I’ve been lobbying for Mike Leach to replace the inept Tyrone Willingham as the Washington Huskies football coach for most of the season. Leach would have brought a tsunami of offense to the Pacific Northwest, and he would have made the kind of splash and headlines that the floundering UW program so desperately needs.
I don’t know which side ended the talks, but if UW offered Mike Leach the position and he turned it down, it’s a decision he’ll regret for the rest of his career. Leach is topped out at Texas Tech. The Texas Tech program is topped out.
Texas Tech is in Texas. As if that isn’t bad enough, it’s in Lubbock, TX. Other things in Lubbock, TX? Don’t feel bad; I can’t come up with anything, either.
For those of you who don’t know, the University of Washington is in Seattle. Seattle is one of the few things I love that won’t fit in my carry-on. The University of Washington has a proud football history. Unfortunately, after years of mismanagement, it’s all history.
The Huskies, since the 1950’s, are, on average, a 7-4 team. Under Willingham, the Huskies are averaging 3-9 seasons. That’s unacceptable anywhere. At UW, it’s an abomination.
I’ve created the following table to compare all-time great coaches (Bryant, Paterno, and Bowden) to successful modern coaches (Meyer, Carroll, and Leach) to floundering, overpaid modern coaches who brought nothing but gridiron despair to the universities which so richly rewarded them (Willingham and Weis).
It’s fascinating how evenly-matched Paterno and Bowden are. Even the rating, calculated from their records and years of experience, is dead even.
It would appear from these calculations that an average yearly record of 9-2 is the best winning percentage which is sustainable over the long-term. Over shorter periods, Bryant, Paterno, and Bowden had fewer than 2 or 3 losses, but that’s the way it works over the long-term. If that’s what Bear Bryant, the coaching gold standard, averaged over his long career, it’s likely that 9-2 is the best pace any coach can maintain over his career.
There are other coaches with outstanding records, Bud Wilkinson and Barry Switzer of Oklahoma, Tom Osborne of Nebraska, and Knute Rockne of Notre Dame. My choice of Bear Bryant as the coaching gold standard is subjective and may change before I finish writing this article, but in 38 years as a head coach for 4 different teams, the only place he didn’t win a championship was Maryland, and he was only there for one year. Bryant had one losing season in 38 years, his first season at Texas A&M. The next year his team was 7-2-1. In his third season, they were 9-0-1 and champions of the Southwest Athletic Conference.
Bryant was 5-4-1 in his first year at Alabama, a team which had won a total of 4 games in the previous three years.
The man brought winning with him.
That’s a great coach.
Steve Sarkisian has great potential.
He is not yet a great coach.
Steve Sarkisian is, apparently, the new head coach of the University of Washington Huskies football team.
I’m disappointed that it’s not Mike Leach, but, after wiping away my tears and looking at the choice, I think it’s a good one…as second choices go.
Sarkisian is young, energetic, and demanding. He will demand effort, something the Huskies rarely offered over the last few seasons.
Sarkisian learned offense at BYU, an offensive school in so many ways, where he studied under Norm Chow, a renowned architect of offense.
Sarkisian learned defense under Pete Carroll, the man who brought defense to the Pac-10. If Sarkisian thrived in the frenetic USC coaching staff under the hyperkinetic Pete Carroll, you know what kind of manic energy he’ll bring to every practice and every game. The Huskies need energy. These dawgs aren’t sleeping; they’re comatose.
Sarkisian knows the Pac-10. Sarkisian knows how to win in the Pac-10. His Trojans have dominated since Carroll took over the program in 2001.
But, how well does Sarkisian know the Pac-10? His old mentor, Norm Chow, is now the offensive coordinator at UCLA. His old boss, obviously, is Pete Carroll at USC. The man who recruited him to play quarterback at BYU is DeWayne Walker, now the defensive coordinator at UCLA.
If all that’s not enough familiarity with the Pac-10, there’s those years of studying Pac-10 opponents as the USC offensive coordinator.
There’s no question that he’s qualified, and there’s no doubt that he can handle the pressure. Nobody who works for Pete Carroll is a slug or a wallflower.
Certainly, Sarkisian must also understand that this has to happen quickly. UW fans are out of patience. They waited 2 years too long for the Willingham miracle that never came. Of course it never came. The data indicates that Willingham, over a 14 year head coaching career, is a 5-6 coach. That’s a lot of data, and the results are clear. Willingham is not a qualified head coach.
It’s time to find out if Steve Sarkisian is.
Tags: Alabama, Bear Bryant, Bowden, Bryant, Carroll, Chow, Huskies, Husky, Leach, Meyer, Paterno, Pear Bryant, Sarkisian, Seattle, Washington, Weis, Willingham
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