So, obviously it would be ideal to go from John Cooper (not quite good enough) to Jim Tressel to Urban Meyer to Ryan Day. But that's not the way it works for most. Tennessee finally seems to have found a good one in Josh Huepel, but after the end of Fulmer, they went through Lane Kiffin, Derek Dooley, Butch Jones, and Jeremy Pruitt. After the Gene Stallings era, Alabama went through Mike DuBose, Dennis Franchione, and Mike Shula before getting to Saban.

So, the overall philosophical question becomes - when do your toss your head coach, and when do you live with the good, but not nationally excellent record?

On Monday, October 17, 2022 at 12:53:42 PM UTC-4, JGibson wrote:
> So, obviously it would be ideal to go from John Cooper (not quite good enough) to Jim Tressel to Urban Meyer to Ryan Day. But that's not the way it works for most. Tennessee finally seems to have found a good one in Josh Huepel, but after the end of Fulmer, they went through Lane Kiffin, Derek Dooley, Butch Jones, and Jeremy Pruitt. After the Gene Stallings era, Alabama went through Mike DuBose, Dennis Franchione, and Mike Shula before getting to Saban.

Saban, Tressel, Jones and Meyer all had fairly long track records of success as head coaches at the time of hire. That is neither necessary nor sufficient, but it's the way to bet. Mike DuBose, Mike Shula, Lane Kiffin, Jeremy Pruitt, Luke Fickell and Ryan Day had no college head coaching experience--- only Day was successful at first job.

Derek Dooley had limited and mixed success as a HC before failing at Tenn. Dennis Franchione had ok experience and he won the division at Bama before taking the TA&M job where he was not successful. Cooper has decent success before tOSU and was good there, but less successful than his predecessors.

I think experience is especially important at the big programs where the pressure is immediately intense . Local ties are always nice.

> So, the overall philosophical question becomes - when do your toss your head coach, and when do you live with the good, but not nationally excellent record?

The loss at Michigan was a stinker, but it was on the road at a top 5 team.

On Monday, October 17, 2022 at 9:53:42 AM UTC-7, JGibson wrote:
> So, the overall philosophical question becomes - when do your toss your head coach, and when do you live with the good, but not nationally excellent record?

What program are we talking about here?

That's pretty much the question. 9-3 might be acceptable (or even laudable) for many schools, but 9-3 will get you FIRED completely from a few schools and some furrowed brows at a few more.

Mike

On Tuesday, October 18, 2022 at 2:59:35 AM UTC-4, Michael Falkner wrote:
> On Monday, October 17, 2022 at 9:53:42 AM UTC-7, JGibson wrote:
>
> > So, the overall philosophical question becomes - when do your toss your head coach, and when do you live with the good, but not nationally excellent record?
> What program are we talking about here?
>
> That's pretty much the question. 9-3 might be acceptable (or even laudable) for many schools, but 9-3 will get you FIRED completely from a few schools and some furrowed brows at a few more.
>

Well, I was particularly thinking of Penn State and James Franklin when I wrote that, but it also was in my head due to the earlier thread about Paul Chryst and Wisconsin. Of course, the ideal would be to be Alabama or Ohio State every year, but most programs aren't that. My thoughts were particularly inspired by all the "fire Franklin" posts on Facebook. But my biggest worry there is turning into Nebraska.

On Tuesday, October 18, 2022 at 6:58:27 AM UTC-7, JGibson wrote:

> Well, I was particularly thinking of Penn State and James Franklin when I wrote that, but it also was in my head due to the earlier thread about Paul Chryst and Wisconsin. Of course, the ideal would be to be Alabama or Ohio State every year, but most programs aren't that. My thoughts were particularly inspired by all the "fire Franklin" posts on Facebook. But my biggest worry there is turning into Nebraska.

That's the thing - ESPECIALLY the cultists at Penn State...

