Michigan AD Warde Manuel, ex-president attempted to bury Connor Stalions scouting scandal, lawsuit alleges

The term "scandal-ridden" is often thrown around Michigan's athletics department, so before we go further it's useful to put all the scandals in one place. During the 2021-23 period, Michigan's football coaching staff included all of the following:

-- A head coach who would serve two separate 3-game suspensions in the 2023 season, one for NCAA recruiting violations and another for an illegal advanced scouting scandal
-- An offensive coordinator, later promoted to head coach, eventually fired and arrested for actions stemming from a romantic relationship with a subordinate
-- A co-offensive coordinator indicted by the FBI for allegedly obtaining a vast network of private, illicit photos of college-aged women
-- A defensive analyst found to have masterminded a vast and sophisticated advanced scouting operation
-- A position coach fired for his part in the advanced scouting scandal, then later cleared of all wrongdoing by the NCAA who would later sue the university and its leadership for his improper firing

Michigan's president at the time, Santa Ono, and its head coach, Jim Harbaugh, famously got out of town before the posse arrived. Ono left to become the president of the University of Florida, had his hiring rejected by the Florida Board of Governors, and is now the president of a technology company in England; Harbaugh, as we know, is now the head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers. As for AD Warde Manuel, it seems his proverbial posse is gathering outside the city, with the findings of an 8-figure investigation into U-M athletics due later this week and his exit expected not long after. 

But though Ono, Harbaugh, and Manuel are or soon-to-be gone from Michigan, their actions during that, ahem, eventful time are still being litigated.

According to the lawsuit by former linebackers coach Chris Partridge, filed back in March, Michigan officials became aware of Conor Stalions's advanced scouting operation in January 2023 as part of the investigation into then co-offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Matt Weiss. Weiss was fired in January of 2023, but the Stalions scandal did not break until October of that year.

Partridge's suit also alleges Manuel and others were aware of Moore's relationship with his assistant years before it went public.

Partridge's claims are second-hand -- "upon information and belief" -- and separate from the Jenner & Block investigation, whose findings are due later this week. However, Manuel has denied knowledge of the relationship between Moore and the assistant, Paige Shiver, and Shiver herself sued Michigan last week on Freedom of Information Act grounds. 

"I don’t know a place in America that doesn’t have issues,” Manuel said this spring. “I don’t know a household, I don’t know a family, I don’t know a company that doesn’t have issues. What I’m proud of is the way that our people continue to move forward.”

Based on all the accumulated and circumstantial evidence -- and also the fact that Michigan already has a new president and head football coach in place -- it would be the surprise of all surprises if Manuel continued to move forward as Michigan's AD much longer.