(12-08-2017 09:30 PM)westsidewolf1989 Wrote:  At the very least, this isn’t Arizona State, where their Stanford-grad AD decided to hire his former client/friend/walking caricature who hasn’t coached in the NFL in a decade and hasn’t coached in college in over 25 years.

But that could be taken as a measure of how much they hated Todd Graham.

It's not impossible to believe that Coach B will leave after 1 year. if he delivers 8-5 up from 1-11, the offers will come in.

We need to be prepared for it and not react like last time and hire a guy whom we knew would be so happy to be here that he'd never leave.

Let's recap Arkansas St for comparison. Rice is a better job, probably, but here is what it was

2010. 4-8 with Steve Roberts. they fire him after 9 years, 45-63, 1 conference title and 1 bowl game

2011. promote OC Hugh Freeze. 10-3. undefeated in conference. goes to Ole Miss

2012. hire Gus Mahlzan out of Auburn OC. goes 9-3 with conference championship. goes to Auburn

2013. hire Bryan Harsin from Texas OC. goes 8-5 with conference co-championship. gets hired by Boise

2014. hired Blake Anderson from UNC OC. has stayed 4 years and gone 31-19. worst conference finish is 4th place. has won conference twice in 4 years.

(12-09-2017 12:07 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  It's not impossible to believe that Coach B will leave after 1 year. if he delivers 8-5 up from 1-11, the offers will come in.

We need to be prepared for it and not react like last time and hire a guy whom we knew would be so happy to be here that he'd never leave.

Let's recap Arkansas St for comparison. Rice is a better job, probably, but here is what it was

2010. 4-8 with Steve Roberts. they fire him after 9 years, 45-63, 1 conference title and 1 bowl game

2011. promote OC Hugh Freeze. 10-3. undefeated in conference. goes to Ole Miss

2012. hire Gus Mahlzan out of Auburn OC. goes 9-3 with conference championship. goes to Auburn

2013. hire Bryan Harsin from Texas OC. goes 8-5 with conference co-championship. gets hired by Boise

2014. hired Blake Anderson from UNC OC. has stayed 4 years and gone 31-19. worst conference finish is 4th place. has won conference twice in 4 years.

This is a good point. There are a lot of arguments that Bloomgren is unlikely to do this based on how long he stayed at Stanford and the things he has said publicly. If he isn't being ... entirely forthcoming about wanting to coach smart kids, then all bets are off. But assuming he is being 100% honest in saying that he really only wants to work at one of the elite academic schools that also plays FBS football...
Northwestern - I can't see Northwestern opening anytime soon. Fitzgerald is a Northwestern alum and Northwestern has been very good (overall) with him there. No recent downturns in their performance.

Stanford - Hard to imagine Shaw leaving Stanford for another NCAA job. He is successful, well-paid, and a Stanford alum. He has coached in the NFL, so perhaps he could move on if he wants that kind of challenge again. Each of the last 2 seasons, there have been rumors that he is highly coveted by NFL teams. But he has been content at Stanford.

Duke - Cutcliffe at Duke has been less consistent than Fitzgerald and Shaw. He's been there 10 years, but his last two years are 4-8, 6-6. So maybe that spot could open, particularly if he has a bad 2018.

Vandy - Derek Mason has been at Vandy for 4 years and they have never finished over .500 (best finish was 6-7 in 2015 with a bowl loss). Tough place to succeed in the SEC, but certainly a higher profile than Rice.

So if Vandy or Duke has a bad year, or Shaw decides to jump to the NFL, it isn't hard to imagine Bloomgren being on the list for each of these programs if he engineers a quick Rice turnaround. I'm not sure what "preparing for it" entails. The guys he is hiring so far are very young (like he is), but don't necessarily have the track record to step into an FBS job after just 1 season at Rice. So in this scenario, perhaps JK would just open things up again and trust himself to make a good hire.

As an aside, there seems to be some common thread about what type of coach can succeed at an elite academic school and stays with that program for a long time. I can't quite put my finger on it...

You could argue that Mack actually has a better resume than Jay Hopson had when he was hired at USM (from Alcorn, similar place to NCCU).

Hopson has been decent at USM.

