.
Former UM player and FIU coach Mario Cristobal, now Offensive Coordinator at Alabama, has proven adept at mining South Florida talent. Foto de Señor Gaston De Cardenas El Nuevo Herald
BY GREG COTE
gcote@miamiherald.com . Greg Cote: UM search committee must find great recruiter who will keep talent home | Miami Herald
The University of Miami on Monday announced it has hired a search firm and appointed a search advisory committee to help it find and hire the right football coach.
We’ll see what search firm Korn Ferry shakes out, but, for me, I can save everybody a lot of time, the favorite at the outset of UM’s search might well be Mario Cristobal, the former Canes player and FIU head coach currently working under Nick Saban.
There is one ideal, available person who is experienced, charismatic, a proven winner and with strong Hurricanes ties.
One possible stumbling block: Good luck hauling Jimmy Johnson out of coaching retirement, out of the upper Florida Keys and off his beloved fishing boat, the Three Rings. He’d also be too costly, probably at least 5 million a year, by which I don’t mean dollars; I mean bottles of Heineken Light.
Wait. Possible solution: UM allows Johnson to run practices and coach games via Skype while simultaneously reeling in a 54-inch wahoo.
There will be no shortage of actual candidates for the Miami opening when Los Angeles-based Korn Ferry, the world’s largest executive search firm, begins searching and vetting for possibilities to replace fired Al Golden and interim replacement Larry Scott.
UM hired Korn Ferry on Monday and also announced a six-person advisory committee, including Board of Trustees members Hilarie Bass, David Epstein and Steve Saiontz; deputy athletics director Jennifer Strawley; and former Hurricanes players Vinny Testaverde and Jonathan Vilma.
Athletics director Blake James called the search already “well underway” and noted “a tremendous amount of interest in The U.” James also said he’ll be “reaching out to a number of UM constituencies to engage in dialogue and to hear their thoughts and vision.”
By including former players on the advisory committee and “reaching out” for other input, Blake obviously wants to make a hire that will be popular with fans and alumni or at least leave them convinced all options were considered.
A word of advice to Mr. James:
Hire the best candidate, regardless of whether he has any UM ties, and do so with zero concern whether the hire will be popular with Warren Sapp, fans who rent flyover banners, or callers to local sports-rant radio. If the hire happens to have those Coral Gables ties, great, but that ought not be a priority, let alone a prerequisite.
Former Hurricanes players have come to adopt too much entitlement when it comes to their say in the program. Get real, fellas. The fact you played a couple of seasons 20 years ago doesn’t make you any smarter in terms of who the next coach should be.
ESPN college football analyst Paul Finebaum recently called UM “a dumpster fire,” a job no coach would want. He could not be more ludicrously wrong, of course. The Canes are a five-time national champion program and following an unpopular coach seen to have underachieved will put the next coach in a position to be play savior and hero fast.
“Strong recruiter” should be the priority in the next hire, and Cristobal last year was national recruiter of the year — and is especially adept at mining South Florida talent. UM must earn claiming rights to its own backyard again. Getting back to national stature begins there.
I don’t get the fascination among many fans with Butch Davis, Miami’s head coach from 1995-2000. Davis clearly wants the job, but turns 64 on Tuesday and hasn’t coached for five years. I also doubt UM, a school just past an NCAA scandal, wants to hire a coach fired by North Carolina amid its own NCAA scandal, although was not directly implicated.
Miami’s next coach might well be a man currently employed elsewhere but soon to be forcibly unemployed.
What if Texas parts ways with Charlie Strong?
I like Mark Richt as a strong candidate if he and Georgia separate.
Might Rich Rodriguez leave Arizona?
You hear so many other names also being tossed around, including Rob Chudzinski, Dana Holgorsen, Doc Holliday, Lane Kiffin, Winston Moss, Chuck Pagano, Greg Schiano, Mike Shula and Mark Stoops.
There also is an intriguing sub-category of young, rising, inexpensive coaches to whom Miami would be a dream job, a promotion. They include Memphis’ Justin Fuente, Houston’s Tom Herman and Toledo’s Matt Campbell.
