The CheckerBoard

The first and greatest fear is obvious--that whoever he hires can't win and stinks it up.

But what would be almost as bad? A "good" hire who may eventually win, but engenders as much if not more apathy in the process of building the team. Assume the next guy is NOT a perceived (remember, in the "splash" hire game, perception matters as much if not more than reality) big time hire, and thus the national reaction from the media and recruits is a collective "yawn, more of the same" engendering no buzz whatsoever.

You fired Dooley because, even in a time of financial hardship for the Ath. Dept., he became more of a liability than the "step back" and gamble aspect of a new hire, due to fan apathy and lack of fannies in the Neyland bleachers. So after 5 horrible seasons, by our standards, and now on a new, 4th coach in year 6 who no one knows, is the fan base gonna start donating and ticket buying (and those who do actually showing up), or will they stay away until he starts winning. Will they come back and wait and see if he loses, or will they stay away until, and wait and see, if he wins? At this point, I think most of the fan base is at the latter point: "Yeah, I'm still a VFL; they'll always be my team; and I'll always root for them. But until they, and the new coach, show me something, I'll be rooting for them on the big screen in HD from the comfort of my couch."

Assume further that this new coach wins more than Dooley, but no "signature wins," and still can't be fired b/c he's early in his tenure and IS in fact doing better. Let's say we lose to Oregon, but win three SEC games every year (below .500, but better than CDD). He gets us to a bowl game his first two seasons, but we lose both to perceived inferior conferences. He doesn't lose to Vandy or KY.

After that hypothetical 2 year period, though improved marginally, we'd be more irrelevant than we are now, because we'd be ever further from '98, and our last SECC game appearance in 07.

You can't fire the guy, because we're getting better, but apathy is worse than now, and the athletic dept. is hemorrhaging even more money. That's the nightmare. I am NOT predicting that will happen, just saying that's the nightmare scenario for Dave Hart to avoid. A guy who lost all of his games in year one and was fired by game 8 would be far preferable.

He HAS to get someone who can show some BIG improvement by year 2, or it won't matter whether we fire him and get a new AD. We may be hosed for at least another decade, unless and until we luck out and hire a no-name coach who is the equivalent of catching lightning in a bottle.

All we can do now is and .

We all know this hire is critical. But even that word doesn't convey the seriousness or importance to the program long term of this hire. JMO