The Illinois Coaching Staff Search

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#376      

Deleted member 747671

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Helfrich is an interesting name. I had considered him as a good OC candidate but kinda disregarded him as I didn't see any type of connection to BB. He's pretty much always been out west.
 
#378      

altenberger22

altenberger22
South Carolina
altenberger22
O&BInsider said:
The OC will be one of three names. Derek Dooley, Dan Enos or Mark Helfrich. Do I know which one? Maybe. And if I recall correctly, Bielema stated he wanted to have his staff ready to go first week of January. Sounds like some announcements this week
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If true, I'm voting:
1. Enos
2. Dooley
3. Helfrich (West Coast guy/recruiter?)

Guess I'm therefore settling on a preference of Ash/Enos given the names that are out there. Bret -- whatcha thinkin'?
 
#379      

ChiefGritty

ChiefGritty
Chicago, IL
ChiefGritty
O&BInsider said:
The OC will be one of three names. Derek Dooley, Dan Enos or Mark Helfrich. Do I know which one? Maybe. And if I recall correctly, Bielema stated he wanted to have his staff ready to go first week of January. Sounds like some announcements this week
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illini0440 said:
I am probably in the minority here but what about Mark Helfrich as OC?
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Helfrich was the guy I feared might be our head coach when I was thinking of going through a coaching search without any money. He's a bit of a cipher really, less of a pure-bred Chip Kelly devotee than his billing.

The thing that strikes me looking at that trio though is not anything about how GOOD their offenses are, or even what STYLE they are, but that the history would indicate that Enos is the only one of the three whose system is designed for a TEMPO that fits with the ball control and clock control principles Bielema laid out.

Dooley was a hurry-up guy at Mizzou and obviously Helfrich ran the Oregon blur offense. That's not a fit with what Bielema has told us.

I would pick Enos which has seemed like the obvious fit from day 1. If you told me Dooley meant Harry Hiestand as OL coach you would get my attention though. You'd be lying if you didn't say Helfrich, who has absolutely no connection to Bielema, smacks a little of "we don't have the juice to get the guys we want, so we're reaching for a name to justify the money", which would connect directly to the parts of Bielema's history and reputation that give you pause about him in the first place.

So it's Enos 1, Dooley 2, Helfrich 3 for me.
 
#380      

moggs3

M
moggs3
altenberger22 said:
If true, I'm voting:
1. Enos
2. Dooley
3. Helfrich (West Coast guy/recruiter?)

Guess I'm therefore settling on a preference of Ash/Enos given the names that are out there. Bret -- whatcha thinkin'?
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1.Dooley
2.Helfrich
3.Enos (the more I look into him the less I like him)
Wildcard: Tim Lester
 
#381      

Deleted member 747671

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I wonder how much Dooley and Helfrich have changed philosophies since leaving college for the NFL. I'm guessing that would have a lot to do with tempo. I can't see BB running an Oregon style tempo. I think it's a weapon you can use occasionally, but no way would I think he'd want that all the time.
 
#382      

Deleted member 747671

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ChiefGritty said:
I would pick Enos which has seemed like the obvious fit from day 1. If you told me Dooley meant Harry Hiestand as OL coach you would get my attention though. You'd be lying if you didn't say Helfrich, who has absolutely no connection to Bielema, smacks a little of "we don't have the juice to get the guys we want, so we're reaching for a name to justify the money", which would connect directly to the parts of Bielema's history and reputation that give you pause about him in the first place.

So it's Enos 1, Dooley 2, Helfrich 3 for me.
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Don't forget Helfrich also has a connection to Hiestand from their time with the Bears.
 
#383      

ChiefGritty

ChiefGritty
Chicago, IL
ChiefGritty
WINTer said:
I wonder how much Dooley and Helfrich have changed philosophies since leaving college for the NFL. I'm guessing that would have a lot to do with tempo. I can't see BB running an Oregon style tempo. I think it's a weapon you can use occasionally, but no way would I think he'd want that all the time.
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Even Oregon didn't necessarily go as fast as their reputation, especially after Kelly left.

But in terms of the way you think about winning a football game on the theoretical level, the simplistic and repetitive game of trapping defensive packages on the field and exploiting matchup advantages that Dooley and Helfrich were last practicing is almost as different from Bret Bielema/Paul Chryst football as something like the triple option is.

