As a coach Mike's coaching always seemed like "when his system worked it worked" but that's it.I'm not sure what to say about Leach in the HoF
Record-wise he's the pass-wacky version of Glen Mason or PJ Fleck
But he was famous and could be considered a significant innovator in the game
I think the Air Raid system is the basis for most modern offenses - especially in college football. I don't know the exact amount of that is attributed to Mike Leach personally, but I don't think when you evaluate the impact of that offense it makes sense to just look at Mike Leach's teams he personally coached.As a coach Mike's coaching always seemed like "when his system worked it worked" but that's it.
He never seemed to be able to balance his system / incorporate other coach's input to make up for the downsides.
Granted ... it worked more often than it didn't.
59.5% of the time.Granted ... it worked more often than it didn't.
Depending on how he finishes his career, this could also impact Kirk Ferentz, who currently sits at 59.8%.
I'm not sure what to say about Leach in the HoF
Record-wise he's the pass-wacky version of Glen Mason or PJ Fleck
But he was famous and could be considered a significant innovator in the game
And it feels like PJ's teams won those games that Glen's teams .... even when close were miles away from winning ...Record-wise, Fleck is a good comparison to Leach. Mason? Mmmm... no. Not so much.
According to their respective Wiki pages...
Fleck's career record is 86-61. By my sometimes shaky arithmetic, that's a winning percentage of .585 (which is in the same ballpark as Leach's).
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P. J. Fleck - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Glen Mason's career record is 123-121-1. That looks to me to be a winning percentage of just a hair above .500 — which is not really close to Leach or to Fleck.
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Glen Mason - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Leach gets a ton of credit for the work done by earlier coaches like Mouse Davis who developed the run-and-shoot at Portland State in the mid-1970s that featured two QBs who played in the pros: June Jones and Neil Lomax. Hal Mumme was doing pretty much the same thing at Kentucky with Tim Couch at QB in the late-1990s before Leach became a head coach. I think what separates Leach from those two (and earlier pioneers like high school coach Glen Ellison and half of the coaches in the early days of the American Football League). Leach was a good interview. Add to that all the pirate BS and somehow people think that's enough to make some room for him.I think the Air Raid system is the basis for most modern offenses - especially in college football. I don't know the exact amount of that is attributed to Mike Leach personally, but I don't think when you evaluate the impact of that offense it makes sense to just look at Mike Leach's teams he personally coached.
If you're talking about Craig James' kid, Leach was 100% in the right.Selective memory for a coach who had a lot of charisma...nevermind how he treated players...as long as he wins games and is funny...
Another example of the f'd up values
His mother was from hinckley you know, so that practically made him one of us. It’s a shame the admin were a bunch of invertebrates, because I wanted to see the pirate’s air raid gopher offense.I SO wanted Leach here when we hired Jerry Kill, but the administration at the U is too risk averse.
Hal Mumme was doing pretty much the same thing at Kentucky with Tim Couch at QB in the late-1990s before Leach became a head coach.
Hal Mumme is the guy but leach taking it to Oklahoma as OC kind of legitimized it forever.I think the Air Raid system is the basis for most modern offenses - especially in college football. I don't know the exact amount of that is attributed to Mike Leach personally, but I don't think when you evaluate the impact of that offense it makes sense to just look at Mike Leach's teams he personally coached.
They’re similar in some ways but the route concepts between mouse Davis and Hal mumme are differentLeach gets a ton of credit for the work done by earlier coaches like Mouse Davis who developed the run-and-shoot at Portland State in the mid-1970s that featured two QBs who played in the pros: June Jones and Neil Lomax. Hal Mumme was doing pretty much the same thing at Kentucky with Tim Couch at QB in the late-1990s before Leach became a head coach. I think what separates Leach from those two (and earlier pioneers like high school coach Glen Ellison and half of the coaches in the early days of the American Football League). Leach was a good interview. Add to that all the pirate BS and somehow people think that's enough to make some room for him.
Hal Mumme is the guy but leach taking it to Oklahoma as OC kind of legitimized it forever.
The tree off of mumme is leach, dykes
The tree of of leach is massive
Dykes also has a bit of a tree
I think holgerson is part of the dykes branchDana Holgerson, too. He's now Nebraska OC, we see him in October.
That general coaching tree also includes Art Briles and Kliff Kingsbury to a certain degree.
I think holgerson is part of the dykes branch
Briles and kingsbury worked for leach or played for leach. I could be wrong about Helgerson
But holgerson actually played for mumme at Iowa Wesleyan
I’m kind of a traditionalist and don’t like historic rules changes to allow one person in. If they want to create a special one time honor, like Originator of the Air Raid Offense, so be it. But don’t group him in with others who actually won enough to be inducted.
