The day after Harmon broke the story (which, if you question the integrity of his sources then you question Dick's integrity because he based his story and his reputation on his trust of what they told him and numerous others confirmed), Darnell Dickson published this:

"BYU has refuted rumors that the entire offensive football staff has been released and told to look for new jobs, as reported by various Salt Lake City sports media outlets Monday afternoon.

"Any reports that BYU football coaches have been released from the staff are inaccurate. " (official BYU press release)


Not being naive and having seen public officials tap dance around semantics more times than I can count (hence the Bill Clinton reference) it's pretty easy for BYU officials to go through some verbal gymnastics to avoid a bald face lie and still get around the truth. For example, in the fragment "BYU has refuted rumors that the 'ENTIRE' offensive staff has been released 'AND' told to look for new jobs..."

it's pretty easy to do the Clinton Two-Step and refute that statement if not every member of the offensive staff was being affected by this (maybe a grad assistant on offense was safe and not being fired) or they weren't told both things, that they were getting released AND needed to seek employment elsewhere. If they were only told one or the other BYU officials could refute the claim that they had told offensive coaches both things.

It comes down to which scenario you think is more likely, that Dick Harmon is a sloppy or dishonest and irresponsible journalist who would risk his professional credibility by not verifying his information to ensure it's reliability or Bronco etc who routinely gets lambasted in the media for not being open and transparent regarding issues facing his program that cast it in a negative light (and numerous examples of this exist)?

When it comes to trusting coaches, how many times have you heard a football coach repeatedly deny he's a candidate or interested in taking another coaching position and then later that week he gets announced as that team's new coach and leaves his team and players in the lurch? (*cough*Nick Saban)

It's not a knock on coaches, it's just what they do. The more skin they have in the game the more you see it happen (cui bono).