FAU does not appear to be a serious football team under Tom Herman. They are getting absolutely destroyed by ECU on national TV right now.

If sacked in Boca, would he return to be our OC for a prove-it year? Probably not, but doesn't hurt to ask. The guy has a national championship ring.

Also, his buyout at FAU is pretty large, so they could easily stick with Herman.

(11-07-2024 05:28 PM)OwlWKIF Wrote:  The NCAA-provided team statistics shed some light on where the program is this season. Regarding our current strengths, we are 23rd in total defense, 37th in first down defense, 7th in kickoff returns, 7th in passing yards allowed, 10th in sacks allowed, 11th in total sacks, and 14th in total TFLs.

Yes, Georgia, Ohio State, Oregon, etc. are going up against notably tougher competition than us, but they are also much more talented than the teams they face each week and have overflowing NIL.

Moral of the story? Brian Smith is not the problem. Pete Alamar is not the problem.

Because the defense looks good under Brian Smith, I don’t think Rice should have an obsession with hiring a defensive-minded HC. Especially nowadays, the HC is a CEO (see Ryan Day reluctantly giving up playcalling), fundraiser, and promoter, not the chief-OC.

It seems like it’s been a long time since we’ve had a top 25 defense. We may not stay that way with some talented offenses coming up, but if it does, Smith will be getting a promotion of some type in 2025.

(11-07-2024 07:42 PM)Hambone10 Wrote:  or perhaps the new coach IS Brian Smith or John Kay

It's all about putting together a great team... and I don't think we need to be 'married' to the idea that a HC can't mostly be a position coach who also handles 'the big picture' and gives a lot of free reign to his coordinators.... within his structure.

True, but McClelland knows these coaches, so he must feel that neither of them have the chops to be the head coach, or they'd be getting a look. Maybe with more time on the staff, and under a coach like Clark, one of them would be ready in the future. Kay is the one that has me intrigued. He may be the future of our program five years from now. I hope that he's retained.

(11-07-2024 11:19 PM)OwlWKIF Wrote:  FAU does not appear to be a serious football team under Tom Herman. They are getting absolutely destroyed by ECU on national TV right now.

If sacked in Boca, would he return to be our OC for a prove-it year? Probably not, but doesn't hurt to ask. The guy has a national championship ring.

Also, his buyout at FAU is pretty large, so they could easily stick with Herman.

Is it? This article says if Herman is terminated by the university without cause, he will be paid a lump sum severance that is equal to twenty weeks of his annual salary or the remainder of the contract, whichever is lower. He's getting paid $1mm this year, so I would assume his buyout is around $400k

https://247sports.com/college/florida-at...200898182/

It's only his second season. They need to give him one more year. I read on the conference board that his four top receivers are all injured.

(11-03-2024 08:17 PM)Ourland Wrote:  I prefer defensive minded coaches.

I prefer coaches who emphasize all THREE sides of the ball (including kicking game/special teams). I think the kicking game is particularly important at a place like Rice because 1) beating an opponent who has more talent often comes down to fluke plays, and the kicking game is where more fluke plays occur than anywhere else, and 2) the big boys (and many non-P4/5s) tend to ficus recruiting only on offense and defense, and rely on walk-ons to fill the kicker jobs, so that by recruiting scholarship kickers Rice can at least in theory have better kickers than opponents.

I think one problem with the offensively minded head coaches at Rice, is that the offensively-minded coaches have simply focused on out scoring opponents, leaving defense and special teams a kind of secondary concerns.

Homer Rice and Wason Brown were offensive geniuses, each deserving consideration as the best offensive mind of his era, who, in the words of “Bloody Joe” Davis, “Don’t know how to spell defense.” They were 8-36.

