What would be your top 5 Realistic HC Wishlist for Miami?

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Here’s what we should be hiring for:
- leadership and accountability
- evaluation and recruiting (selling) skills, and commitment
- ability to build a staff
- high expectations/ambition

Out of people who meet those criteria, we should screen for offensive and defensive philosophy (scheme and style), to ensure fit with our program’s assets (local talent and culture).

I personally wouldn’t hire a fancy coordinator. Too much risk on the critical traits, and not needed because the right HC will get the right staff hired and system implemented. The job of the HC isn’t offensive scheming. It’s running a program. Talent eval, roster management, recruiting, retention of key players, position selection/changes, staff composition, S&C, development, scheme, game planning, play calling, motivation, nutrition, alumni relations, media relations, etc.

If you score our past HCs, you can see they all failed the basic criteria.

Coker wasn’t a leader, and didn’t hold his staff accountable, was terrible as a recruiter / evaluator (recruited off lists), allowed our S&C to decline dramatically, and allowed a culture of low expectations to set in.

Shannon wasn’t a leader, and didn’t build a good staff, maintained no discipline on S&C, and was mediocre and reluctant as a recruiter / evaluator.

Golden was a snake-oil salesman, didn’t hold his butt buddy accountable, was not a good recruiter or evaluator, got his schemes totally wrong for our program, and continued a mediocre S&C program. He was all spin and deflection, and had no expectation of real success.

Richt built a mediocre staff, and obviously had no accountability given his son’s performance and our offense’s performance generally. He hired a terrible S&C guy and didn’t fix it. He was a very lazy roster manager and mediocre evaluator. And he was clearly content with ‘okay’ results. He came to UM to retire, not compete.

Diaz, not a leader, lots of talk, no accountability, mediocre staff at best, not a good recruiter / evaluator.
 
Here’s what we should be hiring for:
- leadership and accountability
- evaluation and recruiting (selling) skills, and commitment
- ability to build a staff
- high expectations/ambition

Out of people who meet those criteria, we should screen for offensive and defensive philosophy (scheme and style), to ensure fit with our program’s assets (local talent and culture).

I personally wouldn’t hire a fancy coordinator. Too much risk on the critical traits, and not needed because the right HC will get the right staff hired and system implemented. The job of the HC isn’t offensive scheming. It’s running a program. Talent eval, roster management, recruiting, retention of key players, position selection/changes, staff composition, S&C, development, scheme, game planning, play calling, motivation, nutrition, alumni relations, media relations, etc.

If you score our past HCs, you can see they all failed the basic criteria.

Coker wasn’t a leader, and didn’t hold his staff accountable, was terrible as a recruiter / evaluator (recruited off lists), allowed our S&C to decline dramatically, and allowed a culture of low expectations to set in.

Shannon wasn’t a leader, and didn’t build a good staff, maintained no discipline on S&C, and was mediocre and reluctant as a recruiter / evaluator.

Golden was a snake-oil salesman, didn’t hold his butt buddy accountable, was not a good recruiter or evaluator, got his schemes totally wrong for our program, and continued a mediocre S&C program. He was all spin and deflection, and had no expectation of real success.

Richt built a mediocre staff, and obviously had no accountability given his son’s performance and our offense’s performance generally. He hired a terrible S&C guy and didn’t fix it. He was a very lazy roster manager and mediocre evaluator. And he was clearly content with ‘okay’ results. He came to UM to retire, not compete.

Diaz, not a leader, lots of talk, no accountability, mediocre staff at best, not a good recruiter / evaluator.
How is Diaz not a great recruiter.. if you include Walker he would have the 10th best recruiting class after going 6-7 his first year. He also hired one of the top 3 best OCs available and convinced him to come here over Washington and Oregon and other power 5 jobs. He then was smart and let Lashlee pick his guys for his offensive staff and we came away with Rob Likens who was just a OC at Arizona State and is probably the best WR coach we have had in years. Garin Justice also looks to be a solid hire so far. The only questionable thing he's done is retain Patke and Rumph. Baker should end up being a solid DC. His first season here he put together a top 20 defense without much help from the Offense. He's not a good recruiter but his players do seem to like him.
 