The timing of Miami’s search will be interesting. UM must be patient and see if Richt or other big names become available after the regular season ends in a few weeks. But UM also must be mindful of a particularly competitive market, because Southern Cal, Illinois, South Carolina, UCF, Maryland, Missouri and Virginia Tech are among other schools that also will be coach hunting.
Miami will be fine as long as its clear emphasis is an accomplished coach whose priority is making UM a champion again and whose strength is recruiting — a man able to win back South Florida for The U.
It’d be nice if the next guy happens also to have a great Hurricanes past, but far better still if a great Hurricanes future is what matters more.
Read Greg’s Random Evidence blog daily at MiamiHerald.com and follow on Twitter @gregcote.
Greg Cote has been a Miami Herald sports columnist since 1995 and also writes the Random Evidence blog. He has covered Hurricanes football (1984-88), the Dolphins (1990-91) and his notorious sidekick the Upset Bird. You can reach him at gcote@miamiherald.com
GREG COTE
COMMENTS
Betty Nevelus · Fairfax Hall, Waynesboro, VA
Quit touting Cuban Al, Greg. He failed at FIU and is now recruiting for Alabama. That is a very easy job for anyone with a pulse.
Like · Reply · 2 · 7 hrs
Joey Powell · Pensacola, Florida
Didn't Butch Davis bring Miami through a scandal, and then put together the best team in the history of college football?
Strong? L'ville, in what conference with what QB? Then to Texas and what. Won't get you there.
Richt? Georgia fans would love that. 10 or 9 wins a seasons but never, ever a championship.
Rich Rod probably the only "BIG NAME" other than Butch that has the ju ju beans to get it done.
Cristobal will get you 5ive more years of ****. UNLESS, he comes as an asst. Lets see how much of a Cane he is then....See More
Like · Reply · 2 · 6 hrs
Dee Barr
VERY WELL SAID IN BOLD LETTERS.......
Like · Reply · 1 · 6 hrs
Gonzalo Sanabria · Coral Gables, Florida
Steve Spurrier
Like · Reply · 6 hrs
Sergei Imawriter
PLEASE! Where do you folks come use for brains? NO UM alum or fan would EVER support that move. Besides, he's as old as croesus, quit on his team in a worse manner than Butch.
Like · Reply · 4 hrs
Arnold Markowitz · Fishing writer at Waterfront Times
Think outside the box: when will Nevin Shapiro be eligible for parole?
Like · Reply · 5 hrs
Sergei Imawriter
James Coley was hired as a recruiter. Where did that get UM? I can name a dozen coaches who have coached up 2 and 3 star recruits to 10-2 11-1 records. Start with Boise State, Utah, Memphis, Houston, North Carolina, Mississippi State, etc.
Jimbo didn't have all these 4 and 5 stars when he got started.
Unlike · Reply · 1 · 4 hrs
Bill Henzler
Seriously? You don't get the fascination with Butch Davis? Have you been watching the NFL for the past 10 years? Butch's players had major roles on Sunday's and a few are still there.That NC team he assembled has to be one of the best if not the best college football team ever assembled. He's the same age as Saban. You really seem as biased against Butch as much as the way many of us are biased for him. The difference is we have his body of work as our evidence, you are just biased because of a hiring mistake he made many years ago. I just can't believe that we have a guy dying to get back here who has shown what he can do and so many are just dismissing him as a possibility. Just shaking my head as much as I have been watching Golden for the last 5 years. Maybe Vinny and Vilma will talk some football sense into these people.
Like · Reply · 3 hrs
George Garcia
Cote's wrong. There is nothing special about Mario Cristobal. He had modest success at an irrelevant school in a joke of a conference. And lets not forget that towards the end of his reign at FIU, he was losing more than he was winning. Cristobal is not D1 head coaching material.
The emphasis on recruiting South Florida is a bit overrated. Golden did a fantastic job recruiting South Florida. Over the past 4 years, the roster has been chock full of South Florida talent, and that has gotten us nowhere. Any coach that has credibility will be able to keep plenty of South Florida kids at home. Another thing that has become apparent to me is that South Florida turns out athletic skill players. Tons of them. South Florida kids aren't maulers. They're not in the trenches kids. They used to be, but not anyomore. Coaches in South Florida high schools know they can win with spreed, not brawn. A good recruiter has to be able to look outside of South Florida to bring in kids who are used to be smashing heads.
