Sark after dark COACHING STAFF thread

[closetojumping 62259]

2 hours ago, Richter said:

Adios, enjoy your new board

That board has no fucking idea the level of banal, insipid, voluminous word vomit it is about to be blitzed with, and I hope someone posts a screenshot of their reactions. 

In regard to the actual staff stuff, Lupoi and Sark have obviously worked together before, but they’re not exactly buddies. I hope he’s a guy Sarkisian brings in, but I worry that’s more hope than reality. 

[CenTex Hill Billy 146]

12 hours ago, Mitch Cumsteen said:

https://247sports.com/Coach/Tosh-Lupoi-715/AllTimeRecruits/

Holy shit. 

[RockyMountainHighHorn 890]

56 minutes ago, CenTex Hill Billy said:

Holy shit. 

Watson was better

[Leanderman 2268]

Actually kinda fun throwing names out their for position coaches. Why not bring back Samples in some role while we are at it?

[Coelenterate Fuccboi 13010]

1 minute ago, Leanderman said:

Actually kinda fun throwing names out their for position coaches. Why not bring back Samples in some role while we are at it?

* there

Think bigger than Samples. If we are targeting him, none of us will be happy with the overall hires.

[pacman 7331]

5 hours ago, Thiefery said:

Don't want the current steelers OL coach.. They have regressed since Munchak left a couple seasons ago 

You sure?

Best pass protect stats in the league..solid 2+ yards before contact for the starting rb connor

Edited January 4, 2021 by pacman

[Longboard Horn 40167]

 

[Thiefery 4970]

50 minutes ago, pacman said:

You sure?

Best pass protect stats in the league..solid 2+ yards before contact for the starting rb connor

I'm positive.. He hasn't been good and the depth of the line which he's been coaching up, hasn't been great. 

[The Earl of Texas 3131]

That great white sark account is bad, which is a bummer because we deserve good parody.

[BurntOrange&White 39702]

 

[Doc Reeves 6434]

1 hour ago, Longboard Horn said:

 

That’s... that’s just unfortunate. 

[KYHorn 16865]

42 minutes ago, The Earl of Texas said:

That great white sark account is bad, which is a bummer because we deserve good parody.

Friendly fire, man. But, yeah, he's hopefully still finding his voice there

Edited January 4, 2021 by KYHorn

[The Beast 584]

12 minutes ago, BurntOrange&White said:

 

That's something.

 

[Dbeasy 14980]

As Sark puts together his staff, he will likely have one big advantage vs Strong and Herman. 
 

People always say that the downfall of Herman and Strong is the fact they brought in weak staffs. It was, but people seem to believe it’s because they just made bad hiring decisions. It’s much more than that.
 

Great coaches won’t go to work for someone who they believe isn’t good for their career. Strong and Herman weren’t respected enough in the coaching community to draw top talent, despite working for a top destination school with the biggest budget. 
 

Think about that for a second. They were so weak, even the massive appeal and resources of Texas didn’t solve the issue. It’s how we ended up with Tim Beck, Shawn Watson, etc. 

 

Sark, on the other hand, should be a big draw. The only caveat is the drinking problem. If he really hasn’t addressed it, then the talent won’t follow him here. 

[HenryJames 65898]

17 hours ago, Sal said:

I probably missed it a few pages back, but has there been any mention of who Sarkisian is targeting for strength and conditioning?

@closetojumping and @SydneyCarton are pretty influential, and they’re both aggressively promoting Brian Cushing for the job.

[SydneyCarton 47932]

1 minute ago, HenryJames said:

@closetojumping and @SydneyCarton are pretty influential, and they’re both aggressively promoting Brian Cushing for the job.

On one hand that guy can forever get fucked and I’d rather have the reanimated corpse of Peter Cushing in the role...on the other hand we know he had access to the best roids. 

[Hiphopopotamos 20865]

12 minutes ago, Dbeasy said:

As Sark puts together his staff, he will likely have one big advantage vs Strong and Herman. 
 

People always say that the downfall of Herman and Strong is the fact they brought in weak staffs. It was, but people seem to believe it’s because they just made bad hiring decisions. It’s much more than that.
 

