What did the anti-Ferentz Crowd Think of Saturday?

[Northside Hawk]

This has kind of turned into an odd sort of revisionist history. Hayden was definitely a better offensive coach than Kirk, so somehow people have added the corollary that he had top receivers coming in all the time, which isn't true. Heck, in the famous '85 Michigan, one of our starting receivers, Happel (if i'm spelling that right!) was a walk-on.

Both coaches have done great things for the University and I have tons of great memories of both. While Kirk has made really frustrated at times, I am more than willing to accept his faults and appreciate those great times. Especially in light of what we've seen in the past decade at other conference schools (MSU, PSU and OSU).

Winning is a great thing, but there are other ways to consider success.

The other 1985 starting receiver, Scott Helverson, was a walk on as well.

In fact, he didn't go on scholarship until late in his redshirt sophomore year.

Bill Happel in high school may have been a better defensive back than receiver.

 

[dahlhawk]

Mark Richt coached at Georgia and now at Miami. Look at the recruiting classes the past ten years at both. it's a different ball game at those schools...there is an element to what Kirk Ferentz has to do that Mark Richt never had to do. Develop players from a much lower starting point. I know it's fantasy, but the way Iowa plays, with all 4* and 5* recruits would look alot like Alabama.

The anti Kirk crowd is about to have a really difficult couple of years. Yesterday showed we now have depth on the OL...depth on the DL. That's typically the start of a very good run of football. This is the type of team that may stumble in these first 5-6 games a couple of times...but I would not want to play them in November. We are big, physical on the offensive line...and we have athletes on defense. We just need more experience. Kirk's best teams always got their mojo around week 5-6, it's just whether we can avoid the flat performance or turnover laden game early.

I really hate that some people relate not being a fan of Kirk to wanting Iowa to be unsuccessful. I love Iowa football and always will. I've said it before, Kirk is not Iowa football. Kinnick will not be closed when he retires. I think his style of football sucks the joy from the game. Just my opinion which means nothing to anyone that matters.

 

[tanaros]

I really hate that some people relate not being a fan of Kirk to wanting Iowa to be unsuccessful. I love Iowa football and always will. I've said it before, Kirk is not Iowa football. Kinnick will not be closed when he retires. I think his style of football sucks the joy from the game. Just my opinion which means nothing to anyone that matters.

I don't think most of the anti-kirk crowd actually want Iowa to be unsuccessful. Sometimes though, it does come across from some people that that is the price they'd be willing to pay to see him go.

 

[ThunderHawk]

Well...if your TE catches the ball...and your QB makes better decisions and throws...it's a different half in the first half. We just didn't execute. So we regroup and come out and our offensive line dominates, our defensive line dominates...and we outscore a good team 30-7...and made it look easy.

Don't make me break out the tape of Hayden Fry chastising the media about why they ran the ball into eight man fronts in an early season game. You have to practice running the ball to do it well. Contrary to what the casual observer thinks...our running game is not as vanilla as it appears. There is a lot more going on than people realize. You also have three guys on your OL that have never played. That was a great experience for them and it was important to get those reps.

Kirk Ferentz gets criticized for not being more aggressive with a lead and throwing to score more points, especially in a second half like yesterday. The play action was there from the middle of the third quarter on...yet we ran the ball. I'll go out on a limb here. I'm going to say KF thinks it was more important to get his offensive line reps in the running game, than it was to show more of our passing game. Remember, the running game sets up the entire offense..I'll go with KF here. Personally, I love watching Iowa's offensive line, so that was fun for me. They lit up NIU in the second half and NIU knew it was coming. Good stuff.

Well, we were also just absolutely ramming it down their throats after about midway through the third quarter.

"Scratch where it itches," was it?

When you're ramming it down the D's throat running the ball, it's football malpractice to start flinging the rock.

 

[ThunderHawk]

Georgia Tech. I'm not sure that I even need to explain the other things to you. When it works it works, and when it doesn't, it doesn't. Both Iowa and GT trend toward average seasons with a few outliers on both ends. There are usually more positive outliers than negative. The thing that people like you that hate on these sorts of schemes fail to recognize is that there are many teams that play much more "interesting" schemes yet would kill for the sorts of success these two teams have had, despite their recruiting disadvantages and generally unchanging gameplans. And believe you me, I want Iowa to be less vanilla, and I think we're getting that. We got that last year in some big ways, but we also saw the growing pains. We saw that on Saturday, and we would have seen more had our receivers been better at catching balls.

