In Reply to: Short opening statement by Chesney. He starts off by saying... posted by BrewNGold on December 09, 2025 at 13:25:27
is when he talked about his relationships with Bill Belichick and the GM of the Chiefs. I fear that if he has 1-2 good years, he will end up in the NFL. But, I'd still take that because it would mean he picked us up off the mat.
The guy was confident, convincing, and just looked thrilled to be here. He didn't have to tell us about how excited he was or how much passion he has. It was apparent from everything else he said.
I think he also got pretty bold with some of his statements without coming off as arrogant.
I also thought he came across as very palatable to the UCLA culture. Talked convincingly about character and the importance of developing young men, but without the "glory to god" and "god has a plan for me" stuff. Looks good and sounds good without coming off as disingenuous or slick. No signs of discomfort, paranoia, or irritability, unlike pretty much all of the post-Donahue coaches.
I think he will be an elite recruiter.
I don't think we could have realistically made a better hire. That doesn't mean he will succeed but the process UCLA went through here was done right.
Of course, it's all happy talk now. We will see how he does when he hits some adversity.
But I don't know how anyone can look at this as anything other than extremely promising.