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How is Diaz not a great recruiter.. if you include Walker he would have the 10th best recruiting class after going 6-7 his first year. He also hired one of the top 3 best OCs available and convinced him to come here over Washington and Oregon and other power 5 jobs. He then was smart and let Lashlee pick his guys for his offensive staff and we came away with Rob Likens who was just a OC at Arizona State and is probably the best WR coach we have had in years. Garin Justice also looks to be a solid hire so far. The only questionable thing he's done is retain Patke and Rumph. Baker should end up being a solid DC. His first season here he put together a top 20 defense without much help from the Offense. He's not a good recruiter but his players do seem to like him.
You and I live in different universes it seems.

Manny has never been a good recruiter, or even cared much about it. He didn’t as DC under Richt, that‘s for sure. As for ‘including Walker,’ sorry but we lost his recruitment. He’s a transfer. Nice to get him but not a recruiting win. And I don’t give a rats **** about ratings. Coker’s ‘04 was a top 3 class. It was our worst class in decades. And if you lived through that era, you’d know it wasn’t particularly good recruiting, though Coker had a lot more to sell than our coaches today have. It was list recruiting and targeting too many kids local powers didn’t want. James Bryant, Rhyan Anderson, Andrew Johnson, D. Hendricks, Leggett, Heard were all 4* (or in Leggett’s case, 5*) kids from elsewhere who we got In part because others evaluated them better.

As for Lashlee, I’m optimistic, but this time last year two-thirds of this board crowned Manny for stealing Enos from Saban. So forgive me if I don’t give out a genius trophy to Manny before he has a winning season as a head coach. On the defensive side, Manny’s shown loyalty and not wanting to hire anyone who challenges him, imo. Not great signs.
 
You and I live in different universes it seems.

Manny has never been a good recruiter, or even cared much about it. He didn’t as DC under Richt, that‘s for sure. As for ‘including Walker,’ sorry but we lost his recruitment. He’s a transfer. Nice to get him but not a recruiting win. And I don’t give a rats **** about ratings. Coker’s ‘04 was a top 3 class. It was our worst class in decades. And if you lived through that era, you’d know it wasn’t particularly good recruiting, though Coker had a lot more to sell than our coaches today have. It was list recruiting and targeting too many kids local powers didn’t want. James Bryant, Rhyan Anderson, Andrew Johnson, D. Hendricks, Leggett, Heard were all 4* (or in Leggett’s case, 5*) kids from elsewhere who we got In part because others evaluated them better.

As for Lashlee, I’m optimistic, but this time last year two-thirds of this board crowned Manny for stealing Enos from Saban. So forgive me if I don’t give out a genius trophy to Manny before he has a winning season as a head coach. On the defensive side, Manny’s shown loyalty and not wanting to hire anyone who challenges him, imo. Not great signs.
I disagree he's definitely a Recruiting win... Dude didn't even go to one practice at Florida. He realized he made a mistake and came back to UM. Diaz first season recruiting gave us a lot of Talent. We got two Blue Chip RBs in Knighton and Chaney. Two of the best OTs in Florida with Walker and Rivers. We also landed the best Safety in the country in Avante Williams and added a blue chip DE in Chantz. He also landed Two of the top 5 best transfers in the country. Recruiting and transfers go hand and hand. So people say he's some terrible recruiter but his results show other wise. Diaz first Recruiting class at UM was easily an A+++ considering our 6-7 Season
 
You and I live in different universes it seems.