But Iowa doesn't run some gimmick offense. Iowa runs the pro set. We really do need a more productive passing game. We need receivers who can stretch the field to keep defenses from stacking the box sans consequence. I believe Brian Ferentz wants that arrangement, and I can imagine that he's frustrated with the subpar execution.

 

[IowaPhan]

Weird we can’t recruit a true WR who’s natural at catching a football, besides last year’s Vandenburg. Fant and another receiver didn’t extend to catch a ball in their hands, but lackadaisically hoped for it to magically float into their midsections, even while being molested by defenders. We resorted to tight ends, not WR’s – not a good sign. Stanley looked out-of-breath and baffled most of the game – listening to too much hype about himself? KF finally allowed a 2nd unit QB to get some snaps. So many years of watching KF’ psychosis about keeping the no. 1 QB in simply to rack up personal statistics or learn to command a game, even at season’s end. Be careful against ISU … we showed them ours, but they didn’t show us theirs. Still, I’m excited and feeling good for the Hawks – look out badgers.

 

[dahlhawk]

Enough people in football circles who work with him very closely like Brian's football mind and coaching. People far more football intelligent and football un-biased than either side of that fence here. He'd be on an OBrien or Bellichik staff today, possibly working up to a coordinator position by now. If not now, in time. Pump the breaks on the criticism. Its 1 game into yr 2.

That's very hypothetical, pump your own brakes.

 

[ThunderHawk]

Weird we can’t recruit a true WR who’s natural at catching a football, besides last year’s Vandenburg. Fant and another receiver didn’t extend to catch a ball in their hands, but lackadaisically hoped for it to magically float into their midsections, even while being molested by defenders. We resorted to tight ends, not WR’s – not a good sign. Stanley looked out-of-breath and baffled most of the game – listening to too much hype about himself? KF finally allowed a 2nd unit QB to get some snaps. So many years of watching KF’ psychosis about keeping the no. 1 QB in simply to rack up personal statistics or learn to command a game, even at season’s end. Be careful against ISU … we showed them ours, but they didn’t show us theirs. Still, I’m excited and feeling good for the Hawks – look out badgers.

What our receivers really seem to fail at year after year is creating separation.

 

[dahlhawk]

Stoops might have signed. He had another decent offer. He also wasn't a proven commodity at head coach at the time.

That's BS, Stoops was coaching the best defense in the nation, Iowa fans desperately wanted him. He was a hot commodity and wanted to coach at Iowa. Instead of offering him on the spot like OU did Iowa decided to form a Search Committee. The rest is history.

 

[Adam]

That's BS, Stoops was coaching the best defense in the nation, Iowa fans desperately wanted him. He was a hot commodity and wanted to coach at Iowa. Instead of offering him on the spot like OU did Iowa decided to form a Search Committee. The rest is history.

While a good portion of me believes Bob Stoops could have done better there is certainly no empirical evidence to make it fact.

 

[BigD]

Kirk owes his head coaching career at Iowa to two people whose last name is spelled;

P-A-R-K-E-R.

Congrats to Kirk and the record, while at the game I didn't even think about it. Kirk has been a class act and has had some great seasons, but it seems like (minus 2015) the past 6-7 years have been kind of stale. I'm wondering if we have gone as high as we're going to go with him as head coach? We aren't even in the top 25 anymore and he is paid like 4 million a year. I know people on here are happy with the average 7-8 wins, but I am greedy and want more, like 10-11 wins a year, why not? Look at Wisconsin, they have been to 3 Rose Bowls, Cotton Bowl and Orange Bowls and have played in the Big 10 championship game like every year except twice. Why can't we do this? We have an incredible new football facility, great and renovated football stadium, great fans and tradition. On the Big 10 Network Face Book page they posted a photo of the outside of Iowa's weigh room. Above the doors it read "The road to the Big 10 Championship goes through these doors." An opposing fan wrote saying it should read..."The road to the Outback Bowl goes through these doors." Hate to say, it but it does has some truth to it under Kirk.

Well said!!!!!!!!! Sounds familiar for some strange reason.

 

[BigD]

Went to the game. My feelings coming away from it was a typical Ferentz like win.....feeling like a typical Ferentz like year likely to happen (7-8 wins). I think he is a good coach, but not a great one. By all accounts a good man with a good family, but very stubborn. He is overpaid if we are going by results. However, I do think he deserve his own statue or name being put on some U of I building. I think the U of I Children's Hospital mentioned in this thread would be a great idea. He will go down as an all-time great out of Iowa coaches in sports at the U of I. His body of work will also be good enough probably to be a Hall of Fame coach someday.