(12-09-2017 12:07 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  It's not impossible to believe that Coach B will leave after 1 year. if he delivers 8-5 up from 1-11, the offers will come in.

We need to be prepared for it and not react like last time and hire a guy whom we knew would be so happy to be here that he'd never leave.

Let's recap Arkansas St for comparison. Rice is a better job, probably, but here is what it was

2010. 4-8 with Steve Roberts. they fire him after 9 years, 45-63, 1 conference title and 1 bowl game

2011. promote OC Hugh Freeze. 10-3. undefeated in conference. goes to Ole Miss

2012. hire Gus Mahlzan out of Auburn OC. goes 9-3 with conference championship. goes to Auburn

2013. hire Bryan Harsin from Texas OC. goes 8-5 with conference co-championship. gets hired by Boise

2014. hired Blake Anderson from UNC OC. has stayed 4 years and gone 31-19. worst conference finish is 4th place. has won conference twice in 4 years.

Meh. Plateaued.
Avg annual wins per coach:
10,9,8,7.75

Big sigh of relief looks like Lynch is gone. Changed his twitter handle removing “rice” and took down the rice football banner on top.

(12-09-2017 12:44 AM)mrbig Wrote:  

(12-09-2017 12:07 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  It's not impossible to believe that Coach B will leave after 1 year. if he delivers 8-5 up from 1-11, the offers will come in.

We need to be prepared for it and not react like last time and hire a guy whom we knew would be so happy to be here that he'd never leave.

Let's recap Arkansas St for comparison. Rice is a better job, probably, but here is what it was

2010. 4-8 with Steve Roberts. they fire him after 9 years, 45-63, 1 conference title and 1 bowl game

2011. promote OC Hugh Freeze. 10-3. undefeated in conference. goes to Ole Miss

2012. hire Gus Mahlzan out of Auburn OC. goes 9-3 with conference championship. goes to Auburn

2013. hire Bryan Harsin from Texas OC. goes 8-5 with conference co-championship. gets hired by Boise

2014. hired Blake Anderson from UNC OC. has stayed 4 years and gone 31-19. worst conference finish is 4th place. has won conference twice in 4 years.

This is a good point. There are a lot of arguments that Bloomgren is unlikely to do this based on how long he stayed at Stanford and the things he has said publicly. If he isn't being ... entirely forthcoming about wanting to coach smart kids, then all bets are off. But assuming he is being 100% honest in saying that he really only wants to work at one of the elite academic schools that also plays FBS football...
Northwestern - I can't see Northwestern opening anytime soon. Fitzgerald is a Northwestern alum and Northwestern has been very good (overall) with him there. No recent downturns in their performance.

Stanford - Hard to imagine Shaw leaving Stanford for another NCAA job. He is successful, well-paid, and a Stanford alum. He has coached in the NFL, so perhaps he could move on if he wants that kind of challenge again. Each of the last 2 seasons, there have been rumors that he is highly coveted by NFL teams. But he has been content at Stanford.

Duke - Cutcliffe at Duke has been less consistent than Fitzgerald and Shaw. He's been there 10 years, but his last two years are 4-8, 6-6. So maybe that spot could open, particularly if he has a bad 2018.

Vandy - Derek Mason has been at Vandy for 4 years and they have never finished over .500 (best finish was 6-7 in 2015 with a bowl loss). Tough place to succeed in the SEC, but certainly a higher profile than Rice.

So if Vandy or Duke has a bad year, or Shaw decides to jump to the NFL, it isn't hard to imagine Bloomgren being on the list for each of these programs if he engineers a quick Rice turnaround. I'm not sure what "preparing for it" entails. The guys he is hiring so far are very young (like he is), but don't necessarily have the track record to step into an FBS job after just 1 season at Rice. So in this scenario, perhaps JK would just open things up again and trust himself to make a good hire.

As an aside, there seems to be some common thread about what type of coach can succeed at an elite academic school and stays with that program for a long time. I can't quite put my finger on it...

good analysis, but I'm going to rebut just a little:

1. I think you have defined the academic peer group too narrowly. Other jobs that could be on this list are service academies, Notre Dame, and possibly Michigan. Not hard to imagine more than one of those jobs being open this time next year

2. The point of the Arkansas State story is they did NOT promote from within.
so what I'm hoping is that JK has a piece of paper titled "Guys I might have hired if Mike B hadn't accepted" and that he stays close to their agents.

