In discussions of DB's record at Rice, Rick Gerlach and I have fallen into a pattern where I analyze his full tenure at Rice and Rick dates everything to after Memphis-2012, since which time his record is 28-14 with a conference championship and 2 bowl wins in 3 trips. If the light is just right, some can look at this stretch as the Golden Era of Rice Football.

The record is what it is, and let's stipulate for grins that DB did in fact go through some favorable transformation in ability, approach, etc. on or about October 7, 2012. If you are willing to believe that (*), then I think you also have to question if some equally unfavorable shift (or reversion to the mean?) occurred after the Marshall game in 2013.

Since posting what is clearly the best win of his tenure at Rice, DB's record is 12-10, but it may well be the worst 12-10 in the history of college football.

The 12-10 segments as follows

0-5 vs. P5 teams with an average margin of defeat of 32 points
2-5 vs. bowl eligible G5 teams with average margin of defeat of 28 points
9-0 vs. non bowl eligible G5 teams with average margin of victory of 13 points
1-0 vs. FCS

Again, I'm not necessarily endorsing the Gerlach inflection hypothesis, but if we do act as if Bailiff is 28-14, we might begin to believe that he was 16-4 but has more recently been 12-10.

I can point to three things that happened after Marshall

1. He got a contract extension and might plausibly believe that a conference championship equates to de facto tenure, subject to excellence in graduation rates and compliance
2. He promoted an OC from within the staff who had no demonstrated capability for the position
3. Phillip Gaines, probably the best player Rice has produced in the last 30 years, exhausted his eligibility.

There is nothing to do about #3, but 1 and 2 are fixable.

More recently Rick has articulated the Halley's Comet theory that Rice will be good every 5 years (2008, 2013, ...) as performance peaks drive recruiting peaks. On the pace we are on since Marshall, it will be a really fun 2016 and 2017 waiting for 2018.

(*) As part of acceptance of the Gerlach Inflection Hypothesis, one agrees never again to mention the south Louisiana teachers college with a name that sounds like a 5 cent coin.

EDIT--for completeness I will note that DB's record UTAIM (up to and including Memphis-2012) was 24-43 with one winning season and one bowl appearance in his 5 full seasons

(10-31-2015 09:04 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  ...
0-5 vs. P5 teams with an average margin of defeat of 32 points
2-5 vs. bowl eligible P5 teams with average margin of defeat of 28 points
9-0 vs. non bowl eligible P5 teams with average margin of victory of 13 points
1-0 vs. FCS

...

Should some of those 'P5' references be 'G5' or 'non-P5'?

yes. fixed. thanks.

I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that being good "every five years" isn't part of JK's grand plan.

the sharp segmentation of the 12-10 recent stretch by quality of opponent suggests that we can just barely continue to schedule our way to bowl eligibility.

It requires that we play no more than two P5 in a season and that the quality level of CUSA stay flat or weaken.

If one's definition of success begins and ends with bowl eligibility, we can safely project continued success, though scheduling help may be needed at times (e.g., out with TAMU/Baylor, in with Eastern Michigan)

(10-31-2015 09:04 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  In discussions of DB's record at Rice, Rick Gerlach and I have fallen into a pattern where I analyze his full tenure at Rice and Rick dates everything to after Memphis-2012, since which time his record is 28-14 with a conference championship and 2 bowl wins in 3 trips. If the light is just right, some can look at this stretch as the Golden Era of Rice Football.

The record is what it is, and let's stipulate for grins that DB did in fact go through some favorable transformation in ability, approach, etc. on or about October 7, 2012. If you are willing to believe that (*), then I think you also have to question if some equally unfavorable shift (or reversion to the mean?) occurred after the Marshall game in 2013.

Since posting what is clearly the best win of his tenure at Rice, DB's record is 12-10, but it may well be the worst 12-10 in the history of college football.

The 12-10 segments as follows

0-5 vs. P5 teams with an average margin of defeat of 32 points
2-5 vs. bowl eligible G5 teams with average margin of defeat of 28 points
9-0 vs. non bowl eligible G5 teams with average margin of victory of 13 points
1-0 vs. FCS

Again, I'm not necessarily endorsing the Gerlach inflection hypothesis, but if we do act as if Bailiff is 28-14, we might begin to believe that he was 16-4 but has more recently been 12-10.

I can point to three things that happened after Marshall

1. He got a contract extension and might plausibly believe that a conference championship equates to de facto tenure, subject to excellence in graduation rates and compliance
2. He promoted an OC from within the staff who had no demonstrated capability for the position
3. Phillip Gaines, probably the best player Rice has produced in the last 30 years, exhausted his eligibility.

There is nothing to do about #3, but 1 and 2 are fixable.

More recently Rick has articulated the Halley's Comet theory that Rice will be good every 5 years (2008, 2013, ...) as performance peaks drive recruiting peaks. On the pace we are on since Marshall, it will be a really fun 2016 and 2017 waiting for 2018.

