Lessons from history in hiring coaches: 2002, 2004, 2010, 2014

[Escambia94]

On January 4, 2002, Steve Spurrier resigned as the head coach of the Florida Gators and signed with the Washington Redskins what was at the time the most lucrative NFL coaching contract in history. According to rumors and the media at the time, the leading candidates to replace the Head Ball Coach were Bobby Stoops (head coach, University of Oklahoma), Mike Shanahan (head coach, Denver Broncos), Rick Neuheisel (head coach, University of Washington), Mike Bellotti (head coach, University of Oregon), and, of course, Ron Zook (defensive coordinator, New Orleans Saints). Stoops and Shanahan were having too much success in their jobs to leave those jobs. Both of them had been assistants at Florida at one time or another. Neuheisel and Bellotti were the standard rumors, and Zook was the fallback plan should the other options not pan out. Jeremy Foley caught a lot of flak for going with Zook, who had no head coaching experience, but given the options at the time I can see why Foley went with a former assistant under Spurrier. Stoops and Shanahan were never going to leave their jobs in 2002 to coach Florida, but either one of them would have done better than Zook. Neuheisel was an interesting rumor at the time that was probably thrown out there because at the time he was one of the highest paid coaches, and one of the few demanding $1M salary. I am glad Florida did not select him--assuming he was actually on Foley's list--due to his run ins with the NCAA. Bellotti would have been a good hire for Florida, but he was probably just another rumor and he was deeply entrenched at Oregon. He even became an athletic director at Oregon soon after promoting his offensive coordinator, Chip Kelly, as head coach. What a small world! Although it is tempting to say that Foley should never have hired Zook due to his lack of head coaching experience, I can see why he was the best choice at the time. Ron Zook had ties to Florida, had served as assistant head coach under Spurrier, was friends with Jeremy Foley, and was available.

On October 25, 2004, Jeremy Foley fired his friend Ron Zook, but allowed him to continue coaching the final four games of the season. Bernie Machen had been the University of Florida athletic director since January of 2004 after serving in the same role for six years at Utah. The circumstances surrounding the hiring of Urban Meyer involve a lot of different variables to align. Urban Meyer was a friend of Bernie Machen, having served as a head coach under him at Utah. The University of Utah was also rather accommodating of Meyer in the way they structured his contract with a clause that made it easy for him to leave Utah without a buyout as long as it were for one of Meyer's dream positions at Ohio State, Notre Dame, or Florida. In November 2004, Notre Dame fired Ty Willingham, which opened up a bidding war between Notre Dame and Florida for Urban Meyer's services. In the end, I think it was the relationship that Meyer had with Machen that won the day, as well as Meyer's very high praise of the Florida program--even compared to his other dream jobs at Notre Dame and Ohio State.

On December 8, 2010, Urban Meyer announced his retirement from the coaching for the second time, and Will Muschamp was named head coach only three days later. Jeremy Foley probably had Muschamp lined up as a backup plan a year earlier when Meyer resigned and un-resigned. The rumors at the time had Bobby Stoops (head coach at the University of Oklahoma, former defensive coordinator under Steve Spurrier), Dan Mullen (head coach at Mississippi State, former offensive coordinator under Urban Meyer), Charlie Strong (head coach at University of Louisville, former assistant under every Gator coach since Charley Pell), and Kyle Whittingham (head coach at the University of Utah and successor to Urban Meyer). The off-the-wall rumors at the time (some even discussed on this forum) include Boise State's Chris Petersen, Stanford's Jim Harbaugh, and TCU's Gary Patterson. Given that fact that only three days passed between Meyer's resignation and Muschamp's hiring, I believe that the hiring process really came down to a phone call and a visit between Jeremy Foley and Will Muschamp.

On November 16, 2014, Jeremy Foley announced that William Larry Muschamp would be stepping down at the end of the season and once again the Gator Nation spun up the coaching rumor mill. This time around I do not think Foley had a very strong list of candidates to choose from, and he did not have the advantage of a year's warning that he had with Meyer. The usual sources cited Mike Gundy (head coach at Oklahoma State) and Jim McElwain (head coach at Colorado State) as the leading candidates, although many other names were thrown around: Chad Morris (offensive coordinator, Clemson University), Dan Mullen (head coach, Mississippi State University), Rich Rodriguez (head coach, University of Arizona), and any name on the list from 2010. On December 4, 2014, after a few rounds of tracking UF's Cessna Citation and King Air 200 back and forth to Colorado. On this forum, interestingly enough, I had Chip Kelly atop my list of replacements for Muschamp, but Jeremy Foley could not land a deal with anyone other than Jim McElwain for whatever reason.

