In Reply to: Ucla football, HC's, and HC searches. posted by hotspot on January 09, 2024 at 12:39:31
interesting thoughts, nice post.
About Chip and assistants - after the ASU debacle reports were that Jarmond was looking around. Then we beat SC which lowered the heat a bit and ultimately we stood pat with Chip. Who has stood pat with his assistants after SC more than doubled Lynn's pay and the latter moved on (taking his two young defensive stars with him).
Money talks. UCLA was in a tough financial position and in a huge public university system that is traditionally fiscally conservative. The UnderArmor fiasco dug us a deep hole. and as we are climbing out of that one, the Pac's underpaying of Comcast created a need for over-payments which cut a chunk out of the money we expected to be getting from the Pac-12.
But imo it makes sense to wonder a couple things about this situation - i have no doubt but our decision to stand fast wasn't dictated by the administration's unwillingness to pony up all the millions of dollars that would be required to both pay off the current HC and probably nearly all his staff as well and also, at the same time, come up with the funds to make a successful hire of a new HC and his all new staff as well. And the key donors weren't willing to do so either.
At the same time i wonder if the writing about next year isn't already up there on the wall. We're not likely to be better than a .500 team next year and that's counting on the couple early easier games. At best it would seem 7-5 but imo more likely to fall below .500. Wonder if that's another reason Lynn decided to move on - take the big raise and likely better spot now rather than stick it out, have poorer results next year and then get fired with the rest of the staff a year from now.
Personally i was hoping we'd make the change. There are good things about Chip and his program - the way he treats his players, the fact that, with the right personnel his offenses are still effective. But his failures in recruiting - imo that's where fb has passed him by - you aren't going to compete with the big boys successfully today on a poster of 3 stars you hope to develop over time.
Making the change would have given the new staff the cover of their honeymoon period to start building the program back up. We still get knocked around next year but after a year or two we're getting into position to actually compete with our new conference.
NOT making the change just feels like a temporizing move. With the results we are facing next season, don't see how Chip can survive beyond next year. And at that point we're in the B1G, already are getting B1G money. and perhaps that gives us more optimism about finding the right coach. All three other Pac-12 schools going B1G with us have shopped and found outstanding new HCs in the process. DeBoer at UW, Landing at Oregon, Riley at SC (don't write him off yet - his offense is still top notch and with Lynn (as well as Sc$$) he may finally have the defense to truly lift his program to contention at the top).
Riley was an elite serving HC; Lanning was a good-as-it-gets Coordinator at an elite program; DeBoer was an elite lower division wunderkind HC who also already had some experience as the HC of a D1 program. Three different avenues. My own hope is we go for one of the latter routes - find the right coach rather than someone who's been there already and may or may not have the energy and enthusiasm for the long haul in a program that could have decent money but not nearly at the same level of the handful of top programs.
Anyway, Chip has promoted talented and loyal guys already on staff to fill current vacancies. He didn't - or wasn't able to finally - go out and spend what it would have taken to replace D'Anton Lynn with an equally high level DC. Again, who would come given Chip's hot seat situation and the specter of following an outstanding year of defense while losing what may turn out to be the entire core of the defensive talent that led to last season's defensive success?
Sure sounds to me like a probable one-year gig - up root your family, move to new digs in one of the most expensive real estate markets in the country, and then prepare to start all over at the end of one less-than-impressive season?
Anyway, your post is a good one - and it may actually be just as meaningful after next season as it is now - perhaps even moreso. (Note: Mora had a record of quick success followed by a decline in effectiveness prior to UCLA. He was terrific at first, convinced me i was wrong to doubt him, but then something changed - his personal life - and his program floundered. John had excellent NFL creds but college success is about recruiting and that wasn't his background far as i know. Anyway, he decided his future was in the NFL - and he was certainly right about that. With Chip, the same questions - feeling was his name and rep would take care of recruiting but recruiting, like playing defense in basketball, is all about effort and that hasn't worked out so well. i too liked Fisch - he was a terrific OC - certainly reasonable questions about how he'd do as a HC. So far certainly so good at AZ and good for him. Now let's see how he holds up in the long run there in the hot and dry B-12....)