Great coaches won’t go to work for someone who they believe isn’t good for their career. Strong and Herman weren’t respected enough in the coaching community to draw top talent, despite working for a top destination school with the biggest budget. 
 

Think about that for a second. They were so weak, even the massive appeal and resources of Texas didn’t solve the issue. It’s how we ended up with Tim Beck, Shawn Watson, etc. 

 

Sark, on the other hand, should be a big draw. The only caveat is the drinking problem. If he really hasn’t addressed it, then the talent won’t follow him here. 

For Herman at least I think it had less to do with not being able to draw top talent and more to do with an unwillingness to work with anyone outside of his bubble.  He needed the culture fit (or so he thought) and didn't really consider anyone outside of the group that brought him success at UH.   But I do sort of agree with you that Herman probably wouldn't have drawn that top talent even if he wanted to.  I posted elsewhere that one of Herman's issues is that he had grinded away at smaller profile schools and didn't have the same level of colleague as someone like Sark who had worked at high profile schools or the NFL his entire career.

I think Strong tried to bring in what he thought was a 'top staff' - he was just clueless.

Edited January 4, 2021 by Hiphopopotamos

[closetojumping 62259]

24 minutes ago, HenryJames said:

@closetojumping and @SydneyCarton are pretty influential, and they’re both aggressively promoting Brian Cushing for the job.

 

23 minutes ago, SydneyCarton said:

On one hand that guy can forever get fucked and I’d rather have the reanimated corpse of Peter Cushing in the role...on the other hand we know he had access to the best roids. 

I was going to make a joke about wanting to pull Boyd Epley’s corpse from the dustbin and fire up the Nebraska livestock growth hormone injection work from the 80’s/90’s into the program. Then I looked him up and that dude is alive and just fucking retired from Nebraska last summer. Nevermind. 

[alphahorn 1637]

Tosh would be great of course, but if we get him, then we'd better have mustard to go with his fries and by all means no sling blades allowed

[NTVTXN 1432]

59 minutes ago, Dbeasy said:

Sark, on the other hand, should be a big draw. The only caveat is the drinking problem. If he really hasn’t addressed it, then the talent won’t follow him here. 

I understand what you’re saying, here...However, I certainly hope that this was topic 1A that del Conte covered with Sark’s Agent,  Saban and Byrne.  If not...Lord help us...

[Doc Reeves 6434]

1 hour ago, Dbeasy said:

The only caveat is the drinking problem. If he really hasn’t addressed it, then the talent won’t follow him here.

The word is he has been a good boy and realizes the enormity of how fucked up he was. Seems he might have liked nose clams also and that made the drinking explode and led to some of the most dramatic public shit. Who knows tho, that’s all that’s all 3rd hand info.

Fuck it, he seems to have his shit together and UT fans are going to have to just take it one day at a time like he does.

[BurntOrange&White 39702]

1 minute ago, Doc Reeves said:

The word is he has been a good boy and realizes the enormity of how fucked up he was. Seems he might have liked nose clams also and that made the drinking explode and led to some of the most dramatic public shit. Who knows tho, that’s all that’s all 3rd hand info.

Fuck it, he seems to have his shit together and UT fans are going to have to just take it one day at a time like he does.

I did like hearing that he goes to meetings or talks to sponsors every day to keep working on it and keeping those demons behind him. 

[stork642 4498]

1 minute ago, Doc Reeves said:

The word is he has been a good boy and realizes the enormity of how fucked up he was. Seems he might have liked nose clams also and that made the drinking explode and led to some of the most dramatic public shit. Who knows tho, that’s all that’s all 3rd hand info.

Fuck it, he seems to have his shit together and UT fans are going to have to just take it one day at a time like he does.

He knows this is his last chance to be a head coach.  If he screws this up the best he can hope for is a coordinator position. 

[BurntOrange&White 39702]

Rewatching the initial press briefing CDC’s comments about the staff have me thinking it’s mostly in place. Just some final touches are needed. 

[SydneyCarton 47932]

10 minutes ago, Doc Reeves said:

The word is he has been a good boy and realizes the enormity of how fucked up he was. Seems he might have liked nose clams also and that made the drinking explode and led to some of the most dramatic public shit. Who knows tho, that’s all that’s all 3rd hand info.

Fuck it, he seems to have his shit together and UT fans are going to have to just take it one day at a time like he does.

