The Snyder tenure at Cal was before my time, but I recall that during the Holmoecaust, older Blues would hold Snyder up at the kind of coach Cal needed to turn the program around. Before Tedford, Snyder was the only modern coach to harness Cal’s strengths as a recruiting destination and transmute them into on-the-field results. I’ve never held his jumping ship against him, as my understanding is that his departure from Cal was more a case of being neglected by the Administration than trading up. Fortunately, the University learned its lessons from that era and applied them to the Tedford Era. I will say that Snyder was a scary opponent and the ’96 Sun Devils were one of the best teams the Pac-10 has turned out in the last couple decades.

I long held bitter feelings toward Snyder because of his sudden departure in 1991, and some of the comments he made afterwards. But those feelings are long gone, both because time heals all wounds and because I’ve been properly educated as to how much of a role the AD (Bockrath) had to do with his departure.

I believe Tedford is a much superior coach—Snyder’s teams were horribly undisciplined—but I also think the 1991 Bears were better than even the 2004 squad. They certainly remain my favorite Cal team of all time, their Big Game egg notwithstanding.

The Pac-10 has lost one of its finest with Snyder’s passing. My most sincere sympathies to his friends and family. He will long be fondly remembered. Rest in Peace.

Bockrath is most to blame for Snyder leaving (well that and money) – but Bockrath basically called Bruce’s bluff from what I rememeber (I was a senior in high school really looking forward to attending school with Heisman Trophy winner Russell White and NCAA ROY Jason Kidd – whooops)

Coach Snyder was the coach during my undergrad years. Never did I blame him for leaving after the 1991 season; to this day, I blame Bockrath for that. (Not doing all he could to keep Coach Snyder was but the first mistake of Bockrath’s disastrous run as the AD.)

Coach Snyder turned our program around remarkably well in a short period of time. And I have always been envious of the 1996 Arizona State team because, in my heart of hearts, I’ve believed that was supposed to be OUR team.

I’ll remember Coach Snyder as a heckuva football coach who was a great gameplanner and had a knack for recruiting diamonds in the rough. I’ll also remember him as a pretty good guy, too. I enjoyed covering his weekly media lunches as a young KALX reporter because he was such fun to listen/talk to. I also remember that he took the time to be our guest on our KALX sports call-in show one time.

I always liked Snyder, particularly because he showed that football can succeed in Berkeley.

Coming after the surreal circus of Joe Kapp, a guy who could build a program that not only won, but ended up going 10-2, demolishing Clemson in a bowl game, and being ranked in the top 10 was amazing.

Personally, I didn’t blame him for leaving, especially after being treated like pond scum by Bockrath. Of course, that helped really reinforce the idea that Cal was not a football-friendly place, and then we had to contend with Gilby. Ugh.

The only knock on Snyder was that he perhaps didn’t have a tight enough grip on discipline on the team. I seem to recall a lot of personal fouls and unsportsmanlike penalties with his guys.

Still, I will always have good feelings of his time as a Bear.