2019-20 Coaching Discussion/Carousel

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#776      
Well, at least I have the fact that Purdue struggled against a very good TCU defense with Rondale Moore as evidence. But see, here is where you and I differ. I will back off my statement and say that Purdue would probably struggle offensively against Penn State even with Rondale Moore. See how easy that is?

Fine, then Minnesota's FEI (Football Outsiders is phenomenal with a high rate of sucess doing what they do) should force me to rethink the Minnesota defense, points allowed notwithstanding.

It is easy.
 
#777      

Deleted member 654622

D
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I watched triple option football for 4 years at the Air Force Academy (and the 11 years since I graduated). The only time it’s not fun is when you lose...just like Every. Other. Offensive. Style. And we’ve seen plenty of examples of service academies doing well recently.

I think people assume that just because we go triple option, we would look exactly like Air Force, Navy, or Army. (When it comes to size/speed/athleticism)

This won’t be the case. The service academies have a tough sell when it comes to recruiting:

1. They have certain weight standards that have to be met, so they can’t automatically go after the biggest guys, even if those guys WANTED to come. (OL and DL are most affected here)

2a. Academic standards are very high. Even if a player can get in, staying eligible is tough work and really displays the “student” part of student athlete.

2b. If the players CAN’T get in right away (which is A LOT) they go to a prep school. Basically it’s an automatic redshirt. This could deter some guys from coming who could play right away at a school with lower academic standards.

3. Recruiters have to try and hide the fact that these kids will be going to a military school. Many of the players think they will be coming to play football and that the non-football players are the ones in the military. It’s a rude awakening on day one when they are getting screamed at by training instructors/senior cadets. Some players find out about this and decide not to go. Others leave quickly and a select few stick it out.

I say all of this to show that the school itself is more of a deterrence to getting top talent than the style of football. Service academies run the triple option because it makes them competitive with the limited talent they are able to pull in.

Illinois would have NONE of those restrictions. (With the exception of academic...but it still isn’t as tough as the academies)

So, even if we ran a triple option offense, much like Gritty has said, it could/probably would include lots of high caliber players because we are recruiting to a B1G school and not a service academy.

Thus, it will be exciting. (As long as we win)
All great points and insight on the service academy. A few of us have already said we should be looking at what Georgia Tech did when they ran it. That is more of a realistic comparison. Not gonna hammer it out again, but yes they had success and yes they have now ditched it. The Paul Johnson retired and they did not go with one of his triple options guys. Take it for what it is worth. Either way, GT should be the comparison
 
#778      

Deleted member 654622

D
Guest
Minnesota has one of the worst defenses in the FBS.

They play Penn State Saturday. You’ll see soon enough.

Uh I thought we played them Saturday?
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#779      

ChiefGritty

Chicago, IL
The very same. The 3 aforementioned players generate a higher composite team score than Justin Fields did/would. Don't mean to knock our guys, the McCoy kid has some talent and he excites me but this is fundamentally flawed in every way.

Well yeah, but that's a dumb way to look at it.

If Kevin Tyler, Phifer Griffin and Quinton McCoy played a game of football against Justin Fields, they would win easily, right?

If we could play Ohio State 11 on 10, we'd crush them.

I'd take your point in a basketball recruiting sense where you often have to compare one five star in a class where a school only had one scholarship versus 5-6 guys. But in football the biggest difference is probably less than double, somewhere from like 15-28, and in a context like that, and a sport like that, assigning one player a value greater than multiple others doesn't make a heck of a lot of methodological sense to me.

What MIGHT make sense is assigning QB's a much higher weight than other positions, but QB recruiting can be such a crapshoot you'd probably lead yourself further astray.
 
#781      

Hoppy2105

Little Rock, Arkansas
All great points and insight on the service academy. A few of us have already said we should be looking at what Georgia Tech did when they ran it. That is more of a realistic comparison. Not gonna hammer it out again, but yes they had success and yes they have now ditched it. The Paul Johnson retired and they did not go with one of his triple options guys. Take it for what it is worth. Either way, GT should be the comparison

Bingo
 
#782      
Well yeah, but that's a dumb way to look at it.

