Then what?

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drinks at Northpoint

drinks at Northpoint

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For all those that want the coaching staff fired for losing to a better team, with two weeks rest, on the road...
For all those that want Kill to step down because of the seizures...
Then what?
Another coaching search, accompanied by all the Tony Dungy dreamers. Having all the mid level candidates look at the worst facilities in the conference and turning us down. Listening to all the talk radio guys mock the program the same as the basketball search. Starting over with a new coach and new philosophy. Probably lose another recruiting class, etc.
I'm not asking to argue if we need a new coach, only your thoughts on what would happen next.
I think the highest percentage for success for the University of Minnesota is to keep building the program and work with Coach Kill to control his seizures.
I don't think his seizures affect recruiting nearly as much as the lack of facilities.
I don't think the plan was to compete for the Rose Bowl this year, it was to be competitive in years 4, 5, and 6.
This program was at rock bottom a few years ago. It is making improvement. I see a team that is getting better. Defense is in position to make plays. They tackle well. They are a well coached team. They just lack dynamic players.
Like I said, our highest percentage to be a competitive team is to continue building the program, brick by brick.
Rip away.
 


Logic and reason on an internet message board??

Go away!
 




drinks at Northpoint said:
I don't think the plan was to compete for the Rose Bowl this year, it was to be competitive in years 4, 5, and 6.
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Call me when we're competitive.

I believe Kill's exact words were that we'd "keep it close in year 2, and win a few in year 3."
 


I don't want to lean too heavily on "ifs and buts", but if you were to take away the first couple of minutes of the game (Leidner's fumble) and the last few minutes of the game, it was very competetive. Looking back to 2010 and 2011, we have made a good deal of progress in my opinion. In 2011 we looked like a high school team playing against a college team on a couple of Saturdays. Lets wait and see a little bit more before we go into collective panic mode.
 

Let just hope our growth is on more of an exponential curve then (eg huge upshot year 4). Cause if it's supposed to be linear, we are in for some trouble.
 



It's not going to be linear it's going to be Leidnier #tundratebow
 

LOL. Alba sandwiches. Yum.

Seriously, if we do firesale our staff probably not the best time to do it since USC, Texas and Nebraska will also be on the hunt for head coaches this winter.

P.S. The always sexy coaching candidate Marc Trestman is already coaching the Chicago Bears.
 

BarnBoy said:
Let just hope our growth is on more of an exponential curve then (eg huge upshot year 4). Cause if it's supposed to be linear, we are in for some trouble.
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There is no chance of that (huge upshot year 4). We have no talent at receiver and our offensive line isn't going to get much better. We have nothing special at running back and expecting a true freshman to change that next year is asking a lot. If anything, we'll be the same or a small increment better than this year. We'll need to decide soon if a coach that wins 6 games a year is good enough. Because the crappy recruiting this staff has done isn't going to ever win more. Thank ALL of our lucky stars it isn't a Maturi decision...
 

Lets see what happens the rest of the year, BUT assuming this season stays on the course it appears to be (0-1 B1G win, at least 2-3 more games where the team is non-competitve), I would make a move.

That decision would be based on both on the lack of success on the field and Jerry Kill's continued health problems. The other issue is that recruiting remains at the very bottom of the B1G, there is literally nothing tangible you can point to that the Gopher football program is doing well right now. I think after 3 years, it's fair to expect some tangible gains (3 B1G wins this years and fewer games the Gophers were non competitive in were my baseline for this season).

Starting in 1998, Minnesota has had just one season where it failed to win 2 conference games. It's really tough to continue to argue that this staff is the right fit going forward if this season continues along the same path.
 



I'm hoping Kill gets his seizures under control so that this staff can be measured on their merits. I'd give them a D so far this year. Even the non-conference games were ragged before we overpowered the cupcakes. I'd be "happy" with games that are watchable this year and then next year they either win seven or eight and Kill is on the sidelines for the games or we move on, again. Yes, thank God Maturi isn't making the decisions. He's set us back more than a decade already.
 

EG#9 said:
Lets see what happens the rest of the year, BUT assuming this season stays on the course it appears to be (0-1 B1G win, at least 2-3 more games where the team is non-competitve), I would make a move.

That decision would be based on both on the lack of success on the field and Jerry Kill's continued health problems. The other issue is that recruiting remains at the very bottom of the B1G, there is literally nothing tangible you can point to that the Gopher football program is doing well right now. I think after 3 years, it's fair to expect some tangible gains (3 B1G wins this years and fewer games the Gophers were non competitive in were my baseline for this season).

Starting in 1998, Minnesota has had just one season where it failed to win 2 conference games. It's really tough to continue to argue that this staff is the right fit going forward if this season continues along the same path.
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+1
 


I think it's clear as day that Limegrover is not built for Big Ten level football...
 

thailleagle said:
I think it's clear as day that Limegrover is not built for Big Ten level football...
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Let's not forget that he coaches the OL, too. I don't think that anyone would say that they're overacheiving or have taken a great leap forward this year. Get Bak out of there he's not a B1G athlete.
 

The facilities argument loses me when I consider the success Northwestern has had over nearly 20 years, including 2 B1G titles and now regular appearances in the Top 25. Their facilities are brutal -- worse than ours (they're in the early stages of a $220 million fund raising drive to build a new athletics complex, but they haven't even broken ground yet). The biggest difference between Northwestern and Minnesota is that Gary Barnett changed the entire culture there in the '90s, then the tragic death of Randy Walker led them to a young, dynamic and terrific coach in Pat Fitzgerald. That level of coaching is what the Gophers haven't had since Lou Holtz shot across the sky. Northwestern has higher academic standards and worse facilities than the U, yet currently are much more successful. Go figure.
 