Mike

On Tuesday, October 18, 2022 at 10:27:20 AM UTC-4, Michael Falkner wrote:
> On Tuesday, October 18, 2022 at 6:58:27 AM UTC-7, JGibson wrote:
>
> > Well, I was particularly thinking of Penn State and James Franklin when I wrote that, but it also was in my head due to the earlier thread about Paul Chryst and Wisconsin. Of course, the ideal would be to be Alabama or Ohio State every year, but most programs aren't that. My thoughts were particularly inspired by all the "fire Franklin" posts on Facebook. But my biggest worry there is turning into Nebraska.
> That's the thing - ESPECIALLY the cultists at Penn State...
>

Well, yes, there are certainly Paterno cultists that remember a time that didn't actually exist ... where Penn State was competing for national titles every year. In reality, they had a very weak schedule in the '60s and '70s that helped with the record those seasons, and the rankings reflected that. Played a harder schedule in the '80s by adding Notre Dame and Alabama .... and the result was national titles in '82 and '86 but a lot of mediocre or worse years in between. People seem to forget the '84 6-5 season and the '88 5-6 season. Or the final independent season where they were 7-5 and lost to Stanford 24-3 in the Blockbuster Bowl. The start of the Big Ten was actually more consistent for them, but outside of '94, they were clearly third fiddle. But also, the distance between them and Ohio State didn't seem as far because Ohio State under Cooper wasn't in contention for the BCS title game every year.

On 10/17/2022 12:53 PM, JGibson wrote:
> So, obviously it would be ideal to go from John Cooper (not quite good enough) to Jim Tressel to Urban Meyer to Ryan Day. But that's not the way it works for most. Tennessee finally seems to have found a good one in Josh Huepel, but after the end of Fulmer, they went through Lane Kiffin, Derek Dooley, Butch Jones, and Jeremy Pruitt. After the Gene Stallings era, Alabama went through Mike DuBose, Dennis Franchione, and Mike Shula before getting to Saban.
>
> So, the overall philosophical question becomes - when do your toss your head coach, and when do you live with the good, but not nationally excellent record?

Pretty much depends on the the history of football prowess at each
school, especially in the last 40-50 years. For some schools, winning
75% of their games is not good enough. Or losing too often to a hated rival.

OSU has had a pretty good run since even before Woody Hayes. Its only
real hiccup was under Fickel. UM has been pretty similar with the
exceptions of RichRod and Hoke.

As you point out, Bama was looking for a coach with some type of tie to
the Bear. When that proved fruitless they went after Saban. The rest is
history.

Tennessee was a cluster fuck as soon as they forced Fulmer to retire.
They could have had Brian Kelly but the staff under the AD wanted
Kiffin. I fully expected Kiffin to bolt back to the west coast as soon
as he was offered a job and that's just what he did. Tennessee was
caught with its pants down and went begging for a coach. They finally
hired Derek Dooley (who would have been a great OC).

Georgia has finally hit the jackpot with Smart. But they also had some
decent coaches after Vince Dooley, notably Mark Richt and Jim Donnan.
Richt even had a better overall winning percentage than the venerable
Vince Dooley. But he was in the same conference as Fulmer, Saban,
Spurrier, Meyer, Chizik, and Tuberville.

The Paul Chryst firing looks a little outrageous on the surface, given
his W-L record. Apparently the Badger insiders saw the program was
being poorly administered and took preemptive action to make a course
correction.

How head coaches et selected is always interesting. Some look like hot
prospects that everyone wants, like Gary Patterson of TCU. He was pretty
good while TCU was playing in the WAC or Mountain West, but faded when
they moved to the Big 12. TCU ended up firing him.

It could also be that some coaching candidates are excellent salesmen.
Maybe that is how you explain the hiring of Sarkisian, RichRod, Hoke,
Chizik, Taggert, Strong, Bob Davie, Miles at Kansas (although I thought
he would do well), Muschamp at US Carolina, Charlie Weis at KU, etc. It
seems the hiring schools just ignored past records.

--
"In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In
practice, there is." Ruben Goldberg

On Wednesday, October 19, 2022 at 12:58:10 AM UTC-4, RoddyMcCorley wrote:
> On 10/17/2022 12:53 PM, JGibson wrote:
> > So, obviously it would be ideal to go from John Cooper (not quite good enough) to Jim Tressel to Urban Meyer to Ryan Day. But that's not the way it works for most. Tennessee finally seems to have found a good one in Josh Huepel, but after the end of Fulmer, they went through Lane Kiffin, Derek Dooley, Butch Jones, and Jeremy Pruitt. After the Gene Stallings era, Alabama went through Mike DuBose, Dennis Franchione, and Mike Shula before getting to Saban.
> >
> > So, the overall philosophical question becomes - when do your toss your head coach, and when do you live with the good, but not nationally excellent record?
> Pretty much depends on the the history of football prowess at each
> school, especially in the last 40-50 years. For some schools, winning
> 75% of their games is not good enough. Or losing too often to a hated rival.
>
> OSU has had a pretty good run since even before Woody Hayes. Its only
> real hiccup was under Fickel. UM has been pretty similar with the
> exceptions of RichRod and Hoke.
>