I'd rather he be cynical and positively surprised than romantic, jilted, and unprepared

Since the golf course is closed for frost, I'm going to research how much staff continuity there was at Arky State

(12-09-2017 08:51 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  

(12-09-2017 12:44 AM)mrbig Wrote:  

(12-09-2017 12:07 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  It's not impossible to believe that Coach B will leave after 1 year. if he delivers 8-5 up from 1-11, the offers will come in.

We need to be prepared for it and not react like last time and hire a guy whom we knew would be so happy to be here that he'd never leave.

Let's recap Arkansas St for comparison. Rice is a better job, probably, but here is what it was

2010. 4-8 with Steve Roberts. they fire him after 9 years, 45-63, 1 conference title and 1 bowl game

2011. promote OC Hugh Freeze. 10-3. undefeated in conference. goes to Ole Miss

2012. hire Gus Mahlzan out of Auburn OC. goes 9-3 with conference championship. goes to Auburn

2013. hire Bryan Harsin from Texas OC. goes 8-5 with conference co-championship. gets hired by Boise

2014. hired Blake Anderson from UNC OC. has stayed 4 years and gone 31-19. worst conference finish is 4th place. has won conference twice in 4 years.

This is a good point. There are a lot of arguments that Bloomgren is unlikely to do this based on how long he stayed at Stanford and the things he has said publicly. If he isn't being ... entirely forthcoming about wanting to coach smart kids, then all bets are off. But assuming he is being 100% honest in saying that he really only wants to work at one of the elite academic schools that also plays FBS football...
Northwestern - I can't see Northwestern opening anytime soon. Fitzgerald is a Northwestern alum and Northwestern has been very good (overall) with him there. No recent downturns in their performance.

Stanford - Hard to imagine Shaw leaving Stanford for another NCAA job. He is successful, well-paid, and a Stanford alum. He has coached in the NFL, so perhaps he could move on if he wants that kind of challenge again. Each of the last 2 seasons, there have been rumors that he is highly coveted by NFL teams. But he has been content at Stanford.

Duke - Cutcliffe at Duke has been less consistent than Fitzgerald and Shaw. He's been there 10 years, but his last two years are 4-8, 6-6. So maybe that spot could open, particularly if he has a bad 2018.

Vandy - Derek Mason has been at Vandy for 4 years and they have never finished over .500 (best finish was 6-7 in 2015 with a bowl loss). Tough place to succeed in the SEC, but certainly a higher profile than Rice.

So if Vandy or Duke has a bad year, or Shaw decides to jump to the NFL, it isn't hard to imagine Bloomgren being on the list for each of these programs if he engineers a quick Rice turnaround. I'm not sure what "preparing for it" entails. The guys he is hiring so far are very young (like he is), but don't necessarily have the track record to step into an FBS job after just 1 season at Rice. So in this scenario, perhaps JK would just open things up again and trust himself to make a good hire.

As an aside, there seems to be some common thread about what type of coach can succeed at an elite academic school and stays with that program for a long time. I can't quite put my finger on it...

good analysis, but I'm going to rebut just a little:

1. I think you have defined the academic peer group too narrowly. Other jobs that could be on this list are service academies, Notre Dame, and possibly Michigan. Not hard to imagine more than one of those jobs being open this time next year

2. The point of the Arkansas State story is they did NOT promote from within.
so what I'm hoping is that JK has a piece of paper titled "Guys I might have hired if Mike B hadn't accepted" and that he stays close to their agents.

