Is Kirk over rated?

[ChosenChildren]

He has been a very good coach for Iowa. He still has time to build on his record. I think the overall talent is there to be a very strong team this year and next.

 

[Ree4]

It was definitely pre-hire sentiment. But, cancer or not, KF won the job, it was not by default or "because of..."

Um, duh? The point is Bob didn't interview because he was in the hospital, not sure what's so hard to understand

 

[HawkGold]

An article: Of course the first one mentioned didn't work out. Feb 4 1998
It was quite a year for high school football talent in the Chicago area.

Too bad not much of it plans to stick around.

UCLA came all the way to New Lenox for its quarterback of the future, Lincoln-Way's Cory Paus.

Michigan added Addison Trail's Dan Rumishek and Bolingbrook's Todd Howard to a recruiting class being acknowledged among the top three in the nation.

Penn State landed the No. 1 prospect in Illinois, Waubonsie Valley tight end R.J. Luke.

But Iowa came away with the biggest cache of all in All-Staters Siaka Massaquoi of Evanston and Eric Steinbach of Providence, second-team All-Staters Chris Oliver of Homewood-Flossmoor and Andy Lightfoot of Maine West plus special mention All-Stater D.J. Johnson of Naperville Central and late-blooming John Omotola of H-F.

Recruits will begin signing letters of intent to colleges Wednesday, the first day of the football signing period.

"We did better than we expected," said Iowa assistant coach and ex-Wheaton North and ex-Detroit Lion quarterback Chuck Long. "We knew Chicago would have an excellent recruiting class, and (coach) Hayden Fry made it a high priority."

Fry's down-home approach and the "Hayden hug" won over the Hawkeyes' prime objective, Massaquoi.

"I chose Iowa over Illinois, Michigan, Notre Dame and Northwestern because, well, coach Fry was the only coach who hugged me," said Massaquoi, who rushed for 2,035 yards and 29 touchdowns last fall. "Everyone at Iowa took more of a personal approach. On my visit, the Iowa players were great. It wasn't like I was some little chump coming into their world.

"The coaching staff said to do what's best for me and didn't keep harping on Iowa. It's not how I played, but who I was that seemed to matter. That whole place, you go there and just start smiling. I didn't want to come home after my visit."

The 6-foot-7-inch, 275-pound Lightfoot said a conversation with Massaquoi at a leadership conference helped persuade him to commit to Iowa.

"You could just see it in his face how happy he was to be going to Iowa," Lightfoot said.

"The Iowa coaches told me I was the first part of their recruiting plan and after that, it just snowballed," Massaquoi said. "I'll try to hook up Iowa with all the good players."

Steinbach talked to other top recruits before making his oral commitment in early November.

"It seemed like everyone had Iowa in their top five choices," said the 6-7, 235-pound Steinbach, who led the state with 26 sacks and was also recruited by Notre Dame, Michigan, Georgia Tech and Boston College. "I liked the way they didn't bug you and let you make the decision."

Others Betts, Allen, Hill, Dodge, Oliver, Nelson, Pickens, Clark

Not sure who recruited Gallery

Might be off on a few on this post.

Yes they were good classes. I specifically remember an article from before Fry retired which mentioned back to back top 20 classes, but can't find that article.

 

[Marinehawk]

Kirk is not overrated, he is just obscenely overpaid!

 

[SmokeTownHawk]

Kirk is overrated in so far as consistently winning 9+ games a year and winning the B1G. But he's vastly underrated in terms of keeping this program from falling to the level of IL or KU, and the means in which he has to do it. No vast home state talent pool. Few 4 and 5 star recruits on the roster. 7-5 isn't sexy but it's Kirk.

 

[ohhawk]

http://www.espn.com/college-footbal...g-leadership-iowa-hawkeyes-coach-kirk-ferentz

 

[Hawkfnntn]

We've been over this a number of times. He did not take over a program in rough shape. Fry ended his career with 2 outstanding recruiting classes. Were they young? Yes. KF also had K Hill with all that plus and minus.

Kirk was a mediocre coach with very little HC experience. None at D1. He had poor results at Maine and I think if remembering correctly, he did more poorly overall than his predecessor and his replacement. The guy was green. Green as hell. He had no OC or DC experience. He had 3 years. Correct me if I'm wrong but he won about 1/3 of his games at Maine in 3 years.

KF at times seems more preoccupied with his contract than performance, especially when he first came. It has oft been a distraction.