Manny has never been a good recruiter, or even cared much about it. He didn’t as DC under Richt, that‘s for sure. As for ‘including Walker,’ sorry but we lost his recruitment. He’s a transfer. Nice to get him but not a recruiting win. And I don’t give a rats **** about ratings. Coker’s ‘04 was a top 3 class. It was our worst class in decades. And if you lived through that era, you’d know it wasn’t particularly good recruiting, though Coker had a lot more to sell than our coaches today have. It was list recruiting and targeting too many kids local powers didn’t want. James Bryant, Rhyan Anderson, Andrew Johnson, D. Hendricks, Leggett, Heard were all 4* (or in Leggett’s case, 5*) kids from elsewhere who we got In part because others evaluated them better.

As for Lashlee, I’m optimistic, but this time last year two-thirds of this board crowned Manny for stealing Enos from Saban. So forgive me if I don’t give out a genius trophy to Manny before he has a winning season as a head coach. On the defensive side, Manny’s shown loyalty and not wanting to hire anyone who challenges him, imo. Not great signs.

If you compare Diazs 1st 2 recruiting classes to Dabo's 1st 2 recruiting classes, you might be surprised to learn that Diaz absolutely crushes Dabo in the recruiting rankings. You are saying the recruiting rankings and transfers are irrelevant because they dont fit your theory.

D'Eriq King was the most coveted transfer QB this year. He was down to 3 choices. Miami, LSU, Oklahoma. Had a good chance of being a starter at all 3 schools. Why did he choose Miami? Because he was highly impressed with Diaz. Dont believe me? Read it yourself.

 
If you want to disregard recruiting rankings, that's fine but then the only way to judge a recruiting class is how they perform on the field and not a single player from the 2020 class has played a snap. At worst, you would have to give Manny the head coach an INC. for recruiting grade.
 
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The UM job is such a unique position. Here you have an embarrassing amount of local talent with just about every school in America throwing bags around to get that talent out of SFLA.

We need someone who already has connections to the area. We need a proven recruiter, who has experience beating the 'bag' schools. We need someone who had already lead teams and even had success as a CEO before. And we need someone who's been around CFB long enough to be able to put together a respectable staff. It wouldn't hurt if this guy had once coached at a 'bag' school to atleast know exactly what he's up against.

As much as some of you dont want to hear it, Mario is that guy! And hes about to have 2 kids drafted in the Top 10 in consecutive years...out of Oregon! He can recruit his *** off! Pair him with Lashlee and a proven DC and WE BACK!!

We've tried the midwestern car salesmen type and the over-the-hill 'good guy'. For almost 2 decades, we've gotten exactly what we paid for. It time to pony up and get someone we KNOW can win here. The longer we wait, the more it's going to cost!
 
Programs underachieve, and college football is cyclical. Historically, Texas is an elite program. Remember the following: Ohio State went over 30+ years without a national championship, were they not elite? Alabama has had long stretches without a title. Same with Michigan, Penn State and others.

By the way, Miami has good facilities, but let's be honest: We aren't nearly at the level these factory schools are putting out. We've come a long way, but there's only so much revenue available for a program like Miami, compared to a place like Penn State, where they are literally the economic engine for an entire region.
I think there is a difference between an elite program and an elite job.

An elite program is legitimately competing for conference championships on a nearly annual basis, winning more than a few, and a regular CFP/NC contender. At the moment I’d assign the label to Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, and Oklahoma. We’ll see if Georgia and LSU can remain at a high level or will bounce up-and-down between 11 and 7 win seasons like Auburn.

An elite job is another matter. Texas is an elite job because the only reason the Longhorns have not enjoyed elite results is poor hiring choices for HC. Tom Herman may or may not end up the right hire. Charlie Strong was a disaster

Miami can be an elite job but they lack the will to compete financially.
 
I disagree he's definitely a Recruiting win... Dude didn't even go to one practice at Florida. He realized he made a mistake and came back to UM. Diaz first season recruiting gave us a lot of Talent. We got two Blue Chip RBs in Knighton and Chaney. Two of the best OTs in Florida with Walker and Rivers. We also landed the best Safety in the country in Avante Williams and added a blue chip DE in Chantz. He also landed Two of the top 5 best transfers in the country. Recruiting and transfers go hand and hand. So people say he's some terrible recruiter but his results show other wise. Diaz first Recruiting class at UM was easily an A+++ considering our 6-7 Season
You would have given coker an even higher grade in ‘04, and shannon in ‘08. Maybe eventually you’ll learn to be less emotional in your analysis.