(*) As part of acceptance of the Gerlach Inflection Hypothesis, one agrees never again to mention the south Louisiana teachers college with a name that sounds like a 5 cent coin

I think the key question is where do we want to be. If we want to be right where we are, DB is exceptionally good at keeping us there. I would argue that right where we are is not a good place. First, it is no fun. Second, as many posters have cogently noted, right where we are is with a group of schools which may be hurting our national reputation in other areas (and if we stay where we are, we will not escape them)(for instance, when I was in HS, schools like Northwestern, Duke and Vanderbilt were clearly considered to be inferior schools to Rice academically. Now they are largely considered equal or superior. Note that each one is in a P5 conference) , and third, with the changes happening in the national football scene, where the rich will get richer and the poorer get poorer, not being among the "rich" puts on in an extremely vulnerable position. And CUSA is not among the rich.

If you accept that repositioning our football program is necessary to get to where we want to go, you have to consider who is the best guy to get us there. I do not believe DB is that person. Regardless of how many meaningless bowls we go to, we have to be able to hold our own against real teams, not glorified community colleges.

We are talking about the future of Rice. Not DB's feelings. He may be a great guy but ....... He has had a good ride.

The thing is, I think most people on the board agree on where we need to go and why. I guess some believe that DB has the ability to get us there. But regardless of the number of wins and bowls, you need to be competitive against P5 and top 50 teams, and as ably demonstrated above and by Walt and other posters, we have not been over these last 9 years, and there does not seem to be any reason to believe we will get there if we keep Bailiff.

(10-31-2015 09:14 AM)Orange County Owl Wrote:  I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that being good "every five years" isn't part of JK's grand plan.

At some point, DB's resume is JK's resume. Might have already happened since JK was responsible for the last contract extension.

(10-31-2015 10:56 AM)ESE84 Wrote:  

(10-31-2015 09:14 AM)Orange County Owl Wrote:  I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that being good "every five years" isn't part of JK's grand plan.

At some point, DB's resume is JK's resume. Might have already happened since JK was responsible for the last contract extension.

Hey ESE84, you mentioned in the CUSA main forum that you were going to wear a Fire Bailiff Now sign if the Owls were blown out or came out flat against LaTech at the Southern Miss game....just joking around or should I look for you on TV? Ha!

As far as I can tell, no one on this board has any clue how much the buy-out is in Bailiff's contract. Everyone seems to assume that it is 100% of his salary for the remaining three years. I have no idea what the buy out is, but there is no reason why JK could not have negotiated a lower buy-out as part of the contract extension. Its not like folks were knocking down the door to hire Bailiff away at that time. My completely uninformed guess is that JK was smarter than that.

Even if the buy-out is 100% of salary, that is less than $1 million/yr for three years. Less than 5% of the current annual subsidy provided by the University. The real question is how can Rice afford to keep Bailiff for another year?

(10-31-2015 03:53 PM)WIowl Wrote:  

(10-31-2015 10:56 AM)ESE84 Wrote:  

(10-31-2015 09:14 AM)Orange County Owl Wrote:  I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that being good "every five years" isn't part of JK's grand plan.

At some point, DB's resume is JK's resume. Might have already happened since JK was responsible for the last contract extension.

Hey ESE84, you mentioned in the CUSA main forum that you were going to wear a Fire Bailiff Now sign if the Owls were blown out or came out flat against LaTech at the Southern Miss game....just joking around or should I look for you on TV? Ha!

I'll probably have one. Or something to make it abundantly clear that there are those who aren't impressed with smoke and mirror wins against the bottom half of CUSA

(10-31-2015 04:41 PM)temchugh Wrote:  As far as I can tell, no one on this board has any clue how much the buy-out is in Bailiff's contract. Everyone seems to assume that it is 100% of his salary for the remaining three years. I have no idea what the buy out is, but there is no reason why JK could not have negotiated a lower buy-out as part of the contract extension. Its not like folks were knocking down the door to hire Bailiff away at that time. My completely uninformed guess is that JK was smarter than that.

Even if the buy-out is 100% of salary, that is less than $1 million/yr for three years. Less than 5% of the current annual subsidy provided by the University. The real question is how can Rice afford to keep Bailiff for another year?

Interesting point. Yes, I assumed it would be three years of full salary, but you have excellent points about a reduced buyout.

My understanding of a buy out is the amount another school would pay Rice to hire DB out of his existing contract. If we fire DB we would have to pay the entire contract amount rather than a buy out amount if I understand it correctly. Need a little legal help here Owl69.

The buy out (I.e., the cost to Rice of not keeping Bailiff for another three years) is whatever $$ the contract specifies. I'm sure that is covered in the contract. And I'm pretty sure that no one posting on this board knows what that $ amount is.

(10-31-2015 08:53 PM)ricex Wrote:  My understanding of a buy out is the amount another school would pay Rice to hire DB out of his existing contract. If we fire DB we would have to pay the entire contract amount rather than a buy out amount if I understand it correctly. Need a little legal help here Owl69.

