Gilbert would be a home run for Aggie.
The rest of those guys wouldn't even answer the phone. Well Sark might if he is out of rehab and currently drunk.
Strong officially targeting Cumbie
- Thread starter Scholz
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Gilbert would be a home run for Aggie.
The rest of those guys wouldn't even answer the phone. Well Sark might if he is out of rehab and currently drunk.
Really?? UT is now like SMU or ISU then! Also Cumbie I am sure was offered a lot of money but there is a chance Strong gets fired after next season ( heck start 1-4 and he should be fired)
Texas head coach Charlie Strong offered the role of offensive coordinator to TCU co-offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Sonny Cumbie on Sunday evening, sources tell Horns247.
Cumbie is expected to make a decision possibly as soon as today, a source close to the situation tells Horns247.
If he accepts, Cumbie would get complete control of Texas' offense and will be allowed to choose at least two offensive assistant coaches. Only first-year tight ends coach Jeff Traylor is certain to remain on the team's offensive staff.
The offer to Cumbie includes a financial compensation package "north" of $1 million annually and a three-year guaranteed contract, multiple sources tell Horns247.
Strong and Traylor flew to Fort Worth on Sunday afternoon to meet with Cumbie. Traylor and Cumbie know each other through coaching circles and years of working in the state of Texas.
Sources tell Horns247 the coaches on Texas' offensive staff were told by Strong that he will hire an offensive coordinator. Following the selection, Strong will allow the others to interview for their current positions. However, sources tell Horns247 that only Traylor and possibly receivers coach Jay Norvell stand any chance of remaining at Texas, regardless of whether Cumbie accepts the position or not.
Texas' other three offensive assistants are assistant head coach for offense/quarterbacks coach Shawn Watson, offensive coordinator/offensive line coach Joe Wickline and running backs coach Tommie Robinson.
Cumbie is expected to make a decision possibly as soon as today, a source close to the situation tells Horns247.
If he accepts, Cumbie would get complete control of Texas' offense and will be allowed to choose at least two offensive assistant coaches. Only first-year tight ends coach Jeff Traylor is certain to remain on the team's offensive staff.
The offer to Cumbie includes a financial compensation package "north" of $1 million annually and a three-year guaranteed contract, multiple sources tell Horns247.
Strong and Traylor flew to Fort Worth on Sunday afternoon to meet with Cumbie. Traylor and Cumbie know each other through coaching circles and years of working in the state of Texas.
Sources tell Horns247 the coaches on Texas' offensive staff were told by Strong that he will hire an offensive coordinator. Following the selection, Strong will allow the others to interview for their current positions. However, sources tell Horns247 that only Traylor and possibly receivers coach Jay Norvell stand any chance of remaining at Texas, regardless of whether Cumbie accepts the position or not.
Texas' other three offensive assistants are assistant head coach for offense/quarterbacks coach Shawn Watson, offensive coordinator/offensive line coach Joe Wickline and running backs coach Tommie Robinson.
The fact that Strong's first 2 years have been a total implosion and he is now taking on a 3rd offensive identity in as many years blows my mind he is making 5 mil. He is grasping at straws. Why wouldn't Texas kick strong to the curb and hire an uo and comer at half of Strings salary and have say so in who he hires. Strong and Muschamp are comparable and SC is absolutely retarded for hiring him.
The runningback position was one of the few bright spots on the offense, why are we looking to replace Robinson? He had one senior and freshmen, and he did a heck of a job on them.
I look at the runningback position a lot like I look at wide receiver. A RB coach can't create talent, he can teach the talent how to play the position to make them a great football player, but he can't team them how to run the ball.
For what it's worth, I thought he did a great job on the backs he had. They were blocking well and running patterns well. I know we were all disappointed with how Gray looked, but that couldn't be helped, his injury took a lot out of him, but he was great at other things such as picking up blitzes and catching the ball.
I'd sure like to hear other thoughts on this.
I look at the runningback position a lot like I look at wide receiver. A RB coach can't create talent, he can teach the talent how to play the position to make them a great football player, but he can't team them how to run the ball.
For what it's worth, I thought he did a great job on the backs he had. They were blocking well and running patterns well. I know we were all disappointed with how Gray looked, but that couldn't be helped, his injury took a lot out of him, but he was great at other things such as picking up blitzes and catching the ball.
I'd sure like to hear other thoughts on this.
A RB coach at this level is nothing but a recruiter. Yeah sure he organizes some drills, and there are pass protections concepts to teach, but the position is mostly athleticism and instinct.
