But as I scrolled down, I saw something interesting. The phrase “fire bret bielema” had driven two visits; meaning that, most likely, some drunk buffoon in Madison watched Wisconsin get trashed by Iowa today and then typed “fire bret bielema” into Google and landed on my previous post that paid homage to the biggest losers in college football last weekend. More importantly, it means that at least some Badger fans have decided that one bad month of football should spell the end of a pretty good start to the Bret Bielema era so far. Look at the numbers coming into the season:

• 21-5 overall record, 12-4 in the Big Ten
• Two straight bowl appearances, winning the Capital One Bowl in 1996
• Consistently in the top 10, occasionally breaking into the Top 5

As a Tennessee fan, numbers like these look pretty good. And when Wisconsin jumped out to a 4-0 record before beginning Big Ten play, Brett Bielema sat at 25-5 through his first 30 games as a head coach. That is an outstanding winning percentage of 83.3%. Even with four straight losses, Bielema is 25-9, a winning percentage of 73.5%.

Could firing Bret Bielema really be a reasonable topic of thought and conversation for Badger Nation?

Well, look at the losses. The Badgers had the Michigan game in hand, and inexplicably allowed the Wolverines back into the game, which they subsequently stole away in the final minutes. The next week, Wisconsin played valiantly against Ohio State in Madison but lost 20-17. These two losses seemed to take the wind out of the Wisconsin sails. Over the last two Saturdays, Bret Bielema and the BADgers have been outscored 86-23 by Penn State and Iowa. They either didn’t show up or are much less talented than in previous years.

And perhaps therein lies the problem.

We have seen over and over in college sports a highly successful or legendary coach retire, only to see his successor post great records over his first few seasons using the players the previous coach recruited. In college football, think Larry Coker at Miami. The Hurricanes continued to dominate while Butch Davis’ recruits were at the U. Once they had all moved on to the NFL, Coker was unable to similarly stock the cupboard. For a basketball example, look no further than the Mike Davis era after Bob Knight retired. Davis took highly recruited players like Jared Jeffries, Dane Fife, and AJ Moye to an NCAA title game — seeming to be the perfect antidone to Knight’s bombastic coaching style, but reaping the results of Knight’s ability to teach and (at least back then) recruit.

But what happened to Coker and Davis after a few years? They failed…gradually but, ultimately, miserably. And both programs are still picking up the pieces.

Are these past four games the beginning of the demise for Wisconsin? And if so, should Wisconsin cut its losses now and bring in an experienced or successful up-and-coming coach to stop the bleeding?

I can’t answer that. I don’t really follow Wisconsin enough and, admittedly, have not watched them play. Perhaps some of you Badger fans can chime in with comments. Does this year’s team look less talented? Has the level of play, discipline, and strategic decision-making diminished substantially since Barry Alvarez left the sidelines and became the Athletic Director? I would be interested to know the answers from people who are informed.

Because the reality is this: if the answers to the questions I just posed are “yes” then the leadership of Wisconsin’s athletic department should act swiftly. If Bielema is in over his head, if he is great guy but just a glorified coordinator or position coach (like Mike Davis was), and if he can’t effectively bring talent to Madison, then this four game slide will be the beginning of a trend and not just a hiccup. I’ve seen it happen too often, and seen athletic departments wait way too long to pull the trigger for change when all of the symptoms of current and future mediocrity are present.

Unfortunately, it looks like Indiana might have done that with Bill Lynch in the aftermatch of Terry Hoeppner’s tragic death and the Hoosiers’ exciting run to a bowl game last year. The problem is that, while Lynch coached under Terry Hoeppner, he was an assistant for a reason. He is a solid tactical coach and teacher, but perhaps not the charismatic leader and program steward that a successful college football program needs.

When someone is miscast in a role, as these last four games have shown that Bret Bielema may be, it requires acute foresight from the leadership above to make a decision in the best interest of the school. Patience may be a virtue, but so is judgment. The ideal, obviously, is to combine both; to give coaches enough time to prove themselves, but not to run a program into the ground if they can’t.

I don’t think it’s time for Bret Bielema fired, but it certainly is time for the Barry Alvarez and the Badger athletic department to be vigilantly on point. If Bielema is not the guy, he could unwittingly lead the erosion of the tradition that Barry Alvarez built up. This happened at Indiana, it happened at Miami, and Wisconsin has not built-in immunity to it happened to them.

Not every school can be like Michigan State in basketball, where Jud Heathcote handed over the reins to Tom Izzo and the program maintained or arguably even jumped up a level.

I guess the way I’d feel if I was a Wisconsin fan is that it’s still a little bit early to be doing Google searches on firing Bret Bielema, or creating www.firebretbielema.com, but I can certainly understand and relate to your frustration.

[tags]wisconsin badgers, college football, ncaa football, bret bielema[/tags]