I don't know what's in the contract, but I have a pretty good idea how these things are usually done. It's usually some multiple of one year's salary, and it usually declines as the contract approaches full term. Maybe something like a half year's salary for every year remaining on the contract. The amount that the university has to pay to buy out the coach may or may not be the same as the amount that the coach has to pay to break the contract. In an actual situations, an amount is typically negotiated that tends to be less than the contractual amount. Both sides typically have other considerations which can be offered in exchange for a reduced buyout. I am familiar with a couple of situations involving former Rice coaches, and in both cases the buyout was negotiated down from the contract amount. We both know someone who knows what's in Bailiff's contract, but I haven't asked him and don't plan to do so. The exact terms are really none of my business.

(10-31-2015 08:58 PM)temchugh Wrote:  The buy out (I.e., the cost to Rice of not keeping Bailiff for another three years) is whatever $$ the contract specifies. I'm sure that is covered in the contract. And I'm pretty sure that no one posting on this board knows what that $ amount is.

It is absolutely covered in the contract. As I say, I don't know the number, but I do know what is typical in these deals. The proposal I previously outlined would provide for a substantially lower buyout than the norm. That would be my intent, I would want to make it easier to fire a coach and easier for a coach to move on. My experience in the real world is that contractual limits that keep someone where there is not a good fit never work very well.

In the contract proposal I outlined, suppose we finish 7-5 and go to a bowl this year, nobody hires Bailiff, and next year we win CUSA again. That's hardly certain, but well within an optimistic range of expectations. Bailiff would almost certainly get hired away then, and a relatively cheap buyout could be a factor. But we'd be in a far better place to hire a replacement than we've been to hire a replacement for anyone since Neely (or maybe Fred, maybe). At that point, we'd have been to 5 bowls in a row, including 2 conference championships at that point, the EZF would be in place, and we'd have a cheap buyout provision. That would make us look like a great opportunity to some up-and-comer seeking to be that year's Tom Herman. And I would expect that Dr. K would be able to find and hire him.

So the current buy out is most likely affordable.

If JK has concluded that Bailiff is very unlikely to take Rice to another conference championship, there is no good reason not to make the change at the end of this season.

Just to clarify, for those who still think Bailiff might be the right coach, the proposed contract with a low buy out might make sense (as long as the public does not know the terms, because that would undermine recruiting).

However, for folks who have concluded that Bailiff is definitely not the guy, there is no way that the cost difference between a buy out this year and a buy out next year could justify the cost of keeping Bailiff for another year.

(10-31-2015 10:04 PM)temchugh Wrote:  So the current buy out is most likely affordable.
If JK has concluded that Bailiff is very unlikely to take Rice to another conference championship, there is no good reason not to make the change at the end of this season.

I'd say it's most likely painful, but if we determined that we absolutely had to make a change, it could be done. I really don't think a change is so urgent, or so certain to yield significant improvement, as to justify spending that much money.

Watching Bailiff's teams absolutely drives me up the wall. I simply can't stand to watch them. When I go to a game, I usually get so frustrated that I leave early. I was planning to go last night, then decided no, I really don't want to make the trip just to get frustrated. In retrospect, my blood pressure and I are glad I passed on it.

But I am still not sure the right answer is firing him. I'd like to know just what the hell he is trying to do before making that decision. As I've said a couple of times, the only plan I can see is recruit better and hope to God that works. I don't think that will get it done, but then again I didn't think it would get us this far.

I think that we are pretty close to the same place. Except, I see more downside in keeping Bailiff. I see the perception of low standards. I see a loss of any momentum that we gain from opening of the EZF.

Know one knows for sure what will happen next year or after that. Getting Rice into the top 25 is not easy. But I think that a JK selected coach has a better chance than Bailiff.

(10-31-2015 10:43 PM)temchugh Wrote:  I think that we are pretty close to the same place. Except, I see more downside in keeping Bailiff. I see the perception of low standards. I see a loss of any momentum that we gain from opening of the EZF.

Know one knows for sure what will happen next year or after that. Getting Rice into the top 25 is not easy. But I think that a JK selected coach has a better chance than Bailiff.

Well stated.

(10-31-2015 10:43 PM)temchugh Wrote:  I think that we are pretty close to the same place. Except, I see more downside in keeping Bailiff. I see the perception of low standards. I see a loss of any momentum that we gain from opening of the EZF.
Know one knows for sure what will happen next year or after that. Getting Rice into the top 25 is not easy. But I think that a JK selected coach has a better chance than Bailiff.

What I keep hoping is that Bailiff will finally address the same issues that have been present since Nicholls State. The longer he goes without addressing them, the more frustrated I become. I've really reached the point that I can't stand to go to games and watch the same sloppy, ill-prepared effort week in and week out. It literally makes me ill. So I probably won't make any more games this year. And given my history and involvement with the program, that's probably an amazing commentary. I don't think I've posted this before tonight. But I'm actually glad that I have now. I'll be interested in any reaction from people who know me.