IMO RB is also the easiest position to coach followed closely by DL. The hardest would be OL and DB.
Exactly, and he is one of the best recruiters in the country. He was an ace recruiter with USC, he landed Warren last year. The guy is good.
I don't know who Warren's main recruiter was but just because he is a RB it doesn't mean he was recruited by the RB coach. Given the comments his family made I would guess Strong is really who landed him, with the help of a coinflip as well.
I don't know how accurate this is but when I look at Robinson's bio on Rivals he isn't listed as the main recruiter on too many players.
He's brought in
Tristan Houston
Kirk Johnson (Legacy)
Ryan Newsome
Hemphill-Mapps (Commit to previous staff)
I wouldn't call that an ace recruiter.
True but Cale Gundy has done a really good job at OU developing talent in my opinion. I'm not talking about Peterson, etc I am talking about guys like Clay, Chris Brown etc. Average running backs but getting the most out of them. He is now working with the receivers now but he is the recruiting coordinator.
I remember a few years back Altons listed him as one of the top recruiters in the country. When he came aboard lots of us thought he was a great hire for this reason.
Yup, we are nothing more than bottom dwellers that knock off the big boys.
That may be, but I think a lot of coaches get reputations as ace recruiters when it's really the program itself that is doing the recruiting. It's almost impossible to distinguish from the outside looking in. Either way he has certainly proven to be replaceable here. Brick Haley is another similar ace recruiter heading in that direction.
I know just think he beat ou with a crappy Texas team......if he gets it squared away......YOU SCREWED.
I think the position of RB coach should go to an ACE recruiter......Robinson is not even average....most coaches can teach the fundamentals of this position.....hold onto the ball.....who to pick up in pass pro......not hard.........Recruiting is the lifeblood of a program.
Lol, please stop. You have nothing to offer me in terms of a discussion as you are clearly retarded.
I saw on another site that if Cumbie accepts then the RB and Oline positions would be filled very quickly meaning he's probably already got his guys ready to go. Very interesting. On a side note, it appeared Wick has been making some real progress with what he has had to work with, you guys in favor of giving up on him? I know he's not a great recruiter but he appears to know what he wants in a player and seems to do a good job of developing an oline.
I understand some of the questions about Texas' targets for OC and people debating whether various position coaches should be retained (Robinson, Wickline, Norvell, etc.)... and I mean, I kind of wonder if giving Wickline time to continue to develop the OL as he has been would be worth it, for example. I mean, I feel like a lot of us felt he was one of the biggest hires of Coach Strong's original staff. But I look at it this way. Either the athletic department has given Coach Strong free reign (and the checkbook) to make his hires, or the athletic department is advising who they think should be high on the list. Either way, they're the ones who have worked with who we have and they're the ones who are making decisions that well affect them the most.
Coach Strong is choosing candidates that he thinks have a shot giving the offense enough of a boost to save his job. You better believe that, whether we agree with who he hires and who he lets go, that he's choosing those things based on what he thinks will be best for recruiting and on-field results at this point.
Meanwhile, the athletic department and any advice they're giving, also has big implications for them. We've all heard the rumors of the potential OC salary, and the guarantee of several (3 was the last I read) years on the contract. Not that they don't have money, but with the athletic department having had plenty of experience recently when it comes to continuing to pay out former employees while paying their replacements (with lots and lots of zeros on those checks), it's likely that any advice they give is going to be for someone that, similarly, will be well worth it. They contract may say "we pay you for 3 years even if you only coach here for 1" but they're certainly not going to do that hoping to have to pay someone the big bucks for 3 years of work after showing the entire staff the door after 1.
It's not that anyone ever tries to hire someone they think won't do a good job, but at this point both Coach Strong, and UT are likely at a point where they aren't going to get too tied up in any other motivations for retaining coaches or choosing new ones. They want the ones who are going to make a big difference ASAP.
Coach Strong is choosing candidates that he thinks have a shot giving the offense enough of a boost to save his job. You better believe that, whether we agree with who he hires and who he lets go, that he's choosing those things based on what he thinks will be best for recruiting and on-field results at this point.
Meanwhile, the athletic department and any advice they're giving, also has big implications for them. We've all heard the rumors of the potential OC salary, and the guarantee of several (3 was the last I read) years on the contract. Not that they don't have money, but with the athletic department having had plenty of experience recently when it comes to continuing to pay out former employees while paying their replacements (with lots and lots of zeros on those checks), it's likely that any advice they give is going to be for someone that, similarly, will be well worth it. They contract may say "we pay you for 3 years even if you only coach here for 1" but they're certainly not going to do that hoping to have to pay someone the big bucks for 3 years of work after showing the entire staff the door after 1.
