Link: The Mess Jimbo Left: Inside FSU's Fall and Willie Taggart's Plan to Rise Again
- Thread starter RTR91
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It's still an excuse.
Gene Chizik inherited a 5-7 football team playing in a MUCH tougher conference than Taggart is - and won a national title his second year there.
Butch Davis inherited a probation-riddled train wreck at Miami. They went 9-3 his second year and beat two ranked teams.
Pat Dye inherited a 5-6 probation-riddled mess at Auburn in 1980 and had them in a toe-to-toe slugfest with #1 Georgia his second year and a title contender his third.
Bob Stoops inherited a train wreck that had been in the doldrums most of a decade - and won a national title his second year.
Brian Kelly inherited an absolute disaster of a program that had spent most of the previous decade-plus wandering in the wilderness - and had them in the title game in three years.
Tom Herman inherited a terrible situation and in his second year played for the Big 12 title and beat one of the nation's five best teams in the Sugar Bowl. (Yeah, we can say Georgia didn't want to be there, but Texas still had to win the game).
Terry Bowden inherited a mess at Auburn, too - and won his first twenty games.
Dan Mullen inherited a complete disaster at Miss St (29-65 from 2001-2008, with ONE winning season) and was 9-4 his second year and massacred a Michigan team on whom most of his own players would be second-string.
Taggart inherited a program that in the eight years before he got hired went 83-23 and won a national title.
NONE of these other coaches inherited that good a situation.
So I don't want to hear it.
Maybe Willie can find a generational talent at QB like Chizik did. It's a stretch to include Chizik when the circumstances there were anything but normal.
Can't help but notice most of your list is second year. Not saying Taggart is going to win a title this year, but it is his second year.
Exactly.
Kirby Smart, too.
And while I know the whole Chizik thing (he's an exception)......the FACT is, they still won those games and the SEC was a meat grinder more so then than now.
I skipped Saban and Bryant, too, but those are hardly fair.
But if you're a GOOD coach......well, we will find out this year. I'm a firm believer in that.
We can add Kirby Smart, but he DID inherit a substantially better situation, too.
Nah.
Steve Spurrier quit on his team (South Carolina). Bobby Petrino quit on the Atlanta Falcons. Fisher may have left before he said he would, but he at least finished the season.
Fisher was actually forced out by FSU because of something that he said or did say on one of his talk shows the week before the Florida game if memory serves me correctly. I think they knew they burned a bridge by not upgrading after years of him begging and knew aTm was calling with oil money so they tried to save face by forcing a bogus ultimatum.
I think his point was that all of them inherited bigger messes but didn’t cry about the messes they had to clean up.
Yeah... He didn't quit like the guys 08 listed, but he quit in every other sense of the word. IIRC, FSU reporters said he had quit recruiting midseason.
I don't know all the details, but I know these. One of my co-workers is a cousin of one of the assistants on FSU.
She knew in October that Jimbo was leaving because the guy told her so.
TIFWIW.
I'm almost certain that this piece is one of those where insiders have fed the journalist a story so it can get out in front of what will very likely be a mediocre 2019 season. Could be that they just want to drag Jimbo's name through the mud too. Either way, the difference between Shula stepping in for Fran via Price and Saban stepping in for Shula is illuminating.
In those early days of Shula a lot of yarn was spun about the disadvantages facing Shula due to the NCAA sanctions and Franchoine's bad roster management. Nobody was too concerned with the difficulties facing Saban in 2007. The discussion was almost immediately about how soon the championship would come not if it would come at all. (My guess was that it would take 4-5 years and 2010 would be our first real contender LOL).
The fact this is the mindset around Tallahassee should bring joy to Clemson lurkers or anyone else with FSU on the schedule over the next 3-5 years.
In those early days of Shula a lot of yarn was spun about the disadvantages facing Shula due to the NCAA sanctions and Franchoine's bad roster management. Nobody was too concerned with the difficulties facing Saban in 2007. The discussion was almost immediately about how soon the championship would come not if it would come at all. (My guess was that it would take 4-5 years and 2010 would be our first real contender LOL).
The fact this is the mindset around Tallahassee should bring joy to Clemson lurkers or anyone else with FSU on the schedule over the next 3-5 years.