On October 29, 2017, Jim McElwain's contract as head coach at Florida was terminated for cause (TFC). This is an important distinction from Mac's predecessors. (I happen to deal with government contracts, so I consider TFCs to be serious). This coaching search is like a mix of 2014 with the tracking of airplanes and outlandish list of rumored candidates and 2004 with the impending bidding war between UCLA and Florida for Chip Kelly.

 

[Leakfan12]

I think someone posted that Spurrier resigned late making difficult to get a new coach or something like that. I doubt Shanahan would have left the NFL. Stoops would have been nice but Oklahoma was a great situation especially two years remove from a championship.

2004: In fairness, we should be lucky Meyer (despite how we feel about him now) chose Florida over his dream job of Notre Dame. Would the Gators win in 2006 and in 2008 without him? I doubt it. Also besides Bernie Machen, a reason why Meyer chose Florida was the recruitment in Florida. You could recruit Florida high schools and be in time for dinner.

2010: It would have been nice to get Mullen though I'm sure he wanted to build Miss St. Whittingham probably would have taken the job if Utah didn't get added in the Pac 12. Plus we thought it was a coup to get Muschamp because he was the coach in waiting for Mack Brown. Didn't pan out though he did take the team to a BCS Bowl.

2014: Gundy wasn't going to happen because he's there in his alma mater.

2017: If Chip Kelly either goes to UCLA or stays with ESPN I think either Frost or Mullen should get a look it though I doubt Franks can do what those three will demand of him. Granted they can recruit a dual threat QB.

 

[DRU2012]

I needed a day off from all the hand-wringing and doubt that this whole "situation" has descended into.
As we turn now to our "last game of the season", and are forced to deal with whatever remains after (in my view) squandering the only (admittedly dubious) "advantage" our headstart on the rest of them out there who'll soon be similarly scrambling to make THE BIG MOVE, for the moment I commend y'all to my post over on the "Chip Kelly..." thread.
At the moment, I have no gut-level "feel" for where this Gator "braintrust" is headed, nor indeed much confidence that THEY know. Worst of all, I have begun to feel that (for all the reasons we have discussed and MORE) NONE of the candidates seemingly remaining are right for us:
@Escambia94, @Leakfan12 ,
Your arguments and analyses themselves only DEEPEN my concerns, and solidify fears that we are about to do the same "dance of hope-to-disillusionment" once more--and this time it really WILL likely be "ONCE...", followed this time by a plunge into full-on irrelevancy for some years to come.
We are at that teetering point-of-disaster, I'm afraid. There isn't any more time or room to "try again and see what happens".
Are we ready to flounder in the wilderness of futility for 10 or 15 years before someone special, freakishly talented, uniquely suited and dedicated to The University of Florida IN PARTICULAR to come along, ready, able and WILLING to step in and save us? Where IS this "next SS"? There's no sign as yet that TT (the obvious parallel posssibility) is even interested in that future, let alone that he has the calling. Who will come and SAVE us this theoretical "Next Time" anyway???!!!

 

[Escambia94]

I think the next, good Gator head coach will not be the next Steve Spurrier, but the next Urban Meyer. I know there is still some ill will towards Urban, but keep in mind that in 2002 he was seen as an offensive innovator at Bowling Green, and by 2004 everyone knew that he was too big for Utah--despite his lack of head coaching experience at a Power 5 school.

Scott Frost might be the next Urban Meyer, but I am not ready to make that assumption. I am more apt to believe that Chip Kelly is the next Steve Spurrier due to both of them having pro coaching experience and college coaching with a conference championship before being considered at Florida (although there was no doubt that Florida would have taken Spurrier back home in December 1989 given what happened with Charley Pell and Galen Hall).

 

[DRU2012]

@Escambia94,
Next Coach "...not a Spurrier, but rather an Urban Meier..."?
My first response was "...It'll HAVE to be!"
For a lot of reasons, but mostly just cynical, practical ones.
My SECOND response, on further thought soon after, was more along lines of--"At this point, We'll TAKE it!"
Matter of fact, truth is I'd had more or less my own version of the same thought already--that if we were to find someone likeliest to succeed for and with us now it'd probably be someone who CAN "play the angles", in the gray areas "on and around the edges" that skirt or finesse the legalities and supposed rules' "intents and purposes".
Once you ARE successful there is a whole lot less "vested interest" in seeing you cornered and crucified for it. Just look at the facts. Saban doesn't have to even TRY to be likeable. Even Urban Meyer when still back with UF was never really pressed--even while the same people went after some of his PLAYERS--kids recruited by and playing under him...and of course not a blink in his direction when it turned out how he was double-dealing us at the end. That was OUR problem, OUR oversight (outside of Gator Nation, of course.
Let's face it: We'd ALL settle for another such roller coaster ride now if it included success, prominence, great stars and high-profile CHAMPIONSHIPS here and there for a time--even if that all led to notoriety and eventual betrayal at the end once again. I'm not proud of this admission--and I'd still RATHER go for "honor and pride" behind a man focused much as possible on "doing it right", but is that at all likely? Not when "stumbling irrelevancy" is our greatest fear, extended deterioration the big enemy now.