I mean, it most certainly is NOT all 3rd hand information. 

[EZ$ 2102]

I’m willing to bet that whoever he hires as assistants, Surly will be surly.  

[Hiphopopotamos 20865]

1 minute ago, BurntOrange&White said:

I did like hearing that he goes to meetings or talks to sponsors every day to keep working on it and keeping those demons behind him. 

I was listening to the Fire Tom Herman podcast (since re-branded) and one of the hosts talked about the 12 step program and the impact it might/should have on Sarks life/career.  Apparently the host has worked a little bit in addiction/recovery and at least has a bit of an idea of what hes talking about on this subject.

The gist of it was that going through and completing the 12 step program requires you to be introspective to take a look at your life and career and goals and how all of that was impacted by your addiction.  You have to strip away all ego and realize that there things you can not control.  Just a really intensive self-therapy.  A type of therapy that goes beyond just beating addiction.

It requires a kind of self-evaluation that would do wonders for someone like Tom Herman - and likely made a huge impact on Sark as a coach.

The hope would be that he carries over that kind of critical self-evaluation into all areas of his life - including decisions like coaching staff.  Hopefully he doesn't allow things like ego or a lack of self -confidence steer him into making lesser hires because he's worried he might be over-shadowed or challenged.

The initial list is full of names with as much or more experience than him, at big time programs, with big time success.  If he can get just a couple of those names his initial staff will be miles ahead of what Strong/Herman walked onto the 40 acres with.

[Viper 12034]

5 minutes ago, BurntOrange&White said:

Rewatching the initial press briefing CDC’s comments about the staff have me thinking it’s mostly in place. Just some final touches are needed. 

I don't see how you say you are excited about the staff unless you already have some handshake agreements with some exciting guys. Unless you're an amateur and are just getting excited because a guy threw out some long shot names in a job interview.

[Landomatic 3813]

10 hours ago, maninblack said:

It's important but message boards over blow it. 

I think this played a role in that...

 

7 hours ago, maninblack said:

There's at least 10 positions Sark is worried about before S&C. 

Show us on the doll where the strength and conditioning coach touched you.  Maybe coordinators, but not 10 positions.  I think S&C is more important than you know.

 

[JPETERMAN 111]

10 minutes ago, BurntOrange&White said:

I did like hearing that he goes to meetings or talks to sponsors every day to keep working on it and keeping those demons behind him. 

Isn't Saban one of the first big "Process" guys.  I heard Sark allude to that in the presser a couple times if I recall.  Seems like dealing with addiction also kind of falls into that category of just trusting the process, going about your business and then the end results (winning, or staying sober) will just be the byproduct.  Hopefully for him personally, and the team, he'll be successful with both.  I just hope his process is a bit different from Jason Garrett's process.

[GTX Horn 1707]

B&E here in Austin just mentioned bringing back Akina as DC if Sark doesn’t keep Ash

[victory88 5663]

Just now, GTX Horn said:

B&E here in Austin just mentioned bringing back Akina as DC if Sark doesn’t keep Ash

LOL, nope.  DB coach, sure!  DC... no thank you.  We already tried that experiment and it failed miserably.  Muschamp took that same defense and turned them into a top 5 squad the next year.  

[BurntOrange&White 39702]

Hard pass on Aikina. He had a good run here but if Cory Raymond is a legit possibility then hell fucking no. 

[closetojumping 62259]

1 hour ago, Dbeasy said:

As Sark puts together his staff, he will likely have one big advantage vs Strong and Herman. 
 

People always say that the downfall of Herman and Strong is the fact they brought in weak staffs. It was, but people seem to believe it’s because they just made bad hiring decisions. It’s much more than that.
 

Great coaches won’t go to work for someone who they believe isn’t good for their career. Strong and Herman weren’t respected enough in the coaching community to draw top talent, despite working for a top destination school with the biggest budget. 
 

Think about that for a second. They were so weak, even the massive appeal and resources of Texas didn’t solve the issue. It’s how we ended up with Tim Beck, Shawn Watson, etc. 

 

Sark, on the other hand, should be a big draw. The only caveat is the drinking problem. If he really hasn’t addressed it, then the talent won’t follow him here. 

