DeLoss Dodds Stepping Down as AD at Texas, so There's No Way Mack Brown Remains Coach [UPDATE]

DeLoss Dodds, the 74-year old Texas AD who has been in his position since 1981, is stepping down at the end the year according to OrangeBloods.com. Ordinarily, an AD stepping down wouldn’t be major news, but this one is significant for two reasons:

1) Dodds, just this week, said “Mack Brown is fine.” Mack Brown is the embattled Texas football coach who is coaching for his job.

2) A new athletic director will want to bring on “his guy” to be head coach. Who wants to lose with someone you didn’t hire? Will Alabama’s Nick Saban be at the top of the new AD’s list? He should be.

Check out these quotes, somewhat buried in the Orange Bloods report:

"“There are likely big changes coming, and DeLoss knows it and doesn’t want to stand in the way of progress,” one source close to the situation told Orangebloods.com. Sources said if the football team continues to struggle the way it did in a demoralizing loss at BYU, in which the Longhorns gave up 550 yards rushing, that Mack Brown would likely announce his resignation."

Read: Big monied donors are not going to stand for a struggling football team, regardless of what this fossil of an AD says. Orange Bloods says Dodds recommended Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby as a possible replacement.

[UPDATE: Seventeen days after this report … Kirk Bohls of the Austin American-Statesman says Dodds is stepping down Tuesday.]