 

[Ufgatorfan]

OMFG.... we are the laughing stock of the coaching process too. We can’t even get that right. i wasn’t sold on Kelly because I️ believe he’ll bolt for the NFL again but it was a big miss and essentially he chose a baset ball school over a football school. Craziness

 

[DRU2012]

OMFG.... we are the laughing stock of the coaching process too. We can’t even get that right. i wasn’t sold on Kelly because I️ believe he’ll bolt for the NFL again but it was a big miss and essentially he chose a baset ball school over a football school. Craziness

Yes. Our AD wasted a lot of time, meanwhle thru it all sending the covert message that this was The Guy HE wanted, letting Kelly string us along the whole time while he maneuvered for the job he REALLY wanted. Kelly used us as a bargaining tool, made our AD look like a rube (which in many ways I'm afraid he IS), a naive fool who showed everyone the cards in his (weak) hand.
I am NOT that disappointed in not getting him--more and more saw reasons why Kelly had baggage AND wasn't a good fit at UF--but the time wasted during this time, and what it all showed--both about our AD AND the other candidates--have fallen all the further after the one he held in highest regard both weakened our prospects, AND my feelings regarding our prospects with him carrying out this search, making the decision.
I think his seemingly now-obvious 2nd choice, Frost, is no better (probably even a LESS attractive) candidate: HE may well try to use us the same way to get his best deal with Nebraska as his mentor just did with UCLA--and am not sold he's anything more than a potential "repeat-MacEllwaine" anyway.
After that, we are back to the start--about where we were (and should have been moving forward FROM) weeks ago.
I go over all this and more in my last post on today's ostensible gameday-thread ("Crappy Gator/FSU Game...").
The questions I end those comments with are the ones that are still truly CENTRAL here:
"What do we do?" "Who do we go after?" "What IS our FUTURE??!!"

 

[Escambia94]

I am not sweating the UCLA hiring of Chip Kelly unless Chip grabs a bunch of good coordinators.

 

[Leakfan12]

I am not sweating the UCLA hiring of Chip Kelly unless Chip grabs a bunch of good coordinators.

Plus it helps that he's not going to recruit many players from Florida, maybe a few but that's it. California they're packed as well and so is Texas.

 

[Ufgatorfan]

I’m over all this Florida crap. From the useless Mac to his entire staff. Not a fan of Shannon. I think he’s a honorable guy but not sure I’d like to see him stick around. I feel an entire new staff from top to bottom would do us good.

I’m so glad the season is over. And I’ll end it with this. I thought Franks would be a good QB. He truly has no head smarts when it comes to the QB position. For goodness sakes his post game interviews are as bad as Macs. He seem to believe that INT age no big deal and part of the game. Well so is losing Franks and no one goes out there to lose jackass!!

 

[DRU2012]

I’m over all this Florida crap. From the useless Mac to his entire staff. Not a fan of Shannon. I think he’s a honorable guy but not sure I’d like to see him stick around. I feel an entire new staff from top to bottom would do us good.

I’m so glad the season is over. And I’ll end it with this. I thought Franks would be a good QB. He truly has no head smarts when it comes to the QB position. For goodness sakes his post game interviews are as bad as Macs. He seem to believe that INT age no big deal and part of the game. Well so is losing Franks and no one goes out there to lose jackass!!