I think you're directionally correct here, but I disagree with a few of your thoughts.

1) I can't help myself when I see someone hint at some reason for why Strong wound up with Watson at Texas as anything other than the mere fact that Strong really wanted Watson at Texas. Everything else was theater. You can ask folks who were involved with the AD, the media, or in the coaching realm at the time. Strong was given advice not to bring in Watson, so he acted like he was looking for someone else for 3 weeks and then brought the motherfucker in. I went from being excited, to hopeful, to immediately despondent during Strong's assistant staff assembly. Watching people, good posters even, defend the Watson hiring in the early days was depressing. It was a straight up fucking disaster hire and Strong was flat out willful in making sure it happened. 

2) Herman could have brought in anyone he wanted for his staff and there were coaches clamoring to get on board. Brewster, who knows him, made it explicitly clear that he'd be interested in coming back to Texas. Herman not only showed no interest, he touted that as a story to make his staff assembly sound like the best and the brightest. Same is true for Traylor. Traylor wanted to stay at Texas. He knew Herman for what he is, but wanted to make it work because of how he viewed his future if he could make it work at the school. I can't remember if Herman just obviously mailed-in the interview with Traylor or was even more dismissive and didn't give him one, but either way, Traylor fucking despised the guy upon his arrival. That isn't because he was fired. It's because of the way he was handled on the way out and the way Herman treated everyone when he showed up at Texas. 

So I hope you're right regarding Sarkisian's reach, but the job itself could have created far better outcomes for both Strong and Herman if they weren't fucking idiots in each of their own rights.

To me, everything hangs in the balance with the Sarkisian hire over the next two weeks. If he gets the staff even half right, with the talent on hand, he's off and running. If he can't flex his network and the job itself to get at least a few excellent recruiters, an excellent OL coach, and an excellent DC, we'll be here in 3-4 years or the middle of 2022 after he flames out from the pressure coupled with on-field failings and a firing after missing practice while he's hungover in bed with a coed. 

[Hiphopopotamos 20865]

6 minutes ago, GTX Horn said:

B&E here in Austin just mentioned bringing back Akina as DC if Sark doesn’t keep Ash

Thats not going to happen - unless he is a Co-DC with someone else making the calls.

[TexasTroll 454]

30 minutes ago, Doc Reeves said:

The word is he has been a good boy and realizes the enormity of how fucked up he was. Seems he might have liked nose clams also and that made the drinking explode and led to some of the most dramatic public shit. Who knows tho, that’s all that’s all 3rd hand info.

Fuck it, he seems to have his shit together and UT fans are going to have to just take it one day at a time like he does.

Nose clams??

i like mine fried.

Edited January 4, 2021 by TexasTroll

[EvilCaseMcCoy 691]

Just now, TexasTroll said:

Nose clams??

Pshh? Whats the problem, never done nose class before? I did some this morning with breakfast. 

[Viper 12034]

8 minutes ago, closetojumping said:

a firing after missing practice while he's hungover in bed with a coed. 

I mean, there's worse ways to go

[Newy25 7638]

My cautious optimism about the staff assembly comes from CDC’s comments about part of the reason he was targeted was the vision for the staff he would bring.  Hamilton did not just pull those names out of his ass, presumably and most of those first names indicated a coach who understood what needed to be done. The three coaches we have to upgrade are OL, DB and WR.  I know we talk about Hand a lot for good reason but I haven’t seen a more pathetic position group in my lifetime watching Texas football than our wide receivers this year. That group has to perform better next year. And recruiting was just as disastrous as OL this year at the position. 

[closetohumping 17408]

16 minutes ago, GTX Horn said:

B&E here in Austin just mentioned bringing back Akina as DC if Sark doesn’t keep Ash

Those guys are bozos

[Viper 12034]

6 minutes ago, TexasTroll said:

Nose clams??

no, I think you misheard him, he said nose hams

[RGBIII 22798]

6 minutes ago, Newy25 said:

My cautious optimism about the staff assembly comes from CDC’s comments about part of the reason he was targeted was the vision for the staff he would bring.  Hamilton did not just pull those names out of his ass, presumably and most of those first names indicated a coach who understood what needed to be done. The three coaches we have to upgrade are OL, DB and WR.  I know we talk about Hand a lot for good reason but I haven’t seen a more pathetic position group in my lifetime watching Texas football than our wide receivers this year. That group has to perform better next year. And recruiting was just as disastrous as OL this year at the position. 

