It's time for us to look in the mirror and face some harsh realities. Until we do that, nothing is going to change for us.
1. Our athletic department needs an enema, starting with Cohen. Hiring a baseball coach to be AD was always a terrible idea. Power 5 athletic departments are big business, requiring someone with business experience running them. I don't care that splitting 12.5 scholarships across 25 people is hard, it doesn't come close to preparing you to run a P5 athletic department. Cohen is a great baseball GM, but he's a terrible AD.
2. Our recruiting is terrible, but it's only partially due to a lack of effort by current and previous coaching staffs. The real problem is our compliance. We still act like the NCAA is the NCAA of the 1980s, with the power and will to drop the hammer on "cheaters." We intentionally handcuff ourselves in what we're willing to do, which is why we get the same quality of players no matter who's coaching. The only slight exception was Moorhead because he and his staff loved recruiting and put in the work. But it was only a slight improvement. Until we're willing to update compliance and recruit like the rest of the SEC, we'll never get the quality of player we need to be competitive in this league. And now that NIL rights are a thing, impermissible benefits are basically extinct. We've got to realize this and start recruiting for real.
3. Leach is a dumpster fire of a coach. He's basically semi-retired and using us for a last big payday. His offense is an outdated gimmick that hasn't been updated or changed in 25 years. We're not only one dimensional, but we're soft. But as bad as Leach is, he's a symptom of the real problems. If he were worth a damn, why did no other SEC program even seriously kick the tires on him even once in the last 20 years? Because they all knew he was a joke. But going back to my Point 1 - we have an AD who's stupid enough to get conned by Leach and actually hire him.
4. Cohen has taken football back to the Bad Old Days in just 4 short years. Back to back 40 point losses to Bama for the first time since the 70s is unacceptable. I never expected to win last night. Hell, I expected to get skulldrug last night. But doesn't the fact I expected that say it all?
Here's the good news: Our problems are all fixable. But they all stem from a lack of leadership at the top. If we want change, it can't be simply changing the coach. We've got to make changes at the very top. The athletic department needs to be nuked and rebuilt. Hire an AD with business and sports experience. Modernize the compliance department and have it run by either a lawyer or a former NCAA compliance officer (who's probably also a lawyer) so we can recruit like the rest of the big boys. Go actively court NIL opportunities for players who come to State. Until we fix that, changing coaches isn't going to change much because whoever is coach isn't competing on the same playing field as everyone else. We'll be competitive when we decide to join the modern P5 in how we operate as an athletic department. Unless we're willing to do that, we need to look at moving to a softer conference where we won't be an embarrassment.
1. Our athletic department needs an enema, starting with Cohen. Hiring a baseball coach to be AD was always a terrible idea. Power 5 athletic departments are big business, requiring someone with business experience running them. I don't care that splitting 12.5 scholarships across 25 people is hard, it doesn't come close to preparing you to run a P5 athletic department. Cohen is a great baseball GM, but he's a terrible AD.
2. Our recruiting is terrible, but it's only partially due to a lack of effort by current and previous coaching staffs. The real problem is our compliance. We still act like the NCAA is the NCAA of the 1980s, with the power and will to drop the hammer on "cheaters." We intentionally handcuff ourselves in what we're willing to do, which is why we get the same quality of players no matter who's coaching. The only slight exception was Moorhead because he and his staff loved recruiting and put in the work. But it was only a slight improvement. Until we're willing to update compliance and recruit like the rest of the SEC, we'll never get the quality of player we need to be competitive in this league. And now that NIL rights are a thing, impermissible benefits are basically extinct. We've got to realize this and start recruiting for real.
3. Leach is a dumpster fire of a coach. He's basically semi-retired and using us for a last big payday. His offense is an outdated gimmick that hasn't been updated or changed in 25 years. We're not only one dimensional, but we're soft. But as bad as Leach is, he's a symptom of the real problems. If he were worth a damn, why did no other SEC program even seriously kick the tires on him even once in the last 20 years? Because they all knew he was a joke. But going back to my Point 1 - we have an AD who's stupid enough to get conned by Leach and actually hire him.
4. Cohen has taken football back to the Bad Old Days in just 4 short years. Back to back 40 point losses to Bama for the first time since the 70s is unacceptable. I never expected to win last night. Hell, I expected to get skulldrug last night. But doesn't the fact I expected that say it all?
Here's the good news: Our problems are all fixable. But they all stem from a lack of leadership at the top. If we want change, it can't be simply changing the coach. We've got to make changes at the very top. The athletic department needs to be nuked and rebuilt. Hire an AD with business and sports experience. Modernize the compliance department and have it run by either a lawyer or a former NCAA compliance officer (who's probably also a lawyer) so we can recruit like the rest of the big boys. Go actively court NIL opportunities for players who come to State. Until we fix that, changing coaches isn't going to change much because whoever is coach isn't competing on the same playing field as everyone else. We'll be competitive when we decide to join the modern P5 in how we operate as an athletic department. Unless we're willing to do that, we need to look at moving to a softer conference where we won't be an embarrassment.
