Thanks to our new sponsor Inteleca for helping bring back Q's Take my weekly look at things around GT and college sports from my vantage.
I've had the pleasure to cover more programs that probably a lot of you all realize in various capacities during my time at Rivals from starting with the madhouse to the East and moving South to the Gators and LSU and around the time I started up on the GT site to Cincinnati, South Florida, Wake Forest and Alabama plus connections to hundreds of coaches along the way. There are two traits I've found in the majority of the successful coaches I've covered or worked with over the years and the lack of this trait is often a telltale sign that a program is going to fail under a new coach, a detailed and executable plan of action.
I've seen spectacular failures like GC3 here or Jeff Scott at USF and guys past their prime chasing a retirement fund like Tommy Tuberville or Charlie Strong, but the ones who seem to last have a plan, are detailed and it is one that can be accomplished with the resources available. Collins sort of had a plan, but it was like most things he did, sort of a permeable and ever-changing blob of concepts. Jeff Scott had no plan, no idea what the heck he was doing, and looked like if they pulled a random fan off a sideline and asked him to be a football coach. Jeff is a tremendous person, but he and Scottie Montgomery (ECU) may be the two worst coaching hires of the last decade-plus of CFB. Two guys who were good recruiters to a point and that was about it. I'm still unpacking GC3 to be honest. What he said and did often differed greatly and what he said made sense and what he often did, did not.
Willie Taggart was another guy with no plan. He stumbled into a generational talent who was basically just short of that school's Joe Hamilton in Quinton Flowers and started him after his staff threatened a revolt if he started Steven Bench over Flowers. He rode Flowers into the Oregon job and then to FSU and then FAU and back onto the Harbaugh's coattails in Baltimore with John Harbaugh.
On the flip side, say what you want about Paul Johnson, but he had a plan and knew what he wanted to do and what he was looking for with kids and it mostly worked with some tremendous highs and other than an injury-riddled 2015 season the lows were not horrible. Even that team was more competitive than the first three years under Collins despite massive injuries. CPJ was a master of his offense and he ran a pretty solid ship that took on water after losing key assistants and dodging obstacles from the administration both financially and in the other category like the old drug policy that wiped out almost half of one of his signing classes in later times.
I saw the same thing with Mark Richt down the road, he had a plan mostly copying what Bobby Bowden did at FSU mixed with some Miami stuff, but it was still a plan and it worked. That plan also was helped by being able to attract top talent.
Nick Saban has a plan. Really everyone people hold in high regard minus a few outliers like Lane Kiffin who runs more of a loose program leaning on the portal these days has a pretty detailed oriented plan.
I spent the previous weekend down with the guy I had just behind Brent Key as my top target for GT in their coaching search Alex Golesh. What I saw was a very organized and detailed organization with very clearly set job functions and a relatable staff that had good energy and could recruit. The Bulls landed their first four-star player in several years this weekend in Zavier Hamilton because of Golesh and his staff.
Now you are probably like Kelly I don't give a crap about these people, what are you going on about? The point is for the first time since probably 2016 I see a very clear vision and a detailed plan that is achievable under Key here. I think he has hired a very strong staff and they are getting the right kids to visit and if they get the NIL support they need they have a chance to build something more sustainable I think in the future. Key knows how everything works here and he can positively and negatively recruit almost any school in the country based on his own knowledge and history dealing with everyone GT recruits against.
What Key needs now is proof of concept and financial support via NIL. I think if he gets those two things the ceiling moves up for GT football with him.
GT scratched the top 25 today in the Rivals Recruiting Rankings mostly due to the sheer size of the class at the moment, but the quality pieces are in place and if Key can keep them, I think the future is very bright for GT football especially if people open up their wallets and support what he is doing.
I've had the pleasure to cover more programs that probably a lot of you all realize in various capacities during my time at Rivals from starting with the madhouse to the East and moving South to the Gators and LSU and around the time I started up on the GT site to Cincinnati, South Florida, Wake Forest and Alabama plus connections to hundreds of coaches along the way. There are two traits I've found in the majority of the successful coaches I've covered or worked with over the years and the lack of this trait is often a telltale sign that a program is going to fail under a new coach, a detailed and executable plan of action.
I've seen spectacular failures like GC3 here or Jeff Scott at USF and guys past their prime chasing a retirement fund like Tommy Tuberville or Charlie Strong, but the ones who seem to last have a plan, are detailed and it is one that can be accomplished with the resources available. Collins sort of had a plan, but it was like most things he did, sort of a permeable and ever-changing blob of concepts. Jeff Scott had no plan, no idea what the heck he was doing, and looked like if they pulled a random fan off a sideline and asked him to be a football coach. Jeff is a tremendous person, but he and Scottie Montgomery (ECU) may be the two worst coaching hires of the last decade-plus of CFB. Two guys who were good recruiters to a point and that was about it. I'm still unpacking GC3 to be honest. What he said and did often differed greatly and what he said made sense and what he often did, did not.
Willie Taggart was another guy with no plan. He stumbled into a generational talent who was basically just short of that school's Joe Hamilton in Quinton Flowers and started him after his staff threatened a revolt if he started Steven Bench over Flowers. He rode Flowers into the Oregon job and then to FSU and then FAU and back onto the Harbaugh's coattails in Baltimore with John Harbaugh.
On the flip side, say what you want about Paul Johnson, but he had a plan and knew what he wanted to do and what he was looking for with kids and it mostly worked with some tremendous highs and other than an injury-riddled 2015 season the lows were not horrible. Even that team was more competitive than the first three years under Collins despite massive injuries. CPJ was a master of his offense and he ran a pretty solid ship that took on water after losing key assistants and dodging obstacles from the administration both financially and in the other category like the old drug policy that wiped out almost half of one of his signing classes in later times.
I saw the same thing with Mark Richt down the road, he had a plan mostly copying what Bobby Bowden did at FSU mixed with some Miami stuff, but it was still a plan and it worked. That plan also was helped by being able to attract top talent.
Nick Saban has a plan. Really everyone people hold in high regard minus a few outliers like Lane Kiffin who runs more of a loose program leaning on the portal these days has a pretty detailed oriented plan.
I spent the previous weekend down with the guy I had just behind Brent Key as my top target for GT in their coaching search Alex Golesh. What I saw was a very organized and detailed organization with very clearly set job functions and a relatable staff that had good energy and could recruit. The Bulls landed their first four-star player in several years this weekend in Zavier Hamilton because of Golesh and his staff.
Now you are probably like Kelly I don't give a crap about these people, what are you going on about? The point is for the first time since probably 2016 I see a very clear vision and a detailed plan that is achievable under Key here. I think he has hired a very strong staff and they are getting the right kids to visit and if they get the NIL support they need they have a chance to build something more sustainable I think in the future. Key knows how everything works here and he can positively and negatively recruit almost any school in the country based on his own knowledge and history dealing with everyone GT recruits against.
What Key needs now is proof of concept and financial support via NIL. I think if he gets those two things the ceiling moves up for GT football with him.
GT scratched the top 25 today in the Rivals Recruiting Rankings mostly due to the sheer size of the class at the moment, but the quality pieces are in place and if Key can keep them, I think the future is very bright for GT football especially if people open up their wallets and support what he is doing.
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