Well said. We all want rutgers to do well and these decisions make it harder to be a fan.
I am sure the tone around here would be better if we had a team we weren’t ashamed of.
Looking back..Al Golden
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Well said. We all want rutgers to do well and these decisions make it harder to be a fan.
I am sure the tone around here would be better if we had a team we weren’t ashamed of.
Coach hiring is almost always an inexact science. For the most part no such thing as "proven" or "real" coach even though those terms and similar get thrown around a lot here.
I've said a millions times it's a general profile I like to see (career with strong offensive influence or acumen or both and signs that the defense wouldn't be disregarded totally). Hopefully that profile can be successful but no guarantees and even if it failed I'd still go back to it because it still strikes me as the most feasible avenue for a school like us.
Ash wasn't on my radar at all and his OSU stint wouldn't have sold me anyway. It's a bonus. It's his Wisconsin stint as DC that made me okay with him. They didn't recruit all that highly with Bielema and he did well there. His Arkansas so stint I kind of write off because it was just 1 year and right after the whole Petrino/John L Smith deal. Hard to read too much into 1 year positive or negative, coaches can have down years too even if not for the fiasco there and I wouldn't ding somebody harshly for that if the rest of the body of work is solid enough.
Being better than an F is not my measure or my goal personally. Cs and Ds are better but that's not what I want. I'm not unrealistic to think we can get an A without some luck but a B type is plausible to me and Cristobal/Golden at those points in their careers don't strike me as that.
Cristobal is getting his shot now so we'll see and this is after his Alabama anointment. He's been gifted a very nice QB and solid DC in Leavitt. Let's see what he does with it. Tough loss to Stanford last night.
Golden could not win in a much easier division in one of the easiest to recruit schools in America
There were way better names out there two years ago and four years ago and when GS left for Tampa.
There were way better names out there two years ago and four years ago and when GS left for Tampa.
I'd love to believe that. But please tell me what makes you think Ash can turn this thing around.
Are you writing the check to pay Coach Ash and the Assistants for the term of the contracts? We are in a hole for the forseeable future..
Miami has done very well with Golden players. RU has done well with Washington, a Golden player.
He straightened out Temple.
Hobbs screwed up. Would have been a cheap gamble with experience and northeast connections rather than the colossal Ash failure.
He straightened out Temple.
Hobbs screwed up. Would have been a cheap gamble with experience and northeast connections rather than the colossal Ash failure.
I've been hearing THAT since Schiano left.
I think I also heard that after Graber left.
He underachieved in Miami and they had much better players.
I wanted Babette, just felt his wild open offense would lead to “W” and be popular with recruits.
With what players? Dick Anderson was the best game day coach we have had since Frank Burns and he couldn't succeed long term because he couldn't recruit the required talent.
I agree he's going to be a very good football coach. Given time.
The question is, does RU have the time? Recruiting is about perception, locally and nationally. And perception is very, very bad right now. It has never been good nationally, except maybe ever-so-slightly during the 2006 season. And locally it hasn't been great either, except the last handful of years of Schiano's term, when it was better than now, but still not very good (again, except for 2006).
I don't know that ANY non-marquee coach can overcome that perception problem w/recruiting. And I think, by far and away, the program's problem has been and continues to be building depth of quality at all positions.
I wouldn't get rid of Ash now, though, unless we can spend $10MM on a marquee name head coach with a long history of success, along with the extra millions for his assistants. Because all these other names people mention would all face the same recruiting/perception problems. We would very likely wind up spending a bundle just to get maybe a couple more wins a season.
So I'm pretty patient. Constantly changing coaches doesn't seem like a winning prescription. Odds are that we'll keep winding up where we're at now unless we do something drastically different.
Mullen and Narduzzi. It would have cost us $4million per year for Mullen. It probably would have cost that for Narduzzi too.
I don't see it. His recruiting classes have been progressively getting worse. Even if he learns to motivate the team and out coach other teams to some degree, RU will keep dropping off because of his lack of early progress which will make top recruits look elsewhere. He had to show decent progress by this year IMHO. Next years recruiting will even get worse if he does not go on a run this year. Then there is no digging out of the hole he dug.
Golden sucks and is loyal at the same time. He couldve held on to that Miami job, where he couldnt win with Top 10 talent but decided that keeping D'Onofrio against AD wishes was worth losing his job.
Pass on this package deal.
Looking at Golden's recruiting at Miami vs what he could've done at Rutgers is not relevant.
Miami is a name program and kids want to go their. In addition, as a warm weather private school many of the Northeastern kids get enamored when they visit.
Golden would have been recruiting the 2nd tier NJ kids just like every other coach. The Ohio St's, Michigan's, and Penn St's will be taking the top NJ kids. Those kids may also choose Miami but Rutgers is just a safety school for these kids. Rutgers will not be a top 20 quality school until we get the better recruits.
