Penn State Coaching Mess Getting Worse Due to Out of Touch Former Players
by Year2 on Jan 6, 2012 10:52 AM EST
in SEC Football
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Something became more and more clear over the months since Penn State fired Joe Paterno: the head coaching job there is radioactive. Not only is it not a good idea to be the guy who follows the legend, but the Jerry Sandusky scandal is among the worst there's ever been in college sports. The fact that a coach (Mike McQueary) and two school officials (Tim Curley and Gary Schultz) are going to be involved in high profile court cases over the coming months doesn't make it any better.
So the school ended up with Patriots offensive coordinator Bill O'Brien. He's not a big name and doesn't appear to have earned a job as prestigious as Penn State's, but the school can't hire a big name right now. He at least has been a college coach for much of his career (mostly in the ACC) and has worked under some pretty good coaches before. If the school was looking for an inoffensive placeholder who has never worked with Sandusky to mind the store until the scandal blows over, O'Brien appears to fit the bill.
The hire seems to have pushed a berserk button among a number of former players. LaVar Arrington says he's no longer a Penn State guy. Former All-American Brandon Short says the university is no longer Penn State. Their complaints? The school didn't hire a Penn State guy. D.J. Dozier and an number of other former All-Americans are upset that they weren't consulted:
"I would venture to say that a lot of guys thought, why not? Why wouldn't someone ask us? Aren't we a part of this university? Aren't we a part of the program? Don't we care? Don't we have a little bit of expertise or at least a thought that may spur another thought? I believe to get the right or best answer, you survey the land.
"So, do the guys feel left out and pushed to the side? Well, of course..." [All quotes by Dozier]
I understand that Penn State hasn't gone looking for a new head coach in a few decades, but how out of touch can these guys be? Hiring someone with ties to a school is no longer a requirement in major college coaching and hasn't been for some time. The era when lifers and insiders like Tom Osborne, Steve Spurrier, and Phil Fulmer won national titles passed a decade ago.
Nick Saban had no ties to LSU or Alabama before taking those jobs. Urban Meyer had no ties to Florida before taking the job there. Les Miles had no LSU ties before taking the job there. Mack Brown had no ties to Texas before taking the job there. Pete Carroll had no ties to USC before taking the job there. Bob Stoops had no ties to Oklahoma before taking the job there. The most you can say is that Gene Chizik, Jim Tressel, and Butch Davis had a couple of years as assistants at Auburn, Ohio State, and Miami (FL) before taking those jobs, but none of them were "guys" of those schools. Even some people who end up lifers don't start out that way; Bobby Bowden had never worked a day in the state of Florida before taking the job at FSU.
And for another thing: what school in its right mind would consult with former players before hiring a coach? Do you think Jeremy Foley called up Danny Wuerffel or Tim Tebow for advice before hiring Will Muschamp? Do you think Jay Barker had to sign off on Saban being hired in Tuscaloosa? I can't imagine Georgia asking Hershel Walker, Buck Belue, and Lindsay Scott for their opinions prior to hiring Mark Richt.
Penn State is in a special situation, as the acting AD making the hire only has ties to sports via being an orthopedic surgeon with a specialty in sports medicine. However, there are a number of coaching search firms that are far better equipped for helping out than former players are. Whether Penn State used a search firm I don't know, but the point is that including former All-Americans in a coaching search simply because they're former All-Americans is asinine.
It still is bad news for Penn State that these former players are revolting. Fans often follow famous players' lead in setting their sentiments, which means O'Brien might not get a fair shake because of them. A school can get by with one or two big names not in support; Florida was just fine while Emmitt Smith refused to return to Gainesville because he didn't get along with Spurrier. You can't lose a lot of them and expect to keep fan support high, though.
Penn State couldn't realistically hire as head coach or retain anyone who had ever played under or worked with Sandusky. The scandal surrounding the former defensive coordinator is that toxic. Among the top PSU current staff, that leaves 71-year-old Galen Hall and co-DC Ron Vanderlinden (who only became co-DC after Paterno's firing). Hall is too old and, while he's a "Penn State guy", I'm not sure Vanderlinden's resume is all that much better than O'Brien's is.
I don't think O'Brien is that great a hire even given the circumstances, but I am reluctant to bash it simply because I don't know exactly how bad it was behind the scenes. I agree with the number of people saying they should have gone after FIU's Mario Cristobal, but would a real up-and-comer risk derailing his career to take over the PSU mess? I have real doubts about it.
But even if O'Brien isn't going to do a good job, these unrealistic former players are making things worse. And when it comes to hire O'Brien's successor? They will make it even worse then. I can't help but think PSU is going to be down for quite some time.