I agree with how limiting arbitrary numbers can be. Greatness is always measured by numbers and the Hall of Fame should also be for coaches that truly made a difference for the game. But changing a win percentage by half a point just doesn’t seem right so there must be a better way. Mike Leach brought a unique personality, popularized an offense and was a character in every sense of the word. He should be in the HOF. Maybe in death he’ll even modernize the HOF rules to honor the greats.That said, setting an arbitrary win percentage for a coach to get into the Hall of Fame is stupid anyway.
Why 60%? What's magical about that?
What other Hall of Fame does that? To make the Baseball Hall of Fame you have to have a career batting average of .300? A running back must average 5.5 yards per carry to make the Football Hall? Nope.
Golf has a few weird criteria for its Hall, but most Halls just let the merits speak for themselves.
For example, a guy like Leach winning 59% of his games at Texas Tech, Washington State, and Mississippi State is far more impressive (to me) than say John Cooper winning 72% of his games at Ohio State, right?
Yet, Cooper makes it into the Hall easily and Leach doesn't based on a silly, arbitrary 60% win rule?
Paths to greatness have many different variables.
I would eliminate the winning percentage altogether.
Some coaches take over downtrodden programs and it takes awhile to build. At only 11 or 12 games per year it doesn't take too many 3 or 4 win "rebuilding" seasons to knock you out of 60%. Seems like a strange criterion to make it arbitrarily 60%.
And, for traditionalists, there are several coaches in the Hall of Fame with career records below .600 already. The .600 winning percentage wasn't strictly enforced until the mid-2000s.
I agree with how limiting arbitrary numbers can be. Greatness is always measured by numbers and the Hall of Fame should also be for coaches that truly made a difference for the game. But changing a win percentage by half a point just doesn’t seem right so there must be a better way. Mike Leach brought a unique personality, popularized an offense and was a character in every sense of the word. He should be in the HOF. Maybe in death he’ll even modernize the HOF rules to honor the greats.
I agree Obi-WanThat said, setting an arbitrary win percentage for a coach to get into the Hall of Fame is stupid anyway.
Why 60%? What's magical about that?
What other Hall of Fame does that? To make the Baseball Hall of Fame you have to have a career batting average of .300? A running back must average 5.5 yards per carry to make the Football Hall? Nope.
Golf has a few weird criteria for its Hall, but most Halls just let the merits speak for themselves.
For example, a guy like Leach winning 59% of his games at Texas Tech, Washington State, and Mississippi State is far more impressive (to me) than say John Cooper winning 72% of his games at Ohio State, right?
Yet, Cooper makes it into the Hall easily and Leach doesn't based on a silly, arbitrary 60% win rule?
Paths to greatness have many different variables.
I would eliminate the winning percentage altogether.
Some coaches take over downtrodden programs and it takes awhile to build. At only 11 or 12 games per year it doesn't take too many 3 or 4 win "rebuilding" seasons to knock you out of 60%. Seems like a strange criterion to make it arbitrarily 60%.
And, for traditionalists, there are several coaches in the Hall of Fame with career records below .600 already. The .600 winning percentage wasn't strictly enforced until the mid-2000s.
That said, setting an arbitrary win percentage for a coach to get into the Hall of Fame is stupid anyway.
Why 60%? What's magical about that?
What other Hall of Fame does that? To make the Baseball Hall of Fame you have to have a career batting average of .300? A running back must average 5.5 yards per carry to make the Football Hall? Nope.
Golf has a few weird criteria for its Hall, but most Halls just let the merits speak for themselves.
For example, a guy like Leach winning 59% of his games at Texas Tech, Washington State, and Mississippi State is far more impressive (to me) than say John Cooper winning 72% of his games at Ohio State, right?
Yet, Cooper makes it into the Hall easily and Leach doesn't based on a silly, arbitrary 60% win rule?
Paths to greatness have many different variables.
I would eliminate the winning percentage altogether.
Some coaches take over downtrodden programs and it takes awhile to build. At only 11 or 12 games per year it doesn't take too many 3 or 4 win "rebuilding" seasons to knock you out of 60%. Seems like a strange criterion to make it arbitrarily 60%.
And, for traditionalists, there are several coaches in the Hall of Fame with career records below .600 already. The .600 winning percentage wasn't strictly enforced until the mid-2000s.
They "Moved the Goalposts".My suggestion is the better way is to eliminate the silly arbitrary number. It seems they added that requirement in the mid-2000s. No reason to keep it.
Leach either is or isn't a Hall of Famer...either way winning 59.6% instead of 60.0% should not be a determining and especially not an eliminating factor.
They "Moved the Goalposts".