It's not that anyone ever tries to hire someone they think won't do a good job, but at this point both Coach Strong, and UT are likely at a point where they aren't going to get too tied up in any other motivations for retaining coaches or choosing new ones. They want the ones who are going to make a big difference ASAP.
I doubt Wickline's departure will be one sided. The way everything was handled regarding him (lawsuit / demotion) he probably is wanting to move on regardless.
Whoever the OC is should be able to bring in some of not all of his own guys. Trust is a big deal to coaches. You need to know if the man sitting beside you is ready to go to war with you bc every given Saturday you could potentially lose your job at this level. Your livelihood and your families livelihood depends on the decisions of 18-20 yo kids.
He did beat OU but that's not the point. The point is you are paying a guy 5 mil. per year whose staff is discombobulated. I can understand if his record was 6-7, 8-4 but his record is 6-7 and 5-7 with no improvement and making coaching changes.....again. If I was in your AD's shoes, I would pull the plug on the whole Strong experiment and go with someone else. And please nobody start telling me how if you fire Strong then no black football players will want to play for Texas again or that it somehow sends the wrong message to future coaches. I'm pretty sure future coaches would understand that if you make 5 mil a year you are expected to win and progress not lose and regress. Pretty simple really.
It's probably part of the deal to ensure he comes here, but traditionally I don't think it's a given that a new OC gets to bring in all new offensive assistants. He still reports to the HC, and the HC hired all of the assistants. In this case there wasn't much success so no one is safe, but there are certainly situations when a new coordinator comes in alone. Who did Muschamp bring with him when we got him in 08?
I'll be the first to admit, that I thought the Wickline hire was a homerun, but now I think circumstance above everything had destroyed it. We should have just payed the damn buyout from the beginning. He would have been happier and wouldn't have had all these distractions.
Charlie Strong was not a home-run hire, he was a risky hire. He was an up-and-coming coach from a small school. He should have been giving a lot more support than he got, but someone (probably our former AD) thought it was a good idea to give him (Wickline) a made up title and say he is the OC when everyone knew who the real OC was all along.
Now it's a FUBAR hire, and Charlie is on the verge of being replaced.
I still think Charlie sucks, but we didn't help matters at all.
Charlie Strong was not a home-run hire, he was a risky hire. He was an up-and-coming coach from a small school. He should have been giving a lot more support than he got, but someone (probably our former AD) thought it was a good idea to give him (Wickline) a made up title and say he is the OC when everyone knew who the real OC was all along.
Now it's a FUBAR hire, and Charlie is on the verge of being replaced.
I still think Charlie sucks, but we didn't help matters at all.
I think there are a few reasons that would be given to keep Coach Strong around. I'm not saying there aren't good counterpoints to them or that I agree 100% with them, but I think there is SOME logic behind them, and then it just comes down to how the people making the decisions feel on the topic.
First, whether people would have predicted how this season went or not (mostly not), I don't think anyone with a sense of reality (and certainly not those in power) expected Texas to be "back" until year 3 or year 4. That's why they hired Strong in the first place. That's why they were fans of the whole "cleaning out" he did of the program. Year 3 and 4. Again, year 2 went way worse than most of those people would have thought I'd imagine, but... the goal was always for year 3 to be good and year 4 to be back in the mix of things. At least some people want to stay the course for that. And those people can find ways to support that, even in this season.
Which brings me to the second part. I mean, the people who were looking towards season 3 as the first real indicator can point to the special teams mistakes that lost the Cal and Oklahoma State games that didn't continue later in the season. Those two games that could have been wins(but, no, weren't) would have given Texas 7-5. They also would have given Texas wins over 3/4 of the best teams in the conference. They aren't the only "coulda shoulda woulda" losses on the schedule this year either. And yes, as I said before, there are perfect counterpoints to this thought process... most obviously, they WEREN'T wins. But given some added support from the AD and new coaching hires, could you imagine where the close games (Cal, OSU, and Tech) would be wins? Sure. Could you imagine where a situation like the ISU game wouldn't have happened? Sure. So there's that.
