Posts
1. Randy Shannon was the right coach at the right time.
All you people who are quick to play the affirmative action card (read: unqualified minority) can eat shit right now. Larry Coker, for all his success on the field, left the program in tatters. More players were getting press for criminal activity than for what they did on the field. Practically nobody graduated. Miami football was a black eye to all of college sports, and an insult to black academic and social progress.
Enter Randy Shannon. He grew up in Miami, won championships there as a player, and another as an assistant coach. He knew the school. He knew the lineage of Canes football. And, most importantly, he knew the pools of talent in the area. As Donna Shalala stated at his hiring, he is Miami. Not only was he arguably the best qualified man for the job, he was definitely the most uniquely qualified candidate for the position as well.
Yet past performance doesn't equal future success. And for that reason...
2. Miami was absolutely correct to part ways with him.
Shannon is an absolutely fabulous leader. He reestablished an air of discipline and accountability. His players graduated. By virtually all accounts, he did everything right as a coach.
Except win enough games.
Somewhere down the line, Shannon seemed to forget that he wasn't coaching Boy's Town, but at the U. Consistent 7-5 seasons, with losses to seemingly inferior schools in your own state, will eventually get you fired anywhere. But at Miami, where the expectations are winning conference titles and competing for BCS championships, 7-5 is beyond substandard. Even when you are fielding teams that students and alumni can be proud of, you can't get by with mediocre seasons when you're stocked with 11-1 talent.
But in no way should that make his tenure a racial issue. Shannon's firing is not an indictment of his intelligence, his coaching acumen, and damn sure not his color. ESPN's Mark May, defending Shannon shortly after the initial reports, said "[Shannon] was brought in to change the culture of the program. He did that." And I agree; most people do. But most of us could also see that Coach Shannon took the program as far as he could take it. It was time for a change.
Shannon got the job because he deserved it. He got a contract extension because he deserved it. And he got fired because he deserved it. It's not that hard to understand. Shannon is a tremendous coach and he will get another head coaching opportunity much sooner than later. But just as there should be no debate on his hiring, this is not another Tyrone Willingham situation, either (and besides,Shannon walks away with a better record). Randy Shannon may not have been given all the chances in the world (I could never really say that about a black coach), but he certainly had enough.
So, if you must bring up affirmative action (though you shouldn't), acknowledge that its intent is to create equal opportunities, not equal results. A black man was given a chance to display his talents; he succeeded in some respects (and be honest---for a first-time coach he really didn't do a bad job), but ultimately things didn't pan out. That's perfectly OK with me. And I bet it's just fine with him, too.
They could have let him coach the bowl game, though. Just sayin'.
3. Love him or hate him, Fox Sports' Jason Whitlock is right.
Funny, when I saw the final score of that Central Florida game, I thought that Shannon was going to be on the hottest seat in the country next season. When I saw the news that he'd been fired, I thought immediately of what Whitlock said in 2008 about Turner Gill.
Gill, currently the head coach at Kansas, was the front runner (?) for the job at Auburn. I remember all the hoopla and bellyaching that came about because he got passed over for a guy who was like 1-70 (exaggerating here) at Iowa State. And to be honest, with Gill coming fresh off a MAC title at Buffalo, I didn't get it, either.
But then I read Whitlock's column, and I realized that you can't just jump at any job because someone else tells you that it's the best opportunity. You should choose that job (or stay where you are) because at the time, it's the right one. Gill ended up at a place where he had close ties to the conference (he starred at rival Nebraska), and where it seems like there's isn't as much pressure to win now as it is to be competitive. Should he had been given the chance to coach Cam Newton? Don't know. But I am sure that Gill would get to grow at Kansas in ways they'd never let him at Auburn.
I'm not going to contradict myself and tell you that Shannon shouldn't have taken the Miami job; he should have. I'm hoping that next time, he considers where his strengths and weaknesses are, bounces them off the expectations of the program, and chooses a place that can not only utilize his leadership and talents to their fullest, but also can better afford to take the time necessary to build a consistent winner.