But, again, I don't think he is a great coach. If he was a great coach, Iowa would be more like Wisconsin is now.....getting to far more Big Ten Title games and winning some of them.....winning more far more big time BCS like bowl games (Rose Bowls). Having a much higher winning percentage against inferior competition.

Ferentz is a good coach, but if you hang around a place long enough (and it helps if you are good and can keep your team competitive like he does and you have a boss like Barta that gives you lifetime contracts) you can become the all time winningest coach in your program's history. As noted above as well, he also holds the most losses in program history. So although he is now in the record books as having the most wins and it can feel good....it can certainly feel good, I would also liken it to feeling like more quantity over quality as well (not to say there is not quality wins in their because there certainly is). So, I don't think it is something we should party about no longer than using Ferentz's own 24 hour rule on wins and losses. The Iowa St game should be the next focus on the agenda.

Again, I see a team that can be a tough out, but also can be real rough around the edges. Offensively, this team is going to have its struggles again. When you are content with going up the middle, up the middle, up the middle, and not being a consistent deep threat down the field, you are not going to strike fear on the opposing side of the ball. That is going to cost Iowa in some games this year yet again.

Iowa's defense is going to have to bail out the offense again and that will likely hurt in games where the games are close going into the fourth quarter and Iowa's defense has been on the field for a long time.

I think the schedule is going to help them out some and all things considered, Iowa will make another bowl game provided they avoid major injuries to key players. I do think this team could knock off again somebody they should not, but will lose a game or two to somebody they have no business losing to.

Just another typical Ferentz team. Good, but not great. But, it has been more consistent than the basketball program and has had better post season success over the last 20 years or so.

Very well stated 56. I have very similar feelings. I like Kirk and his family and would be one of his biggest backers if he had taken it up a level. There really is no excuse that we can’t be the reoccurring champs of the West division. He is the senior coach of the conference and that should at this point give him MEGA HUGE recruiting advantages. By now with twenty years of coaching in the conference his offense should be down to a science and he should know every trick in the book AND be willing to pull them out on a regular basis.

Those of us who have been life long loyal hawk fans deserve a championship season at least once. God only know he gets paid enough to do it just once.

 

[skinnykilmer17]

While a good portion of me believes Bob Stoops could have done better there is certainly no empirical evidence to make it fact.

And of course the Oklahoma AD who grabbed him up was none other than former Clown coach Donnie Duncan.

Oh the irony.

 

[Northside Hawk]

Very well stated 56. I have very similar feelings. I like Kirk and his family and would be one of his biggest backers if he had taken it up a level. There really is no excuse that we can’t be the reoccurring champs of the West division. He is the senior coach of the conference and that should at this point give him MEGA HUGE recruiting advantages. By now with twenty years of coaching in the conference his offense should be down to a science and he should know every trick in the book AND be willing to pull them out on a regular basis.

Those of us who have been life long loyal hawk fans deserve a championship season at least once. God only know he gets paid enough to do it just once.

It would be nice, but in the grand sceme of things not many coaches get to the very top of the mountain. Bill Snyder has been a HC longer than Kirk and does have offense down to a science and has never won a (I assume you mean) national championship. It's not easy.

 

[Northside Hawk]

Kirk owes his head coaching career at Iowa to two people whose last name is spelled;

P-A-R-K-E-R.




Well said!!!!!!!!! Sounds familiar for some strange reason.

Is one of those two people Jonathon Parker?

 

[BigD]

It would be nice, but in the grand sceme of things not many coaches get to the very top of the mountain. Bill Snyder has been a HC longer than Kirk and does have offense down to a science and has never won a (I assume you mean) national championship. It's not easy.

Your absolutely right it is very difficult to win a national championship. Yet it is the altimate goal of most power five teams every year. For it to happen their has to be constant improvement by both the players AND THE COACHES.

Recruiting should always be an improving process. Reaching out to more and more players from all over the country. Changing and adapting schemes on both sides of the ball, especially if the schemes your running aren’t particularly effective. It just seems like the offensive schemes are stale and uncreative.

Everyone knows it’s best if the opponent doesn’t have a good idea what’s coming. Seriously, what coach in America wants their opponent to know when they are going to run the ball? Here at Iowa when our quarterback comes up to the line and starts to call an audible there’s 99% we’re running the ball. This allows the secondary to cheat and come up toward the line of scrimmage. This is just dumb.