You can win doing any of them. But it's just very different, and it affects the way you construct your whole program and changes the way you coach on gameday.

Bielema has always gone slow. Control the ball, keep your defense rested and coached up to what's happening on the sidelines, keep the opposing offense off the field and out of rhythm, make it a smaller, shorter game, and minimize the number of things you have to do right to win the game.

Tempo flips that on its head. Play in space, identify matchup advantages and kill, kill, kill, never give the other team a breath to figure out what you're doing, trust that they can't stop you often enough to keep the score down, and then just fly around and be opportunistic on defense and hope you make enough plays to give them fewer points when the gun goes off.
 
#384      

ILLINIShox24

ILLINIShox24
Orange Krush '04 & '05
ILLINIShox24
WINTer said:
Don't forget Helfrich also has a connection to Hiestand from their time with the Bears.
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Is Hiestand really possible for our OL coach? That would be insane. I see he coached for us back in the Turner days. Now I'm thinking of how highly Olin Kreutz speaks of Hiestand and how his son is coming to Champaign. Would be incredible.
 
#385      

ChiefGritty

ChiefGritty
Chicago, IL
ChiefGritty
ILLINIShox24 said:
Is Hiestand really possible for our OL coach? That would be insane. I see he coached for us back in the Turner days. Now I'm thinking of how highly Olin Kreutz speaks of Hiestand and how his son is coming to Champaign. Would be incredible.
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He's currently a free agent after being let go with Helfrich from the Bears staff last year. Still only 62. A no-brainer if we can pull it off. The line he built at ND was unbelievable and obviously his group was a perennial strength under Turner here as well.
 
#386      

ProfessorQC

ProfessorQC
Ace Wolf
UofI
ProfessorQC
O&BInsider said:
The OC will be one of three names. Derek Dooley, Dan Enos or Mark Helfrich. Do I know which one? Maybe. And if I recall correctly, Bielema stated he wanted to have his staff ready to go first week of January. Sounds like some announcements this week
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Spot on 👌🏽✨

I’ll take your 1st choice and let’s run with it 🔸🏃‍♂️ 🏃‍♂️ 🔹
 
#388      

Rad

R
Nashville, TN
Rad
Don't know about his football knowledge/coaching but word here in Tennessee was that Dooley's interpersonal skills and how he carried himself on the practice field was not at all flattering.
 
#389      

ProfessorQC

ProfessorQC
Ace Wolf
UofI
ProfessorQC
skyIdub said:
I'll take a Dooley with a side of Hiestand please.
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#390      

Deleted member 186590

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ChiefGritty said:
Completely false revisionist history.

You look back at 2012 and look what has happened in the coaches careers since and that initial Beckman staff was an absolute grand slam.

Billy Gonzales is the Passing Game Coordinator at Florida
Chris Beatty is the WR coach at Pitt after being the AHC/Co-OC at Maryland
Tim Banks is the Co-DC at Penn State
Alex Golesh is the Co-OC at UCF after being the RC at Iowa State that built that whole team
Aaron Hillmann is Campbell's head Strength Coach at Iowa State

And that's not just hindsight, these guys were big gets at the time, especially Gonzales.

As a collective it is definitely true that you had a lot more recruiting ability than coaching ability in that group, a totally fair criticism, and none of them being outright playcallers despite their high market values reflects that. But the problem was Beckman, who in 2012 was completely unprepared and in over his head as the CEO of a Big Ten football program. That's a deficiency even Campbell would have had a hard time masking, having a boss and manager who didn't know what he was doing.


Ha, you were nicer about it than I was.

You see in this false narrative the way the Guentherite Myth works. It cannot be that Beckman and Illinois had the resources and the clout to hire a solid staff in 2012, because the central fact has to always be that NO ONE, ANYWHERE, EVER would work for Mike Thomas or have anything to do with a Mike Thomas athletic department, and it has to be that Matt Campbell laughed his butt off at the mere suggestion of ever being involved with Mike Thomas' Illinois.

Thankfully we now have an AD that synthesizes the virtues of Guenther (credibility with and control over the elite coterie of donors) and Thomas (actually attempting to run a modern-day athletic department), while having the critical extra piece that both of them lacked (the ability to scout and recruit big time revenue sport coaches). This is an argument about the mists of history, but the propaganda campaign still drives me insane.
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I agree that Beckman was the problem, and I’ll retract the word pedestrian to characterize Beckham’s staff because that’s not fair to the assistants but I think you are doing some revisionist history yourself here.