Think of these recruits from the past:
- Britt
- Sanu
- Anthony Davis
- Rice and the McCourty's for 2 and 3 star recruits but they all came when Syracuse changed coaches
Looking at the Rivals top 30 for NJ for 2019:
https://n.rivals.com/state_rankings/2019/new_jersey
- Notre Dame has 2 in the top 10
- Penn St has 2 in the top 10
- Alabama has 2 in the top 10
- following have 1 in the top 10 (Ohio St, UNC, Va Tech, Nebraska)
top NJ kids going to RU are 14, 19, 24, 25, 28
Miami is a name program and kids want to go their. In addition, as a warm weather private school many of the Northeastern kids get enamored when they visit.
Golden would have been recruiting the 2nd tier NJ kids just like every other coach. The Ohio St's, Michigan's, and Penn St's will be taking the top NJ kids. Those kids may also choose Miami but Rutgers is just a safety school for these kids. Rutgers will not be a top 20 quality school until we get the better recruits.
Think of these recruits from the past:
- Britt
- Sanu
- Anthony Davis
- Rice and the McCourty's for 2 and 3 star recruits but they all came when Syracuse changed coaches
Looking at the Rivals top 30 for NJ for 2019:
https://n.rivals.com/state_rankings/2019/new_jersey
- Notre Dame has 2 in the top 10
- Penn St has 2 in the top 10
- Alabama has 2 in the top 10
- following have 1 in the top 10 (Ohio St, UNC, Va Tech, Nebraska)
top NJ kids going to RU are 14, 19, 24, 25, 28
In this league, poorly coached legit talent would have produced similar results to what we're now seeing. And that would have resulted in the flow of legit talent to RU drying up.
I wanted Golden to be the hire. Not because he was gonna win big here. But he would have recruited big ten talent. So even if he didnt win - he was gonna leave a talented roster for the next guy. Hiring a first time head coach from Iowa - to turn this around - was always a joke decision
It seems our teams take after the last name of our HC in noun form
Golden might be our only hope
Golden might be our only hope
Flood - was a flood of trouble
Ash - the fire has left us bare with ashes
Golden - we would have been headed to a sunny future lol
Golden was a truly awful choice. Just what RU wanted on the back of Flood embarrassments - a guy who had so much trouble getting it done in Miami, they flew airplane banners to run him out of town.
Al Golden is CFB poison, especially at that point in time. Anyone who advocated for him should be ashamed.
Exactly and why Rutgers initially should look to successful coaches in the Div II or Div III. The Guy who coaches buffalo Lance Leipold is the coach in NCAA history to reach 100 wins the fastest. This guy is going places. He will be a div I soon. The Buffalo Bulls were a struggling program before leipold got there this year they are 4-0 and just beat Div I Rutgers. This guy is a flat out winner. I say make him an offer before someone else does. https://www.usatoday.com/story/spor...-buffalo-bulls-wisconsin-whitewater/29850137/
You have to have some perspective tho on Golden. His run at the U was tarnished by NCAA sanctions that he wasnt warned about before he left Temple and took the job. And he rebuilt Temple from a far worse situation then what he would inherit from Ash.
He would certainly recruit NJ better then Ash and knows how to get players. plus he has FL connections to recruit down there too.
Bottom line is IF he couldve won an ACC title and beat FSU hed still be there.
But we need to have some perspective. We are not playing in the deep end of the pool of candidates. We need someone who can stop the bleeding and rebuild this roster and credibility with HS coaches in our recruiting territory. Golden aint perfect - no candidate will be really.
He would certainly recruit NJ better then Ash and knows how to get players. plus he has FL connections to recruit down there too.
Bottom line is IF he couldve won an ACC title and beat FSU hed still be there.
But we need to have some perspective. We are not playing in the deep end of the pool of candidates. We need someone who can stop the bleeding and rebuild this roster and credibility with HS coaches in our recruiting territory. Golden aint perfect - no candidate will be really.
Serious question. What makes you guys think he’s going to be a good HC in the future? Honestly I’m not trying to be snarky, but I just don’t see it and curious what you guys have observed.
Being a HC is more than being a good football mind. You need an ability to run an organization and manage a large moving object under chaotic and ever changing conditions real well (game day). Not to mention the skill set to get adults and young men moving in the same direction regardless how they feel about you personally. You also need to be centered and consistent.
Has Ash shown that he has those skill sets?
I just saw Al's brother yesterday and told him to tell him that we need to get him on the banks ASAP. He just laughed and said at quite a few people knew this was a bad hire from the word go
I wish I could dig up one of my older posts. As I said before and more eloquently, this was a protection hire. Protect the program from further embarrassment.
Hobbs was never going with a high risk guy and he wasn’t looking for a quick turnaround. I honestly believe he was looking for a clean cut young coach with a solid football background who would prevent further embarrassment, bring in mature young men, fix the culture from a PR perspective and get the program back to respectability as he turned his attention to major fundraising. It’s the same reason Hobbs has a better chance of hiring me today before a guy like Partridge.
It didn’t work. Plus, the cc scam (while not on Ash and thankfully didn’t blow up) f’d up his hope for a clean program with no messy hiccups.