Dave Mona said 90% chance Claeys named full time coach this week

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GophersInIowa said:
In case you didn't hear, Frank Beamer announced he is retiring after this season so there is another open coaching position.
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Gopherhole will not be impressed. Most at VT will probably be OK with it.
 

Good move. They need to lock down the recruiting class before the kids start to look around. Also, this would keep the same fundamental systems and coaches in place to see if we can continue to improve. If not, they can move on. Can't wait for the full time AD, give that to Beth and see how it plays out.


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Sid thinks an announcement by Wed/Thurs on Claeys. He also think Goetz will be AD.


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So, the U does not need to go through a full search for a coach? I was thinking there was some school rule (or maybe an NCAA rule). Obviously, I may be mistaken. If they are leaning towards hiring him, let's get it done sooner than later. Like many people on here the first couple of hours after that stinging loss, I was having second thoughts on TC. But, after some time has gone by, and the emotions subsided, I realize that the game was generally great for the first 99% of it, and happy to hear TC own up to the errors made.

I saw some of Tracy's pregame speech, he's much more laid back than Kill, and didn't give the typical rah-rah speech you usually see from many coaches. Do you think these pre-game speeches are over blown? Are there examples of other good coaches that are a bit more mellow? I've never seen or heard a Tony Dungy pregame speech, but I'd guess he'd be on the low key side.
 

Johnny Olson said:
The amount of years may not be as important as the $$ of the contact. A million a year for seven years would be a good deal.
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Until people start complaining that he's at the bottom of the Big Ten for pay and deserves a raise.
 


MaxyJR1 said:
So what will be reaction in Virginia if Bud Foster is named coach this week? 34 year assistant. Never HC.


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Not sure how likely that really is. Just read a long article on ESPN naming a bunch of candidates and Foster wasn't even on the list.

There are usually pretty good reasons why a coach stays an assistant for decades without ever moving up or even being a serious candidate for a head job anywhere else.
 

Donovan said:
So, the U does not need to go through a full search for a coach? I was thinking there was some school rule (or maybe an NCAA rule). Obviously, I may be mistaken. If they are leaning towards hiring him, let's get it done sooner than later. Like many people on here the first couple of hours after that stinging loss, I was having second thoughts on TC. But, after some time has gone by, and the emotions subsided, I realize that the game was generally great for the first 99% of it, and happy to hear TC own up to the errors made.

I saw some of Tracy's pregame speech, he's much more laid back than Kill, and didn't give the typical rah-rah speech you usually see from many coaches. Do you think these pre-game speeches are over blown? Are there examples of other good coaches that are a bit more mellow? I've never seen or heard a Tony Dungy pregame speech, but I'd guess he'd be on the low key side.
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It's a State of Minnesota job opening, so legally, they have to post it, but I don't think that means they can't post it nominally and then just hire Claeys (or Goetz for that matter). I don't see what choice they have but to promote Claeys. They HAVE to have a permanent head coach in place for recruiting and with the huge number of open head coaching jobs right now (I can't think of a year where there were more openings this early) they'd be best to lock it in now.

Add Hawaii to the list of openings as of this weekend too, as they canned Norm Chow (who's had a great career overall and deserves a nice retirement). And yes, I know that Hawaii is a dumpster fire of epic proportions with all kinds of logistical issues, but I hope they can keep their program as there have been questions as to the long term viability of it, due to location.

I don't know about the whole rah-rah thing and how it affects players. I only played through high school, but I always thought it was stupid. Either you're up to play, or you're not was my thought. Someone yelling and playing cheerleader had nothing to do with it.
 

I'm surprised no one has pointed out that the posting can be internal and promotion from within the university. The problem would come if some university employee thought he or she was a better candidate and didn't get fair treatment in the hiring process.
 

killme said:
I'm surprised no one has pointed out that the posting can be internal and promotion from within the university. The problem would come if some university employee thought he or she was a better candidate and didn't get fair treatment in the hiring process.
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A totally plausible and likely scenario given our luck :/
 



Sparlimb said:
My worry as well. I was all Gutey back then, thinking it would keep going. Then Holtz's whole recruiting class switched to Notre Dame and they won a title. We got nothing but the a few years before the Wacker disaster.
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Count me in this small club. I like Claeys and think he's a good coordinator, but being the head coach is a whole different ball game. Not saying he can't do it, but I don't think it's a slam dunk that he can and most of the optimists here think everything is just going to keep chugging along as if nothing happened.

