It’s the Rebirth of a Salesman : Fred Miller Made ASU a Power, Now He’s at It Again at SDSU

The hard sell starts at the top these days, with guys such as Lee Iacocca and Frank Borman. Whether it’s a car, an airline or even an electric shaver, the chief executive isn’t afraid to come out of his office and do some shilling.

In the case of Fred Miller, who’s peddling an athletic program, he’s probably only too happy to get out of the office.

The man’s office is a dead giveaway to the ennui and the starvation budget gripping San Diego State University sports.

Miller’s work space has the feel of a mid-level civil servant’s office--cramped and spartan, not even a couch.

Apart from a couple of uninspired prints on the wall, the most prominent feature is an oval table piled high with typed documents and legal pads. Hardly a typical athletic director’s office.

But let’s not be too quick to judge. A year from now, Miller may may have talked himself into an office as colorful, expansive and unconventional as Horton Plaza.

Miller’s words have a way of solidifying into bricks and mortar.

He wheedles, cajoles and massages the titans of capitalism, and before you can invoke the name of Donald Trump, stadiums swell in capacity. Arenas and tracks materialize after the shortest possible period of gestation.

The question before the house is whether this silver-tongued salesman can do for SDSU’s downtrodden athletic program what he did for Arizona State a decade ago. But without the catastrophic consequences.

New facilities, new sources of revenue, new image. They’re all contained in Miller’s mental blueprint for the future.

His plan is easy to capsulize.

“We want to become a national-class program,” he said, fully cognizant that he’s working with middle-of-the-road Western Athletic Conference material.

Naturally, he has dreamed up a doozy of a marketing plan, designed to whip a few gung-ho boosters, borderline fans and the idly curious into a frenzy of ticket-buying.

“We need quick fixes,” he said. “We’re broke.”

He forecasts a tripling of 1985 football season tickets, from 8,000 to 24,000, by the 1986 season, and never mind that the school record of 21,000 came after back-to-back 10-1 records in 1976 and 1977.

He expects to wipe out a $750,000 deficit in one broad stroke by forming a Golden Aztec Circle. The idea is to induce 60 well-heeled believers to spend $10,000 for a package of 18 prime seats on the press level at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

“Look, if we’re content to just screw around for four or five years, we might as well fold our tents,” he said.

Miller clearly isn’t afraid to throw a little reality in the faces of Aztec fans, many of whom seem stuck in the past, in the Don Coryell era, which ended before the Vietnam War did.

If he is to have credibility, Miller can’t stray too far from the facts.

The man’s record is hardly unblemished. In fact, when the 1980s began, it seemed his career might be over. Phoenix beheld the death of a salesman.

He had enlarged Arizona State’s football stadium to 70,000 and filled it to overflowing with idolatrous fans.

Through his alliance with a powerful booster group called the Sun Angels, Miller made the campus bloom with athletic facilities, and still kept the budget on solid footing.

Then he fired a coach who was a father figure, and watched a mushroom cloud darken the Valley of the Sun.

The fallout brought allegations, investigations, death threats, lawsuits and the termination of his job. By the time it had all settled, Miller wound up in a forced retreat.

For five years, he took refuge in a classroom, emerging only to serve as a consultant for a cable TV sports operation.

“It got quiet,” he said. “Too quiet.”

Now, arising from the ashes of Phoenix, he has migrated west, to a desultory athletic program. It may be he wants to restore his own good name almost as badly as he desires to make San Diego State a national-class power.

A beach bum from Venice who spent the prime years of his career in an arid environment, Miller has returned to Southern California with plans to live as close to the water as he can get in Pacific Beach. At 54, he’s primed for one last big charge.

“I’m more cautious now,” he said. “I’ve been bruised. I have some scar tissue. But I know college athletics pretty darn well. I know where you can get blindsided.

“Can I fall flat on my face here? Sure. But behold the turtle: He sticks his neck out. So do I.”

His plan is part patchwork and part guesswork. And the outlook is mixed. There is no compelling reason, aside from Miller’s zeal, to think his scheming can wring passion and commitment from a largely indifferent city.

“It’s ridiculous this town doesn’t have a strong, viable major-college athletic program,” said John Reid, executive director of the Holiday Bowl and a man who worked in proximity to Miller in Phoenix.

“A lot of people feel the odds are insurmountable, but I can’t think of anyone with a better chance than Fred. He’s not afraid to step on toes or try crazy things that come to fruition.”