Jerry Berndt followed Brown, and his first year record improved from 3-8 to 4-7, primarily because of defensive improvement under Milan Vooletich, whom I thought to be the best assistant on Berndt’s staff. Unfortunately, Vooletich left after one year. Wichita State discontinued football and Berndt hired their head coach, Ron Chismar, as numerical replacement. Chismar, whose prior career had been on the offensive side on the ball, was hired not only as Vooletch’s numeric successor but also as his successor as defensive coordinator. Don Dobes had been offensive coordinator for Berndt’s first year, and if Vooletich wasn’t the best coach on that staff, then Dobes was. Dobes is currently defensive coordinator at Dartmouth. In fact almost all of Dobes’ career has been spent on the defensive side of the ball, except one year at Penn, and his time at Rice and Temple, all under Berndt. So for Berndt’s last so years at Rice, he had a defensive guy as offensive coordinator and an offensive guy as defensive coordinator. There was a considerable talent gap between Rice and the rest of the SWC, primaily because Berndt did have a Texans on his staff (there is a story among Texas HS coaches about a Rice assistant recruiting WestTexas who asked a HS coach if he could give him directions to “Large Springs”). But I have to wonder if Rice might not have been able to steal a few more wins if they had an offensive guy as OC and a defensive guy as DC. Of course, any evaluation must include a very young QB coach named Curt Cignetti and a wide receiver coach named Tyrone Willungham, both of whom have gone on to bigger and better things.

Then along came Fred who was a defensive guy, but he had one of the truly great offensive minds of his day in Dinger as OC, and Fred pretty much turned him loose to be creative.

Excuse me for not being more clear. If I had to choose between the two sides of the ball, it would be a defensive minded coach.

Just win. I don't care if you win with defense, offense, both or neither. Just win.

I think we all feel that way

I don’t think it is possible to win without paying attention to all THREE sides of the ball—offense, defense, and kicking game/special teams. My experience has been that the offensive genius types don’t pay enough attention to the other phases.

Peterson and Conover paid attention to defense and special teams, and Conover in particularly won several games with defense and/or kicking game. Homer Rice and Watson Bown, in the words of “Bloody Joe” Davis, were, “offensive geniuses who couldn’t spell defense.” In between them, Ray Albirn simply didn’t have enough talent to matter. The experiment with lower admissions standards for athletes meant that Rice was, in the words of Fred Goldsmith” because , losing because it had to “play 18-and 19-year-olds against everybody else’s 22- and 23-year-olds” because those 18- and 19-year-olds were flunking out before they got to be 22- and 23-year-olds. I know players from that time frame who remember, “looking around in team meetings and asking to myself what are these people doing at Rice.”

Jerry Berndt was another offensive guy who didn’t pay attention to defense or special teams. His first year the defense was decent because Milan Vooletich was his DC. When Vooletich’s best friend took the Naval Academy head coaching job and he left to become DC at Annapolis, Berndt made what seemed a curious move at time. Wichita State had just discontinued football, and Berndt hired Wichita HC Ron Chismar as numeric replacement for Vooletich. Good addition except that Chismar’s entire career had been on the offensive side of the ball, and Berndt made him DC. His first year OC had been Don Dobes, who impressed many of us as an up-and-coming young coach. Dobes is now DC at Dartmouth, and other that his time working for Berndt his entire coaching career has been spent on the defensive side of the ball. So for his last two years at Rice, Berndt had a defensive guy running his offense and an offensive guy running a defense. There was still a talent gap between Rice and the rest of the SWC, caused by all those 18- and 19-year-olds flunking out (although Watson Brown had addressed this somewhat) and also by Berndt’s not having much of a Texas presence on his staff. But one has to wonder if Berndt could not have squeezed out a few more wins if he had an offensive guy running his offense and a defensive guy running his defense. There was actually some coaching talent on that staff—the QB coach was Curt Cignetti, currently HC at Indiana, and the WR coach was Tyrone Willingham, who was later HC at Notre Dame, Satanford, and Washington.

Fred came along, put a lot more emphasis on defense, special teams, and recruiting Texas via contacts with Texas HS coaches, and very quickly turned the program around. He won 5 games his second year and 6 games his 4th and 5th year, before leaving for Duke. Ken Hatfield replaced Fred in a move that I think was orchestrated earlier than was ever admitted. Other than exchanging Dinger’s unique one-back offense for Hatfield’s flexbone, the philosophy didn’t really change much. Hatfield kept producing respectable records, with and SWC co-championship, two 7-win seasons, and an 8-win season, until his defenses began to fail. The less said about Todd Graham, the better. David Bailiff was the really curious one to me. He came from a DC background, and employed the kind of very conservative strategy that typically goes with strong defenses and special teams. But despite some outstanding individuals in those areas, his teams were typically horrible on defense and godawful in the kicking game. He won 10 games in seasons when he got great QB play, and 1-4 games when he didn’t. Bloomgren insisted on an offensive philosophy ill-suited to the kinds of athletes that Rice can recruit, had virtually no Texas contacts on his staff until too late, and apparently pissed off a lot of players with his attitude.

