Just saw a report from the NFL Network that Monty Kiffin is leaving the Bucs to become an assistant coach with my Alma Mater of the University of Tennessee. Let me be the first to say this is a HORRIBLE move. Monty Kiffen is used to dealing with grown men now and he will not have any interests in going out and recruiting. He has never been known as a sociable guy and in today's college football the ability to recruit rivals in importance the ability to coach. I can't imagine Monty Kiffin having an in home visit with a kid from the inner city of Memphis and coming out of there with a committment. But hey who needs a recruiter when your son is the Head Coach. I love UT but this has all the makings of being an EPIC FAIL. But I am willing to be persuaded that I am wrong.
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I'm in northern Mexico now. I was a big fan in your day too. Would I know your name?
ReplyDeleteI was pretty critical of the Kiffin hiring; I would have liked an offensive genius and/or someone with more of a track record building a program, like Mike Leach. Charlie Strong also makes sense, for other reasons. I'm feeling a little better Kiffin now, I guess because I saw that Manning was for it and lots of NFL guys seem to think he's a good coach, but he just got stuck in an awful situation in Oakland. Whatever the case, it's got a high risk-reward ratio. I hate to say it, but if Kiffin doesn't work out, this could be kind of like the situation Alabama was in after Stallings left, where it just drifted from one guy to the next for a decade before landing Saban. Bama and UT are similar in that they both need to recruit out of state to be successful, so having a big-time coach is all the more important. I can see the logic of hiring Kiffin, because he'll be able to recruit om southern cali in a way that the other SEC coaches can't. Hopefully. If Kiffin isn't the guy, well crap, it's going to be another five years before we can look forward to contending.
Monty coming along seems kind of weird for the reasons you mention, but I imagine he'll be more of an x's and o's guy than a recruiting asset.
You might recognize the name or not. I put in a little work back in the day. But I don't like to put it out there because I don't want to be seen as promoting myself because of that part of my past.
ReplyDeleteAs for the Kiffin hire, the problem with recruiting California primarily is that most of those guys don't want to come all the way across country to a conservative place like Knoxville. Besides that, after USC and the rest of the PAC 10 coaches get done, the kids we will get out of that area will be mostly the also rans. Right now there is an AWESOME Running Back starting for the University of Miami that came from Memphis. We need to do a better job of recruiting in the south before we go off to the west coast looking for saviors in my opinion.
Monty Kiffin is a pretty good X and Os guy but you have to remember that its different going from coaching when you have a defense full of pro bowlers to coaching kids who can't even back peddle. Plus like I said you can't go out and offer a guy a bigger contract to sign with UT. Recruiting is the life blood of any great program. If he can't do it, and I don't think he can, Tennessee is going to be in for a disaster in the next few years.
Look around the nation. What perrinial top 10 team has an old coaching staff? Even if you count Penn State, only the head guy is old. The assistants are all young and up and comers. I just don't see how this will work out well for us.
By the way, some of the best players on Bama's team that almost made it to the national title game are from Alabama or Florida.
John Parker Wilson
Javier Arenas
Rashad Johnson
Rolando McClain
Julio Jones
Glen Coffee
Mount Cody
Antoine Caldwell
Andre Smith
Perception isn't always reality
Thats why we should have hired Charlie Strong. Screw California, we need some horse from Florida balling for UT