Some of the darkest days for fans of the University of Colorado football program have been concentrated in the last several years. Paradoxically, those looking for a new dawn in Boulder might focus their attention West to Palo Alto in California's Bay Area. It is there on the Stanford campus where one might find how quickly a new coach can turn around a moribund program.
The mastermind behind what is now the Stanford juggernaut was current San Francisco 49ers coach Jim Harbaugh. Following a three year stint at the University of San Diego, Harbaugh was named the head coach at Stanford. The situation in Palo Alto in 2006 was every bit as dire as it was in Boulder in 2012.
The Cardinal finished the 2006 season with a record of 1-11, lowlighted by an offense which scored a grand total of 127 points for the season. How bad is that? By comparison, the CU Buffs scored 214 points in 2012. Two days after the 2006 season ended, head coach Walt Harris was fired, and the Harbaugh revolution was begun.
Following the 1-11 season in 2006, Harbaugh began the arduous task of rebuilding the football culture for the Stanford Cardinal. In 2007, Stanford won four games, in 2008 they won five games, and in 2009 they won eight games to become bowl eligible for the first time since 2001.
By 2010, the rebirth of the Stanford Cardinal football program was complete. Harbaugh led the team to an astonishing record of 12-1 and were ranked #4 in the country following the bowls. It was the first time that Stanford had been ranked in the top five at the end of the season in 70 years.
When Jim Harbaugh was hired at Stanford, one of the more important things he did was to bring along Mike Shaw, the current Cardinal head coach. When Harbaugh moved on to become head coach of the NFL San Francisco 49ers following the 2010 season, Shaw stayed at his alma mater as head coach and has kept the Cardinal rolling with 23 wins out of his 27 games. Stanford has ended the year in the Top 10 both of those seasons.
Like the Cardinal in 2006, the 2012 version of the CU Buffs was arguably the worst in the long and storied history of the program. They not only lost a lot (11 times, versus only victory), but they also lost so ugly that opponents scored more than 40 points 8 times during the season. Four opponents scored at least 50 points, and two rocked the Buffs for 69 and 70, respectively. Following the end of the season, head coach Jon Embree was fired.
Mike MacIntyre was hired in December 2012 as the new head football coach at the University of Colorado. MacIntyre was previously the head coach at San Jose State, where he pulled a very Harbaugh- like reconstruction of the football program. In his three years at SJS, the Spartans went from a single win in 2010 (1-12), to 5-7 in 2011, and then to a stellar 11-2 record in 2012.
Like Harbaugh did at Stanford, MacIntyre took the San Jose State program and changed the culture. He did this by building an excellent staff that was dedicated to working as a team to molding young men into student athletes first and foremost. The excellence they demanded of their players off the field helped turn them into very good football players on the field.
The terms "strength" and "conditioning" are a mantra for all football programs, of course, but MacIntyre took it to a new level by hiring a young man named Dave Forman to be his director of Sports Performance. While at San Jose State, Mac hired Forman away from Stanford, where he had been working as a strength and conditioning coach for three years.
In his time at Stanford and his two years at SJS, Forman turned programs which were routinely pushed around into teams known for their strength, conditioning and performance. There is no reason whatsoever to believe that he will not achieve the same thing in Boulder. Indeed, the altitude at CU will only help CU to become one of the best conditioned programs in the conference and the country.
In the horror of the 2012 football season, it seemed to many Buff fans that the football world had been turned upside down. That being the case, the sun coming up to better times has risen from the West. Stanford and San Jose State are both bastions of the Bay Area's Silicon Vally, and together they helped create the new football technology which will return Colorado to football prominence once again.
Let the MacIntyre revolution at CU begin!
-------------
Check out "A New Dawn for Colorado Buff Football"
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Why CU Buff Football Fans Should FORGET About the Recruiting Services
There are more than EIGHT months to go before the 2014 National Signing Day for college football, yet many CU Buff football fans are worried about coach MacIntyre's next recruiting class and how it is ranked by the well known recruiting services Scout.com and Rivals.com. These fans should really STOP giving so much credence to these and other recruiting services.
