The CheckerBoard

I am sorry man. We have been over this Hart thing. Dave is doing his job. Please let the man work. If something factual comes out about Dave not doing his actual job of Athletics Director incorrectly then we can throw rocks at glass houses. Until then We should be behind Dave and the athletic department. I assure you that Dave Hart knows more about the situation than we do. Dave Hart is the Athletics Director at Tennessee, A darn fine one

Just my opinion... You know like the rest of us the next 10 years of this program are up to this hire we can't keep stepping back. Do we wanna play with the big boys or do we wanna be the next Vandy?

He hasn't had a hire with more on the line then this one. This one will either unite or completely divide the fan base. Sad to say but it will unravel.

That is some real optimistic thinking. No actual candidate we hire for the job will unite this fan base. Not even JG would have done that. Winning games is the only thing that will unite this fan base. Winning solves a lot of problems.

I knew I would get this question I have to borrow from respected fellow poster Ghost of Neyland. This was his post from yesterday:

"I said this to a friend this morning, and I'll repeat it here. He asked, "What has Dave Hart done to make you trust him" in response to me telling him that I trust Dave Hart. My response was as follows:

He barked up a tree that has been dead for four years and $18 million fell down.

He hired Anthony Grant at Alabama.

He hired Jimbo Fisher to be HC in waiting at FSU.

Pushed Bowden out and Jimbo in, leading to the re-emergence of FSU

He -- from most of my Alabama buddies -- essentially ran that athletic department at UA from a day-to-day operations standpoint while he was there.

He got our fundraising back on track to where it isn't governed by academics.

He consolidated the men's and women's athletic departments, cutting tons of dead weight and getting us more aligned with what every other university's athletic department in the country is, with a revenue stream that can eventually get us out of this hell.

That's all I got. But it's a pretty good track record so far.

He isn't some damn mole hired to sabotage our athletic department. He's a really good AD. Believe it or not, but he is."

Before I had read this I was of the same thinking of What has Dave Hart actually done. This is a nice list.

There has been so many different reports, taking one out of the bunch and dogging the AD over it seems a little careless to me. The only person who knows exactly what is going on and what has actually gone down is Hart. He is the one who is in charge of the search. Bottom line, if Gruden really wanted to be the coach at UT, then I'm sure he'd be the coach at UT. To think anybody on UT's end would have caused that not to happen is probably a little far fetched. Hart said in his press conference that he would do his due diligence in regards to this search. He has taleked with Strong after his last game and will talk with others coaches after their seasons end. You should meet with as many quality coaches as possible to gage their interest (if any) in the opening. Once he has done that, he will narrow his list and pick the best choice. This seems to be a professional and classy way of doing things. Now, if you don't like who he picks......well that's on you. I'm going to pop the top on a cold one, sit back and watch some football and let Dave Hart do his job.

Winning does solve the problem. That and being able to bring in the top caliber players year in and year out. I like Strong personally outta the potential candidates left but I am concerned with his recruiting. I've seen post after post about how good of a recruiter he is but his class this year is currently upper 80's if I remember correctly. His class last year wasn't great either

Down vote for asking a legitimate question?

I hit you with a +1 to offset.

Thanks..not sure what I said to rattle someone's cage, but I was seriously asking...I don't know any of Dave Harts hires at FSU or Bama.

You can't judge Hart based on the Gruden pursuit. You can't judge him at the time of the hire, either. It's easy to play armchair QB, but whoever he hires, you need to give them a few years before judging Hart. I get fans being upset Hart didn't go all in for Gruden (if that's what happened), but rational people realize there were just as many questions about whether he would have been successful here as there are opinions on why he definitely would have been.

If Hart can get anyone out of the top 5 or 6 being suggested, then we got a damn good coach at the end of the day. Nothing in life is a sure thing. Period.

EDIT: and something everyone on here seems to ignore from the Gruden chase is it's smart not to completely shift the market on coaches salaries. If Gruden had gotten over $5 million without ever having won a college game, and his staff had gotten over $5 million....there would have been a lot of schools and AD's who would've made UT an enemy for that. Whether you choose to ignore it or not, the politics of this whole thing matter. But for fans it's always easy to cut a blank check for anyone.

For the umpteenth time our fan base is divided largely due to these message boards and talk radio. Joe Bubba Jim Bob who has no investment in our program now has a public forum to complain and point fingers and keep the unsuspecting stirred up. We'll never be united.

IMO, Hart's biggest hire is Anthony Grant at AL. He took the top rising coaching candidate in the country and convinced him to take an offer at a downtrodden program with crappy facilities and who's athletic department overlooked when the cash was handed out. I was shocked when he chose bammer over some better basketball programs.