Agreed, the names came out too quickly to not have already have them either lined up or damn near

[BrazilHorn 6577]

19 minutes ago, GTX Horn said:

B&E here in Austin just mentioned bringing back Akina as DC if Sark doesn’t keep Ash

No thanks. Fresh start. Don't bring in old retread coaches.

[Johnny Sack 8397]

15 hours ago, XYZ said:

Is Ash really that good? I feel like after Manny _iaz and To__ Orlan_o, we are just happy that our defense under Ash didn’t have huge schematic holes that get exploited over and over by the other teams, but statistically speaking this year’s defense wasn’t very good at anything.

I feel like he is good.  But in this day in age in college football, you have to realize elite defensive minds with elite staffs still get their asses lit up.  Alabama this year can be had on defense.  A hot QB with good skill talent in a good scheme will light up the score board on certain days.

Find me a college DC who has to coach against spread offenses that doesn't occasionally get taken.

[Johnny Sack 8397]

15 hours ago, XYZ said:

Is Ash really that good? I feel like after Manny _iaz and To__ Orlan_o, we are just happy that our defense under Ash didn’t have huge schematic holes that get exploited over and over by the other teams, but statistically speaking this year’s defense wasn’t very good at anything.

I feel like he is good.  But in this day in age in college football, you have to realize elite defensive minds with elite staffs still get their asses lit up.  Alabama this year can be had on defense.  A hot QB with good skill talent in a good scheme will light up the score board on certain days.

Find me a college DC who has to coach against spread offenses that doesn't occasionally get taken.

[RollLeft 5040]

13 minutes ago, BrazilHorn said:

No thanks. Fresh start. Don't bring in old retread coaches.

The Akina era cemented us as DBU so i would hardly call him a retread.  He's older so it should be questioned if he has the fire/energy to recruit at the level we need but there is no doubt he would be the best DB coach we have had since he left.  He's no dc.

Edited January 4, 2021 by RollLeft

[BurntOrange&White 39702]

Just now, Johnny Sack said:

I feel like he is good.  But in this day in age in college football, you have to realize elite defensive minds with elite staffs still get their asses lit up.  Alabama this year can be had on defense.  A hot QB with good skill talent in a good scheme will light up the score board on certain days.

Find me a college DC who has to coach against spread offenses that doesn't occasionally get taken.

The advanced stats say the most important thing right now is big play scoring. The rules and etc have changed so much to favor offenses you have to take advantage of any chance you can get to score. Letting the foot off the gas just allows your opponents to stay in the game. Throttling a team from start to finish and not getting conservative is the key going forward in football. 

 

 

[MoJames 8241]

5 minutes ago, RollLeft said:

The Akina era cemented us as DBU so i would hardly call him a retread.  He's older so it should be questioned if he has the fire/energy to recruit at the level we need but there is no doubt he would be the best DB coach we have had since he left.  He's no dc.

I still have a sour taste in my mouth with how he handled Diaz.

Also, he was an awful DC.

I would much rather move on from any Mack coordinators outside of Muschamp (which looks like it won't happen anyway).

[Machinator 32098]

The role of a defense in modern football is to get enough stops so that your offense can win the game for you. The days of 9-6 contests are largely over unless you play in the Big Ten.

At a place like Texas, we can probably expect a defense to produce winning efforts the majority of the time by putting elite athletes in a position to win through fundamentally sound coaching in a sensible base scheme (with opponent adjustments built in as always). The big matchups are where the elite DCs make their bones by understanding that you win the game by minimizing the advantages of offenses who get their athletes one on one in space.

I think Ash mastered that first part this year but it's still TBD on the second.

[Johnny Sack 8397]

9 minutes ago, BurntOrange&White said:

The advanced stats say the most important thing right now is big play scoring. The rules and etc have changed so much to favor offenses you have to take advantage of any chance you can get to score. Letting the foot off the gas just allows your opponents to stay in the game. Throttling a team from start to finish and not getting conservative is the key going forward in football. 

 

 

That seems right to me at least intuitively (I don't know the stats).