Yeah, he's not "learnin' and growin' ", that seems clear. Probably another guy who leaves and does ok somewhere else--but at our level of talent and expectation: Not much more than an "ok drop back" QB, NO kind of a modern "run'n'gun/spread" Coach's guy...He's more a "bail out/back up" caliber QB for us--and THAT'S only if he can finally learn when NOT to throw it. Little sign of it so far.
And yes, those recent after-game interviews are almost comical--in fact, if he were the OTHER team's QB I WOULD be cracking up!
Above all, "entire new staff, top to bottom..." is fine with me; but I would add (as much or MORE importantly) "...and the AD must go right along WITH them!" We already need a new guy there, one who can say "No, NO WAY!" to the current "backroom boosters": might be the only way to effect a true and sorely-needed "house cleaning" in our program.
This Gator is rotting from the head DOWN! And let's face it: Right now "the head" isn't even on the official "paid staff". We CAN'T fire the guys mostly running things right now. So I am sure that at SOME point we gotta clear out those we can, bring in someone who will deal with them himself--Find and hire someone with guts and vision who will stand UP to them.
(I know I'm gonna hear from E- all kinds of reasons why that can't and/or won't happen--not in any "official" way...and though I understand, practically speaking we damn well better find a way to basically and effectively accomplish just that, or there will be no change in our future or fate.)
It is BECAUSE of the current dysfunctional nature of the group running things that we are not only "in a deep hole getting deeper", but that our ability to change that appears so hopelessly missing.

 

[Escambia94]

I actually agree with you, @DRU2012 . High school kids in the Sunshine State are built for some variation of the spread. The new coach will thrive if he brings in a spread offense that suits kids coming out of Orlando Dr. Phillips, Orlando Winter Park, Apopka Wekiva, Fort Lauderdale St Thomas Aquinas, Plant City, and St Augustine. If those high schools look familiar, it is because that is where everybody else not named UF or FSU seems to be grabbing talent and bringing them to Clemson, Alabama, and even Nebraska. UF has done well with Plant City and St Thomas Aquinas, but not so much with the others. To top it off, the kids that UF does recruit well are the ones that are, um, full of the kind of kids that would steal credit cards or get caught smoking pot the week before a big game. Whatever sensitive issue it is that I am tap-dancing around there needs to be fixed by the next head coach, and it will not be fixed simply by plugging in Chip Kelly or Scott Frost.

Fix the recruiting. Instill discipline in the recruits. Develop the talent. Execute good football. Muschamp and McElwain focused too much on defense or offense and national signing day, but not much else. That needs to change with the next coach: a holistic approach to fixing the program.

 

[DRU2012]

@Escambia94,
Could not have said it any better.
And yes, "a holistic approach" would be a godsend--a complete sea change, for all the concrete reasons you have noted, above and elsewhere.

 

[DRU2012]

Oh, one more thing:
A point E- made back at the start of this, Mac's firing and again just a few days back that underlined and further detailed what in fact really happened, something that bothered me at the back of my mind then but got lost in other concerns...
This point about him being "Fired FOR JUST CAUSE": That IS a different thing, a higher magnitude, on another LEVEL of seriousness and severity than the mumbo jumbo normally surrounding a simple "parting of the ways" when administration and fans are simply tired of LOSING under a particular Coach. This "...Just Cause" context is something that indicates deeper, more long-standing and legally actionable problems out there...But then it came out that these geniuses had offered and staked this unproven-at-our-level outsider to an unusually large and seemingly ironclad "pre nup": I suspect there was more going on there behind the scenes, more than we'll ever know long as Mac just shuts up and takes the (significantly less than contractually owed) buy-out ("HUSH"?)MONEY with no further comment. Even at the time, just based on what was said and what we DO know, I thought it was mostly a matter of expediency--save some cash and get him OUTTA here, keep things quiet as possible and keep the focus OFF how bad a decision AND contract you made with him in the first place. More I think about it now, more I realize that they WERE relatively easy on him--and went that way BECAUSE it WAS such a misjudgement by "certain people" in so many ways. Any way we could push our current AD out for all the mistakes and bad judgement HE (AND the cabal manipulating his puppet strings) was in fact responsible for, as indicated by this tip-of-the-iceburg "bail-out and get-him-GONE" approach, E-???
And more: I always thought that Meier deserved that level of scrutiny, at the very least, for the behind-our-backs betrayal he engineered from behind the desk in his PRIVATE OFFICE IN THE UF ATHLETIC DEPT the following Fall after stepping down as our Coach...Did Slive and Co. ALSO pull a similar "cover-ass-and-get-him-outta-here" thing??? The same "backroom booster guys" were in place then, and the much-respected EVERYWHERE Slive was angling for his eventual coronation as SEC Commish, after all...Is this just another sleazy episode of "How Business is DONE in Big Time College Football?"--And too damn BAD for the Program and particular School that made it all possible for everyone involved? It may not ITSELF have driven our ongoing slide, but together along with all the Mac shit (maybe Muschamp too--there's a pattern shaping up here: Why SHOULDN'T we take another, closer look at that stretch in the middle of all this?), and many other such things, large and small along the way, been a part of an ongoing attitude and environment of old-boy "handshakes, favors and wink-at-the-rules" corruption that were the long prelude and contributor to where we are headed now.
I don't know what, if anything, could be done directly to anyone now--but maybe, just maybe, a little "investigative journalism", or even "seedy gumshoe legwork", might dig up enough in the way of supporting evidence, or even just the SMELL of such "evidence", to "move a mountain" after all: Get the heretofore "UNmoveable" rich-guy string-pullers OUT of the way, send them packing and clear the way long enough to GET someone with integrity and a new slate in there at AD etc and start over, CLEAN HOUSE like we really NEED to but aren't gonna be able to get done with the current vile crop of corruptors still on the scene.
Just a THOUGHT, mind you.