WHY should fans take what the services say with a grain of salt?
If a coach from a FBS school offers a scholarship to a young man who is unrated or a two-star recruit according to the recruiting services, what it usually means is that the coaches know a lot more about the recruit than the "services" do. We should let them do the jobs they are PAID to do.
A case in point here is the young man named Connor Center who recently signed on to play for the Buffs. He is an excellent athlete who played another sport in high school. So what? His numbers (6' 8" tall, 250 lbs., and 4.68 in the 40 yard dash) would have made him a top ten recruit at tight end. Even though he never played high school football, many schools offered him a scholarship based solely on a workout video he sent out this spring. But CU coaches liked what they saw and sent a coach across the country to work him out in person. A visit to Boulder later, and the Buffs now have one of the biggest coups of the 2013 recruiting class. As the old saying goes, you can't teach height or speed.
Another example is David Bakhtiari, who left school early and was drafted recently into the NFL. Coming out of high school, David was listed by the recruiting services as a TWO star recruit.
------------------------------------------
On another note, USC was in the news recently for offering a scholarship to an 8th grade kid who hasn't even gotten to high school yet. Brave move by a coach that many Trojan fans want gone. The one way to nip this idiotic trend in the bud is to make schools live up to that offer no matter what happens to the kid in the next four years. Is the offer still good if the young man blows out his knees or gets multiple concussions? No coach is bound to honor scholarship offers, especially those made by prior coaches. Even the ones they offer themselves can be rescinded at any time. And recruits can also change their minds at any time. Nothing is set in stone until the Letter of Intent is signed, sealed and delivered.
WHY should fans take what the services say with a grain of salt?
- Rivals and Scout each use a network of about 300 "sources" to come up with their ratings of players.
- According to USA Football, there are roughly 1.134 MILLION high school football players at 15,513 high schools across the US.
- That would mean each "source" used by these recruiting services would be responsible for well over 50 high schools, which would not be an easy task.
- If that were not daunting enough, according to the Digest of Education Statistics there are actually over 37,000 public and private high schools in the US. This is well more than double the number listed by USA football.
- This would raise the number of schools to be watched over by each "source" to about 120, a much harder task.
- Many of the "sources" used by recruiting services are unpaid fans of local football. Most of them depend on simple calculations like height, weight, and 40 yard dash times to determine the number of "stars" a recruit will get from them.
- Most never have access to whether potential recruits have the grades or test scores that indicate probable success as a STUDENT at the college level.
- They are not trained or paid (in most cases) to evaluate growth and strength capabilities of rapidly growing young men.
- Some so-called recruiting services can be persuaded to UP their evaluations if the price is right. Basically, this means the are being paid to promote athletes.
- These men are paid handsomely to build relationships with high school coaches and prospective recruits.
- They have to get inside the heads of their recruits. They meet their families and learn about how dedicated to schoolwork the young men are.
- Meeting the parents and siblings (especially older ones) allows these men to ascertain how much the recruit is likely to grow, and how much family support is there for the University of Colorado.
- The coaches also have to evaluate prospective players psychologically. They have to determine if they are dedicated TEAM players, or if they are a potential prima donna who will be disruptive to the team.
- Sadly, they also have to determine if the prospective student is likely to have "legal problems" or thrive in an environment which might be VERY different than they are used to.
- These men take these responsibilities very seriously because their jobs and career depend upon it.
If a coach from a FBS school offers a scholarship to a young man who is unrated or a two-star recruit according to the recruiting services, what it usually means is that the coaches know a lot more about the recruit than the "services" do. We should let them do the jobs they are PAID to do.
A case in point here is the young man named Connor Center who recently signed on to play for the Buffs. He is an excellent athlete who played another sport in high school. So what? His numbers (6' 8" tall, 250 lbs., and 4.68 in the 40 yard dash) would have made him a top ten recruit at tight end. Even though he never played high school football, many schools offered him a scholarship based solely on a workout video he sent out this spring. But CU coaches liked what they saw and sent a coach across the country to work him out in person. A visit to Boulder later, and the Buffs now have one of the biggest coups of the 2013 recruiting class. As the old saying goes, you can't teach height or speed.
