(02-14-2014 11:59 AM)Orange County Owl Wrote:  This can make sense IF we are going to invest dollars into upgrading the supporting/tactical coaching staff.

The OC decision was not particularly encouraging.

I'd be willing to chip in on that if we can get something going.

No surprise that I am not a huge fan of this decision. Do not see any P5 team coming after him just yet. Would have waiting one more year and then given the extension - and if it costs us more, then so be it.

(02-14-2014 11:49 AM)talon owl Wrote:  

(02-14-2014 11:11 AM)d1owls4life Wrote:  Dr. K thinks he has the right man for the job

This. This is Karlgaard picking his horse in football. The past extension was under RG, on RG's terms.

I'm OK with it. Might need to update my avatar with some bling and cascading benjamins though.

I just shed a tear due to the beauty of your avatar.

That's better

(02-14-2014 12:10 PM)talon owl Wrote:  That's better

Overall I approve of this extension by our new AD. Bailiff does a number of things well. He is a great representative for Rice and his players graduate. In addition, he seems to consistently recruit well despite the disadvantages with which he must work, and each recruiting class appears to be better than the prior one. At Rice it is critical for he and his staff to be skillful at projecting how a recruit will develop, particularly linemen. They have done a good job of that. Successful recruiting is the cornerstone of any good program, and although it has taken several years to accomplish, Rice currently has a fairly solid team with more depth than I can remember. So while one can always find shortcomings, I agree with the decision and hope more resources are devoted to retaining able assistant coaches and that the new AD can move forward with stadium renovations.

(02-14-2014 11:29 AM)mrbig Wrote:  (3) At Reliant to a UH team that went 8-5 and had the talent to stick with 2 top-15 teams on the road (Louisville and UCF);

I hope those who say that the current CUSA is just as good for Rice as the AAC take a moment to reflect on all of the implications to the above point.

(02-14-2014 11:29 AM)mrbig Wrote:  Rice was in 4 of those 5 games in the 4th quarter. Pretty remarkable turnaround and I hope Bailiff continues to build the program and has the audacity and vision to keep raising the bar for what Rice Football can accomplish.

I would argue 3 of the 5. I don't think Rice had a chance to win either the TAMU game or the MSU game at that stage.

(02-14-2014 11:31 AM)d1owls4life Wrote:  And he is going to need the support of the fans and alumni to push that bar as high as it can go.

More importantly, he needs the support of coordinators and other coaching staff that would show that he has ambitions for greater things than competing in the current CUSA. What I fear from the hires he made is that his ambitions are to prevent the team from backsliding than in either leveraging the Rice job for a P5 job or advancing Rice into the top 10 a la TCU.

(02-14-2014 12:10 PM)talon owl Wrote:  That's better

Talon, you rock!

I think Bailiff has done a helluva job considering crumbling facilities, minimal budget, low assistant pay, weak conference, no academic breaks for athletes, and the strictest recruiting standards of any D1 school in America. Who else would have done a better job ? Who else could you guys entice to come here (at Bailiff's salary level) and be successful given the above hurdles to overcome ?

(02-14-2014 12:58 PM)I45owl Wrote:  

(02-14-2014 11:29 AM)mrbig Wrote:  Rice was in 4 of those 5 games in the 4th quarter. Pretty remarkable turnaround and I hope Bailiff continues to build the program and has the audacity and vision to keep raising the bar for what Rice Football can accomplish.

I would argue 3 of the 5. I don't think Rice had a chance to win either the TAMU game or the MSU game at that stage.

Picking nits, but I didn't say Rice had a chance to win the TAMU game in the 4th quarter, just that Rice was still in the game. Rice was down 38-28 with 14:56 left in the game and TAMU had the ball at their own 7. Nothing in the 2nd half had me believing Rice would win at that point, but if someone just glanced at the score, time remaining, and field position at that moment, they would certainly have said Rice was in the game. Unlike MissSt...