 

[Escambia94]

1. Jim McElwain. Mac made an egregious error in bringing up death threats at a press conference. If I were Scott Stricklin, I would not have been so generous. I would have taken the podium and announced that Jim McElwain was being terminated for cause and that the University of Florida was going to withhold the remainder of the salary and use a portion of those funds to pay for a private investigation into the matter. If it turns out that he lied, I would even press charges against him and make it very hard for him to get a job anywhere in the NCAA. Anyone who thinks Mac was fired for losing is just not paying attention. Mac is a liar and a quitter who could have put the University of Florida in a legal bind.
2. Urban Meyer. I am one of the few Meyer fans in the Gator Nation. Fans who are upset that we did not win the Chip Kelly or Scott Frost sweepstakes are forgetting that in 2004 we beat Notre Dame in the Urban Meyer sweepstakes. Meyer wrote two books praising the University of Florida and its heritage and how to win football at UF. Dan Mullen was a part of that story as Urban's right hand man. Some say that Mullen's departure was the beginning of the end for Urban Meyer's tenure at Florida.
3. Dan Mullen. Fun fact #1: Dan Mullen is 1-0 against his mentor, Urban Meyer. I was at the game where Mullen knocked the Gators out of the rankings. Will Mullen clean house? We do not know yet. Mullen left UF in December 2008, before the Gator locker room became painfully divisive. Fun fact#2: Dan Mullen is part of the New Hampshire Mafia, a group of coaches from that part of the country. Chip Kelly is also a member.

 

[Leakfan12]

1. Jim McElwain. Mac made an egregious error in bringing up death threats at a press conference. If I were Scott Stricklin, I would not have been so generous. I would have taken the podium and announced that Jim McElwain was being terminated for cause and that the University of Florida was going to withhold the remainder of the salary and use a portion of those funds to pay for a private investigation into the matter. If it turns out that he lied, I would even press charges against him and make it very hard for him to get a job anywhere in the NCAA. Anyone who thinks Mac was fired for losing is just not paying attention. Mac is a liar and a quitter who could have put the University of Florida in a legal bind.
2. Urban Meyer. I am one of the few Meyer fans in the Gator Nation. Fans who are upset that we did not win the Chip Kelly or Scott Frost sweepstakes are forgetting that in 2004 we beat Notre Dame in the Urban Meyer sweepstakes. Meyer wrote two books praising the University of Florida and its heritage and how to win football at UF. Dan Mullen was a part of that story as Urban's right hand man. Some say that Mullen's departure was the beginning of the end for Urban Meyer's tenure at Florida.
3. Dan Mullen. Fun fact #1: Dan Mullen is 1-0 against his mentor, Urban Meyer. I was at the game where Mullen knocked the Gators out of the rankings. Will Mullen clean house? We do not know yet. Mullen left UF in December 2008, before the Gator locker room became painfully divisive. Fun fact#2: Dan Mullen is part of the New Hampshire Mafia, a group of coaches from that part of the country. Chip Kelly is also a member.

I agree with 1 and 2. Meyer leaving for "health reasons" and a year later he's coaching Ohio State was a bitter pill to take. Even worse than Spurrier going to South Carolina and that's saying something. At least it was after the OBC gave the NFL a chance. Plus Meyer probably should have left after the 2009 season. In fairness, I am happy Meyer did chose UF over Notre Dame and happy about 2006 and 2008 (and 2009 minus one game). Who knows if Cam Newton was the starting QB in 2010. Also I remember that MSU in 2010 as well though I was at home watching it on the TV. It was so bad, Mullen didn't even pass in the second half knowing the Gators O couldn't do crap and he was right. Again that was Meyer in 2010, I know people gave Spurrier crap for quitting midseason but Meyer coaching in 2010 was a mistake.