Another example is David Bakhtiari, who left school early and was drafted recently into the NFL. Coming out of high school, David was listed by the recruiting services as a TWO star recruit.
------------------------------------------
On another note, USC was in the news recently for offering a scholarship to an 8th grade kid who hasn't even gotten to high school yet. Brave move by a coach that many Trojan fans want gone. The one way to nip this idiotic trend in the bud is to make schools live up to that offer no matter what happens to the kid in the next four years. Is the offer still good if the young man blows out his knees or gets multiple concussions? No coach is bound to honor scholarship offers, especially those made by prior coaches. Even the ones they offer themselves can be rescinded at any time. And recruits can also change their minds at any time. Nothing is set in stone until the Letter of Intent is signed, sealed and delivered.
Monday, June 3, 2013
In Defense of Mike Bohn -- CU's Leadership is Lacking at the Very Top
Like a lot of people, it was easy for me to think that Mike Bohn was doing a horrible job as the Athletic Director for the University of Colorado. After considerable research, I can freely admit that I was wrong. Mike Bohn has been devoted to the university he loves and did as well as could be expected despite the lack of commitment from CU.
When one digs deep enough to find the true power structure behind CU athletics, the facts are that Mike Bohn was the best fundraiser that CU has ever had in the position and that the true bosses at CU (President Bruce Benson and Chancellor Phil DiStefano) want all the benefits of having a top notch athletic program while making none of the investments needed to achieve that goal.
Case in point: Mike Bohn had a salary of $310,000 per year. Some folks might say that 310k is a lot of money. However, those who hire athletic directors at major universities would say that Colorado was trying to get off cheap. Real cheap.
The true bosses at CU have been quoted as of late saying that CU needs someone in the AD position who can help us compete with the BIG BOYS of college athletics. Really? Are they willing to make the financial commitment to hire one of those people? Mike Bohn was the lowest paid athletic director in the Pac 12. And before that he was the lowest paid AD in the Big 12.
The average AD in the Pac-12 at the public schools is $534,000. Stanford and USC most likely pay much more than average, but as private schools they do not have to divulge their AD pay. Compared to CU's old conference, however, the typical Pac-12 school is certainly not among the big boys when it comes to AD pay. CU's old rivals in the Big 12 pay their Athletic Directors an average of $837,000 per year, which is closing in on 3 TIMES the amount that CU invests.
Jon Embree was paid $725,000 a year to be CU's head football coach. Compare that salary with the average Pac-12 rival coach of $2.29 MILLION or the pay enjoyed by Big 12 coaches of $2.76 MILLION. Embree's pay was less than the coaches of nationally renowned football powerhouses like Arkansas State and Louisiana-Lafayette. Up in Fort Collins, their head coach pulled in almost double what Embree earned.
Not only did CU pay the head of the team for CU's traditionally only revenue generating sport less than a third of what other schools were paying their head coaches, Embree also had to foot the bill for bottled water for his staff. CU's illustrious leaders would not even pay for water? That made CU a much bigger joke around the country than lack of wins on the football field.
It has been said that Benson is a master of getting big donors to give to CU. If that is the case, why the hell is tuition going up at so many times the rate of inflation? Not only that, but CU has a long proud history of treating their students like an unwelcome burden. You guys ought to try being nice to students. Don't you idiots realize that it is the students of today who are the potential donors of tomorrow? If you want dividends in the way of donations in the future, you need to invest in students today. If you want your football program to fund all of your other sports, you need to invest in the program.
Everyone seems to know that the football program lost money this past year. Does that really surprise anyone? It shouldn't. The switch to the Pac-12 cost CU money. They had to pay to get out of the Big 12 and as a new member of the Pac-12 they only got ONE FOURTH of the television money that the other schools got, same as Utah. Next year, that goes up and CU's athletic program will once again be flush with money.