So we recruit the same kind and level of players, run the same plays and keep getting the same results. This leads to your 7-5 regular seasons. How can Kirk seriously look his players in the face every season and say their goal is too when the BiG Ten title and play for a national title. Ain’t happening if his recruiting doesn’t start upticking and his offensive schemes don’t improve.................. that’s a fact!!!

So I have been hoping Brian is a man of his own and brings something new to the table. Something creative, something fun to watch. The first half last week wasn’t it.

 

[deanvogs]

I wasn't trying to go after you. It just amazes me how some folks on here think a 55% B1G & 59% overall record is "great," but the same folks fail to realize what "great" truly is. It's ok to be glad that Kirk kept us from tanking as a program and average to above average, but it's ridiculous, IMO, to say he's a legend or great.

Is Hayden Fry "great"? Hayden Fry coached 238 games at Iowa and won 143 games. Ferentz has coached 242 games and won 144 of them. You keep trying to argue that 59% isn't that good, but Fry was good. If Fry coached 242 games at Iowa like Ferentz, the math tells us he would have won 145. So over 242 games, over 19/20 years Fry is 1 wins better if they played the same amount of games. Yet one sucks balls and the other is great? Give me a break TK.

Are either coaches good/great? I think so. I don't think it is easy to win 60% of your games over 39 years at a school if you aren't a blue blood or near blue blood. As a matter of fact Since Hayden got to Iowa only Iowa and Wisconsin + the blue bloods have won more than 60% of their games in the B1G. Wisconsin with 290 wins and Iowa with 286 wins (1979 - 2017). The next closets B1G team is MSU with 256 wins. Iowa and Wisconsin are #23 and #24 respectively for best P5 winning % over the last 39 years. If you look at who is above them you have the blue bloods (OSU, Florida St., Oklahama, Bama, Michigan, Clemson, Texas, Notre Dame, USC) and the near blue bloods or were once blue bloods (Nebraska, Miami, Georgia, Penn St., Auburn, LSU). Just below that you got Oregon, Washington, Tennessee, Virginia Tech, West Virginia, Texas A&M, Wisconsin and Iowa. Not bad company at all winning a "measly" 60% of your games.

 

[Jonrn]

This has kind of turned into an odd sort of revisionist history. Hayden was definitely a better offensive coach than Kirk, so somehow people have added the corollary that he had top receivers coming in all the time, which isn't true. Heck, in the famous '85 Michigan, one of our starting receivers, Happel (if i'm spelling that right!) was a walk-on.

Both coaches have done great things for the University and I have tons of great memories of both. While Kirk has made really frustrated at times, I am more than willing to accept his faults and appreciate those great times. Especially in light of what we've seen in the past decade at other conference schools (MSU, PSU and OSU).

Winning is a great thing, but there are other ways to consider success.

As I get older I respect him more as a man and coach than ever. I’d like to think I’m getting more mature and less obsessed with winning. I think the program will be in good hands when Brian takes over.

 

[BigD]

As I get older I respect him more as a man and coach than ever. I’d like to think I’m getting more mature and less obsessed with winning. I think the program will be in good hands when Brian takes over.

I do like it that Kirk instills into his players work ethic, discipline, perseverance, responsibility, and accountability. Those traits will serve those young men well if they carry them forward the rest of their lives. I have had several opportunities to lead and teach boys scouts, cub scouts, and several young men organizations in my lifetime. We teach them similar things, so I respect those parts of Kirk’s approach to coaching.

Seriously though I have doubts about whether you were ever obsessed with winning. That doesn’t just dissolve and go away.

Kirk was hired to be a football coach not the team minister. Those values should have been taught to these young men in their homes by their parents (or in some cases by their parent). Should it be a part of their being coached? Of course. However, if you think Kirk was hired and given a MEGA contract for solely that reason you are high.

That MEGA contract was given to him after, and ONLY AFTER he had showed that he could win BIG and he did it three years in a row. This lead the powers that be that it would continue on. It was anticipated that this would only improve recruiting and that those three years would be the rule and not the rarity.

That fact is if Kirk had not had those three great years back, to back, to back he would never have gotten such a sweet deal of a contract. We all know that (those of us with a brain). Do you really think Kirk gets that contract if he just 7-5 those three years? No way. He may have gotten contract extension with your basic 2.7 million a year contract. Eventually that would have grown old for the fan base as MOST sports enthusiast have a desire to win at a hire level. Not everyone is a sports enthusiast however and apparently many there are many Iowa fans that aren’t true sports enthusiast. Sure they will love a great season but apparently they don’t expect it. They have come to expect and accept less, besides there is not a lot to do in Iowa so it’s like having a captive audience.

