Greg Hansen: As once-solid program hits rock bottom, Arizona leaders have no choice but to fire Kevin Sumlin

If the UA fires Kevin Sumlin any time before Jan. 15, it owes him a $7.5 million walk-off payday. If it waits until Jan. 16, 2021 the payoff is reduced to $5 million, payable over two years.

Think about that for a second. Based on Sumlin’s current $3.5 million salary, he is paid $1,198 per hour. Of course, that is based on a 40-hour work week and an eight-hour day. That means in the 3½ hours it took Arizona State to deliver the most crushing, embarrassing and historic Territorial Cup loss to the Wildcats, 70-7, Sumlin earned $4,194.

Give or take a few cents.

The only thing that makes sense now is for Arizona president Robert C. Robbins and athletic director Dave Heeke to work out the language with the school’s attorneys and part ways with Sumlin immediately, if not sooner, and not delay until Jan. 16.

It would save $2.5 million, which would be the only victory in Arizona’s 2020 football season.

And how can you move forward and hire a replacement while waiting until Jan. 16, saving $2.5 million? Let the attorneys handle it. You could hire San Jose State head coach Brent Brennan or Oregon assistant coach Joe Salave’a — or whoever — as soon as possible and begin work salvaging the badly-damaged brand of Arizona football.

If Sumlin sues, he sues. That would be much less painful than Friday’s 70-7 Territorial Cup loss, one that will live in Tucson football infamy, a scar that won’t go away for about 100 years.

It took a bit of research, but in my opinion the only comparison to the scope of Arizona’s Territorial Cup embarrassment was the first game of Arizona’s 1982-83 basketball season. Remember that? Phi Slama Jamma?

Houston beat ill-fated Ben Lindsey’s only UA team 104-63. Arizona committed a school-record 33 turnovers. "We were doing stuff I couldn’t believe," said Lindsey, who was fired 3 ½ months later.

Consider the UA football program slammed and jammed. As it quickly fell behind 42-7 Friday, Arizona was doing stuff I couldn’t believe. Could you?

Even John Mackovic’s 2-10 team of 2003, beaten 59-7 by Purdue a week before he was fired at midseason, showed more fight than the Wildcats did on Friday. That '03 team beat UTEP and Washington. Nevertheless, Mackovic was fired 28 games into his UA days.

Mackovic went 10-18. Sumlin is 9-20.

The detractors didn’t wait long to voice their displeasure Friday night.

121220-spt-ua fb main-p43.jpg — Arizona head coach Kevin Sumlin talks to Arizona defensive back Quinn Sullivan (30) during a huddle in the third quarter of their game against Arizona State at Arizona Stadium, Tucson, Ariz., December 11, 2020.
Kelly Presnell / Arizona Daily Star

All-American linebacker Scooby Wright, the UA’s top football player of the last decade, the force behind Arizona’s riveting 2014 Territorial Cup victory and Pac-12 South division championship, tweeted a not-so-subtle: "Dave Heeke better hire someone to change the codes of the facility."

A bit earlier, Arizona’s 2012 quarterback, Matt Scott, one of only four UA quarterbacks in the Pac-10/12 years to be an all-conference second-team QB, tweeted “Just fire everyone please! This product we are putting on the field is hard to watch.’’

That’s the old school spirit.

Even Sun Devil co-defensive coordinator Antonio Pierce, a starting Arizona linebacker in 2000 and 2001, took glee in his alma mater’s misfortune. He retweeted an ESPN Stats & Info message declaring that ASU scored the most points it has scored since 1969.

As the old comic strip character Pogo once said: "We have met the enemy and he is us."

Some took Friday’s loss with a perspective of better days. In a postgame Zoom call, starting linebacker Parker Henley, a senior walk-on, said "It’s not good. … but it’s on to the rest of my life.’’

At 6:36 p.m., Friday, with ASU leading 42-7 at halftime, I got a text from a prominent UA booster, a front-row fan at McKale Center and Sands Club occupant at Arizona Stadium. Here’s what he wrote:

"I just canceled my four football tickets with associated fees. I know $8,000 or $9,000 won’t make a difference to the school. However, I just can’t support an athletic program for a school that doesn’t respect and support their own students. The lack of football leadership is almost criminal."

Getting beat 70-7 in the Territorial Cup is a dreaded record among rivals in modern league history. No other rivalry games has been as lopsided over the last 70 years.

Oregon beat OSU 69-10 in 2017.

USC beat UCLA 50-0 in 2011.

Stanford beat Cal 61-13 in 2013.

Washington beat WSU 51-3 in 2000.

Life went on at those losing schools; blowing one game by a record deficit — even a rivalry game — shouldn’t mean you have to change coaches. But it usually does. That’s the culture of college football now and for the last 50 years.

The questions Robbins and Heeke have surely discussed at length are these: Can we afford to pay Sumlin to leave? Or, is it that we can’t afford to keep him? Lose money now or lose it next season — and maybe years after.

A generation of UA football fans, young and old, are exiting at record numbers. Last year’s average attendance at Arizona Stadium was its lowest since 1974. Whoever gets the blame for making the mistake of hiring Sumlin doesn’t matter now. What matters is getting new leadership, new energy and a different direction.

In the fall of 1994, Sports Illustrated featured the UA’s Desert Swarm defense on the cover of its college football issue. "Rock Solid," it said.

Now it is "Rock Bottom."