Loeffler Leaves BG....Have that on your bingo card?
The news out this morning, my friends. And it's a wow. Scot Loeffler is returning to the NFL for a position with the Eagles.
Whew, things can change fast. Because everything is up for grabs now. I imagine more news will come out, maybe Loeffler will comment on what was happening, but right now, everything is in play. The quality of life has to be much higher in the NFL..College football is a new world and not necessarily a great one.
1. The timing is awful. AWFUL. We're ready for spring practice, and there's a portal opening right after that. BG says it is launching a national search, so we won't be using an interim as a bridge coach. No one else is hiring--how's that for a bright side? This is an attractive job. You can win here. But, the timing is absolutely awful.
2. What often happens when a coach leaves is that the team enters the portal en masse. There have been teams who bring in 65 new players. Sometimes that's OK....Liberty had an incredible season the year they beat us and they had an incredible number of new players. Everyone is up for grabs, though. We know that "agents" come after even average players in the middle of the season. I guarantee that every player has their phone blowing up right now. You can practically hear it. Including our early enrollees and last year's signees. BG will scramble the fighters to try and keep as many players as they can, but until there's a coach and assistants, that's really tough.
3. We will also have to battle to keep assistants to help with that process. We have some guys who would be in demand, and they will be looking out for themselves, as they should. We probably have some guys who don't have as many options in a world where being a graduate assistant with Loeffler 15 years ago is no longer helpful.
There will be plenty of time to assess the Loeffler Era here. He has critics--fairly--and they will be happy to finally see a change. I think he did good things. He dug us out. He put competitive teams on the field, and he beat UT. It was fun last year to go to the stadium and figure we would win.
I also wrote about my disappointment over the last two games and my general feeling that we should have been better and scored more, given the generational talent we had out there. It's fair to wonder if he did good work to get us where we were, and he was a decent coach but not a great one.
Also, the program he wanted to build probably doesn't exist anymore. He kept mentioning Clawson--who also retired out of frustration.
I do trust our AD to get us a good coach. Timing is working against us...we are off cycle. No one from Texas, please.
Watch this space.
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Loeffler also was hired at an awful time. He had no time to put together a recruiting class as it was the first year with an early signing year. Then he had covid hit and cancel spring practice. Then 2021 spring practice also got canceled. The first year where he had a "normal" entire year was 2022, when the wins finely started stacking up.
Whoever takes over will have to keep the team together. Hopefully Loeffler is already telling all his players to stick together and not bail on their commitments to this university and to each other.
As for who to hire. I've seen Mike Jacobs listed as a candidate. Looks great to me. I'd also take a serious look at Mike Tressel, DC at Wisconsin and formerly at Michigan State and Cincinnati. He's the very definition of doing more with less.
And I definitely echo the statement that the program Loeffler wanted to build is no longer an option. He will get paid more to coach only a few guys and not worry about recruiting and keeping his kids out of the transfer portal. And if he turns Jalen Hurts into a more polished passer, he's got a potential whole new career as an NFL playcaller and maybe even a future head coach. This move hurts us, but for him it's a no brainer. I'm happy for him. He salvaged an unsalvagable situation. As far as I'm concerned, he will go down as one of the best coaches in BGSU history for that turnaround. Now it's up to the next coach to elevate the program and keep beating UT into the ground.
Another interesting name to consider is Neal Brown. I don't know why he didn't work out at WVU. But he sure worked out at Troy. He is one of the innovators of the air raid.
For my money, any Air Raid Connection is disqualifying. Although the it was a while ago, he is connected with that Texas Tech group.
As for the first comment, I don't think any P4 coordinator is realistic. Many of them make more than our entire staff. I have seen the Kansas OC on a list, but that's low P4. I think getting an experienced head coach on the way up is the move for us.
As for any placement of Loeffler as "among the best coaches in BGSU History," that's utterly preposterous.
What about a certain coordinator at.. school up north? He’s been a HC before, though what I’d call a HIGH D3 in Mt Union. Wasn he one of possibles when Scot was eventually hired?
I like the guy you are talking about. I have a bias toward proven head coaches.
Mike Tressel makes $800k. That is more than we will pay a head coach. But if he wants to be a head coach soon, sticking around underneath Fickell at Wisconsin is not going to help. Another interesting reason to like Tressel. He understands the importance of winning the rivalry game. MSU is and will always lack the resources of Michigan. During his time at MSU, the Spartans went 8-5 vs Michigan.
I like Tressel fine. Knows Ohio. Impact hire. According to you, wants to be a head coach...brother is the Lt. Governor! I'd be happy with that choice.
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