We can all hope that the next coaching hire will reflect some lessons learned from the above.

(11-03-2024 06:34 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I do not want Rice to hire anybody's offensive cooordinator. Defensive coaches have done better at Rice since Neely. Consider the coaches that have been hired from offensive backgrounds:

Bo Hagan 12-27-1
Bill Peterson 3-7-1
Al Conover 14-28-2, 1 .500 season
Homer Rice 4-18-0
Watson Brown 4-18-0
Jerry Berndt 6-27-0
Mike Bloomgren 22-46-0, 2 bowls
TOTALS 65-171-4 0.279

Compare coaches from defensive backgrounds:
Fred Goldsmith 23-31-0 2 6-win seasons (first winning seasons in 28 years)
Todd Graham 7-6-0, 1 bowl, 1 7-win season
David Bailiff 57-80-0, 1 conference championship, 4 bowls, 2 10-win seasons
TOTALS 87-117-0 0.426,

While neither group set the world on fire, one is clearly better than the other.


I excluded Ray Alborn and Ken Hatfield from this list because both had backgrounds on both sides of the ball before becoming head coaches. While Hatfield is mostly associated with the flexbone triple option, he actually had more year as a defensive assistant (7) than as an offensive assistant (4).
Alborn 13-53-0 .197, 1 5-win season (only one between 1973 and 1990)
Hatfield 55-78-1 .414, 1 conference co-championship, 1 8- win season, 2 7-win seasons

Oklahoma hired a defensive coach. How's that working out?

I don’t think it is possible to win without paying attention to all THREE sides of the ball—offense, defense, and kicking game/special teams. My experience has been that the offensive genius types don’t pay enough attention to the other phases.

Peterson and Conover paid attention to defense and special teams, and Conover in particularly won several games with defense and/or kicking game. Homer Rice and Watson Bown, in the words of “Bloody Joe” Davis, were, “offensive geniuses who couldn’t spell defense.” In between them, Ray Albirn simply didn’t have enough talent to matter. The experiment with lower admissions standards for athletes meant that Rice was, in the words of Fred Goldsmith, losing because it had to “play 18-and 19-year-olds against everybody else’s 22- and 23-year-olds” because those 18- and 19-year-olds were flunking out before they got to be 22- and 23-year-olds. I know players from that time frame who remember, “looking around in team meetings and asking to myself what are these people doing at Rice.”

Jerry Berndt was another offensive guy who didn’t pay attention to defense or special teams. His first year the defense was decent because Milan Vooletich was his DC. When Vooletich’s best friend took the Naval Academy head coaching job and he left to become DC at Annapolis, Berndt made what seemed a curious move at time. Wichita State had just discontinued football, and Berndt hired Wichita HC Ron Chismar as numeric replacement for Vooletich. Good addition except that Chismar’s entire career had been on the offensive side of the ball, and Berndt made him DC. His first year OC had been Don Dobes, who impressed many of us as an up-and-coming young coach. Doves is now DC at Dartmouth, and other that his time working for Berndt his entire coaching career has been spent on the defensive side of the ball. So for his last two years at Rice, Berndt had a defensive guy running his offense and an offensive guy running a defense. There was still a talent gap between Rice and the rest of the SWC, caused by all those 18- and 19-year-olds flunking out (although Watson Brown had addressed this somewhat) and also by Berndt’s not having much of a Texas presence on his staff.