And the third reason that comes to mind involves continuity, recruiting, and even a hypothetical future coaching hire. Texas isn't Kansas. It might be near impossible, even in these low times for UT fans, to imagine a situation where Texas could devolve into the mess that the Kansas program is. But, there is something that Texas COULD do that would be similar to something Kansas has done: fire coaches quickly in succession in hopes of finding a better solution. That's bad. It's bad for current recruiting. It's bad for long term recruiting. It's bad for setting up your best current players to transfer. Kansas is clearly an extreme example of this, but they don't even have a full roster right now because of all the players they lost to transfers and all the recruits they lost as they swapped one coach that did the unthinkable and made Kansas relevant for a promising young coach who never had the chance to make his mark on the program because they swapped him for a big name coach who they hoped would be a game changer (but who really just didn't give a crap at that point) and then left the program with the new guy and hope he can fix the mess that all of that caused. Now, I get it, this would just be the second recent coaching change, not the 4th or 5th... and Texas has a better chance of getting someone who won't need to be changed out than Kansas but...
... that brings me to my final point. If you're going to fire a head coach after two years, despite the fact that the plan was to give him 3 or 4 years at least anyway, you sure as hell better have a home run replacement picked out, and you sure as hell better be certain you're getting him. I'll be honest, a quick glance around the college football landscape and I'm not sure who that guy would be. I'm not sure who the guy is that I think would just blow everyone away because everyone would know that, look out, this guy is bringing Texas back to the top! And I'm not sure, of the few guys who MIGHT be that, which ones aren't either at a point where moving on doesn't make sense for them (like Saban) or where they aren't in a dream job that would overrule even a great opportunity like being the head coach of the University of Texas (like Harbaugh, who is coaching at his alma mater now). An up and comer with potential? Isn't that what we chose Strong for? Honestly, the only guy out there who was on my previous wish list aside from Strong who I think might consider leaving his current gig, who I'd want and who'd be potentially a good cultural fit is David Shaw. Sure, there are some NFL situations that get batted around a bit, but I'm not a huge fan of the main one I keep hearing, and again... it better be a done deal if you're even considering that right now.
So yeah, there are plenty of reasons that the powers that be aren't following a Sooner internet dweller's recommendations about firing Coach Strong after 2 years. Like I said, I don't agree with them 100%, but there's a logic to them that most people can probably see, whether they agree or not.
I would have pulled the plug this year if it was up to me.....having said that I can understand why he was given another year. I hope that he gets this coaching staff right and they start winning and getting better. In short I like Strong (don't think he is a championship coach) and I hope he proves me wrong and wins BIG. But he did field a team last year that except for special teams and a int for a TD by ou outplayed ou pretty big and this year outplayed ou start to finish. He shows flashes.....and then letdowns......so frustrating.
After OU, I thought this team would win the rest of the games except for Baylor. Strong just hasn't been able to get any consistency out of the entire team. Defense, offense, or special teams.
O-line decimated; bunch of deadwood in the upper classes; starting qb knocked silly in the first game, with no quality backups; petty politics from the administration. You can't squeeze blood from a turnip.
There's plenty of fault and some of it is on coach Strong (mainly some bad staff hires). Pretty obvious he realizes that he's got one last chance/season to get this ball rolling. I believe he will do it, but if not, then someone else will get their shot.
Hook 'em
You are correct. Strong is the cause of the mess of the staff. Good coaches pick good staffs. I don't think he should be given the 3rd year either, but he's back so we have to deal with it.
✔ @BDavisAAS
I'm told its unlikely there will be any resolution tonight on Sonny Cumbie's offer to become the Texas OC. Waiting game continues.
4:17 PM - 8 Dec 2015
I wonder if Strong and company put any sort of timeline on this for Cumbie. I definitely understand now wanting to seem like he's being rushed, but from Texas' perspective, for recruiting and continuity purposes it would be important that this happen in the next day or two i'd think, right?
I also wonder if they've had any communication with Gilbert at Tulsa (either direct or through back channels). I'm not sure if it would be awkward to say "if this doesn't work out, you're our guy if you want it!" but... I mean, it seems like that might be the case in reality, even if it would be weird to say for all the egos and decision making involved.
Yeah, I feel like if there was an agreed upon timeline for this, fine, or if Cumbie has indicated to UT what a timeline might look like, fine, but there's a point where you realize that, whether Cumbie is doing it on purpose or not, there's a strategic advantage for Patterson recruiting-wise if this gets drawn out for too long. If we know that our next choice is Gilbert, I'd hope that either they've already contacted him or that they are setting something up so that would happen quickly if Cumbie says no or takes too long. Things get kind of awkward, especially if he's currently out recruiting for TCU...