Rivers and Chantz have been UM leans since Richt showed up. They’re truly Richt kids. He opened Jax. And Manny wasn’t recruiting offense at all. I will give it to Hickson, he delivered two really talented backs. Walker we lost his recruitment to Florida. Maybe COVID explains why he left. We’ll never know. Transfers help but I separate them from recruits. So happy to have King and Roche but not seeing them as revealing of Manny’s evals or (HS) recruiting abilities. Bottom line is Manny has a LOT to prove as a recruiter and roster manager.
 
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If you compare Diazs 1st 2 recruiting classes to Dabo's 1st 2 recruiting classes, you might be surprised to learn that Diaz absolutely crushes Dabo in the recruiting rankings. You are saying the recruiting rankings and transfers are irrelevant because they dont fit your theory.

D'Eriq King was the most coveted transfer QB this year. He was down to 3 choices. Miami, LSU, Oklahoma. Had a good chance of being a starter at all 3 schools. Why did he choose Miami? Because he was highly impressed with Diaz. Dont believe me? Read it yourself.

False. I haven’t said rankings are ‘irrelevant.‘ I said I don’t personally give a **** in the context of this discussion. I’ve followed recruiting for too long and understand what goes wrong when people get fixated on rankings. They’re a piece of data. What you do with it, that requires a bit of thought. Try it out. You can get excited by rankings but you succeed or fail off evals.

Meanwhile, your Dabo analogy is bizarre. Why not compare Diaz’s first two classes to Ron Zook’s?

And if you think King came because of Diaz, you may be smoking something. Lashlee is who made our offense attractive. Sure, kids say nice things about the Hc when interviewed. That’s just blah blah. Absent a new hero to pin your hopes on for offense, Diaz is Enos and Richt’s offenses, and we know what that looks like.
 
False. I haven’t said rankings are ‘irrelevant.‘ I said I don’t personally give a **** in the context of this discussion. I’ve followed recruiting for too long and understand what goes wrong when people get fixated on rankings. They’re a piece of data. What you do with it, that requires a bit of thought. Try it out. You can get excited by rankings but you succeed or fail off evals.

Meanwhile, your Dabo analogy is bizarre. Why not compare Diaz’s first two classes to Ron Zook’s?

And if you think King came because of Diaz, you may be smoking something. Lashlee is who made our offense attractive. Sure, kids say nice things about the Hc when interviewed. That’s just blah blah. Absent a new hero to pin your hopes on for offense, Diaz is Enos and Richt’s offenses, and we know what that looks like.

What were Zooks classes ranked? You tell me. You are the one who brought him up.

It's not bizarre at all to bring up Dabo. He was an in-house hire just like Diaz (technically Diaz was the Temple HC, but most people see it as Miami hiring its DC to be the HC). The Dabo hire was widely panned. Clemson fans thought he was wildly unqualified. The main thing he really had going for him is that he was viewed as a good recruiter. In Dabo's 1st full season he won 9 games and pulled in a class ranked in the 20s. In Diaz's first full season he won 6 games and pulled in a class ranked in the teens (and if you add in transfers, it's a top 10). To me, that's a lot more impressive.

I agree that you rise or fall of evals. Evals are a small part of Miami's problem, but a bigger problem has been player development and scheme. Case in point- Miami's defense was a sieve with D'Onofrio as DC. One of the worst in CFB. Then the very next year they made a huge jump in performance under Diaz with an attacking 4-3. What changed? It was mostly the same players (so evals were fine), but a much more effective scheme. Next year you will see a lot of the same players (Jordan, Davis, Wiggins, Harley and probably 3 or 4 of the same starting OL) but Lashlee's system is going to make them much better. Obviously King helps with that as well.