Fred Goldsmith changed the emphasis to defense, special teams, and recruiting Texas. He took a program that had not had a winning record in 25 years and won 5 in his second year and 6 in his 4th and 5th years, before leaving for Duke. He was replaced by Ken Hatfield in a move that I believe was orchestrated long before it became public. Other than replacing Dinger’s unique one-back offense with Ken’s unique flexbone, the philosophy changed very little. Ken won an SWC co-championship and had two 7-win seasons and one 8-win season before his defuses started to decline (IMO because Ken started paying too much attention to his offense). The less said about Todd Graham, the better. David Bailiff is a hard one for me to figure. He came from the defensive side of the ball, and he consistently followed a conservative strategy that typically goes with having strong defense and kicking. But despite having some outstanding individuals in both areas (Sendejo, Gaines, Callahan, Martens, Boswell) his defenses there that ca were typically awful and his special teams atrocious. His players loved him and played hard, but sloppy, for him. He could win 10 games when he had an outstanding QB, and struggle to win 4?when he didn’t. Bloomgren was wedded to an offensive scheme that did not fit the players that Rice could recruit, did not have a significant presence on his staff until too late, and pissed off a bunch of players with his attitude.

I hope there are some lessons there that can be applied in selecting Coach Nextguy,

(11-11-2024 11:57 PM)WRCisforgotten79 Wrote:  

(11-03-2024 06:34 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I do not want Rice to hire anybody's offensive cooordinator. Defensive coaches have done better at Rice since Neely. Consider the coaches that have been hired from offensive backgrounds:

Bo Hagan 12-27-1
Bill Peterson 3-7-1
Al Conover 14-28-2, 1 .500 season
Homer Rice 4-18-0
Watson Brown 4-18-0
Jerry Berndt 6-27-0
Mike Bloomgren 22-46-0, 2 bowls
TOTALS 65-171-4 0.279

Compare coaches from defensive backgrounds:
Fred Goldsmith 23-31-0 2 6-win seasons (first winning seasons in 28 years)
Todd Graham 7-6-0, 1 bowl, 1 7-win season
David Bailiff 57-80-0, 1 conference championship, 4 bowls, 2 10-win seasons
TOTALS 87-117-0 0.426,

While neither group set the world on fire, one is clearly better than the other.


I excluded Ray Alborn and Ken Hatfield from this list because both had backgrounds on both sides of the ball before becoming head coaches. While Hatfield is mostly associated with the flexbone triple option, he actually had more year as a defensive assistant (7) than as an offensive assistant (4).
Alborn 13-53-0 .197, 1 5-win season (only one between 1973 and 1990)
Hatfield 55-78-1 .414, 1 conference co-championship, 1 8- win season, 2 7-win seasons

Oklahoma hired a defensive coach. How's that working out?

Alabama hired one in Saban and Georgia hired one in Smart. How did those work out?

OK, I've thought it over and have decided to come down on the side of a defensive coach - but not for the reasons Numbers has outlined. I vote defensive coach because the world has changed, and we are now in the NIL era.

We can recruit about 10-15 decent defensive players for the same price as one stud QB, and probably keep them longer. QBs, RBs, and WRs will command the most money, and I think with our alumni/fan base being so small, we cannot compete in the money wars. So we have to put our money where it gets us the most bang, and that is on defense.

And if we are going to bet on our defense to make us winners, we need a coach that understands defense and can utilize the talents of our recruits.

Most of those defensive players will make good ST players too.

JMHO.

There are three segments of ‘CoachNextguy’

Segment 1
Coach ‘UpandComer OC/DC’ such as Bloom, Toad, Fred, etc.
Cherry pick good: Dan Lanning, Kirby Smart, Ryan Day
Cherry pick bad: Don Brown (UMass), Will Muschamp, Brett Venables?

Segment 2
Coach ‘Retread’ such as Hat
Cherry pick good: Schiano, Lane Kiffin, Bill Snyder
Cherry pick bad: Charlie Weis, Mike Riley, Fran at A&M, Herman?

Segment 3
Coach ‘Winner at lower levels. but not yet at this level’ such as DB, Berndt
Cherry pick good: Curt Cignetti, Jim Tressel, Chris Petersen, Urban Meyer, Coach Prime?
Cherry pick bad: Brady Hoke, Joe Moorhead, Mike London

Moral of story is that good and bad exists for all three options.

For Rice at this juncture, I would prefer segment three and understanding why some have won and some have not. I do think system, over reliance on QB (in cases like DB), etc. need to be understood. I do think some coaches are just winners and can drop them in to any situation and they will win even if they are not a CoachHotShot or CoachRetread.