Mike Bohn worked tirelessly to get Colorado into the Pac-12. This was a very good thing, Most of CU's out of state students come from the west. The TV revenue that comes from the new conference is more than double what CU used to make in the Big 12.
Thanks to Mike Bohn and his hiring of Tad Boyle, Colorado now has another revenue generating sport in basketball. Not only do the B-Ball Buffs sell out the Events Center, they also earn big dollars by making it to the NCAA's Big Dance. Based on Boyle's coaching and the quality of his recruits, that will not change anytime soon. Under Bohn, Linda Lappe has rebuilt the Women's Basketball program almost to the point of its former glory under Acting AD Ceal Barry. Stories like this abound in CU athletics. A lot of the thanks for those successes rest with Mike Bohn.
Many forget that Mike Bohn came into his job as AD to rescue CU from a bad situation. The real and fabricated scandals around Gary Barnett were causing CU a great deal of embarrassment. Bohn did his best to mitigate the situation and fired Barnett. It needed to be done. Then, Bohn went out and hired the hottest coaching candidate in the country. When Dan Hawkins was hired away from Boise State, he was considered to be a great hire. His teams as head coach before CU were 93-22. Nobody predicted that Hawkins would go 19-39 at Colorado.
Then came the Embree hire. Following the dismissal of Hawkins, Bohn took the meager funds available to him from the Big Bosses at CU and hired an ex-Buff to revitalize the program. The commitment that CU showed Embree was as small as his pay, and Colorado dropped further and further away from their former glory. Two years in to an untenable position with little support from the university, Mike Bohn was forced to fire Jon Embree. Mike Bohn's handling of the firing of his third head coach gave everybody the impression that Bohn was to blame for all the woes of the football program. And the puppet masters pulling the strings behind the scenes, who also held the purse strings, did nothing to change that view.
Finally, Benson and DiStefano, with Bohn as the fall guy, decided to fire the guy who did more with less money than just about any AD in the country. How delusional are these folks? They sat quietly by and spoke of a "national search" for the new AD. More comically, they mentioned as possible candidates guys who already make significantly more money than Bohn. One guy mentioned makes more in interest on his investments every year than Bohn earned in eight years on the job. As he eloquently stated in letter to the Denver Post, he is NOT a candidate.
Well, the ball is now in the court of two guys who have never shown a commitment to CU athletics. Let's see how much money they are willing to spend on a new AD. One thing is certain, no matter who they hire, they will not have the same love and devotion to the Buffs as Mike Bohn did. At least they had the good sense to let Bohn hire Mike MacIntyre and actually pay him commensurate with his peers.
When one digs deep enough to find the true power structure behind CU athletics, the facts are that Mike Bohn was the best fundraiser that CU has ever had in the position and that the true bosses at CU (President Bruce Benson and Chancellor Phil DiStefano) want all the benefits of having a top notch athletic program while making none of the investments needed to achieve that goal.
Case in point: Mike Bohn had a salary of $310,000 per year. Some folks might say that 310k is a lot of money. However, those who hire athletic directors at major universities would say that Colorado was trying to get off cheap. Real cheap.
The true bosses at CU have been quoted as of late saying that CU needs someone in the AD position who can help us compete with the BIG BOYS of college athletics. Really? Are they willing to make the financial commitment to hire one of those people? Mike Bohn was the lowest paid athletic director in the Pac 12. And before that he was the lowest paid AD in the Big 12.
The average AD in the Pac-12 at the public schools is $534,000. Stanford and USC most likely pay much more than average, but as private schools they do not have to divulge their AD pay. Compared to CU's old conference, however, the typical Pac-12 school is certainly not among the big boys when it comes to AD pay. CU's old rivals in the Big 12 pay their Athletic Directors an average of $837,000 per year, which is closing in on 3 TIMES the amount that CU invests.