They need to bring in a high profile coordinator with big success at a big time D1 school. A young, hungry and smart coach who has been a stud at a big time conference. You'll have to pay him a lot of money, and he might not stay more than 4 or 5 years, but by the time he takes his jump to the NFL, he's built the program back up to a power, and you only need to keep it humming from then on.
My choice? Brent Venebales. The D Coordinator at Clemson. A no brainer superstar. Check out his resume and you'll see a man who has succeeded at the highest of levels and is in his prime. A guy like Venebales reminds me of Jimmy Johnson. Intense. A coordinator who was succesful at a big time school in a big time conference. Hungry. At an age he's in his prime. Every last name we've been reading would be a mistake. Another coach from an unkown football school that has had a couple years of success like the dude from Memphis? No thank you. A 64 year old Butch who hasn't coached in years? No. A coach recently fired from their jobs like Richt or Strong? No way. A coach who has spent most of his career as an assistant in the Pros dealing with mature men like Shula and Chudzinski? A tricky transition. None of the names suggested will get the job, and god help us if they do. Hire a guy like Venebales (I'm sure there are 2 or 3 just like him out there) and this program will be turned around in 2 or 3 years.
Like · Reply · 1 hr
Dave Solove · Works at Trivia host and DJ
Cote, you are delusional as you ruminate on a "who's who" of candidates.
UM IS a dumpster fire that is clearly very low in the pecking order of "desirable jobs". "Home Field" is 30 miles from campus and generally half full unless UM is playing FSU, UF or Notre Dame. And then it is half full of fans of FSU, UF or Notre Dame.
People like you are living in the past, 20 years ago when "The U" was relevant.
It isn't anymore.
Like · Reply · 1 hr
Greg Cote: UM search committee must find great recruiter who will keep talent home | Miami Herald
_______________________________________
Greg Cote is taking no prisoners in wanting Mario Cristobal as the next Head Coach for UM; he's going after Warren Sapp, banner flyers wanting to Make Miami Great Again, former UM players since they only played "a couple of years" 20 old years ago that won't make smarter than anyone else in knowing what a coach should be or just should be insofar as giving inputs.
Former UM player and FIU coach Mario Cristobal, now Offensive Coordinator at Alabama, has proven adept at mining South Florida talent. Foto de Señor Gaston De Cardenas El Nuevo Herald
BY GREG COTE
gcote@miamiherald.com . Greg Cote: UM search committee must find great recruiter who will keep talent home | Miami Herald
The University of Miami on Monday announced it has hired a search firm and appointed a search advisory committee to help it find and hire the right football coach.
We’ll see what search firm Korn Ferry shakes out, but, for me, I can save everybody a lot of time, the favorite at the outset of UM’s search might well be Mario Cristobal, the former Canes player and FIU head coach currently working under Nick Saban. There is one ideal, available person who is experienced, charismatic, a proven winner and with strong Hurricanes ties.
One possible stumbling block: Good luck hauling Jimmy Johnson out of coaching retirement, out of the upper Florida Keys and off his beloved fishing boat, the Three Rings. He’d also be too costly, probably at least 5 million a year, by which I don’t mean dollars; I mean bottles of Heineken Light.
Wait. Possible solution: UM allows Johnson to run practices and coach games via Skype while simultaneously reeling in a 54-inch wahoo.
There will be no shortage of actual candidates for the Miami opening when Los Angeles-based Korn Ferry, the world’s largest executive search firm, begins searching and vetting for possibilities to replace fired Al Golden and interim replacement Larry Scott.
UM hired Korn Ferry on Monday and also announced a six-person advisory committee, including Board of Trustees members Hilarie Bass, David Epstein and Steve Saiontz; deputy athletics director Jennifer Strawley; and former Hurricanes players Vinny Testaverde and Jonathan Vilma.
Athletics director Blake James called the search already “well underway” and noted “a tremendous amount of interest in The U.” James also said he’ll be “reaching out to a number of UM constituencies to engage in dialogue and to hear their thoughts and vision.”
By including former players on the advisory committee and “reaching out” for other input, Blake obviously wants to make a hire that will be popular with fans and alumni or at least leave them convinced all options were considered.