I'd rather he be cynical and positively surprised than romantic, jilted, and unprepared

Since the golf course is closed for frost, I'm going to research how much staff continuity there was at Arky State

WTF are we comparing ourselves to the Arkansas State situation? I don't see a single similarity, especially for a coach raising a young family. And why do you think it's "likely" that the Army, Navy, Notre Dame or Michigan job will open up after next season?

in 2011, with Freeze an internal promote (after only 1 year on staff, which might signal he was promised it was coming), he kept 4 assts. from Roberts' staff

in 2012 when Gus took over for Hugh, he was able to keep 4 assts. from Freeze

in 2013 when Harsin took over for Gus, he only kept 2 of Gus's assistants

in 2014 when Anderson took over for Harsin, the entire staff changed out

4 seasons, 4 head coaches, 24 different asst coaches

(12-09-2017 09:03 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  in 2011, with Freeze an internal promote (after only 1 year on staff, which might signal he was promised it was coming), he kept 4 assts. from Roberts' staff

in 2012 when Gus took over for Hugh, he was able to keep 4 assts. from Freeze

in 2013 when Harsin took over for Gus, he only kept 2 of Gus's assistants

in 2014 when Anderson took over for Harsin, the entire staff changed out

4 seasons, 4 head coaches, 24 different asst coaches

And your point? How long would you want to raise a family in Jonesboro, AK if you had the opportunity to leave?

(12-09-2017 09:06 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  

(12-09-2017 09:03 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  in 2011, with Freeze an internal promote (after only 1 year on staff, which might signal he was promised it was coming), he kept 4 assts. from Roberts' staff

in 2012 when Gus took over for Hugh, he was able to keep 4 assts. from Freeze

in 2013 when Harsin took over for Gus, he only kept 2 of Gus's assistants

in 2014 when Anderson took over for Harsin, the entire staff changed out

4 seasons, 4 head coaches, 24 different asst coaches

And your point? How long would you want to raise a family in Jonesboro, AK if you had the opportunity to leave?

Hey now, Jonesboro, Alaska is a fine place to raise a family!

(12-09-2017 09:00 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  WTF are we comparing ourselves to the Arkansas State situation? I don't see a single similarity, especially for a coach raising a young family. And why do you think it's "likely" that the Army, Navy, Notre Dame or Michigan job will open up after next season?

1. It's a case study of life at very bottom of food chain in FBS. we are in a far worse on field competitive position than Arkansas State was when they fired Steve Roberts. According to coaches hot seat, Arky st pays $800k, which puts it in Rice's quantum level in terms of football economics

2. in terms of those other jobs, it's just pure speculation and pattern recognition.
--Army just signed Monken to an extension, so that is unlikely to open
--Harbaugh is very well paid and went 0-3 against Sparty, Penn St, and Buckeyes
--Ken N at Navy looked hard at BYU last time and not hard to imagine BYU opening again
--Brian Kelly is always one slapped player away from being gone. Miracle in my mind that he survived the death of a student manager earlier in his tenure
--Calhoun at Air Force has been there a long time. If Army beats them again next year, you never know.

the bigger point, Walt, is that if you (or more importantly JK) believe it unimaginable or impossible that Coach B will leave after one year, then he is setting himself up for a hasty and therefore risky decision.

We can't have it both ways. We can't say "Yes, I'm very confident this thing is going to turn around quickly and substantially" and also say "Coach B gets Rice and he's going to raise his kids in Houston". It's an empirically and economically irrational and inconsistent world view.

A more plausible and happy (for us) scenario for him staying a long time is we go 6-6 or 7-5 every year, avoid the hugely embarrassing blowouts that characterized Bailiff, but don't quite do enough to move him to the top of the P5 wish lists.

I would rather go 14-0 next year and have him hired away before the bowl game than go 6-6 every year and stay for 20 years.

Ridiculous conversation to have before Bloomgren has won a game at Rice.

Also, you’re on crack if you think Michigan or Notre Dame is going to hire a coach from Rice after one 8-5 season. It’d be a Schiano-like revolt from their fan base.

(12-08-2017 08:43 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(12-08-2017 08:00 PM)InterestedX Wrote:  

(12-08-2017 06:16 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I predict Rice football practices will look very different next year.

Be honest -- how many Rice football practices have you been to in the past 10 years?

A bunch while I still worked in Houston. Not many since.

But I've made it pretty clear that my comments about practices were based upon observations of others passed along to me, and have accompanied such comments with a request for anyone who did attend regularly and had a different take to speak up. You've noticed there have been no takers on that.

And you can tell how a team practices by watching how it plays. We play like a team that doesn't practice hard.

