Hayes: 2nd best coach in college football hasn't ever won 10 twice in a row

• His best players on offense and defense -- quarterback Tim Tebow and linebacker Brandon Spikes -- chose to return for their senior seasons instead of succumbing to the green and greed of the NFL.

This is such a tired and lazy cliche. The 'greed' of the NFL.

As if there is a long line of writers who would have turned down a ton of money to work at Sports Illustrated with a year left of school.

 

Saban had one decent year at MSU. Had he not had that decent year, he was about to be fired, because they were getting tired of him marching into the president's office every three weeks demanding huge raises and threatening to bolt to the NFL, despite records of 6-5-1, 6-6, 7-5 and 6-6.

Saban's in the top 10, but to rank him ahead of Carroll or Tressel,or even Mack Brown at this point is nuts.

And ranking Rodriguez anywhere is insane. 3-9 is 3-9. If he comes back this year and goes 8-4, talk to us then. Until that happens, he's 3-9.

 

Thanks for the catch. I fixed it. I have no idea where "Jim" came from. ???

 

Best 3-9 coach ever. ;D

 

According to The Product, he has never lost a game - it's usually the players' fault. But he'll have to check the film.

 

Nobody got a mulligan. Everybody had at least one loss. Somebody had to be ranked ahead of someone else. Just because two of the teams were ranked 1-2 doesn't mean their losses were ignored.

Can't argue with that. But it's interesting that this "Murderer's Row" of non-conference opponents can only bump USC's TOTAL strength of schedule to something like 16th (in 2008). Meanwhile, Florida's strength of schedule was 4th. That's the kind of stuff that breaks ties when you are comparing teams with the same number of losses. USC can't control the fact that it plays in a shitty conference whose members --- outside of USC --- have been irrelevant on the college football stage for almost two decades. But they shouldn't be rewarded for it, either.

Because they always play second-place Big Ten teams while UF or LSU plays first-place Big Ten teams for the national title.

Just because a 3-9 Notre Dame team wasn't a gimmie when they were put on the schedule doesn't mean they were not a gimmie when USC played them. Once again, if these non-conference opponents were soooooo tough, why is USC's total strength of schedule only good but never great?

Yes, they could have. And 13-0 Auburn could have defeated USC in the 2004 Orange Bowl, had they been given the opportunity. But they were hurt by their 18th-ranked SOS. USC and Oklahoma, meanwhile, were 2-3 in SOS that year.

The BCS giveth, and the BCS taketh away. When USC plays a monster schedule, they tend to be rewarded for it.

 

Well, I will agree with that based on last year's 87 fumbled returns, the blown kick against Toledo and the blown coverage against Purdue.

That team was three stupid mistakes from being 5-7.

 

Saban was 9-2 in his final year at Michigan State, 6-2 in the conference.
"Never won a conference title?" Are you serious? He was at Michigan State, not Michigan, Ohio State or Penn State. To criticize Saban for not getting to the Rose Bowl at MSU is like ripping Jim Larranaga because George Mason got blasted by Florida after reaching the Final Four.
The team he left behind at MSU got to a bowl game, even though the administration replaced Saban badly.
Hayes could do a touchdown dance on your comments, too.

 

Hi, Matt.

 

Saban didn't "leave Michigan State a mess", though George Perles certainly did (Saban inherited a team on probation). Bobby Williams ran a good program into the ground. There's a reason he hasn't gotten another head-coaching job or even another coordinator job since then (he is now a tight ends/special teams coach at Alabama).

Go back and look at all the guys off Saban's later Michigan State teams that have played or are currently playing in the NFL --- Plaxico Burress, T.J. Duckett, Renaldo Hill, Lemar Marshall, Charles Rogers, Julian Peterson, Robaire Smith, just to name a few. Saban left MSU in fine shape; Williams just couldn't coach to save his ass.

Look, I'm not sure Saban definitely should be No. 2 on the list. But if you're going to rip the guy, rip him for the right reasons, such as the enormous number of eggs his teams lay from time-to-time, like the 2009 Sugar Bowl, the 2007 Louisiana-Monroe game, the 19-7 loss to a Ron-Zook-coached-Florida team at home in 2003, the 31-0 loss to Alabama at home in 2002, the loss to UAB in 2000 or any number of blowout losses at Michigan State.

But to say he hasn't left every college program at which he's ever coached far better than he found it is ridiculous.

 

So clever. Almost as on the money as your initial post.

 

No argument here on Meyer as best coach, even if he is an insufferable prick. (As insufferable pricks go, though, he can't rank higher than fourth in the SEC alone.) But regarding the fact that Tebow "chose to return" for his senior season, are we now giving credit to guys who say no to the possibility of being a fourth-round pick? I am not aware of an NFL team that is planning to go all-Wildcat, all the time.