A word of advice to Mr. James:
Hire the best candidate, regardless of whether he has any UM ties, and do so with zero concern whether the hire will be popular with Warren Sapp, fans who rent flyover banners, or callers to local sports-rant radio. If the hire happens to have those Coral Gables ties, great, but that ought not be a priority, let alone a prerequisite.
Former Hurricanes players have come to adopt too much entitlement when it comes to their say in the program. Get real, fellas. The fact you played a couple of seasons 20 years ago doesn’t make you any smarter in terms of who the next coach should be.
ESPN college football analyst Paul Finebaum recently called UM “a dumpster fire,” a job no coach would want. He could not be more ludicrously wrong, of course. The Canes are a five-time national champion program and following an unpopular coach seen to have underachieved will put the next coach in a position to be play savior and hero fast.
“Strong recruiter” should be the priority in the next hire, and Cristobal last year was national recruiter of the year — and is especially adept at mining South Florida talent. UM must earn claiming rights to its own backyard again. Getting back to national stature begins there.
I don’t get the fascination among many fans with Butch Davis, Miami’s head coach from 1995-2000. Davis clearly wants the job, but turns 64 on Tuesday and hasn’t coached for five years. I also doubt UM, a school just past an NCAA scandal, wants to hire a coach fired by North Carolina amid its own NCAA scandal, although was not directly implicated.
Miami’s next coach might well be a man currently employed elsewhere but soon to be forcibly unemployed.
What if Texas parts ways with Charlie Strong?
I like Mark Richt as a strong candidate if he and Georgia separate.
Might Rich Rodriguez leave Arizona?
You hear so many other names also being tossed around, including Rob Chudzinski, Dana Holgorsen, Doc Holliday, Lane Kiffin, Winston Moss, Chuck Pagano, Greg Schiano, Mike Shula and Mark Stoops.
There also is an intriguing sub-category of young, rising, inexpensive coaches to whom Miami would be a dream job, a promotion. They include Memphis’ Justin Fuente, Houston’s Tom Herman and Toledo’s Matt Campbell.
The timing of Miami’s search will be interesting. UM must be patient and see if Richt or other big names become available after the regular season ends in a few weeks. But UM also must be mindful of a particularly competitive market, because Southern Cal, Illinois, South Carolina, UCF, Maryland, Missouri and Virginia Tech are among other schools that also will be coach hunting.
Miami will be fine as long as its clear emphasis is an accomplished coach whose priority is making UM a champion again and whose strength is recruiting — a man able to win back South Florida for The U.
It’d be nice if the next guy happens also to have a great Hurricanes past, but far better still if a great Hurricanes future is what matters more.
Read Greg’s Random Evidence blog daily at MiamiHerald.com and follow on Twitter @gregcote.
Greg Cote has been a Miami Herald sports columnist since 1995 and also writes the Random Evidence blog. He has covered Hurricanes football (1984-88), the Dolphins (1990-91) and his notorious sidekick the Upset Bird. You can reach him at gcote@miamiherald.com
GREG COTE
COMMENTS
Betty Nevelus · Fairfax Hall, Waynesboro, VA
Quit touting Cuban Al, Greg. He failed at FIU and is now recruiting for Alabama. That is a very easy job for anyone with a pulse.
Like · Reply · 2 · 7 hrs
Joey Powell · Pensacola, Florida
Didn't Butch Davis bring Miami through a scandal, and then put together the best team in the history of college football?
Strong? L'ville, in what conference with what QB? Then to Texas and what. Won't get you there.
Richt? Georgia fans would love that. 10 or 9 wins a seasons but never, ever a championship.
Rich Rod probably the only "BIG NAME" other than Butch that has the ju ju beans to get it done.
Cristobal will get you 5ive more years of ****. UNLESS, he comes as an asst. Lets see how much of a Cane he is then....See More
Like · Reply · 2 · 6 hrs
Dee Barr
VERY WELL SAID IN BOLD LETTERS.......
Like · Reply · 1 · 6 hrs
Gonzalo Sanabria · Coral Gables, Florida
Steve Spurrier
Like · Reply · 6 hrs
Sergei Imawriter
PLEASE! Where do you folks come use for brains? NO UM alum or fan would EVER support that move. Besides, he's as old as croesus, quit on his team in a worse manner than Butch.