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in 1983 the crimson tide brought in an "alabama guy"
to pick up the reigns after the retirement and death of bear bryant. perkins did reasonably well as head coach (32-15-1) but managed to alienate just about everyone along the way. four years he abruptly left to return to the pros and the program was back at square one.
most accounts of this process now underscore how bryant’s death created a power vacuum in the athletic department and launched a battle in the administration for control over it. the prominent alumni were also quite vocal and added to the din that quickly became complete chaos. perkins departure didn’t do much to ammend this state of affairs as bill curry’s tenure at the capstone demonstrated.
the truth is, if you look at alabama’s time in the wilderness during the 1980s you see a program with enough inertia to still put up occasional respectable seasons (both perkins and curry had 10-win outings) but so ravaged by in-fighting that any degree of consistency from year-to-year was impossible.
pretty much every news report out of happy valley since november has indicated penn state is moving down an almost identical path.
Remember the Rose Bowl: The Story of the Alabama Crimson Tide & the Grandaddy of Them All
The political in-fighting is bad enough, but there's also the stain of the scandal up there.
They’ll probably come back from this eventually, but it isn’t hard to imagine that the Nitts’ bottom will be both lower and longer than what we saw with Bama.
My anti-drug is football, because sometimes it is a better hallucinogen than anything you can get at Burning Man. - Spencer Hall 9/28/11
by car.full.of.midgets on Jan 6, 2012 11:28 AM EST up reply actions
ironically, the scandal could be an asset
since it may be sufficient to support a complete change of leadership rather than the expected efforts to hang onto whatever aspects of the paterno era remain in the athletic department.
Remember the Rose Bowl: The Story of the Alabama Crimson Tide & the Grandaddy of Them All
You make a really good point, actually.
I hadn’t considered the virtual house-cleaning that swept through the administration of both the university and its athletic department.
My anti-drug is football, because sometimes it is a better hallucinogen than anything you can get at Burning Man. - Spencer Hall 9/28/11
by car.full.of.midgets on Jan 6, 2012 2:48 PM EST up reply actions
There's also the obvious example of Michigan post-Lloyd Carr
And the two courtships of Les Miles derailed by politics.
Writer (and a handsome one at that),
And the Valley Shook
by Billy Gomila on Jan 6, 2012 11:57 AM EST up reply actions
True
Any time there’s a cult of personality around a coach, it can be very difficult to go in a different direction: Bama with Bryant, Michigan with Bo, even Nebraska went through issues with Solich/Callahan after Osborne left.
The only reason it didn’t happen at FSU was beacuse Bowden wore out his welcome with nepotism (Jeff), scandal, and mediocre seasons down the stretch. Imagine if he hung it up after 2001 or so. It’d have been the same thing there with some politicking for Mickey Andrews, Amato or Richt and others looking for a fresh start.
Team Speed Kills -- SBNation's SEC Blog
If you're so inclined, follow me @Year2
it took almost a decade for the alabama alumni power brokers
to back off enough to let them hire gene stallings who many felt was an “outsider” due to his ties to texas a&m (he was passed over in both the ‘82 and ’86 searches). that’s with the historical precedent of hiring of alabama men “red” drew and “ears” whitworth to succeed the dominant frank thomas regime (who hailed from notre dame).
the lesson didn’t stick particularly well as alabama then turned to loyal bama player and assistant dubose rather than look further afield. but, by that time, AD bockrath had completely shit the bed and was simply looking for a “yes” man. it wasn’t till the BOT brought in robert witt as president that normalcy returned to tuscaloosa.
will penn state go through that kind of chaos? it’s impossible to say. but i’d suggest spending less time watching the coaching hire and seeing how the efforts to replace the president and AD go. if those turn into mud-slinging matches then plan for the absolute worst.
Remember the Rose Bowl: The Story of the Alabama Crimson Tide & the Grandaddy of Them All
They can’t even get a new AD right now because Curley is still employed and on leave. Joyner, the acting AD, is just a guy off the Board of Trustees. Until all the court cases go through, they’re stuck.
Team Speed Kills -- SBNation's SEC Blog
If you're so inclined, follow me @Year2
that situation
plus o’brien’s lack of head coaching experience bodes very badly.
Remember the Rose Bowl: The Story of the Alabama Crimson Tide & the Grandaddy of Them All
DJ Dozier should have definitely been consulted.
After his lackluster career as a 2nd string ballboy for the Vikings, he’s maintained a college football coaching academy in American Samoa. Yes, by all means, Penn State should have sought his august counsel.
"When among evil companions, try to fit in." - Wild Bill Donovan
Rocky Balboa once told me, "Nothing is real if you don't believe in who you are."
I've generally been disgusted with how a lot of the PSU faithful excused Paterno after everything came out.
I understand that the fans and the players especially had a strong affection for Paterno, but the extent they went to make it appear that Paterno and others were being scapegoated was ridiculous.
It’s one thing to consider someone innocent until proven guilty, but it’s another to stick your head in the sand and pretend it’s not a big deal for those people to have done what they did and that Paterno didn’t deserve to be fired. It doesn’t seem that “perspective” is common up there in any sense.
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