If the buyout is reasonable, I'm fine with Claeys moving up.
 


killme said:
I'm surprised no one has pointed out that the posting can be internal and promotion from within the university. The problem would come if some university employee thought he or she was a better candidate and didn't get fair treatment in the hiring process.
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One thing to add from an EEOC perspective. If it's been determined that Minnesota has not done their due diligence in obtaining a representative workforce, an internal posting might not cut it. Now this applies to most public sector jobs, I'm not sure what a private federally funded university has to or does not have to comply with. And one job does not make an employment action plan, it's likely fruitless to cite various legal/federal requirements for one or two jobs. Just the fact that they are high profile and there have been complaints in the past about whether or not University of Minnesota is compliant with similar issues makes you wonder if someone laying in the bushes is holding onto their employment law book looking for a headline.
 

I'm guessing this will happen.

Because this thing will flop around in the wind for 6 months otherwise.
 



caliGopher said:
Keeping the current recruiting class together?


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a) 9 of the 17 kids are from Minnesota. Those guys aren't going anywhere.
b) Kids flip all the time regardless of coaching situation. Sure, Snelson might flip, but people have been worried about that since the day he committed.
c) We are just guessing that there are some number of players who would flip due to a prolonged coaching search, but would stay because of Claeys.
d) Between those 3 factors you're looking at maybe 1 or 2 guys who would choose to go elsewhere merely because of the uncertainty.
e) There's only about a 50% chance that any particular player ends up making a real impact.

Finding the best possible coach is 100x more important than holding on to 1 or 2 recruits. Think of it this way. In retrospect would you rather have had Brewster + 2 extra recruits or Kill without those recruits? Every single person who has ever posted on this board would choose the latter.

I'm not saying that Claeys is the same as Brewster, just making a point that you don't make coaching decisions based on retaining recruits.
 

This program is SO close. SO very close to a point where the floor is raised to 7-9 wins and the ceiling is a B1G title. Even if Claeys isn't the guy that brings rose bowl glory to the U, he is critical to maintaining the slow burn to where the program simply doesn't take a step back for minor bad events.

Hire him on a good contract, promote Sawvel to DC, maintain most of these recruits, get geared up for 2 really winnable schedules with alot of talent coming back, and get the facilities done coming off of 5 or more years of good football and we'll be in a really good place.

Waiver, wait, or try to double down and hit on a new coach and the whole thing could come crashing down to the point where you're looking at another fringe bowl game era for awhile.
 

Donovan said:
So, the U does not need to go through a full search for a coach? I was thinking there was some school rule (or maybe an NCAA rule). Obviously, I may be mistaken. If they are leaning towards hiring him, let's get it done sooner than later. Like many people on here the first couple of hours after that stinging loss, I was having second thoughts on TC. But, after some time has gone by, and the emotions subsided, I realize that the game was generally great for the first 99% of it, and happy to hear TC own up to the errors made.

I saw some of Tracy's pregame speech, he's much more laid back than Kill, and didn't give the typical rah-rah speech you usually see from many coaches. Do you think these pre-game speeches are over blown? Are there examples of other good coaches that are a bit more mellow? I've never seen or heard a Tony Dungy pregame speech, but I'd guess he'd be on the low key side.
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Speeches are overrated, Brew's speeches were legendary, his teams not so much.
 


Ole said:
This program is SO close. SO very close to a point where the floor is raised to 7-9 wins and the ceiling is a B1G title. Even if Claeys isn't the guy that brings rose bowl glory to the U, he is critical to maintaining the slow burn to where the program simply doesn't take a step back for minor bad events.

Hire him on a good contract, promote Sawvel to DC, maintain most of these recruits, get geared up for 2 really winnable schedules with alot of talent coming back, and get the facilities done coming off of 5 or more years of good football and we'll be in a really good place.

Waiver, wait, or try to double down and hit on a new coach and the whole thing could come crashing down to the point where you're looking at another fringe bowl game era for awhile.
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Bingo!!! Not sure why this is hard to understand.
 

I struggle to believe the brick by brick foundation, after 5 years is so unstable as to being in critical collapse mode if a new coaching regime was brought in. There are myriad examples of once proud programs turning around very quickly (see Bob Stoops winning title in second year at OU for example) and many examples of program building in fewer then 5 years ( see Alvarez in Wisconsin, winning Rose in year 4).
There are myriad examples of long time assistants getting promoted to top job and failing. There are myriad examples of long time coordinators that really don't aspire to a HC job (for a variety of reasons).

I think it would be a mistake to assume TC would be great just as it would be a mistake to assume he will fail- but we can look at these examples to make some guesses.

