Byrne found a coach who'll at least fit in
Jeremy Heath

Jeremy Heath is the Dispatch Record's sports editor. His column appears Fridays. He can be contacted via e-mail at jheath@lampasas.com.

To the NCAA, college football is first and foremost about money.

But in college towns, it's still about fans and culture. In College Station, the entire college experience is about culture to a much higher degree than it is in most other places.

That's what makes Texas A&M Athletics Director Bill Byrne's hiring of Houston Texans offensive coordinator Mike Sherman to replace Dennis Franchione so interesting (or safe, depending on how you look at it).

Mike Sherman not only understands the College Station culture, he embraces it.

And trust me, that can be tougher than one might think.

Back in 1998, a buddy of mine -- the current sports editor at the Banner Herald in Athens, Ga. -- and I were a couple of cub reporters in College Station for a convention of college journalists. Both being huge college football fans, we sneaked away from our groups one afternoon and cruised over to the A&M campus to check out the football facilities.

In our search for the athletics office, we stumbled across the statue of E. King Gill, better known to college football fans as the "12th Man." We were aware of the history behind the statue and figured it would make for a pretty cool photo.

Stupidly (in retrospect), I climbed onto the base of the statue and started posing with Gill's likeness.

About that time a small group of young men with crew cuts and uniforms started yelling at me from the distance. Something about staying off the grass and me being a son of a something or another.

Then they started running toward us. The looks in their eyes didn't suggest they were planning on enhancing our tour with their knowledge of the campus.

We decided to split (or ran off tripping and screaming like a couple of little girls, depending on how you look at it).

Long story short, we ducked into a building, praying there would be someone inside willing to call the local police if we started getting our heads kicked in. Luckily, there was a very nice woman sitting at a desk. She introduced herself as then-head coach R.C. Slocum's secretary and asked if she could assist us.

While I was catching my breath, my buddy explained to her (or lied, depending on how you look at it) that we were college sports writers, and we were hoping to meet with Slocum for a story we were writing. Without hesitation, she hit the intercom button on her phone and asked the coach if he had a few minutes for a couple of college reporters. Surprisingly, the voice on the other end said, "Sure, send them back."

Slocum was very nice. He said he had a meeting to attend but made a quick phone call to his groundskeeper and set up a private tour of Kyle Field for us. More importantly, he unwittingly kept us from a pretty severe beating. And I'm not exaggerating: Those guys were going to whip our tails over what they considered disrespect to a cultural icon.

And that takes us back to the point of all this rambling: The culture in College Station is different than anywhere else -- not better or worse, just different.

And that makes Sherman a pretty safe hire. Sherman was a coach under Slocum from 1989-93 and again from 1995-96 before leaving for the Green Bay Packers. He's been there. He understands what to expect. Not only that, but during his press conference on Monday, he made a point to explain repeatedly his affinity for the Aggie culture.

I realize many of the more vocal Aggie fans were a bit surprised by the move because they wanted a big-name, splashy hire.

First, wasn't Franchione supposed to be just that when he abandoned the faithful in Tuscaloosa, Ala., five years ago? How'd that work out? (Besides, much like John Mackovic in Austin, Franchione just didn't seem to fit in College Station.)

Second, those same fans are delusional if they think the likes of Auburn's Tommy Tuberville, West Virginia's Rich Rodriguez or South Carolina's Steve Spurrier would abandon their gigs for A&M. The A&M job is not as appealing as it would have been, say, 10 years ago. It's not Baylor by any means, but it's not Alabama or Texas or Southern Cal, either.

If Byrne had stayed within the college ranks to make his hire, he would have had a much easier time attracting Boise State's Chris Peterson, Arkansas' Houston Nutt (hired by Mississippi on Tuesday) or Houston's Art Briles (hired by Baylor on Wednesday).

But I think Sherman is a better fit than any of the three. Not only because he can walk into a highly touted quarterback recruit's living room and say, "I worked with Brett Favre," but also because in understanding the culture of the school, he'll know immediately if the kid is the right fit for A&M.

At A&M, unlike many other universities, fitting in is still important.

At least Byrne seems to think so.