Shannon, if given the time and the financial commitment from whoever hires him, can build a championship team in short order. But black, white or purple, schools like the University of Miami are not the places to be for a young coach to get his teeth cut. Better to go to a lower-tier Big 6 or an up-and-coming mid-major first.
4. Randy Shannon's successor won't do that much better, anyway.
First of all, Miami is one of the lowest-paying jobs available for a program with such lofty expectations. And I promise you, nobody in broadcasting is going to take less money tor all the hassles that come with coaching. Especially at a school like Miami. So dreaming about a big name coach like Jon Gruden gets you nowhere. Ditto for Mike Leach, unless you want to see the program go back to the bad ol'days of the Coker era. Butch Davis isn't leaving Chapel Hill, either.
So, that leaves room for some young coach or seasoned coordinator who, like Shannon, will have his first head coaching opportunity. Good luck with that. Maybe they could get some retread a la Rick Neuheisel, or perhaps Dan Hawkins can get another shot at glory. If it were me, I'd shoot for the latter.
Miami can't get the big names because it doesn't have the money (Yeah, I know...all that cheddar from licensing and apparel? Really?). A young coach won't survive because there's too much pressure to win, and win now. And even with the best possible coach locked up, the team still plays in a way-too-large arena too far away from campus, suffers from poor training facilities, and is at least a step behind its in-state rivals when it comes to recruiting blue-chip prospects.
Sounds like a recipe for mediocrity to me. Which tells me...
5. Miami fans had better prepare for the new reality.
Contrary to what Athletic Director Kirby Hocutt wants you to believe, that "better days are ahead for Miami," what the firing of Shannon signals is not the beginning of the end of rough times, but rather the end of the beginning.
Miami is not an elite team, and they haven't been the entire decade. They've lost games to schools like Carolina and Georgia Tech, and they're losing ground in recruiting to schools like UCF and South Florida. These schools have solid coaches and have either built or are building better facilities. These are programs on the rise, with bright futures ahead of them.
Better days are ahead for programs like Connecticut, not Miami.
While it's way too premature to equate the Hurricanes to a has-been program like, say, Holy Cross, I do think it's more than fair to look at the U next year and see Notre Dame.
Yes, that Notre Dame, where first-year coach Brian Kelly brought the Irish a 7-5 record and a bowl game---and they're happy about it.
See, just like Miami this season, ND was another big-name school spoiled by their history of success, and their heads in the sand about the changing landscape of college football. They thought the name itself would carry the team to 10-2 seasons and the Orange Bowl. They were wrong. They held their standards way too high; they felt entitled to outstanding seasons. They ended up with running out three so-so coaches (Bob Davie, Willingham, and Charlie Weis), shelling out lots of cash, enduring monumental embarrassments, and nearly causing irreparable damage to their credibility (as a football team and an academic institution)before they came to their senses and realized that they are what their record says they are: a good team but not a championship one.
And this is a school that's got buckets of money and first class facilities.
So, don't think that you're going to hire the next Jimbo Fisher and tear up the ACC Coastal next year, or the next five years, or be in any position to compete for a BCS slot before the end of the coming decade. It's not gonna happen. Florida will just reload next year with a bangin' recruiting class. FSU and Virginia Tech will be the only two teams that matter in the ACC (again), with Carolina, Maryland, NC State, and Ga. Tech continuing to build and get better. The other Florida schools are ascending to prominence fast. It's only gonna get worse before it gets better.
Every team at some point goes through a nadir of sorts. Nebraska seems to have come out of theirs. Notre Dame probably have turned the corner, but they're nothing close to where they were with Lou Holtz. Tennessee will be good again, and Georgia will be back as well. But until the Miami athletic department fixes the other things that's wrong with their program, you can only rightfully expect more mediocre seasons for years to come.
Miami is, at best, a middle-of-the-pack-team in a middle-of-the-pack conference. Get used to it.
No comments:
Post a Comment