Mike DiMauro: Why does Jim Mora continue to belittle Randy Edsall?

Dec. 21—One of the traits I find most repulsive in other humans: Their need to belittle others to justify their own existences.

I'm finding this true of UConn football coach Jim Mora, who appears to have a fetish in the form of publicly disparaging his predecessor.

Amid a landmark UConn football season in which Mora revitalized the program, he used Edsall for a punching bag last week, telling The Athletic, "This was the first team to cancel football for COVID and the head coach left for eight months (in 2020) and went to Florida. These kids told me they didn't see him for eight months."

It is a complete lie.

Moreover, it comes a few months after Mora referred to Edsall as "what's his name" during a news conference, a gratuitous, disingenuous attempt to feign ignorance and ingratiate himself to the media and fandom.

For housekeeping purposes: I spoke to Edsall and learned that he has ample evidence to prove his whereabouts throughout 2020, including airline and hotel receipts from coaching-related activities. I also spoke to some of his assistant coaches and former players who confirmed that Edsall was, indeed, actively running the program.

Edsall said he was in Florida from mid-March when COVID closed the campus until a time in June when at least some form of normalcy resumed. There was also practice in the early fall. By Mora's timeline, "eight months" keeps Edsall in Florida from March into November, except that he was even seen here by the media at fall practice.

"When I wasn't there, it was because the university was shut down," Edsall said. "We couldn't be there and the kids weren't there either."

I reached out over the weekend before the bowl game to ask Mora why he feels the need to tweak his predecessor, especially now with the fandom ready to build a statue to him. Bill Peterson, the university's Assistant Athletic Director for Communications, tried to set up a phone call, but my own work conflict didn't allow for a conversation.

Peterson, whose cooperation was very much appreciated, wrote in an e-mail, "Coach was asked a question about what the players were going through during the COVID season as well as the past few seasons. His response was in reference to the meetings and conversations he was having with the players when he took over and the information they shared with him about that time period."

So now I ask again: What compels Mora to say these things? He could have mentioned the COVID year as being tough times for everybody, but happily, the call is to move forward. Instead, he accused Edsall of abandoning the program.

Funny. In many years on the women's basketball beat, I never heard Geno Auriemma demean his predecessor, Jean Balthaser, about the shape of the women's program when he arrived. I've never heard Mike Cavanaugh aim any darts at Bruce Marshall. And while we're here, has Brian Daboll mentioned Joe Judge's name once this season?

Nobody is going to deny Mora's wizardry this season. I'll be the first to say I was dead wrong in suggesting this was Dead Program Walking. But I am utterly disappointed in Mora's methods of enhancing his own image at somebody else's expense. Makes you wonder how he'll act if next season isn't as successful.

Mora reminds me of this quote from author Ron Baratono: "There are people who will set out to tell lies about you and use their own reckless judgment in attempts to belittle you to as many people as possible. They'll search for the ones that will listen, the ones they feel are weak and can't think for themselves."

Sadly, this story has more tentacles than Mora's pettiness. First, I wonder how the editors at The Athletic, which is owned by the New York Times, could allow such an outrageous quote to be printed without comment from Edsall. It was only after the article was published that Edsall contacted the editors for rebuttal.

Then there's this: If you are gullible enough to take Mora at his word about Edsall's disappearance, how do you defend an athletic director who allowed it to happen? Think about it: Either David Benedict knew Edsall stopped coaching and did nothing about it or had no idea that his football coach wasn't around for eight months. There is no other logical conclusion, thus making Benedict appear incompetent.

But, alas, we know the truth.

And if you think this is over, you might be wrong. The Athletic also alluded to the departure of former defensive coordinator Lou Spanos, who took over as interim coach after Edsall stepped down — and then left the program for what was described as personal reasons two weeks before the season opener.

"We haven't seen him since the day he left," Mora told The Athletic. "He's just in the rearview mirror."

Except that several sources say Spanos is pondering a lawsuit against UConn and the football program, which may cost the university, already awash in the athletic department's financial woes, more money in payouts. Stay tuned on that one.

I get that UConn fans can't hear the truth above the roar. They're not interested anyway. Mora is winning and their fall Saturdays are fun again. Me? I worry that there's really nobody left in Connecticut to hold UConn accountable for anything, in this case allowing Mora's musings to go unchecked.

It's a most dangerous game when media companies are so dependent on UConn for content that they become unwilling to rock the boat. So go ahead and call me all the names you'd like. I've been called worse. Meanwhile, ask yourself why the general disdain for the way Edsall left somehow justifies Mora's repeated attempts to belittle him. I find it pathetic.

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro