This.
We've done all we can do to keep Leach here short of get the IPF done. If someone wants to throw 6-7 million a year for 5 years at him can you be upset if he takes it? 2-3 extra million a year is nothing to sneeze at.
Miss. St
- Thread starter duoz56
- Start date
This.
We've done all we can do to keep Leach here short of get the IPF done. If someone wants to throw 6-7 million a year for 5 years at him can you be upset if he takes it? 2-3 extra million a year is nothing to sneeze at.
I agree. Like you wrote in the other thread, he hasn't voluntarily left a head coaching job. Yes, he listens and in the end, he has stayed. Perhaps he would have left to Tennessee last year, but as far as I can remember, he was on the sidelines at WSU this past season.
Honestly, I think most of us would listen if we were in his situation.
Yeah, thanks for that school record in wins, one of the biggest bowl wins in school history, and that school-record streak of consecutive bowl games, Mike.
This kind of BS is amazing, and I fear that it's going to take our program to fall down to considerable depths for the full absurdity of expecting more than what he's done to be realized. He's had us near the top of the conference in wins over a 5-year stretch and all the other stuff I mentioned, all with the smallest budget, no natural recruiting territory, and the worst situation to recruit to (location, travel, budget, etc.), all in the context of his assistants constantly being poached.
Beyond critique? No. Less than pleased with the rivalry game? Yeah, of course. But people really don't have a full appreciation for how difficult it is to win at WSU, and Leach undoubtedly has done that at a high level.
The last thing I want is for us to become Oregon State post-Andersen but, without predicting it, that's a very real possibility. Something between that and current-day Oregon State or Colorado is a reasonable baseline for a couple years after he bails, IMO, and people just don't get it.
They think we can have a coach who is up and coming, wants to be in Pullman forever, goes 10-2 or better every year, wins bowl games, runs the ball more, beats UW at least half the time, has a full staff of assistants who will stay forever, and where neither he nor any of his assistants are getting or seeking out raises or even talking to any other schools ... and, again, with all of this in the most disadvantaged situation in P5 in the Pac-12 and probably one of the most disadvantaged in the country.
Yeah, sure. I get the counter to all of this that's reflexively given ... in a certain sense, I understand it. It seems lame to think Mike Leach, and only Mike Leach, can ever win in Pullman. That's not my argument. My argument is that he is on staff right now and *does* win in Pullman, and that while it's not impossible for someone else to do the same or better, the likelihood of that probably is 5% or less, and the likelihood of someone who does all the stuff in my penultimate paragraph is more like 0.000001%.
Craig Bohl has been a head coach for the past 17 years, the past 6 at an FBS school. He won 3 national championships at FCS and has taken Wyoming to 3 bowl games. I'm not advocating that WSU hires him if Leach were to bail, but he has a lot of experience and success on his resume...and we could do a lot worse.
Glad Cougar
He is someone WSU should talk to. Give him a chance. Maybe he blows the doors off the interview.
blowing the doors off the interview means nothing, in business or football. I've seen many people that killed it in their interview fail miserably once hired
Let's flip the coin--lets say Chun starts interviewing other coaches, not to hire them per se, just to see what their interest level is and what they have to say about coaching at WSU. Can't hurt to see who else is out there, right? Think CML is cool with this? I'm not saying the guy shouldn't listen if Florida or Georgia come knocking, but I'd think a very decent salary with an automatic renewal of his 5-year contract irrespective of job performance should warrant a modicum of fidelity to his employer, rather than letting any Tom, Dick, and Harry in the door that wants to talk job swapping.
Not really sure it works that way
As to "how hard it is to win in Pullman"...
Historically, the cougs are historically bad. Worse than I ever realized.
WSU 100 years w/l record
- Out of 100 years, 59 are .500 or less.
- 3-4 wins is our historical sweet spot
- One 11, five 10, and five 9 win seasons
- 15 bowl games, 7-8 record
- 12 seasons finished ranked, 5 top 10 finishes (Price has 5 of these, fwiw)
When you go to that link and compare us to other schools, it becomes quickly apparent that it is possible to win in Pullman, but nearly impossible to do it consistently. Also, football in Pullman is either boon or bust.
CML is bringing us something no other ever has - consistency. When (not if) he goes, it is almost certain we will go back to 3 win seasons bracketed by a couple of successfull ones.
SO PICK YOUR FCKING POISON, PEOPLE.