Men and rats both leave a sinking ship. The next few years will determine whether the rat is FSU or Fisher. I'm guessing the rotting hulk in Tallahassee had Jimbo thinking of bailing out well before he did. BTW I'm no fan of FSU, Jimbo nor his predecessor. This doesn't mean that Jimbo isn't the rat, just smart to leave a rotten ship that's sinking for the next crui$e line.
FSU screwed up when they let CBB stay around about 5 yrs too long. That and all the issues they let slip under the rug well before CJF took over. That place has been a toxic cesspool for decades.
Jimbo tried and tried to get FSU to beef up the facillities and the powers that be turned a deaf ear. When your boss won't support you sometimes it's just better to find a boss who will. The Powers That Be at FSU are every bit as disfunctional if not more so than the PTB at the barn.
Maybe CJF could have kept recruiting that season, but why would you if the PTB are not gonna give you the tools to recruit and battle with the Alabamas and Clemsons of the world?
CJF may not be a world beater of a coach but he's not getting support at one place I don't blame him for going elsewhere.
Jimbo tried and tried to get FSU to beef up the facillities and the powers that be turned a deaf ear. When your boss won't support you sometimes it's just better to find a boss who will. The Powers That Be at FSU are every bit as disfunctional if not more so than the PTB at the barn.
Maybe CJF could have kept recruiting that season, but why would you if the PTB are not gonna give you the tools to recruit and battle with the Alabamas and Clemsons of the world?
CJF may not be a world beater of a coach but he's not getting support at one place I don't blame him for going elsewhere.
I agree that Bowden should have been eased out at least 5 years before he was forced out. The whole coach-in-waiting did not work out at Texas or FSU, it is a dangerous precedent. Bowden was never a disciplinarian and as he got older it got worse thankfully he did not get the Alabama job. Fisher was a good OC and QB coach who, IMO was overrated throughout his career, but because he was a valued Saban assistant at LSU he became a hot name. I do think he is a very good coach, great recruiter, and good offensive coach and with the resources at TAMU his future is set provided he can win.
As for Taggart, he hasn't been anywhere long enough to determine his coaching abilities. If I were a wagering person I would bet he is a 9-3 maybe 10-2 coach at best. Time will tell all.
As for Taggart, he hasn't been anywhere long enough to determine his coaching abilities. If I were a wagering person I would bet he is a 9-3 maybe 10-2 coach at best. Time will tell all.
The campuses are on hills separated by a small valley and a series of train tracks. FAMU offers a rich social and cultural life for FSU athletes, much like Tuskegee gives Auburn’s African American players a reprieve from one of the whitest public universities in the South.
So many things.....
FSU did mess up when they kept Bowden around several years too many. He was never a stickler for discipline, and it got worse as he aged.
Fisher, however, took it to an entirely different level with his coddling of Jameis. True, he won a NC. But he tanked the program for several years afterward....I wonder how many FSU fans would make that one-year bargain if they knew what lay in store for years afterward.
In the leadup to the 2017 kickoff, the consensus of the talking heads was a foregone conclusion that, after the season opener in Atlanta, UA and FSU would match up again for it all in Tampa. It didn't work out that way, and a lot of pundits depend on the attention span of their constituency to absolve them of their comments during that summer. Put another way, in about 20 months, FSU went from co-favorite for the NC to a clown car circling a dumpster fire, which dumpster fire was caused by a nearby train wreck.
Point being, the current situation was foreseen by just about nobody. So the 20 / 20 hindsight we hear them braying today is most disingenuous.
Here's the bottom line as I see it: Jimbo Fisher is a good technical coach. He might be a great offensive coach / developer of quarterbacks. He is, however, not the best evaluator of potential, and is penny wise and pound foolish on any number of fronts. Those shortcomings will prevent him from winning anything worthwhile....absent a generational player, most probably a QB.
He jumped from the FSU governance (that could charitably be described as inconsistent) to one at least as dysfunctional as what we see today in Lee County. So I don't see anything allowing him to implement lessons learned from previous shortcomings -- assuming he learned any at all. On the contrary, I see an aTm governance structure that emphasizes the very characteristics in which he has shown himself to be deficient in the past.
So yes, this piece reads like a simultaneous apology for Willie Taggart's own shortcomings, and throwing his predecessor (Fisher) under the bus.