If Kevin Tyler, Phifer Griffin and Quinton McCoy played a game of football against Justin Fields, they would win easily, right?

If we could play Ohio State 11 on 10, we'd crush them.

I'd take your point in a basketball recruiting sense where you often have to compare one five star in a class where a school only had one scholarship versus 5-6 guys. But in football the biggest difference is probably less than double, somewhere from like 15-28, and in a context like that, and a sport like that, assigning one player a value greater than multiple others doesn't make a heck of a lot of methodological sense to me.

What MIGHT make sense is assigning QB's a much higher weight than other positions, but QB recruiting can be such a crapshoot you'd probably lead yourself further astray.

You might be misreading me but I disagree. Allowing those 3 players to generate a higher composite team score than that of Justin Fields is fundamentally wrong in my view and the data would support that. Or maybe I';m misreading you, might be more accurate.

We would never discuss what might happen if we played 11 vs 10 because that's not a realistic scenario, right? We would judge "what does your 11 look like against my 11". Unfortunately, that's not what 247's team rankings are designed to do.
 
#783      

BZuppke

Plainfield
I guess I don’t understand the Luke Fickell love. He could be the next great coach but he’s hardly a proven commodity. He could tank here like lots of coaches who had a couple of good years do - Fuentes et al.

I’ll add that the option talk is interesting but Illinois will never go that route. It’s not going to happen.
 
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#784      
To cut a very odd evening here short, the way 247 values recruiting success is severely flawed and this is where Dino Babers comes into play. He hasn't had a top 50 recruiting class but his AAR over the last 4 years has been higher than it's ever been and he's done this at a University that is notoriously difficult to recruit to for the sport of football. I also commend him for his ability to build his program without heavy use of the transfer portal, something I'm very uneasy about (Is it sustainable? Is it not? I don't know). He's doing it by getting out and signing 18 year old kids who stick with that program for 3-5 years.

The downside here is something that Gritty alluded to pages ago, the 2019 season looks sketchy for him. 4 of their final 7 are road games, the one home game they do get is Wake and the kid DeVito is hurt now. They're gonna struggle to get to 6 and if they don't get there, he could be a tough sell.
 
#786      

mhuml32

Cincinnati, OH
58-37 as a head coach, won 10 games at bowling green and 12 games at eastern. Has an offensive identity as he runs Briles offense. Motivated recruiter and players really like him.

Not sure if this is supposed to mean he's a good recruiter but he's only a good recruiter if you think the same thing about Lovie. Averaging around 53rd in team recruiting rankings is bad for P5 (you have to really hang your hat on the belief you find hidden gems).
 
#787      
To cut a very odd evening here short, the way 247 values recruiting success is severely flawed and this is where Dino Babers comes into play. He hasn't had a top 50 recruiting class but his AAR over the last 4 years has been higher than it's ever been and he's done this at a University that is notoriously difficult to recruit to for the sport of football. I also commend him for his ability to build his program without heavy use of the transfer portal, something I'm very uneasy about (Is it sustainable? Is it not? I don't know). He's doing it by getting out and signing 18 year old kids who stick with that program for 3-5 years.

The downside here is something that Gritty alluded to pages ago, the 2019 season looks sketchy for him. 4 of their final 7 are road games, the one home game they do get is Wake and the kid DeVito is hurt now. They're gonna struggle to get to 6 and if they don't get there, he could be a tough sell.

What is AAR?
 
#790      

ChiefGritty

Chicago, IL
Nice win for Rod Carey and Temple last night at East Carolina to get to 4-1. There's a guy who's had a lot of success in this state, and he's kidnapped Thad Ward to boot.

Restore the ancien regime to Littyville?