Like · Reply · 4 hrs
Arnold Markowitz · Fishing writer at Waterfront Times
Think outside the box: when will Nevin Shapiro be eligible for parole?
Like · Reply · 5 hrs
Sergei Imawriter
James Coley was hired as a recruiter. Where did that get UM? I can name a dozen coaches who have coached up 2 and 3 star recruits to 10-2 11-1 records. Start with Boise State, Utah, Memphis, Houston, North Carolina, Mississippi State, etc.
Jimbo didn't have all these 4 and 5 stars when he got started.
Unlike · Reply · 1 · 4 hrs
Bill Henzler
Seriously? You don't get the fascination with Butch Davis? Have you been watching the NFL for the past 10 years? Butch's players had major roles on Sunday's and a few are still there.That NC team he assembled has to be one of the best if not the best college football team ever assembled. He's the same age as Saban. You really seem as biased against Butch as much as the way many of us are biased for him. The difference is we have his body of work as our evidence, you are just biased because of a hiring mistake he made many years ago. I just can't believe that we have a guy dying to get back here who has shown what he can do and so many are just dismissing him as a possibility. Just shaking my head as much as I have been watching Golden for the last 5 years. Maybe Vinny and Vilma will talk some football sense into these people.
Like · Reply · 3 hrs
George Garcia
Cote's wrong. There is nothing special about Mario Cristobal. He had modest success at an irrelevant school in a joke of a conference. And lets not forget that towards the end of his reign at FIU, he was losing more than he was winning. Cristobal is not D1 head coaching material.
The emphasis on recruiting South Florida is a bit overrated. Golden did a fantastic job recruiting South Florida. Over the past 4 years, the roster has been chock full of South Florida talent, and that has gotten us nowhere. Any coach that has credibility will be able to keep plenty of South Florida kids at home. Another thing that has become apparent to me is that South Florida turns out athletic skill players. Tons of them. South Florida kids aren't maulers. They're not in the trenches kids. They used to be, but not anyomore. Coaches in South Florida high schools know they can win with spreed, not brawn. A good recruiter has to be able to look outside of South Florida to bring in kids who are used to be smashing heads.
They need to bring in a high profile coordinator with big success at a big time D1 school. A young, hungry and smart coach who has been a stud at a big time conference. You'll have to pay him a lot of money, and he might not stay more than 4 or 5 years, but by the time he takes his jump to the NFL, he's built the program back up to a power, and you only need to keep it humming from then on.
My choice? Brent Venebales. The D Coordinator at Clemson. A no brainer superstar. Check out his resume and you'll see a man who has succeeded at the highest of levels and is in his prime. A guy like Venebales reminds me of Jimmy Johnson. Intense. A coordinator who was succesful at a big time school in a big time conference. Hungry. At an age he's in his prime. Every last name we've been reading would be a mistake. Another coach from an unkown football school that has had a couple years of success like the dude from Memphis? No thank you. A 64 year old Butch who hasn't coached in years? No. A coach recently fired from their jobs like Richt or Strong? No way. A coach who has spent most of his career as an assistant in the Pros dealing with mature men like Shula and Chudzinski? A tricky transition. None of the names suggested will get the job, and god help us if they do. Hire a guy like Venebales (I'm sure there are 2 or 3 just like him out there) and this program will be turned around in 2 or 3 years.
Like · Reply · 1 hr
Dave Solove · Works at Trivia host and DJ
Cote, you are delusional as you ruminate on a "who's who" of candidates.
UM IS a dumpster fire that is clearly very low in the pecking order of "desirable jobs". "Home Field" is 30 miles from campus and generally half full unless UM is playing FSU, UF or Notre Dame. And then it is half full of fans of FSU, UF or Notre Dame.
People like you are living in the past, 20 years ago when "The U" was relevant.
It isn't anymore.
Like · Reply · 1 hr
Greg Cote: UM search committee must find great recruiter who will keep talent home | Miami Herald
_______________________________________
Greg Cote is taking no prisoners in wanting Mario Cristobal as the next Head Coach for UM; he's going after Warren Sapp, banner flyers wanting to Make Miami Great Again, former UM players since they only played "a couple of years" 20 old years ago that won't make smarter than anyone else in knowing what a coach should be or just should be insofar as giving inputs.
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