake after a “harsh” 10-day suspension was handed down by Athletics director Paul Krebs.
The team once again made headlines in August 2010 when a player robbed another player’s dorm room, and, you guessed it, got into another downtown bar fight.
Amid the off-field distractions, the team went 1-11 two seasons in a row.
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Locksley said later in the interview that he was proud of the team that he put on the field, and thought that the fans and everyone involved should agree.
That any fanbase would be proud watching its team lose nearly every game is comical.
Locksley lost 12 of his 28 games by more than 33 points, including a 72-point loss to Oregon.
Locksley embarrassed not only himself, but UNM, the fans and anyone involved in Lobo Athletics.
The most logical thing he said was that he did the best he could with the team that was given to him.
Way to throw your team — the team who stuck by you during your terrible coaching — under the bus and take no responsibility for any of your losses.
Locksley is walking away with a cool half-million dollars for all of the hard work he put in over the past two-and-a-half years. I guess winning two games is something to be proud of.
From base pay and his buy-out clause, he walks away from UNM with at least $1.1 million dollars from his coaching career. That’s $550,000 dollars per win. UNM also had to pay $50,000 in fees for lawyers and settlement costs for the Lopez and Gerald disputes.
Athletics lost an estimated $800,000 in revenues from ticket sales this year.
In total, UNM lost at least $2 million for hiring a coach who had never before been a head coach and whose claim to fame was being a good recruiter.
All that the money bought for us was more embarrassments than any athletics program should ever have to deal with.
If only I could find a job that would pay me millions of dollars to do a mediocre job.
Former defensive coordinator George Barlow is now the interim head coach, and things don’t look much better. The team’s defense has been terrible, giving up over 42 points in all but one game this season.
