BL,
Call him a whipping boy. Call him a scapegoat. Whatever you want. But the guy was at the helm when two long time members walked out leaving everyone else scambling. And he got caught by surprise. How can that happen after the last time? It is simply impossible. Read the freaking internet and you'd have seen rumors. if he hasn't got the relationships with the various schools that he can get this kind of information, he shouldn't be inthe job anyway. he can't contact the Pitt adminsitration and get somebody to tell him something? College administrations aren't exactly the CIA, for heavens sake.
I've been saying for a while we need to add teams. You have 8 and lose two, you are screwed. If we had 10 or 12 now, we withstand this realtively easily. And who knows, maybe you don't lose those two. No real way of knowing. But he couldn't bring the basketball schools along with that idea. He proposed Villanova, with a high school stadium and ignored concerns that were raised, but couldn't deliver the votes to add them. He couldn't deliver the basketball schools for anyone else. If I were one of the current Big East members left behind, I'd be calling for his resignation immediately.
I don't hold Syracuse and Pitt totally blameless in this like so many people seem to do, by the way. Texas A&M is slimey, perhaps, but at least they made it very clear what they wanted to do. Nordenberg and Syracuse's President acted in a pretty sleazy manner, in particular Nordenberg, who was chairman of the Big East. Do what's best for your school, of course, but do it up front. They might have wrecked athletic programs at 6 schools and damaged them severely at 7 more since the basketball schools will likely take a big hit in their media deals, too. they ought to be piriahs. Their scheduling ought to be horrible...3 or 4 game road trips, Saturday games followed by Wednesday games followed by Saturday games, every good basketball team on the road...any crappy thing you can do to them. But the fact that they made Fr. Leahy and DeFillipo look honorable doesn't excuse Marinatto in my book. he was a clueless leader with limited imagination and no relationships with the football members that he could count on.