No trick. Rodriguez had said he wasn't going anywhere, and he didn't. Maybe the delay was simply Alabama gave a surprising enough offer that Rodriguez was a little tempted, but it was unreasonable for anyone in Alabama's program to give anyone else the notion that the deal was going down.
Kudos to Roriguez for choosing his family, his current life, his players, and his word to them over Alabama's siren song.
Actually, Coach Rodriguez, through his attorney, accepted the contract last night. He agreeded in principal to become the new coach at Alabama. He backed out on it. If you or I went into a really great and big job worth millions of dollars, we would have hired an attorney also. That attorney would have negociated the contract, told you or me about the results, which we would have agreed to or not. He agreed. He then told the Alabama people he accepted those terms. Then he went home to tell his people his decision, got cold feet, and back out. Thus, it is Rodriguez who did the backing out. He might have told everyone earlier that he was staying, but in fact, he accepted the contract only to back out before signing it. Like the baseball player a week or so ago who accepted the Blue Jays offer, then backed out. The general manager of the Jays said he had NEVER had anyone back out after accepting. Same here with Rodriguez. I am not a Bama fan. But, the guy did tell Alabama he would take the job.
Rich could end up being a god at WVU. He would be able to post 9-3 and maybe even 8-4 records here. Not so much at 'bama.
OK maybe not a trick, but Rodriguez has beeh pushing WVU to give him and his staff a raise and to improve facilities and they were acting slow. Alabama made him a very nice offer that he I am sure seriously was considering and had told Alabama that so he takes the offer to WVU and waits to see if they would counter, which they did. He played it very smart.