This can't possibly be true. We're paying $4mil/year now. That should guarantee us winning seasons more often than not? In fact, I'm not sure we're getting our $4mil worth as is right now. It might even get better from here on when/if Leach leaves
Very possible, not "almost certain." First of all, as you wrote, Leach has brought consistency to the program. That means his replacement will be coming into a more stable situation than anyone else has come into before in Pullman. Secondly, assuming we pay the new coach something close to what Leach is making, that's a lot more than what other new coaches have made coming to WSU. That should buy something better than going back to 3 win seasons. Yes, that assumes the AD makes a good hire, but I have faith in Chun to do just that based on what he has done with other WSU athletic programs.
The most desirable scenario for most of us is that Leach stays. But despite our long history of overall ineptitude in football, we are in a much better place right now to sustain success even without Mike Leach. I'm not afraid of a future without Leach.
Glad Cougar
This...I don’t want Leach to go and it didn’t really annoy me much that he interviewed at Arkansas seeing as though the speculation came and went relatively quickly, and he should certainly make sure he’s compensated fairly. However, news that he is interviewing again, at another job that’s arguably a lateral move, I find to be irritating and disrespectful to KS and Chun, who by all accounts have given him immense support. Also, the continued flirtation with other schools isn’t going to do wonders for recruiting or for a very important DC hire, which is a big part of his job and potential for future success.
What I thought was a little more telling is WSU has exactly ONE win in the Apple Cup in the last 20 years when UW had a winning team. Yeah some of that was Leach's 7 losses, but he also has the one win over a UW winning team. All of the talk of how he has been disproportionately bad in that game does not hold up when you look at actual history. The wins in that game in 2004,2005, 2007 and 2008 were against UW teams with crazy bad records : 1-10,2-9,4-9 and 0-12.
People may not want to acknowledge it but the biggest issue with Leach's run at WSU is it unfortunately corresponded when UW resurrected their program and they are also winning more consistently than they have in the last 25 years. My money is for Leach to maintain his consistency because he has a 20 year track record. The newbie at UW has no track record and can not even hire an OC, so we will see.
My only question about our "more stable situation" was actually gaining ground on other programs (coach salary/facilities etc...) vs just keeping pace and not falling behind even more. That to me, is the million $ question.
33rd highest salary in the nation, 4th in the Pac, 3rd in the north.
MSU is in the basement of the SEC for HC salary and asst salaries, and Moorehead made $500k less than CML.
Arguably this would not be a lateral move, but a step back due to the conference and what it takes to be competitive there.
Seriously, this is a slap in the face of Chun and WSU to take that interview.
It's not quite Tiger Woods and the Perkins waitress, but it's getting close.
The key aspect is what Miss State is offering now, rather than what Moorhead was being paid. His only prior head coaching experience was at Fordham. Leach is in a different category (so is Sarkisian for that matter).
On this, I think your overall point is pretty reasonable in that we don't currently have some of the disadvantages we had historically. The stadium has been improved, we're paying a market wage to coaches, etc. We no longer have to try to hire some Big Sky coach for half of the market wage.
I just hope people understand that paying a market wage and having median-level (or below) facilities in the conference doesn't guarantee success. It is necessary, not sufficient.
Similarly, having a baseline level of lower-tier, arguably solid Pac-12 talent (which is what we have with Leach) doesn't guarantee a subsequent coach can win at a high level with it. Objectively, by the numbers and in the aggregate, the talent we have coming in the door each year is in the bottom quartile of the conference. Those numbers aren't completely reliable, but the current staff's ability to win with lower-ranked talent is as good as it gets nationally and is unusual.
As far as another coach's ability to recruit, keep staff, etc., we have all the disadvantages I mentioned earlier (recruiting territory, budget, history, prestige, etc.). Even if our other "stuff" is as good as everyone else, history and looking at other programs around the country, currently and historically, bears out that this doesn't lend itself to ongoing success. The only "have nots" that have become sustainable winners have had massive infusions of cash into the program (e.g., Pickens, Knight) and/or have had a HOF-level coach that has stayed forever (Snyder, Beamer), and the latter case is questionable in terms of sustainability in and of itself ... at those schools, it has led to significant increases in donations and facilities. Even today, I can assure you nobody in Big 12 country thinks of Kansas State as a "have" or a sustainable winner, for instance.
