ESPN Radio: Only 40% of mid-major HC hires are successful at the next level

[BleedGopher]

There was a fascinating feature early this morning on ESPN Radio that I will try to find the podcast for and post the link, but essentially they had a couple of the studio experts on talking about the annual coaching carousel that we currently find ourselves in. They were talking about the keys to hiring a good coach for the major conferences and what formula works (promoting from within, hiring a top coordinator, hiring a mid-major HC and hiring a HC from a fellow major conference).

They researched the major conference hirings since 1990 and said that a successful hire was a coach that made improvements from the previous coach (better record , better bowl games, etc.) received a legitimate second contract (they actually referenced Brew's extension noting that it would not have counted as a legitimate second contract), and that the fan base would have raised its level of expectations (again, they referenced Minnesota and Mason saying that even though we ultimately fired him, that his hire definitely counted as successful, based on where we were with Wacker and our improvement, which I would agree with, even though we obviously hit a plateau).

Anyway, their research indicated that the best formula for success is to hire a HC who is currently at another major conference as something like 65% of these hires turn out successful based on their criteria. The second best formula for success since 1990 is to hire a coordinator at a major conference to take the next step to be the HC. It was just over a 50% success rate. Promoting from within and hiring a mid-major HC to take over a major conference program had about a 40% success rate over the past 20 years.

Obviously we can all point to examples of where any of the formulas worked or didn't work, but I thought it was interesting to hear this level of analysis over a pretty decent sample size (all of the major conferences) and sample length (20 years).

Go Gophers!!

 

[drinks at Northpoint]

40 percent of mid level coaches are successful at the next level.

But there is only a 10 percent chance of that.

RIP Leslie Nielsen

 

[NateDawgUM]

I wonder what % of coaches do well at schools that always do well.

 

[RodentRampage]

There may be other factors to consider. Perhaps the schools that have the most built-in advantages are the ones most able to hire the big name coaches?

 

[GopherMac]

40% they are successful 100% of the time. Pretty good odds.

 

[Bayfieldgopher]

I'll gladly take the 40% which is light years ahead of what we are used to.

 

[howeda7]

This is true, but probably for other reasons. Who generally hires coaches away from other major conferences? Schools like LSU (Miles) Alabama (Saban-not sure how he'd be counted here) and USC (Kiffin), etc. Who hires coaches from mid-majors? Schools like Indiana, Vanderbilt and sadly, Minnesota. Guess which group has more success? Bottom-line, the major conference coaches who change teams often come from that 40% pool of mid-majors who already succeeded.

 

[Bo Darville]

If you think about it... how many of the coaches currently in the Big 10 came directly from a mid major program? Tressel came from D-1AA Youngstown St, all of the others were BCS coaches (Rodriguez, Dantonio, Zook), assistants at the school that hired them (Lynch, Paterno, Bielema, Fitzgerald, Hope), or NFL assistants (Ferentz, Brewster).

 

[GophersInIowa]

This is true, but probably for other reasons. Who generally hires coaches away from other major conferences? Schools like LSU (Miles) Alabama (Saban-not sure how he'd be counted here) and USC (Kiffin), etc. Who hires coaches from mid-majors? Schools like Indiana, Vanderbilt and sadly, Minnesota. Guess which group has more success? Bottom-line, the major conference coaches who change teams often come from that 40% pool of mid-majors who already succeeded.

exactly

 

[Rosemountian]

40% of the time it works, everytime

 

[RodentRampage]

If you're Eastern Michigan, you're not going to be able to attract a big name coach. And you're going to have a harder time than other schools in doing well anyway. But if you're one of the elite schools, you're probably going to be able to hire a big name coach, and it's going to be easier to rebuild. I'd be interested in seeing this broken down by conference, it would be more useful to compare hires with in a conference.