But even if we don't pick nits, Rice has 5 losses in the last 1.5 seasons. 2 of those were to good SEC teams. 3 were close losses to teams that finished above .500. All 5 of those teams went to bowl games. I want a defining victory as much as the next Owl fan, but winning all the games against bad and mediocre opponents and splitting games against decent opponents is a good start to long-term success. Why it took so many years to get there is another debate for 10,000 other Parliament threads!

(02-14-2014 01:15 PM)davidw Wrote:  I think Bailiff has done a helluva job considering crumbling facilities, minimal budget, low assistant pay, weak conference, no academic breaks for athletes, and the strictest recruiting standards of any D1 school in America. Who else would have done a better job ? Who else could you guys entice to come here (at Bailiff's salary level) and be successful given the above hurdles to overcome ?

Probably a large bunch of people. And stop making coming to Rice sound like such a hardship for high school student-athletes.

(02-14-2014 10:53 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I don't think he's going anywhere, so I don't see the need to lock both sides in.

+1

(02-14-2014 10:36 AM)07owl Wrote:  I remain unconvinced that Bailiff is a coach who will ever be able to take Rice to the next level, but I think he is a good man and mentor, and has the ability to consistently compete in Conference USA

+1

Mistake to do this now. Would have given him a bonus for the C-USA championship this year, and waited until after next season played out to see what to do longer term. There was really no strong reason to do this at this point.

Bailiff is not Wayne Graham. Bailiff's coaching issues and staffing issues were dramatically exposed in the Liberty Bowl. The co-OC's and the problems in developing strong, successful QB's are still there.

Plus, his track record is a marked lack of consistency in winning or even maintaining after a winning season.

If he was to leave for some reason due to success? The pool for coaching candidates should be stronger than when we hired him. But there is no perfect answer to these dilemmas right now for where Rice is at. This will be the first major test of Dr. Karlgaard's leadership. Let's hope it works out. The same decisions didn't for CDC or Greenspan.

(02-14-2014 01:18 PM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  

(02-14-2014 01:15 PM)davidw Wrote:  I think Bailiff has done a helluva job considering crumbling facilities, minimal budget, low assistant pay, weak conference, no academic breaks for athletes, and the strictest recruiting standards of any D1 school in America. Who else would have done a better job ? Who else could you guys entice to come here (at Bailiff's salary level) and be successful given the above hurdles to overcome ?

Probably a large bunch of people. And stop making coming to Rice sound like such a hardship for high school student-athletes.

How is he making it sound like a hardship for high school student-athletes?

My opinion..

First, I'm happy for David and his family.

But as a Rice fan, I find this to be a depressing continuation of ill-conceived positions/decisions from the university/AD leaders.

It's perfectly fine to create a fantasy of "program-building" and how great the last 1.5 seasons have been (nicely illustrated by mrbig, and all of the missing caveats from 4 of those 5 losses), but it becomes problematic when you start believing your own bull****.

If anyone in college football believed Bailiff was building a program, he wouldn't be at Rice. That kind of ability is in rather high demand and commands quite the $ premium. They seem able to recognize the last 1.5 seasons have been the fortunate confluence of a senior-laden roster and historically weak competition.

The hope was JK would come in and make us more Stanford-like. Making this type of commitment to such a mediocre coach only seems to perpetuate our slippage into something more Oberlin-like, where he was AD for 5+ years.

I am disappointed in this decision. I expected DB to be rewarded but not to this extent. I really don't think we have improved so much over the last two years as our competition has diminished. When we play a well coached team at our level of talent, we usually get beat. When we play a team with talent greater than ours, we always get beat. I agree also with those who have pointed out that no one has been beating a path to DB's door to hire him - which is the best indication of where he stands in the coaching pantheon. Furthermore, I'm pretty sure that there are up and coming HS coaches as well as Asst. Coaches throughout the land who would jump at a chance to coach at the Div. 1 level.

Of course, I also agree with those who argue that our problems do not start and end with the head coach. Better facilities, fan support and marketing all stand in the way of improved conference affiliation as does our win-loss record. I question, however whether we would ever be willing to do the things necessary to become a perennial top 20 program as to do might be the equivalent of selling our soul to the devil.