The most respected name in the athletic director’s trade, Michigan’s Don Canham, applauded San Diego State President Thomas Day’s decision to entrust the program to Miller.

“He was absolutely the best man available for the job,” Canham said. “When I was contacted about Fred, I simply couldn’t think of anyone with his background, his charisma or his ability.

“I’ve observed him over a period of many years, and I know what an unbelievable job he did at Arizona State. It’s so refreshing to see a school hire the right person instead of just settling for some guy who charmed the president’s butt off in an interview.”

Another veteran Miller watcher is Joe Gilmartin, a Phoenix sports columnist. He, too, believes Miller is the right man for the Aztec reclamation project, but he tempers his words with caution.

“I wouldn’t hesitate a minute to entrust Fred with building a program,” Gilmartin said. “He’s terrific at doing things that people say can’t be done.

“But if he turns up a gold mine, there will be a lot of eyes on him. If you are upwardly mobile in college football, you pay a price. You get accepted on the scoreboard before you’re welcomed into the family of nations. The guys who have religion don’t always want you in the club.”

In other words, if Miller makes headway in molding San Diego State into a powerhouse, he can expect NCAA scrutiny. History suggests that jealous rivals might be prone to whisper about rule-bending, be it ever so minor.

The prospect hardly causes Miller’s knees to tremble, because he is intent upon maintaining hygiene in his athletic department.

His concern is reflected in a novel scheme that will result in $10,000 being with held from the earnings of football Coach Denny Stolz. If there are no violations, Stolz gets the money at the end of the year. Basketball Coach Smokey Gaines also will participate in the plan.

Further concern is evidenced by the rules tests that each varsity coach must pass with a score of 90 or better on a scale of 100.

“There’s no way this university is going to be embarrassed,” Miller said. “We start from the assumption our coaches know nothing about NCAA rules (and then provide education). We even plan to bring in an outside agency to make sure we overlook nothing.”

Miller has always been known as a fast talker--in a boardroom, locker room or classroom.

He tells a little story that shows he is amused by his reputation.

During his time as a teacher at Arizona State, he witnessed a curious phenomenon.

Before most lectures, he faced several empty rows of seats, always at the front of the room.

One day it dawned on him that his students needed a buffer zone. The word was out: when Fred Miller’s mouth enters overdrive, the words are often accompanied by a shower of saliva.

For such a large man--he played tackle for the Washington Redskins 30 years ago--Miller speaks in a surprisingly high voice, which mixes self-deprecating humor with hyperbole and heavy thoughts.

He can jump from the Oriental philosophy of Alan Watts to the joys of surfing and beach volleyball, and then deliver a soliloquy on the merits of his generation.

“I should show you our Redskins team picture from 1955,” he said. “There we were, posed on the steps of the nation’s capitol, and not a black face in the picture!

“But I don’t feel badly. Look at the social strides made by women and blacks in the last three decades. Hey, my generation is doing OK. Many of us are Depression kids and over-achievers, and we’re doing OK.”

Not long after he gave up pro football, Miller entered grad school and wrote a dissertation on the need to make helmets safer. After completing work on his doctorate, he became athletic director at Cal State Long Beach.

By 1971 he had graduated to Arizona State, where he embarked upon building a program that would shame a Pharaoh.

He expanded Sun Devil Stadium from 30,000 to 70,000 and had blueprints to add another 12,000 seats. He built an 8,000-seat baseball stadium, a 5,000-seat track stadium and a 2,000-seat tennis center. All the money came from private sources.

As a fund-raiser, he expanded the booster group from a membership of 3,000 to 14,000, raising contributions from $50,000 to $1.5 million.

“I worked side by side with him for eight years when I was executive director of the Fiesta Bowl,” Reid said. “There were times when we were bitter adversaries over stadium rental issues, but I never lost respect for the man.

“He is a real innovator and a great communicator. He can speak whatever language is called for. I know of no one better than Fred at communicating. That’s his secret, that and his boundless energy. He’s just a whirling dervish.”

And therein is part of the problem. Miller got so caught up in the urge to bring in new money and build new facilities, his right hand wasn’t always aware of what his left hand was doing--much less what his football coach was up to.

Frank Kush became almost a mythic figure as the Sun Devil football coach. His success dovetailed with that of Miller, pushing the athletic program to new heights. And then the whole thing came tumbling down around both men.

The precipitating incident involved Kush allegedly slapping the face of punter Kevin Rutledge. Kush issued a denial, then was suspended and eventually fired by Miller, who accused him of a coverup.