In the case of Leach, I can recall sentiments among Texas Tech fans that were similar to some of what we've heard from WSU fans recently ... I was looking around the boards when we hired him and I saw some mixed opinions similar to what we're seeing now around the time he was fired. Some were tired of him supposedly shopping around for other offers, etc., while most loved the guy. Tech had expanded the stadium multiple times, had attained a degree of national relevance, etc., but a segment still didn't like the guy and was sure they'd be fine, even better off, perhaps, with Tuberville. Tuberville was hired from the SEC and paid a good amount of money, and many of the arguments (as I recall) were exactly like what we're seeing from some fans here ... everything would be fine because Tech now was a sustainable winner, Leach had improved the program but couldn't get it over the hump, Tuberville cared about defense and wanted a more balanced offense, etc.
Well, Tuberville failed miserably. Then with Kingsbury, everyone thought he was going to be like Leach but even better, with a more balanced offense and various attributes that would allow national attention, great recruiting, etc. Well, he failed, too ... he had a decent first year with Tuberville's / Leach's players and was viewed as doing OK, then just flat-out couldn't get it done.
Are we doomed to the exact same fate as Tech? Not necessarily, but every single piece of objective evidence, and a two-part example that is as on point as you could ever hope for, suggests that we're in for something similar if Leach leaves, if not worse.
I don’t think being tired of Leach’s issues and wanting him to stay are mutually exclusive. He’s been an innovator for a long time, and with Wilson and Grinch, found something we really needed. He needs to work hard to find that again. He also needs to innovate on O and incorporate some running and TE’s as possession receivers into the Offense. The defensive shortfalls are a product of other people taking our good coaches, but for 4mil a year he needs to develop a plan and pipeline of recruiters and coaches to combat that. Is it hard? Yes. But he makes a shit load of money and that’s what he’s paid for. I don’t think it’s acceptable under his watch for our defense to get as bad as it has been.
But I would prefer for him to stay, find a DC, and continue with the program instead of dropping into oblivion.
But I would prefer for him to stay, find a DC, and continue with the program instead of dropping into oblivion.
I get it that you're joking so don't take this too personally... but you've touched on something that always comes up when a persons income, comes up.
But it's so... I don't know the right word... fashionable? Acceptable? Mainstream? Whatever word that fits into your lexicon...
But it's so acceptable to be jealous of someone else's "stuff". I truly do hate it. I wish people would just be concerned about themselves a little more and a little less on what the Jones's were up to. Jealousy is one of the ugliest traits to me.
I would be very, very skeptical about hiring Craig Bohl. He has been underwhelming at Wyoming. He has a losing record overall and he's never lost fewer than five games in Laramie. The thing that is more interesting is looking back at his time at North Dakota State. Following is a list of his records there:
2004: 8-3
2005: 7-4
2006: 10-1
2007: 10-1
2008: 6-5 (changed to Missouri Valley)
2009: 3-8
2010: 9-5
2011: 14-1
2012: 14-1
2013: 15-0
He had a good team in the Great West conference but got smoked for a couple years when they stepped up the level of competition (relatively). By 2010, he had a pretty good team but was still struggling to get over the top. In 2011, he hired a guy named Chris Klieman to work on defense as a defensive backs coach. In 2012, Klieman was promoted to DC. I don't know how much of an impact that Klieman had in 2011, but North Dakota State continued to roll without Bohl there and went 69-6 under Klieman, who led KSU to a much better than expected 8-4 finish in the regular season this year.
There are a lot of KSU fans that feel that Klieman was the key to NDSU's success in the past 9 years. I don't know if that's the case, but Bohl's performance at Wyoming does not impress me regardless, and the stuff that I've heard around here over the past year doesn't make me feel different.
As I've said before, I hope Leach stays at WSU for the foreseeable future. With that said, the mindset of some of our fans who think we'll immediately slide into an abyss if he leaves is peculiar to me.
Don't get me wrong, I too will be nervous about the replacement hire; but pointing to Paul Wulff and referencing Texas Tech after Leach left screams loser mentality. Leach is going to leave someday. Maybe this year, maybe next year, maybe in 5 years. Does that mean it's over for WSU football when he does? We navigated through the 80's with quite a bit of success under Walden and Erickson, the 90's with Price, and the 2000's with Price, Doba, Wulff, and Leach, but that's the end? No other coach can win here?