With that in mind, I'm not too upset with this extension. I trust that if the team craters in the next few years, Dr. K will have the fortitude to admit a mistake and move on. But I won't root for that because of the players and their families. And if DB succeeds beyond my expectations and helps us get to a higher level, I will eat these words.

(02-14-2014 01:53 PM)At Ease Wrote:  My opinion..

First, I'm happy for David and his family.

But as a Rice fan, I find this to be a depressing continuation of ill-conceived positions/decisions from the university/AD leaders.

It's perfectly fine to create a fantasy of "program-building" and how great the last 1.5 seasons have been (nicely illustrated by mrbig, and all of the missing caveats from 4 of those 5 losses), but it becomes problematic when you start believing your own bull****.

If anyone in college football believed Bailiff was building a program, he wouldn't be at Rice. That kind of ability is in rather high demand and commands quite the $ premium. They seem able to recognize the last 1.5 seasons have been the fortunate confluence of a senior-laden roster and historically weak competition.

The hope was JK would come in and make us more Stanford-like. Making this type of commitment to such a mediocre coach only seems to perpetuate our slippage into something more Oberlin-like, where he was AD for 5+ years.

Nicely said.

(02-14-2014 01:53 PM)At Ease Wrote:  My opinion..

First, I'm happy for David and his family.

But as a Rice fan, I find this to be a depressing continuation of ill-conceived positions/decisions from the university/AD leaders.

It's perfectly fine to create a fantasy of "program-building" and how great the last 1.5 seasons have been (nicely illustrated by mrbig, and all of the missing caveats from 4 of those 5 losses), but it becomes problematic when you start believing your own bull****.

If anyone in college football believed Bailiff was building a program, he wouldn't be at Rice. That kind of ability is in rather high demand and commands quite the $ premium. They seem able to recognize the last 1.5 seasons have been the fortunate confluence of a senior-laden roster and historically weak competition.

The hope was JK would come in and make us more Stanford-like. Making this type of commitment to such a mediocre coach only seems to perpetuate our slippage into something more Oberlin-like, where he was AD for 5+ years.

Couple of questions:

1. What has to happen next year to make your opinion swing positively at all? Or is there nothing that can be done at this point?

2. Do your feelings on this preclude you from supporting other initiatives designed to improve things for the football program?

Just curious.

(02-14-2014 01:16 PM)mrbig Wrote:  

(02-14-2014 12:58 PM)I45owl Wrote:  I would argue 3 of the 5. I don't think Rice had a chance to win either the TAMU game or the MSU game at that stage.

Picking nits, but I didn't say Rice had a chance to win the TAMU game in the 4th quarter, just that Rice was still in the game. Rice was down 38-28 with 14:56 left in the game and TAMU had the ball at their own 7. Nothing in the 2nd half had me believing Rice would win at that point, but if someone just glanced at the score, time remaining, and field position at that moment, they would certainly have said Rice was in the game. Unlike MissSt...

Fair enough. Chalk it up to my laziness, but I didn't recall Rice scoring in the 3rd quarter to close the gap, so I thought it was more like 38-21 at that time.

edit: I looked it up... it was 38-21 to enter the 4th, but Rice scored first in the 4th to make it 38-28.

Wouldn't the lack of an extension (or another 1 or 2 year extension) hurt 2014 recruiting?

If I put myself in Dr. K's shoes, maybe I believe the following

1. The days of 4-8 in CUSA are gone forever. I make the determination based on recruiting and getting the right DC, among other things. I believe that the maturation of the program offsets losing irreplaceables like Boswell and Gaines.

2. DB is a resource for fund raising. His "getting Rice", his irrepressible enthusiasm, and his good-guy-ness, with the certainty that he will be here, will cause wallets to open. Basically Bailiff will help to raise money for his own salary increases and for assistants and facilities. On this front, he can speak credibly to the TCU story and his commitment to make it happen here.

3. EDIT: as documented by MemOwl on the message board, the success rate for non-P5 coaches is quite poor. If I think maximin, I keep Bailiff, because I could certainly do worse.

I don't trust DB on X's and O's and I really hate the OC decision, but I do trust Dr. K