KF overall has done OK at Iowa with an impressive record of top ten finishes. It does get tarnished by some bad losses and bad years. He has oft failed to capitalize on success when it seemed to be there for the taking.

KF at times disses Iowa as a state.

KF stubbornness seems to get in his way sometimes.

KF recruiting policy seems to be a limiting factor by limiting offers. Some guys just don't work out.

I'm not aware of other coaches that are faced with as many years of lack of depth for a successful coach. This is particularly apparent on the O line.

KF policies seems to not get younger players much experience until thrust into real important game situations.
This is especially true at QB.

KF seems to have some constant controversy at playing the best players. This year and last year it may be punting.

KF has give we fans measures of success never experienced in a long long time if ever.

KF would never have been hired by many solid programs when he was hired.

KF has beaten teams he shouldn't have. KF has lost to good team he shouldn't have playing Ferentz ball.

At times, KF teams look better than any Iowa team I have ever seen. The next game, I'd rather have Bob C as coach again.

I think KF has quietly upgraded Iowa talent. This may be masked this year by inexperience. The speed on the line and edges (except receiver) on both sides of the ball has been pretty darned good.

KF may have Iowa positioned for their best football ever as soon as this year or at least soon. This year may also be a disaster.

KF has some of the best prepared teams ever and sometimes looks like they didn't give the opponent one thought.

How do you grade out such a coach.

My grade in description. A coach constantly on the verge of greatness but on the verge of outright incompetence.

Last year was typical. Back to Back OSU and Wisconsin. One of the best O displays ever. One of the worst ever. And frankly either results, even reversed, even both being the same wouldn't be a surprise.

To try summing him up in one word is just tough. Inconsistent is about the only one that kinda fits but it only does partially like it doesn't remotely tell the whole story. I think it goes to show ya how hard it is to be consistent when your recruiting classes are in the 40s or lower mostly. Because when that's the case to be expected to VASTLY outperform those rankings year in and year out that's just tough. You can say well he should be recruiting better. But it still is what it is.

Comparing him to a Saban or Meyer or any of those guys wouldn't be apples to apples. Just based on the talent being played with. The margin for error KF has is razor thin. No better example than what we have for week one this year. We are losing our top two tackles. (both of which are sophs but besides the point) What'll be the difference in levels of play to expect with their replacements compared to what Bama, OSU or pick a top 10 programs if they had the same thing happen? If we lose our QB same thing... As a developmental program we aren't getting as many ready to plug and play guys. Typically Iowa would like redshirt sophs to be seeing the field for the first time significantly anyway. These other schools are often 3 deep with ready to go kids. Not all ways but generally. It's what allows them to overcome injuries and attrition that hits everyone to one degree or another. The schools that are fortunate enough to have the least of that certainly have the easier paths to walk anyway. Iowa has rarely had that but in the years we have we've taken pretty good advantage of it...

 

[cincyhawk]

These quotes are from the same article

> Kirk Ferentz quit golfing 20 years ago. He vacations every July in his backyard. He doesn't socialize much with coaching peers, avoids conventions at nearly all costs, bars his players from Twitter and not only admits that his Iowa Hawkeyes can't typically pursue elite talent in recruiting, but he promotes the notion.

> Ferentz needs one victory to pass Hayden Fry for the most wins in Iowa history and to rank behind only Amos Alonzo Stagg, Woody Hayes, Bo Schembechler and Joe Paterno in the Big Ten coaching books.

> "If it came down to competing in size and speed, I was going to lose. The reality is, most of those kids are going to go to the schools that we've all heard about since we were kids. The good news, there's plenty of guys to go around.

"But when they tell us it's Alabama, LSU, Ohio State ..."

Ferentz laughs before naming more traditional powers. "OK," he said, "I think we're [done], unless there's some reason why we might resonate with that kid."

He's simultaneously good and bad. That recruiting schtick though, is uber-cringey. He nexts anyone who is looking at anyone else that we ARE competing with in top ten finishes.

 

[cincyhawk]

Kirk is overrated in so far as consistently winning 9+ games a year and winning the B1G. But he's vastly underrated in terms of keeping this program from falling to the level of IL or KU, and the means in which he has to do it. No vast home state talent pool. Few 4 and 5 star recruits on the roster. 7-5 isn't sexy but it's Kirk.

The means? Look at his salary! Look at what we spend on renovations and upgrades! If all you mean is Iowa is not population dense - Illinois is right next door. And we are better than their state team. Iowa has the means to match almost every P5 team bar Alabama or OSU. That won't continue forever though.