Not exactly sure who some of you think we are going to get. Chris Ash is making $800,000 in Texas with no state income tax. Hey Chris come to one of the highest taxed states in the US. He might for 1.2-1.5 million. We’ve had some “big” names, Lovie, Hardy Nickerson, Garrick McGee and how did that work out? Give me guys that can coach players up. Names mean nothing to me. I’ll take former head coaches as position coaches all day.
The Illinois Coaching Staff Search
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ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
The interesting thing about English is that he had the misfortune of taking the dead-end Eastern Michigan job at the time when the going advice and conventional wisdom in African American coaching circles was to take any head coaching job that comes available, because of the lack of opportunities for black coaches to get that chance. That harmed his career. And yet, the really awful tirade that was taped and became public which got him fired there would have ended his career if it had happened today. It's interesting how timing works.
(That tirade is a skeleton in English's closet, there was also a story that got him in hot water where he said he only wanted to recruit players whose fathers were in their lives growing up. Gotta be careful about this stuff.)
Anyway, English is a good football coach, fairly lightly credentialed as a DC, but he's a guy who is at home in major conference football. And I don't worry too much about his getting fired yesterday, Florida fans hate Todd Grantham for no rational reason and so they're throwing a couple assistants to the wolves, that's the SEC Game of Thrones. Those Grantham defenses at Mississippi State and Florida have generally been great.
The problem is twofold, for me. One is that it's still a pretty underwhelming hire. With the salary pool we have to play with we ought to have our pick of big school position coaches if that's the route we want to go for DC and English is nowhere near the top of that list.
But the second is the really scary thing, which is that if we're looking at English and Petersen as the two coordinators, that's two guys without other equivalent opportunities who have never worked with Bielema before we've needed to wildly overpay to take what should be very appealing jobs. Doing worse than Beckman in 2012, worse than Zook and Guenther with a self-evidently dead project in 2009, and not drawing any of the deep bench of people who have worked with Bielema before raises the scary specter that Whitman got completely played and this guy does not have the credibility in the coaching profession to maintain a top quality staff, which was the obvious question #1 that needed to be investigated in looking at Bielema.
It has also come to my attention that Bielema has the same agent as Bill Belichick, who was clearly an influential reference with Whitman, and Whitman mentioned Barry Alvarez as someone he talked to as well, who also has an obvious conflict of interest in the matter.
I don't know that Charlie Partridge is really any better of a football coach than Ron English is. But man, having someone leave a solid position with a good Power Five program to rejoin Bielema's staff would sure make me feel a ton better about this situation.
Deleted member 747671
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Just spitballing here but what if this is a play for both partridge and English. Partridge has never ran a defense but to get him, he’d need a good pay raise. Make him co dc to make him leave Pitt. Pair him with English, who has dc experience.
ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
Yeah, sort of a pass game coordinator, run game coordinator thing. That would be decent.
If we're randomly plucking position coaches off of big time staffs, let me submit a vote for Brian Jean-Mary, currently LB coach at Michigan. Warhorse recruiter for Charlie Strong at Louisville and Texas, and stepped up to the DC job at USF and did pretty well and was not the side of the ball that was the problem. (2-0 vs Petersen's ECU btw)
Jean-Mary as DC and Partridge as STC would be a tantalizing combo for getting players out of Florida.
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That’s something
ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
For the love of god go get Ash
aiwpfan
- Springfield, Il
... and it is expected that Steve Sarkasian will be named as Herman's replacement
Whole new ball game as Texas just fired Herman
I thought he just signed a contract with Herman.
I remember when Herman was a can't miss hire. Like Harbaugh. Like others have said, makes you realize again what a crap shoot this is.
Urban to Austin?
Urban to Austin?
aiwpfan
- Springfield, Il
His buyout is $15M. The staff is another $24M. That's some crazy money right there.
Never mind - didn't realize Sark was a done deal
sacraig
- The desert
It was reported he already said no.
Deleted member 747671
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Obviously there’s been no dc announcement because they were waiting on ash to avoid any sort of buyout 
My Longhorn connections tell me its a done deal with Sark.
TMC999
- Not Iowa
All very true.
Except now he doesn’t have a job. Go get him Bret!!
Bielema has his man unless he already agreed with someone else. Also supposing he wouldn't stay with the new Texas HC. Also, NU will be needing a new DC as their DC retired after yesterday's game.
I maybe the minority here but Herman was a bust. He was the Jason Garrett of the college game. Poor ingame decisions which cost them 2 wins a year. I hope Sark brings his own guys in and lets Ash walk
Shief
- Champaign Area
Probably not a crazy question but do we have a shot at any Texas staffers for offense and defense position coaches? I like the idea of having recruiting connections instate (BB, Miller), STL/Missouri (?), Texas/Oklahoma (?), Florida/Georgia/Greater Southeast (?), Ohio/Indiana/Michigan (?), and potentially California (?).
Oscar Giles, the Texas D-Line coach, is interesting as well. A Texas native (recruiting contacts), decent coaching experience, and played in the league. Again, this presupposes we don't already have a d-line coach. if he's a good coach, he'll have options including staying with the new regime.
I don't get what Texas is doing - besides all the money they are spending on buyouts, which is insane, Sark was a failure at USC, and who couldn't do a good job calling plays at Alabama with the talent they have. That qualifies him to take over at Texas? Herman killed it at Houston of all places before Texas...I'd take him in a second here. I believe he's 5-0 in bowls.
24m for staff? Are you sure? That doesn’t sound right.
Wait you think Sarks play calling is bad? Have you watched Bama the last two years?
Have you seen the guys on the field?
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