Sorry, E-, but I'm past, WAY past your admittedly "reasonable" projections...the patient needs major surgery--and though it will require time and planning, there is no longer an unlimited amount of either left for any kind of "optimistic prognosis", even if we "get it ALL right" this time.
As I referred to above, I already made the very same arguments and excuses for our HC along the way--was making them right into the 2nd half of the UK game, in fact. Briefly, paragraph by paragraph in your response:
Yes, it's a tough road at a tough time. I don't have answers right off hand, and want to hear everyone's ideas--there don't appear to be easy or obvious ones. That's EXACTLY why I place the whole "Who are we?!!"/"We've got money, power, all the essentials AND intangibles, time to DO something with them!" issue front and center now. No use making excuses in advance: "What can we DO?", not "Why we can't do this or that..."
I don't know if Will Muschamp will ever be "a good Head Coach one day"--He just didn't get the job done here and now--and I would have "bet the house" he could and would when he got here. We were all there, I followed and understood, STILL see and understand what was and wasn't within his control. So I'm not pointing fingers, bemoaning the choice or rehashing what went wrong at this point: Doesn't matter, from a practical, forward-looking POV. All that "MATTERS" for us now is where we go next, and what we do to head there.
(Interestingly enough, btw, and tied in with not only your point but the whole pending debate about "who's out there" is the job facing Charlie Strong here in Austin, and how his approach seems an even more drastic version of Muschamp's attitude and methods regarding reestablishing responsibility and discipline, hopefully "self-discipline" on the part of his players and the team he is trying to restore/rebuild...Another DEFENSIVE-specialist taking the "high/hard road"--and as the guy mentioned most often in "if only", "can't do it now" and "what might have been" terms, it's possible to imagine EITHER scenario: That it would have gone the same in any case (and may well still, for him here), or MAYBE that BOTH programs, thru' timing and circumstance, got it wrong, that each man was more suited for, "natural fits" at the OTHER school, Will at UT and Charlie at UF. We'll never know...but that TOO is part of my point here: IT DOESN'T MATTER now. We gotta deal how things are, what's ahead of us. And I'm NOT convinced that there just isn't a "right move" out there; haven't heard one yet, not even close--but that's why it's time to think in terms of who and what would be the best for us--THEN worrry about if and how to get it done. "No matter what it takes" has to be the catch-phrase, once we get there though.)
As for the last paragraph there, well, I have heard too many versions of that , more and more often as Will Muschamp's tenure has ground on...Never said it myself until now, and here is how I'd put it:
If we were to come close to winning-out, win the games against less-talented teams easily and take, say, all but ONE of the remaining "rival games" against supposed "powerhouse" teams (LSU, Georgia, and FSU), lose one of 'em in a close, hard-fought battle, well, I suppose that would constitute "pulling us back from the brink"--and suggest that I, along with many others, had panicked, "freaked" too soon. Thing is, I don't think it'll take very long to break THAT set of conditions, do you? Meanwhile, I think we all agree that any change wasn't coming anytime soon ("soon" being the next 5 or 6 games, or perhaps more likely not at ALL mid-season--for all the reasons you give, and more.
Sorry, man. I totally respect your views and opinion, your intelligent and rational analysis in general--but I just am further along the "bummer curve" I think this time than you.
I STILL really hope that it is ME that has to back off, ultimately concede my "loss of faith". But by now I HAVE to be where I am, begin to accept and turn-the-page. Hoping for better, wishing it were otherwise is just too painful, a kind of "slow-death" I can't, won't live with. We all care about our team and program that much--and that's what I have to do to carry on: Turn my back on what has been and (I think) is coming, and look to where we can one day be, and focus on what we need to do to get there. That's MY way, ironically I guess, of "Looking ahead with hope".