When Hayden Fry got here he said that the first thing that needed to change was the LOSER mind set. Rosebowl??? Wasn’t even a realistic thought in most Iowa fans minds. No one expects a perennial four win program to even conceive of win their conference and going to the Rosebowl. So what is a loser mind set? It’s for those people who put limitations on expectations for whatever reason. These same people except less and make up excuses for why it can’t be.

Now I am not saying Iowa should be the next Alabama. Alabama is a freak football program. We now have in the Iowa camp those who can’t even conceive of us arising to a annual Wisconsin level. This is sickening. Under Hayden we owned those bitches. Some of the apologist are making their excuses for this standard. Where does it stop? Northwestern? They also were Hayden’s bitchs. Now we are approaching a 50/50 chance of beating them.

ITS A SPORTING CONTEST not Sunday at church. The object is to win and to alter approaches in an attempt to continue to win. Not sitting cozy in a recliner (fat cat mindset) just maintaining a status quo.

Why do you think the major programs find themselves changing coaches when winning isn’t happening??? The Iowa States of the college football world just sit around making up rationalizations and excuses of why they can’t expect to play at the big table with the big boys. Is that what we want at IOWA? Oh by the way things may a cooking over in Ames, but how that turns out remains to be seen. At least they have decided to pay out a little money to see what happens when a coach shows some promise. Good grief I hate to talk about Iowa State. Can we at least shoot for Wisconsin level of football or is that to much for the Iowa fan base?

 

[NoBeer]

I do like it that Kirk instills into his players work ethic, discipline, perseverance, responsibility, and accountability. Those traits will serve those young men well if they carry them forward the rest of their lives. I have had several opportunities to lead and teach boys scouts, cub scouts, and several young men organizations in my lifetime. We teach them similar things, so I respect those parts of Kirk’s approach to coaching.

Seriously though I have doubts about whether you were ever obsessed with winning. Kirk was hired to be a football coach not the team minister. Those values should have been taught to these young men in there homes by the parents (or in many cases by their parent). Should it be a part of their being coached? Of course. However, if you think Kirk was hired and give a MEGA contract for solely that reason you are high.

That MEGA contract was given to him after, and ONLY AFTER he had showed that he could win BIG and he did it three years in a row. This lead the powes that be that it would continue on. It was anticipated that this would only improve recruiting and that those three years would be the rule and not the rarity.

That fact is if Kirk had not had those three great years back, to back, to back he would never have gotten such a sweet deal of a contract. We all know that (those of us with a brain). Do you really think Kirk gets that contract if he just 7-5 those three years? No way. He may have gotten contract extension with your basic 2.7 million a year contract. Eventually that would have grown old for the fan base as MOST sports enthusiast have a desire to win at a hire level. Not everyone is a sports enthusiast and apparently many Iowa fans are. Sure they will love a great season but apparently they don’t expect it. They have come to expect and accept less.

When Hayden Fry got here he said that the first thing that needed to change was the LOSER mind set. Rosebowl??? Wasn’t even a realistic thought in most Iowa fans minds. No one expects a perennial four win program to even conceive of win the conference and going to the Rosebowl. So what is a loser mind set? It’s for those people who put limitations on expectations for whatever reason. These same people except less and make up excuses for why it can’t be.

Now I am not saying Iowa should be the next Alabama. Alabama is a freak football program. We now have in the Iowa camp those who can’t even conceive of us arising to a annual Wisconsin level. This is sickening. Under Hayden we owned those bitches. Some of the apologist are making their excuses for this standard. Where does it stop? Northwestern? They also were Hayden’s bitchs. Now we are approaching a 50/50 chance of beating them.

ITS A SPORTING CONTEST not Sunday at church. The object is to win and to alter approaches in an attempt to continue to win. Not sitting cozy in a recliner (fat cat mindset) just maintaining a status quo.

Why do you think the major programs find themselves changing coaches when winning isn’t happening??? The Iowa States of the college football world just sit around making up rationalizations and excuses of why they can’t expect to play at the big table with the big boys. Is that what we want at IOWA? Oh by the way things may a cooking over in Ames, but how that turns out remains to be seen. At least they have decided to pay out a little money to see what happens when a coach shows some promise. Good grief I hate to talk about Iowa State. Can we at least shoot for Wisconsin level of football or is that to much for the Iowa fan base?

Are you drunk, or ESL?