IMO, this is more important than whether someone is offense or defensive minded.

I think offensive coaches tend to be higher profile.... and thus are more readily pushed for HC jobs. In addition, more people like 40-35 games than 10-7.

I'd tend to want to hire a defensive coach for HC and then hire a young, hungry OC looking to make a name for himself and give him the reins.

(11-12-2024 09:48 AM)owl40 Wrote:  There are three segments of ‘CoachNextguy’

Segment 1
Coach ‘UpandComer OC/DC’ such as Bloom, Toad, Fred, etc.
Cherry pick good: Dan Lanning, Kirby Smart, Ryan Day
Cherry pick bad: Don Brown (UMass), Will Muschamp, Brett Venables?

Segment 2
Coach ‘Retread’ such as Hat
Cherry pick good: Schiano, Lane Kiffin, Bill Snyder
Cherry pick bad: Charlie Weis, Mike Riley, Fran at A&M, Herman?

Segment 3
Coach ‘Winner at lower levels. but not yet at this level’ such as DB, Berndt
Cherry pick good: Curt Cignetti, Jim Tressel, Chris Petersen, Urban Meyer, Coach Prime?
Cherry pick bad: Brady Hoke, Joe Moorhead, Mike London

Moral of story is that good and bad exists for all three options.

For Rice at this juncture, I would prefer segment three and understanding why some have won and some have not. I do think system, over reliance on QB (in cases like DB), etc. need to be understood. I do think some coaches are just winners and can drop them in to any situation and they will win even if they are not a CoachHotShot or CoachRetread.

IMO, this is more important than whether someone is offense or defensive minded.

Good post!

(11-12-2024 02:54 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  OK, I've thought it over and have decided to come down on the side of a defensive coach - but not for the reasons Numbers has outlined. I vote defensive coach because the world has changed, and we are now in the NIL era.

We can recruit about 10-15 decent defensive players for the same price as one stud QB, and probably keep them longer. QBs, RBs, and WRs will command the most money, and I think with our alumni/fan base being so small, we cannot compete in the money wars. So we have to put our money where it gets us the most bang, and that is on defense.

And if we are going to bet on our defense to make us winners, we need a coach that understands defense and can utilize the talents of our recruits.

Most of those defensive players will make good ST players too.

JMHO.

Good post. I hadn't thought about that. True.

(11-12-2024 10:15 AM)Ourland Wrote:  

(11-12-2024 02:54 AM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  OK, I've thought it over and have decided to come down on the side of a defensive coach - but not for the reasons Numbers has outlined. I vote defensive coach because the world has changed, and we are now in the NIL era.

We can recruit about 10-15 decent defensive players for the same price as one stud QB, and probably keep them longer. QBs, RBs, and WRs will command the most money, and I think with our alumni/fan base being so small, we cannot compete in the money wars. So we have to put our money where it gets us the most bang, and that is on defense.

And if we are going to bet on our defense to make us winners, we need a coach that understands defense and can utilize the talents of our recruits.

Most of those defensive players will make good ST players too.

JMHO.

Good post. I hadn't thought about that. True.

Agreed. Said something similar somewhere, but it doesn't surprise me that OO and I are of similar minds on this.

Its one of the reasons I've argued in favor of schemes as opposed to talent on offense. We simply can't get 4-5 star offensive recruits... but we CAN get guys that don't fit traditional schemes like Hat did... or like Clement/Dillard who pan out or Daniels (or Hat as a coach) who were good, but just not good enough for that level of play... maybe because of injury... or an upper-classman whose dream of starting for a big-time program and going to the NFL now has him sitting on the bench with no shot at the NFL... who might value that more prestigious degree and be closer to the operations of an NFL franchise than Tuscaloosa, College Station or Baton Rouge with a 'pro sports' focused degree program.... and to the extent that we must pay NIL, to focus on defense where there is somewhat less competition.

FWIW, outside of QB, it's not that obvious that offensive NIL is more than defensive NIL
https://www.cbssports.com/college-footba...ting-paid/

My birds-eye-view impression is NIL is tightly correlated with how much the position group affects winning