Here's Temple's upcoming schedule: Memphis, @SMU, UCF, @USF, Tulane, @Cincinnati

If there are three wins in there that would be pretty impressive. The AAC is low-key kinda good now.
 
#791      
Nice win for Rod Carey and Temple last night at East Carolina to get to 4-1. There's a guy who's had a lot of success in this state, and he's kidnapped Thad Ward to boot.

Restore the ancien regime to Littyville?

Here's Temple's upcoming schedule: Memphis, @SMU, UCF, @USF, Tulane, @Cincinnati

If there are three wins in there that would be pretty impressive. The AAC is low-key kinda good now.

Think he would consider the Illinois Job? Asking for a friend
 
#794      

Illwinsagain

Cary, IL
Was actually in place after Thomas was canned....Paul Kowalczyk was set to hire Babers.....Barbara Wilson said he couldn't then there we were with the 2 year Cubit deal.
This sucks, I know Babers was popular on this board at the time.
 
#796      
Well yeah, but that's a dumb way to look at it.

If Kevin Tyler, Phifer Griffin and Quinton McCoy played a game of football against Justin Fields, they would win easily, right?

If we could play Ohio State 11 on 10, we'd crush them.

I'd take your point in a basketball recruiting sense where you often have to compare one five star in a class where a school only had one scholarship versus 5-6 guys. But in football the biggest difference is probably less than double, somewhere from like 15-28, and in a context like that, and a sport like that, assigning one player a value greater than multiple others doesn't make a heck of a lot of methodological sense to me.

What MIGHT make sense is assigning QB's a much higher weight than other positions, but QB recruiting can be such a crapshoot you'd probably lead yourself further astray.

Would we?

jk

I think?
 
#797      
A little late but
My top 5
1. Dino babers
2. Seth littrell
3. Mike Norvell
4. Dave Aranda
5. Huepel

Others considered
Fickell
Chip long
Willie fritz
Graham Harrell
Mike tressel (Someone bought me in. Does he have non-fsu DC experience?)

If all these say no
——>Jeff Monken <——
But please no more Monken talk, unless it’s Todd. Jeff is the most the boring, unsexy hire.
 
#798      
Others considered
Fickell
Chip long
Willie fritz
Graham Harrell
Mike tressel (Someone bought me in. Does he have non-fsu DC experience?)

If all these say no
——>Jeff Monken <——
But please no more Monken talk, unless it’s Todd. Jeff is the most the boring, unsexy hire.

Mike Tressel is definitely a sleeper candidate. Not sure he is the "sexy" hire that Whitman would try out though.

He's been coaching in the college game for over 20 years and was recently promoted to be the assistant head coach at MSU. May not be an obvious choice but I wouldn't be upset with a hire like that. He has basically been under Dantonio his entire coaching career. Not a bad idea to look at a prodigy type candidate. Dantonio has turned MSU into a perennial top 25 program.
 
#799      

ChiefGritty

Chicago, IL
2. Seth littrell

Graham Harrell

Seems like this option jumps up the list a bit if we can find a way to piece these two back together in the event Clay Helton is fired at USC.

Mike tressel (Someone bought me in. Does he have non-fsu DC experience?)

If by FSU you mean MSU then no, he's been with Dantonio since Cincinnati (when he was quite young, he's only like 42 now). First as LB/ST coach, then when Pat Narduzzi left for Pitt, Dantonio made Tressel and Harlon Barnett co-DC's in order to keep them both, and then Barnett left to join Willie Taggart's staff at FSU and Tressel became AHC/DC. The results have been gangbusters.


But please no more Monken talk, unless it’s Todd. Jeff is the most the boring, unsexy hire.

Whereas that Todd is one saucy minx, lol.
 
#800      
One random outside the box hire I’d like but is risky, kellen Moore, OC cowboys. He’s shot up the ranks fast. Probably to risky and green. He seems destined for stardom. OC in the nfl is probably a step up for college HC.
 
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