It seems you are doing all sorts of mental gymnastics to avoid giving Diaz any credit. I'm not enamored with him, but I give credit where credit is due. The head coach also has to recruit his coaching staff. Lashlee picked Miami even though he had plenty of other offers. Diaz managed to land him. And it certainly wasn't because Miami could pay more. And because Diaz got Lashlee, it helped Miami land King. That's recruiting 101. Hire guys who can recruit. If Diaz hired Trooper Taylor and Corey Raymond, then those guys started landing 5 star after 5 star, I doubt you'd say, "that doesn't prove Diaz is a good recruiter since Manny isn't personally recruiting them." Or maybe you would since you seem aggrieved by any positive thoughts about the program. Both Oklahoma (a national title contender that produces Heisman winners) and LSU (national champion) wanted King. If King didn't buy what Diaz was selling, he wasn't going to come to Miami even if Lashlee was here, especially given that he could have been the starting QB at programs that have produced Heisman winning QBs in the past 5 years. You'd have to be high to believe King would bypass those other programs and the possibility of starting the season as a Heisman favorite (yes- even with Lawrence at Clemson, King would probably put up mind boggling numbers in Oklahoma's offense and be a legit threat to win the Heisman) simply because he wanted to play for a 6 win team and had some general familiarity with Lashlee's offense.

I don't know what you mean by "Diaz is Enos and Richt's offenses" so I can't respond to that.
 
What were Zooks classes ranked? You tell me. You are the one who brought him up.

It's not bizarre at all to bring up Dabo. He was an in-house hire just like Diaz (technically Diaz was the Temple HC, but most people see it as Miami hiring its DC to be the HC). The Dabo hire was widely panned. Clemson fans thought he was wildly unqualified. The main thing he really had going for him is that he was viewed as a good recruiter. In Dabo's 1st full season he won 9 games and pulled in a class ranked in the 20s. In Diaz's first full season he won 6 games and pulled in a class ranked in the teens (and if you add in transfers, it's a top 10). To me, that's a lot more impressive.

I agree that you rise or fall of evals. Evals are a small part of Miami's problem, but a bigger problem has been player development and scheme. Case in point- Miami's defense was a sieve with D'Onofrio as DC. One of the worst in CFB. Then the very next year they made a huge jump in performance under Diaz with an attacking 4-3. What changed? It was mostly the same players (so evals were fine), but a much more effective scheme. Next year you will see a lot of the same players (Jordan, Davis, Wiggins, Harley and probably 3 or 4 of the same starting OL) but Lashlee's system is going to make them much better. Obviously King helps with that as well.

It seems you are doing all sorts of mental gymnastics to avoid giving Diaz any credit. I'm not enamored with him, but I give credit where credit is due. The head coach also has to recruit his coaching staff. Lashlee picked Miami even though he had plenty of other offers. Diaz managed to land him. And it certainly wasn't because Miami could pay more. And because Diaz got Lashlee, it helped Miami land King. That's recruiting 101. Hire guys who can recruit. If Diaz hired Trooper Taylor and Corey Raymond, then those guys started landing 5 star after 5 star, I doubt you'd say, "that doesn't prove Diaz is a good recruiter since Manny isn't personally recruiting them." Or maybe you would since you seem aggrieved by any positive thoughts about the program. Both Oklahoma (a national title contender that produces Heisman winners) and LSU (national champion) wanted King. If King didn't buy what Diaz was selling, he wasn't going to come to Miami even if Lashlee was here, especially given that he could have been the starting QB at programs that have produced Heisman winning QBs in the past 5 years. You'd have to be high to believe King would bypass those other programs and the possibility of starting the season as a Heisman favorite (yes- even with Lawrence at Clemson, King would probably put up mind boggling numbers in Oklahoma's offense and be a legit threat to win the Heisman) simply because he wanted to play for a 6 win team and had some general familiarity with Lashlee's offense.