Again, I don't think it's going to be easy to replace Leach. It might take a couple of hires, but good Lord, why won't we be able to find a coach? Justin Wilcox has done pretty well at Cal. His 2017 recruiting class was ranked 12th in the P12 and 70th in the Nation. That's just one example, but I find it hard to believe that if we float $3M+/year, we'll only be able to find Paul Wulff type candidates.
Don't get me wrong, I too will be nervous about the replacement hire; but pointing to Paul Wulff and referencing Texas Tech after Leach left screams loser mentality. Leach is going to leave someday. Maybe this year, maybe next year, maybe in 5 years. Does that mean it's over for WSU football when he does? We navigated through the 80's with quite a bit of success under Walden and Erickson, the 90's with Price, and the 2000's with Price, Doba, Wulff, and Leach, but that's the end? No other coach can win here?
Again, I don't think it's going to be easy to replace Leach. It might take a couple of hires, but good Lord, why won't we be able to find a coach? Justin Wilcox has done pretty well at Cal. His 2017 recruiting class was ranked 12th in the P12 and 70th in the Nation. That's just one example, but I find it hard to believe that if we float $3M+/year, we'll only be able to find Paul Wulff type candidates.
I love CML and probably always will. But his shopping around only raises his accountability. Two losing seasons in a row and he may find the tables quickly turned: a hot seat and no one wanting to interview him anymore. So, that's my focus and I really hope it's his too.
Do you really think Chun doesn't have a list of potential HC's? When he travels around, lets say to our bowl game this year and the number of football "higher ups" are all over that stadium for 2 weeks straight, you don't think he goes out for drinks?
CML has been open that he continually has a list of assistant coaches that he'd like to hire, if a position opens up. I don't know a CEO or management person that doesn't do something similar. Sometimes it a mental list (Id say that's accurate for the smaller companies and managers) but certainly the more money on the line, the more it's solid, on paper and shared among the board members and/or upper echelon management team members, etc.
Chun is running a multi-million dollar entity. He has a list, he has been talking. Make no mistake about that. It's called "business".
There are things to be learned from WSUs history. There are also things that history doesnt say.
Until Leach showed up, was WSU really committed? They didnt do much with facilities. They didnt pay much for coaches. I can only imagine what the recruiting budget was.
I am not surprised that WSU has such a lousy history. They got out of it what they put into it.
Looking at the program now, they have pushed a lot of chips in. The program is still not in a place where it can afford to be poorly coached and still win games. To say that the school will be right back to 3 wins when the landscape for college football and WSU has changed so drastically is not accurate.
Win 3 non conference games, win 3 league games, go bowling. That is a really low bar that every BCS team in the nation should be stepping over easily.
Until Leach showed up, was WSU really committed? They didnt do much with facilities. They didnt pay much for coaches. I can only imagine what the recruiting budget was.
I am not surprised that WSU has such a lousy history. They got out of it what they put into it.
Looking at the program now, they have pushed a lot of chips in. The program is still not in a place where it can afford to be poorly coached and still win games. To say that the school will be right back to 3 wins when the landscape for college football and WSU has changed so drastically is not accurate.
Win 3 non conference games, win 3 league games, go bowling. That is a really low bar that every BCS team in the nation should be stepping over easily.
Trust me, I'm not jealous. But your comment that he has to "look out for himself" kind of implies that he's in a tough situation financially--who knows, maybe he is?--but if he is, he must've gone to the MC Hammer School of Financial Responsibility.
Are you really comparing having a mental list in your head and talking shop over drinks to actively interviewing other candidates behind Leach's back?
not convinced that he is indeed shopping around, these schools are travelling to talk to him, not the other way around.
I am surprised.
I did not start falling Leach until he was so mistreated at TT. I was excited to see him get the WSU job. I have followed WSU since. It has been touch as your games end so late for me. Made the next couple days touch.
I wish WSU luck and to all of the anti-Leach people on the site, will see if you get what you wished for. Money is not everything. I have had jobs where people can get real critical when I made more than people in the community dream of. My salary, as was Leach was within market. Your next coach will expect their market value as well.
I wonder what would have happened if Leach had been given the badly needed IPF.
As far as his coaches, when he was offered the Tenn. job his proposed assistant coaches were a who's who list. It will be interesting who he takes. He was not taking many to Tenn.
This is my last post, although I am curious how Smith does in basketball. I think that was a great hire for WSU.
I wish WSU well.
