Jeff Pelline's Sierra Foothills Report

Less than a year ago, I asked whether it was time to replace Cal’s football coach, Jeff Tedford. Now I wonder whether it’s time to replace both Tedford and the Athletic Director Sandy Barbour.

Perhaps Chancellor Robert Birgeneau ought to go too for calling the football program the “financial underpinning for the entire Cal Athletics Department” in Jan. 2009. Wrong.

If you recall, Cal last month was forced to cut its baseball problem and other sports teams, removing 163 athletes from varsity status. Cal’s athletic department expenses are $69 million for the current fiscal year, yet revenues are only $57 million, the S.F. Chronicle reported. The $12 million gap is bridged by student registration fees and the chancellor’s discretionary fund. The athletic department’s revenues come from ticket sales, broadcast rights and donor contributions.

The details are here and here.

Meanwhile, Cal’s football team is mediocre, at best, and Tedford remains the third-highest paid football coach in the Pac-10, earning $2.8 million. Though there have been challenges off the field — including a well-publicized court battle to block upgrading the athletic facilities — the team is not filling up enough seats in the stadium.

Barbour and Birgeneau had bet — wrongly — that Cal’s football team could help carry the rest of the athletic department with a nationally ranked team. But it hasn’t materialized.

“Cal has had top talent – Marshawn Lynch, DeSean Jackson, Jahvid Best,” I wrote last December. “But Coach Jeff Tedford seems more wrapped up in ‘Xs and Os’ than being a head coach. The play calling is inconsistent, the team is not fired up and his ballyhooed genius as a quarterback coach has not materialized.”

Some suggested it was heresy, noting that Tedford is Cal’s winningest coach. So what did Barbour and Birgeneau do? Extend Tedford’s contract through 2015.

“On behalf of our entire University community, I want to congratulate Coach Tedford on the outstanding job that he has done with our football team, achieving both on-field and academic success,” said Chancellor Robert Birgeneau in extending the contract. “Under Coach Tedford, the football program now provides a reliable and robust financial underpinning for the entire Cal Athletics Department, helping to support 14 women’s and 13 men’s intercollegiate teams.”

Five of Tedford’s worst losses at Cal — 17 points or more — have come since September of last year. The latest: a 48-14 rout by USC this weekend. The 52-31 loss to UNR earlier this season was another.

Other alumni, besides me, are starting to ask questions.

As the latest newsletter of Cal’s Alumni group in Tahoe mentioned: “The Bears came out of hibernation to hear Chancellor Birgeneau speak at the Deck Party at the Hubbard’s home.

“It was a beautiful evening on the golf course, and the Chancellor did a great job of addressing many of the issues we all are concerned about, including why Jeff Tedford makes more than he does.”

Good question. Most of the alums in our county still support Tedford, but I suspect they’re rethinking their position. Or they should be.

You can expect to see a lot more commentary like this in coming months — not just on this blog.

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CABPRO has been interviewing Tom McClintock, Sue Horne and Barry Pruett, among others, and uploading the discussion onto the internet.

A Google search also shows “CABPRO’s Dick Marshall interviews Dai Meagher.”

But when you click on the link, the video doesn’t load.

I keep wondering whether CABPRO’s endorsement of Dai is a blessing or a curse. The county’s Democratic Central Committee also has endorsed Dai for county Treasurer.

All five county supervisors have endorsed his opponent, Tina Vernon.

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While Sarah Palin (and Tom McClintock) gathered this weekend at separate political events in Orange County, Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina were campaigning on opposite ends of the state.

Whitman and Fiorina cited scheduling conflicts as the reason they could not attend, according to the L.A. Times. Yea, sure.

As the Times points out: “The candidates also had political rationales for avoiding a joint appearance. A recent Field poll showed that nearly two-thirds of independent voters in California view Palin unfavorably — and Republicans here need the support of independents to overcome Democrats’ double-digit voter registration edge.”

As I’ve said all along, most of us are “in the middle” or centrists.

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Russ Steele is crowing that Tom McClintock’s comment about the need to “agitate in every forum you can” and “take back” the White House is a call to arms for the hard right and disciples like him.

The remarks (listen to the video) came at a big hard right pow-wow — the Western Conservative PAC — which I previously reported.

Though attending this Newport Beach event, Tom has been a “no show” at candidate forums in our rural district — here and in Plumas County — where many of our problems are nonpartisan.

Is this the right approach, where Tom’s “my way or the highway” style is tearing apart the local GOP — and Republicans throughout the foothills for that matter?

Moderate GOPers complain that Tom’s rigid ideology comes at the expense of pragmatism. They depend on him to help land money for roads, broadband, schools and other programs.

In addition, is it working? Tom’s political endorsements were big losers in June (Poizner, Aanestad, DeVore, most of the propositions, and locals such as Barry Pruett, an ill-qualified candidate).

His latest “political baby” — Prop. 23 — is headed for defeat, too, I predict.

Is Tom learning from that? Nope. he adds, it’s time to “take back” the White House. This rhetoric reminds me of his remark that it’s time to replace the “left wing” clerk recorder in our county — something that never materialized.

Tom was elected to represent a small Congressional district in rural California, with many nonpartisan problems. His record in tackling them has been mixed, at best. Many people are asking “What has he done for us?”

This video is very telling about Tom’s grander ambitions. Our 4th district voters should listen up.

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