Indi1006 said:
Let's not forget that he coaches the OL, too. I don't think that anyone would say that they're overacheiving or have taken a great leap forward this year. Get Bak out of there he's not a B1G athlete.
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Bak graded out as the best on the OL last week. OL was not the problem today. We had a freshman make his first road start in the Big House. People need to realize that our QB's have yet to see a B1G team twice.

We need to allow this staff to build a good 4-5 year foundation. Firing Kill won't gain brownie pts with any candidates. Kill and Teague have to come up with a plan and stick with it.
 

MaxyJR1 said:
Firing Kill won't gain brownie pts with any candidates. Kill and Teague have to come up with a plan and stick with it.
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This.

The reason we had difficulty finding candidates in 2007 and 2010 is because coaches see Minnesota as a career dead end. If Kill chooses to step down that's one thing, but firing Kill anytime before December 2015 would just provide more evidence that coming here to coach is a poor career move.
 

I've said that you have to give any staff a certain amount of time, and you have to have a patient attitude during that time period. At the same time, you have to be evaluating the whole time, and you can't be in denial about what's going on. I hope I end up being wrong, but I've had the chance to watch the team pretty closely this year, and I'm afraid they might be the worst team in the conference. There's plenty of time for improvement, but they had better get going.

I did not expect this to be a breakout year with the team being this young, but at the same time, if we are indeed the worst or near worst team in the league in Kill's third year, I think that's a bad sign and a bad place to be. It's certainly not what we all had in mind when he was hired and we were being told the stories of the turnarounds he's engineered. Yes it was a long way back from Brew's basement, but again, we hired someone with a track record of extraordinary turnarounds.

My concerns with Kill's health are not the seizures and related absences necessarily but the everyday effects his less than ideal health has on his energy level and general vigor. It takes a lot of vigor to run a D1 program, much less a Big Ten program, much less rebuild a Big Ten program with the longest league championship drought in the conference. Even a man in perfect health would be taxed by this undertaking. I worry not just about his effectiveness but about what trying to work through this is doing to him. I may be imagining this, but I don't think he has nearly the spring in his step and force in his voice that he did earlier in his tenure. The thing that continues to bother me most about all this is watching him try to soldier through this and fearing more major health issues if he continues to.
 

I don't mean to be one of "those" people, but my wife's friend's brother's chiropractor saw Tony Dungy at the Minneapolis airport about 45 minutes ago.
 

CP Gopher said:
I don't mean to be one of "those" people, but my wife's friend's brother's chiropractor saw Tony Dungy at the Minneapolis airport about 45 minutes ago.
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I'm not sure if this is a joke or not... but I listened to the radio pre-game interview with Karl Mecklenberg (former U player and NFL pro-bowler) who knew almost nothing about the Gophers and had not seen a single game this season. We may overestimate former players' attachement to the U of M.
 

MaxyJR1 said:
Bak graded out as the best on the OL last week. OL was not the problem today. We had a freshman make his first road start in the Big House. People need to realize that our QB's have yet to see a B1G team twice.

We need to allow this staff to build a good 4-5 year foundation. Firing Kill won't gain brownie pts with any candidates. Kill and Teague have to come up with a plan and stick with it.
Click to expand...

Yep
 

Go Gophers Rah said:
I'm not sure if this is a joke or not... but I listened to the radio pre-game interview with Karl Mecklenberg (former U player and NFL pro-bowler) who knew almost nothing about the Gophers and had not seen a single game this season. We may overestimate former players' attachement to the U of M.
Click to expand...

That is sad. If former players don't care about the fb program you are not going to attract casual fans. It is sad how irrelevant this program is.
 

Bad Gopher said:
I've said that you have to give any staff a certain amount of time, and you have to have a patient attitude during that time period. At the same time, you have to be evaluating the whole time, and you can't be in denial about what's going on. I hope I end up being wrong, but I've had the chance to watch the team pretty closely this year, and I'm afraid they might be the worst team in the conference. There's plenty of time for improvement, but they had better get going.

I did not expect this to be a breakout year with the team being this young, but at the same time, if we are indeed the worst or near worst team in the league in Kill's third year, I think that's a bad sign and a bad place to be. It's certainly not what we all had in mind when he was hired and we were being told the stories of the turnarounds he's engineered. Yes it was a long way back from Brew's basement, but again, we hired someone with a track record of extraordinary turnarounds.

My concerns with Kill's health are not the seizures and related absences necessarily but the everyday effects his less than ideal health has on his energy level and general vigor. It takes a lot of vigor to run a D1 program, much less a Big Ten program, much less rebuild a Big Ten program with the longest league championship drought in the conference. Even a man in perfect health would be taxed by this undertaking. I worry not just about his effectiveness but about what trying to work through this is doing to him. I may be imagining this, but I don't think he has nearly the spring in his step and force in his voice that he did earlier in his tenure. The thing that continues to bother me most about all this is watching him try to soldier through this and fearing more major health issues if he continues to.
Click to expand...

Agree with every word.

The one thing I'd add is that I'd like to see us at least entertain the idea of replacing one or both coordinators. It's not going to happen, but I just don't think Limegrover is good enough at this level.
 

afurry91 said:
Call me when we're competitive.

I believe Kill's exact words were that we'd "keep it close in year 2, and win a few in year 3."
Click to expand...

“We need about three recruiting classes to get this thing turned around,” he said. “I think we’re moving in the right direction.”
-Jerry Kill 3-5-13
 

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