My old high school coach was full of aphorisms, and one of his favorite was, “you practice how you play; you play the way you practice.” A bit redundant, but oh so true. And don’t we know it...

(12-09-2017 09:29 AM)ExcitedOwl18 Wrote:  you’re on crack if you think Michigan or Notre Dame is going to hire a coach from Rice after one 8-5 season. It’d be a Schiano-like revolt from their fan base.

Good point. I'm not on crack, so I'll take Michigan and Notre Dame off the list.

The worry list is Vandy, Duke, Air Force, Navy. that's actually a very short list

(12-09-2017 09:21 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  

(12-09-2017 09:00 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  WTF are we comparing ourselves to the Arkansas State situation? I don't see a single similarity, especially for a coach raising a young family. And why do you think it's "likely" that the Army, Navy, Notre Dame or Michigan job will open up after next season?

1. It's a case study of life at very bottom of food chain in FBS. we are in a far worse on field competitive position than Arkansas State was when they fired Steve Roberts. According to coaches hot seat, Arky st pays $800k, which puts it in Rice's quantum level in terms of football economics

2. in terms of those other jobs, it's just pure speculation and pattern recognition.
--Army just signed Monken to an extension, so that is unlikely to open
--Harbaugh is very well paid and went 0-3 against Sparty, Penn St, and Buckeyes
--Ken N at Navy looked hard at BYU last time and not hard to imagine BYU opening again
--Brian Kelly is always one slapped player away from being gone. Miracle in my mind that he survived the death of a student manager earlier in his tenure
--Calhoun at Air Force has been there a long time. If Army beats them again next year, you never know.

the bigger point, Walt, is that if you (or more importantly JK) believe it unimaginable or impossible that Coach B will leave after one year, then he is setting himself up for a hasty and therefore risky decision.

We can't have it both ways. We can't say "Yes, I'm very confident this thing is going to turn around quickly and substantially" and also say "Coach B gets Rice and he's going to raise his kids in Houston". It's an empirically and economically irrational and inconsistent world view.

A more plausible and happy (for us) scenario for him staying a long time is we go 6-6 or 7-5 every year, avoid the hugely embarrassing blowouts that characterized Bailiff, but don't quite do enough to move him to the top of the P5 wish lists.

I would rather go 14-0 next year and have him hired away before the bowl game than go 6-6 every year and stay for 20 years.

I never said "unimaginable" or "impossible", but it certainly is not likely...and to raise the specter of this occurring less than a week after Bloomgren is hired is beyond ridiculous. As bad as Rice football has been the past several seasons, I very much doubt we're perceived by coaches as the equivalent job as Arkansas State. Second, the caliber of the location, university and student-athletes are a world apart. I also wouldn't be surprised if the buyout in the contract is extremely steep should he elect to leave after just one or two seasons.

All the speculation about Bloomberg leaving in 1-3years is based on a wild turnaround from 1-11. No only an improvement but but an exceptional improvement.

I hope it happens. Good problem to have.

The other side of the coin is that in 3-4 years, we may be wanting him fired. It is not a dead solid perfect lock that he will turn us around in specular fashion. If we are still mired at .500 or lower, I bet there will be a a lot of people ready to pull the plug.

I would much rather face the problem of retaining or replacing a winning coach than the problem of releasing and replacing yet another losing coach.

(12-09-2017 09:29 AM)ExcitedOwl18 Wrote:  Ridiculous conversation to have before Bloomgren has won a game at Rice.

Sorry, I don't think it is ridiculous. The frequency of one year coaching tenures is low but decidedly non-zero.

Oregon was a perennial top 10 program early in this decade--hell they played for the national championship three years ago--and they just had a coach leave after one year. And it looks like they hired a guy who does NOT have the resume you would want in that job. UNPREPARED. If they had believed the Jimbo rumors and thought about logic, they might have had a better option than Mario Christobal

MemOwl makes a good point that when you are Rice, it does not hurt to be prepared. He isn’t predicting that Bloomgren is leaving after one year.

JK said there were several other coaches who said they would take the job if offered so I assume that is the start of a list of candidates if Mike is hired away. But really isn’t this whole topic a little silly? Can’t we enjoy the fact that DB’s replacement is better than anyone thought we could get?