I don't know what you mean by "Diaz is Enos and Richt's offenses" so I can't respond to that.
Sorry, I’m not going to waste more of the board’s time with a back and forth that has been discussed ad nauseum. Comparing manny to dabo is a total logical fail. It’s selective reasoning to the extreme. Why not compare him also to equally unqualified idiots who failed? Answer: because you’re engineering your narrative, not trying to make an argument.

Oh, and the one doing mental gymnastics is you. You’re hyping up a guy who just lost to FIU, Duke and LA Tech. I’d think after watching him fail as badly as possible in his first year, you’d have a bit more skepticism about his off-season hype.

I do not think Manny has shown himself to be a good evaluator or recruiter. Let’s hope he figures it all out before he fails.
 
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That's a good question, I don't know how'd he do running a whole program but as an OC he's one of the best in the business. I think he has the personality to be a good HC, but who knows...

I'd take a flyer on him though, he would without doubt open up a pipeline into Texas, he'd probably hire his younger brother Clark to Coach here which could be both good & bad, our offense would never suck in his tenure but our Defense would probably fall off.

Either way, the next HC if Diaz doesn't work out should be an offensive minded coach who has in depth experience with high octane offense & putting up points on the board.

The Defensive minded coaches we always hire always have really bad offenses out the gate because they go ultra conservative on their first OC hire because they want a guy that will play slow paced ball control offense to protect their Defense & it always backfires.

We need to hire Offensive gurus that will keep us relevant to recruits & will be appealing to high level gifted QB's.

The only Defensive minded Coaches I think would be good are the guys who are proven winners as a HC or proven developers during their time as DC's.
What do you think of Mike Yurcich as a HC?
 
I think there is a difference between an elite program and an elite job.

An elite program is legitimately competing for conference championships on a nearly annual basis, winning more than a few, and a regular CFP/NC contender. At the moment I’d assign the label to Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, and Oklahoma. We’ll see if Georgia and LSU can remain at a high level or will bounce up-and-down between 11 and 7 win seasons like Auburn.

An elite job is another matter. Texas is an elite job because the only reason the Longhorns have not enjoyed elite results is poor hiring choices for HC. Tom Herman may or may not end up the right hire. Charlie Strong was a disaster

Miami can be an elite job but they lack the will to compete financially.

There is a significant difference between will and ABILITY. Our fanbase, one of the cheapest in the country expects the school to spend themselves into bankruptcy to fund the program. Miami is earning 50-55 million dollars per year as an athletic department. Ohio State, Florida and others are clearing double that in some cases. People like Blake James have to be good at maximizing the funding available, but when one is behind the 8 ball, it magnifies every mistake. Think about this. Ed Orgeron by all intents and purposes is a mediocre head coach, albeit an outstanding recruiter. LSU has the resources to minimize his shortcomings, while maximizing the one thing he does extremely well.

Manny Diaz is a good x's and o's defensive coach, but lacks the ability to recognize good coaching talent and is a mediocre recruiter. Guess what, Miami can't just throw money around to fix those issues like LSU can. That means that when Miami has to hire a coach, one must be able to recognize up and coming talent, talent that can grow into top end guys. You can't go out and buy finished products like Texas, you sure as **** can't go out and take risks, knowing that you can easily buy your way out, like Florida with Muschamp.
 
How is Diaz not a great recruiter.. if you include Walker he would have the 10th best recruiting class after going 6-7 his first year. He also hired one of the top 3 best OCs available and convinced him to come here over Washington and Oregon and other power 5 jobs. He then was smart and let Lashlee pick his guys for his offensive staff and we came away with Rob Likens who was just a OC at Arizona State and is probably the best WR coach we have had in years. Garin Justice also looks to be a solid hire so far. The only questionable thing he's done is retain Patke and Rumph. Baker should end up being a solid DC. His first season here he put together a top 20 defense without much help from the Offense. He's not a good recruiter but his players do seem to like him.
1st you ask "How is Diaz not a Good recruiter"??....Then the last paragraph you state "He's not a Good recruiter".....are you seriously answering your original stupid question??
 
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