Miller himself wound up being fired amid a nasty set of charges and counter-charges, resulting in the NCAA investigating the football program, the state of Arizona looking into criminal allegations that ticket sales and money had been mishandled, and the Pacific 10 studying the question of eligibility of several ASU players.

It took years before it all got sorted out. The Arizona State program is now under an entirely new administration. Kush is head coach of the Arizona Wranglers of the United States Football League. His relationship with Miller is non-existent.

It is dangerous to generalize about the undoing of the ASU program in 1979, but it’s clear the wounds went very deep.

“The night Frank was suspended as coach, ASU was playing Washington in Tempe,” Reid said. “When the players carried him onto the field, the electricity in the stadium was frightening. It was almost like an earthquake was coming. It showed me the dangerous power of college athletics.”

Half a decade later, passions have abated and Miller is no longer in the mainstream of conversation in Phoenix, according to Gilmartin.

“His contribution to the mess is still murky in my mind,” he said. “He and Frank were just two of the principals. In any case, Fred’s usefulness as a wheeler-dealer and fund-raiser was ended by the affair.”

Canham said he was disappointed Miller didn’t receive more administrative support at Arizona State.

“Fred was a straight guy who did nothing illegal,” Canham said. “He was caught between factions, and somebody had to save face.”

Reid said Miller was torn apart by the whole fiasco.

“A lesser person would have been permanently destroyed,” he said. “It was so very depressing. There was so much hatred. It was a heavy burden for the entire valley, people felt embarrassed and sad.

“Fred himself seemed introverted and reserved for several years, but now he is like a new man.”

A new man, and a wiser man.

The relatively leisurely pace of the last five years agreed with him. He was able to ride his bike to class. There was time for coffee breaks with his son and relaxed dinners with his daughters.

Miller also had time to analyze his shortcomings.

“I don’t have a lot of misgivings about the ethics of what happened,” he said. “But I don’t attempt to hide my faults. I was naive, I assumed too much, I didn’t slow down very often.

“I don’t know that I created a monster, but I’ll admit there are risks associated with being good. The coach (Kush) believed he was bigger than the program. I did a lot of things right, but I sure did get bloodied.”

As he spoke, Miller was sipping an imported beer and enjoying a cup of chili. He had a cold, and one of his ears was throbbing. He playfully tilted his head to the side, seeking relief for his ear but looking a bit odd in a crowded restaurant.

“It was important to me to be had,” Miller said, expressing what seemed an almost masochistic idea. “You really should get worked over at least once in your life to find out what’s important.”

Miller delights in the prospect of proving his critics wrong. The thing about his new undertaking is that he could get bloodied again, but clearly he needs that element of risk.

“What if I fail?” he mused. “That thought trickles across the back of my mind. I’ve put my butt on the line, by promising to fill the stadium in three years and make this school a national power.

“I just believe you have to be willing to take a chance in life. I’ve been criticized as being arrogant, but it would be more accurate to label me a fraud if I were playing my cards too close to the vest. San Diego State should run me off if I didn’t take chances.”

Some of his ideas seem less chancy than far-fetched. For example, he talks of reaching 100,000 San Diego County homes via pay TV in 1992. He believes the large-screen, three-dimensional images and stereo sound that will be part of 1992 technology will make the Aztecs an easy sell. Well, maybe.

More realistic is his acceptance of San Diego State’s future as a member of the Western Athletic Conference. Some ambitious Aztec followers have talked dreamily of the Pac-10, but Miller knows that conference isn’t going to force out any present members or take in new ones.

“I left the WAC once (at Arizona State),” he said. “I’m not leaving again. My middle name is not Judas.”

Miller sees a parallel between the University of Miami’s growth in the last three years with what he aspires to at San Diego State.

“Miami’s facilities and office space are poor,” he said, “but, like us, they have an ideal city for recruiting. They have an advantage in already having a strong football schedule and a national championship trophy to show off.

“It’s going to be a longer pull for us, but if we can put together back-to-back 7-4 seasons, we’ll take off. Success breeds success.”

Even if Miller harbors doubts about the likelihood of transforming San Diego State into a national power, the challenge has filled him with new resolve.

“A lot of people in Arizona have written me off,” he said. “This is like starting over. I’ve come full circle, back to the beach, back to my roots.

“OK, so this is the toughest job I’ve ever undertaken. Give me some time. I was always a hell of a fourth-quarter player. I never really belonged in the NFL. I took my beatings every Sunday. But, man, I always owned that fourth quarter.”