Great questions.
I think Texas is an extremely tough place to build a champion.
The external expectations are insane, possibly the hardest in the country, and the culture surrounding the program seems to be a lot of rich, selfish and inflated egos. The only reason Mack Brown succeeded is because he had arguably the best college QB ever and a second guy who was phenomenal in his own right. Outside of those years Texas has been the Georgia of the B12, even with all the money in the world and unilateral domination on recruiting (at that time). Brown made it harder to do the job by raising expectations while burning bridges and making recruiting the state harder. That job is cutthroat and friendless. In short, Texas ruins people.
I like Herman as a play caller and a developer. He’s a serious football mind that isn’t that far removed from being at the front of the game schematically. The only place he didn’t succeed was Texas, but I obviously don’t pin that all on him. He made Houston think it was a P5 player all by himself. The only knock on him there is how he finished his last season, but he was already heading out of town. He recruited well, developed well and got the most out of his offensive players there. D’Eriq King under Herman would be a much better player than under Lashlee.
I also think Herman coaches with a chip on his shoulder, which fits Miami like a glove. The guy loves to **** people off, and I think Texas robbed him of being the wild card. He had to conform to the mountain range of expectations. Miami is a mole hill by comparison.
The risk with him is that he isn’t hungry anymore, that Texas genuinely killed his imagination and drive. That may be the case and we would have a younger, slightly more capable Richt on our hands if so. But all of these cats have risk, no matter who they are, and while he isn’t my first choice he’s in the top 5 for sure.
