Back to the archive for this week’s best profile, just as college football teams start practicing in pads. Michael Lewis, pre-financial meltdown, gives us the ins-and-outs of Mike Leach’s crazy Texas Tech offense. Oh, Mike Leach is kind of crazy too:
As he allowed himself to be escorted toward the locker room, there were many things Mike Leach might have been thinking about. His team was now 8-1 – the best start in nearly 30 years for a Texas Tech football team. They had just beaten Texas A.&M. by the largest margin in the 80-year-old history of the rivalry. He knew he was not going to sleep anytime soon – he keeps the hours of a vampire and wouldn’t go to bed until 6:30 a.m. – and so he might have even been thinking about reviewing game tape, which he usually does while others sleep.Then he spotted a giant grasshopper on the turf. It twitched on the very spot where, two days earlier, he picked up his third-string halfback’s tooth after it had been knocked out by his second-string defensive tackle. He gazed upon the grasshopper in wonder. He wondered, specifically, how far a giant grasshopper could hop, were he to put his foot to its rear. It was on the 20-yard line; he thought maybe it might make it to the 30.
Finally he looked up from the grasshopper. And, as if for the first time, he noticed that he wasn’t exactly alone. The stands were thick with fans. Twenty thousand Red Raiders were chanting his name.
Coach! Leach! Coach! Leach!
Read more, here.
