More Nebbie Dysfunction

Terry Smith is not the answer at PSU. Its an ok feel good story, but he is not an impressive coach, a bit on the older side, and was a high school coach not all that long ago. If PSU cannot find someone better than that, they are not trying. That said, the new coach should absolutely keep him on the staff if he can.

How Fickle kept his job is beyond me. I honestly thought he might get fired after the Iowa game. That team has no heart and not much talent. Don't see that changing over night.

If PSU really wanted Rhule they could back up the Brinks truck. I doubt they do. Rhule is honestly about the best Nebbie can do right now. If he can luck into a good DC, and keep Holgorson for a couple more years, they might be able to sustain 6-9 wins a season.

Doesn't it feel like Penn St. already has someone pegged but now just waiting for the playoffs to end, like their next coach is still coaching a team above the Cheez It bowl.
 


Doesn't it feel like Penn St. already has someone pegged but now just waiting for the playoffs to end, like their next coach is still coaching a team above the Cheez It bowl.
No, Penn State is really putting themselves in a very bad position. Big names are extending or are getting the open jobs. They've been denied by several high profile and successful coaches. As of the last time I looked there recruiting class is 130th. What happens if the new coach isn't a big name or has any relationship? All those good athletes they do have are going to be jumping ship. I have heard Terry Smith is popular internally with Admin as well as players. They may have no choice but to hire him to avoid a complete collapse. They have no coach at signing day and that is a big problem. The AD had better start updating his resume because I don't think he has much time left.
 


Doesn't it feel like Penn St. already has someone pegged but now just waiting for the playoffs to end, like their next coach is still coaching a team above the Cheez It bowl.
Their latest target was BYU head coach Kalani Sitake and he just signed a long term extension after their interest. That's happened to them 2-3 times now. They are losing the game of musical chairs and as kameltoez said, they may have to go with Terry Smith.
 


At the end of the day Rhule is proving himself a talker and not a doer.

I think of it like this...

I work in business, and if you work in business long enough you will see a ton of people come through organizations hired as change-makers. People with what look like impressive resumes, hired by upper management to shake things up whether it's manufacturing processes, efficiency improvements, financial gurus who come in to tighten things up, and so on. The common thread with all of them is that they come in with a resume where they typically have 1-3 years at each job before "leaving," they have a masters degree in whatever field, and the promise they make is they've seen and done everything in the past and they know exactly what to do to get your operation out of whatever rut it happens to be in. They're upscale job-hoppers in essence.

But in the hiring process they say ALL the right things. They bring in a bunch of vague, overblown statistics of how they turned things around at XYZ company but it's never anything you can ask former employees about or prove they did. No company is going to give you information like that about themselves. Those companies will also never give you an honest evaluation of that former person because they don't want to be sued. So all you have to go on is what you're being sold in the interview.

If you're in the business world you also know that 99% of the time they come in with a million different snake oil ideas but nothing really improves. At that point the excuses begin from them whether it's a lack of buy-in, lack of resources, effectiveness of mid-level supervisors, yadda yadda. The common thread with all their excuses is that none of it is actually measurable. You can't really measure buy-in or those abstract cultural things. They use it as their airtight excuse to shift blame to everyone else but themselves for failing. At that point then they "leave" under the premise not that they failed, but that they did all the right things and no one got on board. They weren't given the opportunity to succeed, so to speak. It's perfect because it's a great excuse for their wives as to why they have to move to a different city every 3 years and it makes them feel better about their job-hopping.

But let me ask this...

If this person was such a world-changer, why wouldn't the last company that he helped rise from the ashes keep him and pay him more money and promote him? I sure as hell would if someone did that at my business. Those are people no smart businessman/woman would let get away. You don't just let those people walk. The people who do have tangible things they can back their talk up with don't get let go for a lateral move...

Now I know it's different with a major football coach because it's a wins/losses thing and at the end of the day their record is what people look at, but it's the same in the sense that guys like Rhule are used car salesmen. They over promise to get in the door, underdeliver, and then it's never their fault when it doesn't work out. The reason they leave is for more money and bigger opportunities, but the song remains the same. There are plenty of reasons along with just dumb luck why a guy like Rhule has a 10 win season at Baylor, many of them which have nothing to do with his individual skill. Those kinds of seasons are his snake oil to get himself in the door. But when you really dig in deep there are so many layers to it that you can never really pin down the reasons for it and you're just left with a choice...do I roll the dice and trust the guy can translate words into results? That's what nebraska has been forced to do since Solich and Pelini and we've seen many, many times how it very rarely works out. Wisconsin is finding that out and should've learned from it.
 


What is going on now in the coaching searches across the country may not be the norm in the near future if some legislation is passed but I hope Beth and Co are paying attention to see just how bad things can get if you don't have a solid replacement plan. The PSU AD looks really bad right now and it could really set the program back big time.

When you compare two things that could potentially damage your program long-term 1) A massive child predator was running rampant in your program and you cover it up 2) You fire a successful coach with no back up. You would think #1 would be more damaging but I am not so sure with what is going on now at PSU.
 






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