I'm not the world's biggest fan of that hire, but Les Miles to Kansas proves this train of logic wrong forever and ever.
You make a coaching change when the future is brighter moving on, considering the situation in total. It's literally never an 100% or 0% proposition, it's about figuring out which side of 50% you're on.
For a variety of reasons, I think keeping Lovie for next year was the right move at the time. A close and tough decision, but the right one. But there's no more rope at this point.
No school has ever let the same coach just wallow in suckitude for the better part of a decade on end. Not Kansas, not Vandy, not 80's Northwestern, not post-Death Penalty SMU, not couldn't-care-less-era Duke, nobody. We are not unique in being down on our luck as a football program.
I don't think we disagree.
You fire a coach when you are COVINCED he's wrong for the program AND you are confident you can find a guy who you are CONVINCED can do a better job.
Saying that, I'm not implying we can never attract upper level coaching talent again. We can, and when the day comes when Lovie quits or is fired, we will. But the pool of available coaching talent for us to attract is WAY smaller than most schools.
Hiring coaches is such a crap shoot for schools like us, AD's like Whitman are not going to pull the trigger that quickly. We cant do what UGa did and just hire the DC off 'Bama.
Les Miles took the UK job because he wanted one last chance to make some real money for 4 years with the chance to make it for 7 years. That was the best Power5 job he was going to get at his age and his history. Most of the kind of players he needs can probably get accepted there, not so much at UI. All in all, a great hire for UK and not that bad a job for a 65 year old Les Miles.
I have 20 people that work for me at my company. I fire guys when they do something worth firing. It happens , thankfully not often. But in todays market for labor, I tend to give people extra time when I am only disappointed in their production. If a guy is a C- or so level guy, finding a guy off the street who can do better is no sure thing. I'll give him more time to either improve, or until I find someone better. Seriously, the "help wanted" sign is out in front of our shop all the time. In my business, finding reliable , hard working people is not easy. From all the other business people I talk to, its the same everywhere. Everyone is always looking for them.