My point is clearly Beckman was not getting his first choices and took a while to find his staff and ended up with a less than ideal staff with co-OC’s and wasn’t pulling from his own coaching circle- finding guys who were good recruiters and giving them a title bump to get them to come. That clearly did not work out well. In terms of how well thought of the coaches were- clearly Gonzales was the flashiest name pulling a big time recruiter and PC/WR coach from the SEC - but 8 years later he’s still a PC/WR coach in the SEC, same with Beatty- he has the same job we hired him away from 8 years ago. It’s not like these guys are superstars in coaching now.

Put it this way- if we hired all of those guys you mentioned right now after 8 more years of experience would we be happy? Absolutely not- our aspirations have to be higher for BB’s staff
 
#391      

ChiefGritty

ChiefGritty
Chicago, IL
ChiefGritty
Henson71 said:
My point is clearly Beckman was not getting his first choices and took a while to find his staff and ended up with a less than ideal staff with co-OC’s and wasn’t pulling from his own coaching circle- finding guys who were good recruiters and giving them a title bump to get them to come. That clearly did not work out well.
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While it is undeniably true that Campbell was Beckman's first choice (Beckman said so publicly at his introductory press conference without Campbell having signed on, the doofus), he did otherwise bring a bunch of his key guys from Toledo in Golesh, Mike Ward, and Steve Clinkscale.

He also if you remember got left at the altar by Jon Tenuta as his original DC pick, who accepted the job and was announced publicly and then changed his mind the next day.

The Beckman/Campbell thing is a trite little fairytale that falls apart upon closer inspection.
 
#392      

Centennial Illini

C
Centennial Illini
ChiefGritty said:
Not much OC experience, but he did coordinate the 8th best offense in the country against an SEC schedule at Mizzou in 2018. And of course he was the head coach at Tennessee. "Inexperience" isn't the issue.

His OC at Tennessee was Jim Chaney too, so there are connections to Bielema beyond just this one NFL staff.

And Dooley's OL coach at Tennessee was Harry Hiestand, who is a free agent right now and would be a grand slam hire for the O-Line.

Look at you, you've got me talking myself into this.
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If we get a chance to grab Harry Hiestand we better do it. Hiestand put alot of Illini in the NFL during the Turner era.
 
#393      

mhuml32

mhuml32
Cincinnati, OH
mhuml32
Ash fits in the "too good to be true" category for me. It's tough to fathom him wanting to jump ship, even with things being tumultuous for UT. I'll be over the moon if we can bring in a DC like Ash that I trust as a coach AND has actual recruiting chops.
 
#394      

Deleted member 747671

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mhuml32 said:
Ash fits in the "too good to be true" category for me. It's tough to fathom him wanting to jump ship, even with things being tumultuous for UT. I'll be over the moon if we can bring in a DC like Ash that I trust as a coach AND has actual recruiting chops.
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It’s almost backwards that the oc list just shared is all very get-able guys. And the dc guys are highly compensated, in demand guys. Makes me think nobody really knows anything.
 
#395      

ChiefGritty

ChiefGritty
Chicago, IL
ChiefGritty
WINTer said:
It’s almost backwards that the oc list just shared is all very get-able guys. And the dc guys are highly compensated, in demand guys. Makes me think nobody really knows anything.
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Ted Roof is available, of guys that have been mentioned.

I'm just glad I haven't heard Paul Rhoads' name mentioned, whose hopeless defenses have now gotten Bielema fired at Arkansas and Sumlin fired at Arizona. One of those guys with a good dude, coaches' coach reputation, but the results are not there.

Roof and Dooley as the coordinators would be about even par for me, given Bielema's stature and the money we have to work with. Fine, but not blowing the doors off.

Interestingly, what to Dooley, Helfrich, Roof, Ash, and Rhoads all have in common? They were all Power Five head coaches. Which I do like, even when they were bad, they have a vision for how a program fits together. Enos was a head coach too at Central Michigan.
 
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#396      

altenberger22

altenberger22
South Carolina
altenberger22
WINTer said:
It’s almost backwards that the oc list just shared is all very get-able guys. And the dc guys are highly compensated, in demand guys. Makes me think nobody really knows anything.
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I believe this is the wrong site if we're looking for certainties --- or for people who truly know something. It's pretty much speculation regardless of the subject matter.
 
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