An excellent job by the Taggart / FSU PR machine. We'll know what's what by mid-October...at both aTm and FSU...and there'll be no way to spin it.
FSU did mess up when they kept Bowden around several years too many. He was never a stickler for discipline, and it got worse as he aged.
Fisher, however, took it to an entirely different level with his coddling of Jameis. True, he won a NC. But he tanked the program for several years afterward....I wonder how many FSU fans would make that one-year bargain if they knew what lay in store for years afterward.
In the leadup to the 2017 kickoff, the consensus of the talking heads was a foregone conclusion that, after the season opener in Atlanta, UA and FSU would match up again for it all in Tampa. It didn't work out that way, and a lot of pundits depend on the attention span of their constituency to absolve them of their comments during that summer. Put another way, in about 20 months, FSU went from co-favorite for the NC to a clown car circling a dumpster fire, which dumpster fire was caused by a nearby train wreck.
Point being, the current situation was foreseen by just about nobody. So the 20 / 20 hindsight we hear them braying today is most disingenuous.
Here's the bottom line as I see it: Jimbo Fisher is a good technical coach. He might be a great offensive coach / developer of quarterbacks. He is, however, not the best evaluator of potential, and is penny wise and pound foolish on any number of fronts. Those shortcomings will prevent him from winning anything worthwhile....absent a generational player, most probably a QB.
He jumped from the FSU governance (that could charitably be described as inconsistent) to one at least as dysfunctional as what we see today in Lee County. So I don't see anything allowing him to implement lessons learned from previous shortcomings -- assuming he learned any at all. On the contrary, I see an aTm governance structure that emphasizes the very characteristics in which he has shown himself to be deficient in the past.
So yes, this piece reads like a simultaneous apology for Willie Taggart's own shortcomings, and throwing his predecessor (Fisher) under the bus.
An excellent job by the Taggart / FSU PR machine. We'll know what's what by mid-October...at both aTm and FSU...and there'll be no way to spin it.
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How did Jimbo tank the program after the NC?
He went to 1 playoff, 2 New Years 6 games during the reign of Deshaun, and probably was in a far better situation in 2017 had Francois not gone down. I think it’s fair to he might’ve let his divorce get the best of him from 2015-2017, but let’s stop acting like his 5-6 2017 season is in anyway the same as Taggart’s 5-7. Jimbo at least can make the argument that he only got blown out once while his quarterback was out for the year and beat Florida on the road. Taggart was in a dogfight with Samford, got blown 5/6 losses, and lost to Florida with a team full of preseason awards watch list players.
I don’t see how exactly any of 2018 was Jimbo’s fault unless you make the case that there was a can’t miss recruit from the 2018 class that could’ve had an immediate impact that Jimbo missed, but then again “why couldn’t Taggart got him back to Tallahassee?”
FSU is on shaky legs because they believed Jimbo was going to be like Bobby and Mike Martin in that they stay for life and don’t make financial demands. They were wrong. Then they hire Willie because they know he won’t make those demands either. The only problem is they know the natives realize Taggart isn’t going to win a championship and probably won’t get them to 10 wins within 4 years, and they have to find a way to divert attention elsewhere before they see for sale signs in lawns.
He went to 1 playoff, 2 New Years 6 games during the reign of Deshaun, and probably was in a far better situation in 2017 had Francois not gone down. I think it’s fair to he might’ve let his divorce get the best of him from 2015-2017, but let’s stop acting like his 5-6 2017 season is in anyway the same as Taggart’s 5-7. Jimbo at least can make the argument that he only got blown out once while his quarterback was out for the year and beat Florida on the road. Taggart was in a dogfight with Samford, got blown 5/6 losses, and lost to Florida with a team full of preseason awards watch list players.
I don’t see how exactly any of 2018 was Jimbo’s fault unless you make the case that there was a can’t miss recruit from the 2018 class that could’ve had an immediate impact that Jimbo missed, but then again “why couldn’t Taggart got him back to Tallahassee?”
FSU is on shaky legs because they believed Jimbo was going to be like Bobby and Mike Martin in that they stay for life and don’t make financial demands. They were wrong. Then they hire Willie because they know he won’t make those demands either. The only problem is they know the natives realize Taggart isn’t going to win a championship and probably won’t get them to 10 wins within 4 years, and they have to find a way to divert attention elsewhere before they see for sale signs in lawns.
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