Fickel was a 1-year interim coach so I don't even really count that. Tressel himself had a similar year in '99, surrounded by better years. A one-off poor year is going to happen occasionally. Ohio State also really struggled at the end of the Earle Bruce and beginning of the John Cooper eras, but overall, both of those coaches were successful. But Bruce's consistent 9-3 years might be what I'm thinking of, and it did get him fired after year #9, which was actually only 6-4-1.

On Wednesday, October 19, 2022 at 11:49:42 AM UTC-4, JGibson wrote:
> On Wednesday, October 19, 2022 at 12:58:10 AM UTC-4, RoddyMcCorley wrote:
> > On 10/17/2022 12:53 PM, JGibson wrote:
> > > So, obviously it would be ideal to go from John Cooper (not quite good enough) to Jim Tressel to Urban Meyer to Ryan Day. But that's not the way it works for most. Tennessee finally seems to have found a good one in Josh Huepel, but after the end of Fulmer, they went through Lane Kiffin, Derek Dooley, Butch Jones, and Jeremy Pruitt. After the Gene Stallings era, Alabama went through Mike DuBose, Dennis Franchione, and Mike Shula before getting to Saban.
> > >
> > > So, the overall philosophical question becomes - when do your toss your head coach, and when do you live with the good, but not nationally excellent record?
> > Pretty much depends on the the history of football prowess at each
> > school, especially in the last 40-50 years. For some schools, winning
> > 75% of their games is not good enough. Or losing too often to a hated rival.
> >
> > OSU has had a pretty good run since even before Woody Hayes. Its only
> > real hiccup was under Fickel. UM has been pretty similar with the
> > exceptions of RichRod and Hoke.
> >
> Fickel was a 1-year interim coach so I don't even really count that. Tressel himself had a similar year in '99, surrounded by better years. A one-off poor year is going to happen occasionally. Ohio State also really struggled at the end of the Earle Bruce and beginning of the John Cooper eras, but overall, both of those coaches were successful. But Bruce's consistent 9-3 years might be what I'm thinking of, and it did get him fired after year #9, which was actually only 6-4-1.

Sorry, that was Cooper that had the bad year in '99 and a mediocre followup in '00. Tressel only started with a 7-5 record in '01.

On Wednesday, October 19, 2022 at 11:49:42 AM UTC-4, JGibson wrote:
> On Wednesday, October 19, 2022 at 12:58:10 AM UTC-4, RoddyMcCorley wrote:
> > On 10/17/2022 12:53 PM, JGibson wrote:
> > > So, obviously it would be ideal to go from John Cooper (not quite good enough) to Jim Tressel to Urban Meyer to Ryan Day. But that's not the way it works for most. Tennessee finally seems to have found a good one in Josh Huepel, but after the end of Fulmer, they went through Lane Kiffin, Derek Dooley, Butch Jones, and Jeremy Pruitt. After the Gene Stallings era, Alabama went through Mike DuBose, Dennis Franchione, and Mike Shula before getting to Saban.
> > >
> > > So, the overall philosophical question becomes - when do your toss your head coach, and when do you live with the good, but not nationally excellent record?
> > Pretty much depends on the the history of football prowess at each
> > school, especially in the last 40-50 years. For some schools, winning
> > 75% of their games is not good enough. Or losing too often to a hated rival.

PSU will probably win at least 75% of their games this year. Granted wins against tOSU have been few, but without looking it up, I think they have been doing well against Michigan. Some of it has to be: do you have a Tressel in mind? Cause things are pretty good program wise: overall wins, recruiting, fans, and scandal are in good places.

There is a parallel argument in the PSU QB room: do you keep 6th year senior Clifford who has been reliably ok, or switch to the wonderkid who has looked great so far.