Jon Embree was paid $725,000 a year to be CU's head football coach. Compare that salary with the average Pac-12 rival coach of $2.29 MILLION or the pay enjoyed by Big 12 coaches of $2.76 MILLION. Embree's pay was less than the coaches of nationally renowned football powerhouses like Arkansas State and Louisiana-Lafayette. Up in Fort Collins, their head coach pulled in almost double what Embree earned.
Not only did CU pay the head of the team for CU's traditionally only revenue generating sport less than a third of what other schools were paying their head coaches, Embree also had to foot the bill for bottled water for his staff. CU's illustrious leaders would not even pay for water? That made CU a much bigger joke around the country than lack of wins on the football field.
It has been said that Benson is a master of getting big donors to give to CU. If that is the case, why the hell is tuition going up at so many times the rate of inflation? Not only that, but CU has a long proud history of treating their students like an unwelcome burden. You guys ought to try being nice to students. Don't you idiots realize that it is the students of today who are the potential donors of tomorrow? If you want dividends in the way of donations in the future, you need to invest in students today. If you want your football program to fund all of your other sports, you need to invest in the program.
Everyone seems to know that the football program lost money this past year. Does that really surprise anyone? It shouldn't. The switch to the Pac-12 cost CU money. They had to pay to get out of the Big 12 and as a new member of the Pac-12 they only got ONE FOURTH of the television money that the other schools got, same as Utah. Next year, that goes up and CU's athletic program will once again be flush with money.
Mike Bohn worked tirelessly to get Colorado into the Pac-12. This was a very good thing, Most of CU's out of state students come from the west. The TV revenue that comes from the new conference is more than double what CU used to make in the Big 12.
Thanks to Mike Bohn and his hiring of Tad Boyle, Colorado now has another revenue generating sport in basketball. Not only do the B-Ball Buffs sell out the Events Center, they also earn big dollars by making it to the NCAA's Big Dance. Based on Boyle's coaching and the quality of his recruits, that will not change anytime soon. Under Bohn, Linda Lappe has rebuilt the Women's Basketball program almost to the point of its former glory under Acting AD Ceal Barry. Stories like this abound in CU athletics. A lot of the thanks for those successes rest with Mike Bohn.
Many forget that Mike Bohn came into his job as AD to rescue CU from a bad situation. The real and fabricated scandals around Gary Barnett were causing CU a great deal of embarrassment. Bohn did his best to mitigate the situation and fired Barnett. It needed to be done. Then, Bohn went out and hired the hottest coaching candidate in the country. When Dan Hawkins was hired away from Boise State, he was considered to be a great hire. His teams as head coach before CU were 93-22. Nobody predicted that Hawkins would go 19-39 at Colorado.
Then came the Embree hire. Following the dismissal of Hawkins, Bohn took the meager funds available to him from the Big Bosses at CU and hired an ex-Buff to revitalize the program. The commitment that CU showed Embree was as small as his pay, and Colorado dropped further and further away from their former glory. Two years in to an untenable position with little support from the university, Mike Bohn was forced to fire Jon Embree. Mike Bohn's handling of the firing of his third head coach gave everybody the impression that Bohn was to blame for all the woes of the football program. And the puppet masters pulling the strings behind the scenes, who also held the purse strings, did nothing to change that view.
Finally, Benson and DiStefano, with Bohn as the fall guy, decided to fire the guy who did more with less money than just about any AD in the country. How delusional are these folks? They sat quietly by and spoke of a "national search" for the new AD. More comically, they mentioned as possible candidates guys who already make significantly more money than Bohn. One guy mentioned makes more in interest on his investments every year than Bohn earned in eight years on the job. As he eloquently stated in letter to the Denver Post, he is NOT a candidate.
Well, the ball is now in the court of two guys who have never shown a commitment to CU athletics. Let's see how much money they are willing to spend on a new AD. One thing is certain, no matter who they hire, they will not have the same love and devotion to the Buffs as Mike Bohn did. At least they had the good sense to let Bohn hire Mike MacIntyre and actually pay him commensurate with his peers.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)