1. That if TC really wanted a HC job, he likely could have had one by now. Maybe phrasing it as "If he wanted a HC job more then the job he had with Kill". But either way, it is fair to say that TC has not been motivated by obtaining a big time program HC to this point in his career.

2. He is a highly skilled DC, what we don't know is if that translates into HC skill.

3. This is year 5 of the Kill plan, of which TC was apart of from day 1. We are seeing regression in year 5- regression that drove Kill's health concerns as opposed to heath concerns causing the regression. Because of this, we are still left not knowing the full potential of the kill plan (and may never know).

I think it's a mistake to assume the Kill plan was without issues and has us right where we want to be. I think there are many examples of coaches taking programs with more issues then which existed at this school when Kill was hired, and having greater success 5 years in. That doesn't mean we aren't having enough success, but to pretend Kill's model has us EXACTLY where we'd want to be isn't really supported by evidence at many many other places.

I guess one poster said it was a gamble either way (stay with TC or go) and I think it's a 50/50 toss up. You get some stability with TC and that is good. You might get the next level, but he needs to learn the fine points of the HC position pretty quick for that to happen. We lose out on hitting a home run with next hire, but we also avoid a brewster hire set back too.

If the AD position was filled I'd say go with new regime. but it's not. Gotta stay the course right? As much as that isn't exciting, it's the least bad of many bad options....
 

killme said:
I'm surprised no one has pointed out that the posting can be internal and promotion from within the university. The problem would come if some university employee thought he or she was a better candidate and didn't get fair treatment in the hiring process.
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This can apply to both the AD and open football coaching position. I would agree for the stability of things, I would like the University to take the interim label off the current interim AD and head football coach. The only thing being, I want to protect the University side of things, both will get prove it contracts, low number of total years say three to four years including this year with low buyouts for both the AD and football coach that way we can see if any of the changes they may make are effective. There needs to be incentive for them to succeed to gain more leverage and salary.
 

edma0012 said:
I struggle to believe the brick by brick foundation, after 5 years is so unstable as to being in critical collapse mode if a new coaching regime was brought in. There are myriad examples of once proud programs turning around very quickly (see Bob Stoops winning title in second year at OU for example) and many examples of program building in fewer then 5 years ( see Alvarez in Wisconsin, winning Rose in year 4).
There are myriad examples of long time assistants getting promoted to top job and failing. There are myriad examples of long time coordinators that really don't aspire to a HC job (for a variety of reasons).

I think it would be a mistake to assume TC would be great just as it would be a mistake to assume he will fail- but we can look at these examples to make some guesses.

1. That if TC really wanted a HC job, he likely could have had one by now. Maybe phrasing it as "If he wanted a HC job more then the job he had with Kill". But either way, it is fair to say that TC has not been motivated by obtaining a big time program HC to this point in his career.

2. He is a highly skilled DC, what we don't know is if that translates into HC skill.

3. This is year 5 of the Kill plan, of which TC was apart of from day 1. We are seeing regression in year 5- regression that drove Kill's health concerns as opposed to heath concerns causing the regression. Because of this, we are still left not knowing the full potential of the kill plan (and may never know).

I think it's a mistake to assume the Kill plan was without issues and has us right where we want to be. I think there are many examples of coaches taking programs with more issues then which existed at this school when Kill was hired, and having greater success 5 years in. That doesn't mean we aren't having enough success, but to pretend Kill's model has us EXACTLY where we'd want to be isn't really supported by evidence at many many other places.

I guess one poster said it was a gamble either way (stay with TC or go) and I think it's a 50/50 toss up. You get some stability with TC and that is good. You might get the next level, but he needs to learn the fine points of the HC position pretty quick for that to happen. We lose out on hitting a home run with next hire, but we also avoid a brewster hire set back too.

If the AD position was filled I'd say go with new regime. but it's not. Gotta stay the course right? As much as that isn't exciting, it's the least bad of many bad options....
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You can't hit a HR with an interim AD and facilities still 18 months away and in the process. Right now we have the 2nd best recruiting class in the last 15 years committed. State HS Coaches committed. I think it should be a slam dunk hire this week.
 

Gotta weigh in on this one.

Yes, the program is very close , and it would be foolhardy to not follow this through. Hiring Claeys is the right choice, as there is
little downside risk and a positive, continued upside.

