Not Understanding Some Coaching Changes

For the time being, I'm talking about two in particular - Maryland and Michigan.

Maryland fired their head coach, the 2010 ACC Coach of the Year, Ralph Friedgen and then hired Connecticut head coach, Randy Edsall. Randy Edsall is a fine coach, as he has brought what was a Division I-AA school in UConn to a Big East Championship and BCS berth in Division I-A in just 8 years. However, Friedgen was the 3rd winningest coach in Terrapins' history and brought what was a doormat of a program to an annually competitive team in the ACC, making bowl games in 7 of his 10 years there and finishing this season at 9-4 after their dominant bowl victory over East Carolina. They may finish the season ranked in the top 25, just a year after they finished 2-10. That's a 6.5 game improvement in one year. Yet, Friedgen was fired. The main reason for this I heard was because attendance is down and there needed to be a new spark to garner locals' interest. Former Texas Tech head coach, Mike Leach, was brought into the discussion and if the reason for Friedgen's firing was accurate, it'd make some sense, as Leach is known for a high-flying offense, creating excitement with the proficient passing game and gaudy point totals. But, instead of making the somewhat sensical move, the Terps hired Edsall. To me, this move contradicts the initial rationale for firing Friedgen. Again, Edsall is a very solid coach, but he's about fundamentals. He isn't one to bring an extra bit of excitement to the game like Mike Leach. His play-calling is actually quite a bit duller than Friedgen's. Friedgen has always been about a balanced approach offensively, as his Maryland clubs have illustrated. Have you seen UConn play in recent years? Their offensive strategy has been, more or less, not to lose. While they typically have fine running backs at the school, like Donald Brown and Jordan Toddman, the UConn passing game has been atrocious. They're typically ranked in the top 35 in rush offense, but in the bottom 20 in pass offense. This lack of balance has gotten them into trouble at times, as it's made it more difficult for them to come back from two or more scores down. They typically don't make a lot of mistakes, whether that be with regard to penalties, turnovers or the fundamentals of football, but still, if the heads at Maryland were truly wanting to draw a larger audience for their football games, this move makes little to no sense.

Another move that has me shaking my head is Michigan's firing of Rich Rodriguez. No, he has not turned heads with his success in his three years at Michigan, but again, the philosophy, the strategy of those in charge at the University has left me a bit befuddled. Remember why Michigan initially hired Rodriguez? Because their offense had become rather vanilla under Lloyd Carr and they wanted to change with the times, focus on obtaining more speed to coalesce with a spread/spread option offense. In order to do this, Rodriguez needed to recruit players to fit his kind of system, which was a 180 from what the team had run previously. This led to problems, especially in his first year with the school. In order to run this offense, you need a rather fleet-footed quarterback, which the Wolverines lacked in Rodriguez's first year. This led to a 3-9 season. He found a better quarterback to fit his system in year 2 with Tate Forcier, but with him still attempting to find the right guys for his system, the team was young, inexperienced and still a year or two away from genuinely illustrating what they could do under the coach's guidance. This led to a 5-7 campaign, a two-game improvement from the previous year, but still not matching Michigan standards. This most recent season, we saw the emergence of Sophomore quarterback sensation, Denard Robinson. The offense improved dramatically, especially when comparing it to the 3-9 squad from two years ago, but the defense, starting as many as 8 freshman at the time, struggled immensely. But, at the end of the season, Michigan finished with a winning record of 7-6 following their bowl loss to Mississippi State. In terms of victories, this was again an improvement of two over the previous year. Next year would be Rodriguez's first at Michigan when he'd be able to work with a quarterback for a second consecutive season and it'd be the first year where he'd have most of his recruits playing for him, rather than a majority or a heavy mixture of Lloyd Carr recruits. Next year would be the year where we would ultimately see what Rich Rodriguez could or couldn't do at Michigan. Instead, he gets fired and this will likely force the Wolverines to lose another 2-3 years before they can become competitive in the Big Ten. Like I said, Rodriguez's offense was a polar opposite from what the team had run under Lloyd Carr. Chances are U of M won't be hiring a coach with a similar offensive philosophy as Rodriguez, so he'll have to try and do what Rodriguez did in the first year or two, use Rodriguez's players to play in an offensive system that doesn't fit their strengths. Also, due to this probably change in offensive philosophy, like with what happened to Rodriguez in his first year, you're likely to see many Wolverines' players transfer to a team where they will likely be better utilized. This may also include Denard Robinson. Unless a coach comes to the team with the intent of running a similar-style offense, Robinson likely won't be his type of quarterback and with the amazing talent the sophomore phenom has, he could very well transfer. Nebraska isn't too fond of Taylor Martinez anymore. I have a feeling Huskers' fans and fans of many other teams would be thrilled at the prospect of attaining Robinson. Look, I know there's a sense of urgency to win in college football and this is especially true at a school like Michigan, which has a grand history of success at the sport. However, like with what has happened at Notre Dame in recent years with their many coaching changes, it's nearly impossible to build a consistently successful program when you're constantly undergoing such drastic changes ever 2-4 years. The heads at Michigan had to know it'd take some growing pains in order for Rodriguez to hopefully make things work at the University. They couldn't have felt otherwise. It's not like Mike Leach can go coach at one of the academies, transition them from a triple option attack to a west coast-type offense and expect it to be a smooth ride as of year 1 or 2. There's a fine line between optimism and naivete and I think Michigan may have confused the two.