People have said its Gutekunst all over again. To remind people, Gutey took over when Holtz left, and ran up four 6-5 records in six seasons.
Not bad, of course, but not the next level. Gutey was and is a good football man. I believe he was a "maintainer", meaning he would keep the
program at about the level he picked it up at, which was....6-5. If he had taken over a 7-4 team, he would have had 7-4 seasons. Gutey, however,
ran a more relaxed ship than Holtz, and with that a lot of the intensity that Holtz instilled wilted some. Players even spoke of it being a more
relaxed atmosphere at the time. The difference between Gutey and TC is that with Claeys, there will be NO reduction in intensity. He's still
gonna push and push and push these players and the program.

Lastly, I have no stomach for going 3-9 next season and the next. None. We know all too well that when you bring in new coach, coach know-it-all
will crumble everything in place to build his system, and program, from scratch. There's a 75% chance that everything that has been worked for
will be gone in 3 months. That buys the new coach a "honeymoon period" where wins and losses will not be an issue so long as he has his
program in place. We see it all too often.

Next season and the next, with all the kids coming back, the Gophers stand a good chance of making some serious noise in the west given the
schedule they'll have. I kinda want to see that, and Claeys can bring that. Get rid of him and its call me in three years.....3-9 is NOT something I
want to watch, not when its so unnecessary.
 

Spoofin said:
I'm guessing the point is that some still think Brewster was a good recruiter at MN. I don't, but many do. So I suspect the point was that if Brewster could recruit here, so can TC.
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Yup. Those Brewster recruited players who are currently in the NFL all got there by sheer dumb luck. None had any talent at all.
 

LesBolstad said:
Gutey 2.0 on the way.
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Love these arguments. Especially on the basketball side "Oh! He's just another Monson!" "He's just another xxx" some coaches work, some don't. Minnesota failed with a TE coach with NFL experience and a national title winning basketball coach. To think every assistant that is hired from the prior coaching staff will have the same result every time makes no sense.

The result some guy had after Lou Holtz has no impact on how successful or unsuccessful Claeys will be.
 



scher215 said:
Yup. Those Brewster recruited players who are currently in the NFL all got there by sheer dumb luck. None had any talent at all.
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Here's the list of Brewster recruits in the NFL:
1. Rashede Hageman
2. MarQueis Gray
3. Brock Vereen

Here's a list of Kill recruits in the NFL:
1. David Cobb
2. Cedric Thompson
3. Maxx Williams
4. Damien Wilson
5. Isaac Fruechte

Brewster's list is complete and will never grow. Most of Kill's players are all still in school and his list will grow exponentially. Kill will probably be at no less than 8 (Murray, BBC, Campbell) when the NFL starts next season. I bet he gets to at least 15 by the time this year's freshman graduate.

So please, once and for all, end the myth that Brewster recruited any kind of significant talent to the U.
 

edma0012 said:
1. That if TC really wanted a HC job, he likely could have had one by now. Maybe phrasing it as "If he wanted a HC job more then the job he had with Kill". But either way, it is fair to say that TC has not been motivated by obtaining a big time program HC to this point in his career.
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I just think there are so many reasons why he hasn't been too interested in a head coaching job up to this point. I think we as fans sometimes assume all coaches want to become a head coach as soon as possible. Some don't ever want to be a head coach. Some just prefer to be an assistant for awhile.

I think it is possible he just wanted to "finish the job" so to speak. He had worked with Kill and everyone else for so long that he wanted to make sure the MN program was in a good place and stable.Then maybe he would start looking to become a head coach somewhere else. Also, Claeys is only 46, about the same age Kill was when he took over at Northern Illinois.

Of course I'm just speculating. I just think everyone's goals and career plan are different.
 

alchemy2u said:
Good move. They need to lock down the recruiting class before the kids start to look around. Also, this would keep the same fundamental systems and coaches in place to see if we can continue to improve. If not, they can move on. Can't wait for the full time AD, give that to Beth and see how it plays out.


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x1000

make it happen this week. All the recruits are saying they are "in" if Claeys is here.
 

John Galt said:
Here's the list of Brewster recruits in the NFL:
1. Rashede Hageman
2. MarQueis Gray
3. Brock Vereen

Here's a list of Kill recruits in the NFL:
1. David Cobb
2. Cedric Thompson
3. Maxx Williams
4. Damien Wilson
5. Isaac Fruechte

Brewster's list is complete and will never grow. Most of Kill's players are all still in school and his list will grow exponentially. Kill will probably be at no less than 8 (Murray, BBC, Campbell) when the NFL starts next season. I bet he gets to at least 15 by the time this year's freshman graduate.

So please, once and for all, end the myth that Brewster recruited any kind of significant talent to the U.
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Does Trumain Brock count? Was a Brewster recruit.
 

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