Link: The Mess Jimbo Left: Inside FSU's Fall and Willie Taggart's Plan to Rise Again

DawgAlum2054

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When FSU hired Taggart he had a head coaching record of 47-50.... I do not see how this was a good hire regardless of what occurred in the Fisher and Bowden era. Taggart did a good job of helping to rebuild USF, but I still don't see how hiring a coach with a losing record in 97 games coached is a good move

Taggart MIGHT get FSU to a 9 win team by his 4th or 5th season, but with the way they have been recruiting at OL, DL, and QB... it's not going to happen
 

bamamc1

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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.
Take a look at the rankings of the recruiting classes that were on that 2017 team. All Top 5. Jumbo Fisher is way OVERRATED.
 

FairlyAmazing

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For all the good he accomplished at FSU, the ridiculous situation created by Bobby Bowden wanting to hang on longer than Joe Paterno really laid the groundwork for the demise.

I've never "seen it" with Jimbo. ESPN keeps telling everyone how great he is, but I'm of a different opinion.


That 10 year contract thrown by Texas A&M is quite a gamble, to say the least.
 

4Q Basket Case

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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.
After some more research, I stand by the tanking characterization.

Fisher's success can be better characterized as a function of Jameis Winston. In the three year post-Winston era, the 'Noles first showed some signs of cracking, then they got worse, then the bottom fell out. That's tanking.

Jameis' last season was 2014. In 2015, the Noles lost three games, two of which were in the ACC (one to eventual NC Clemson...no shame there), and one of which was to an unranked team. But that doesn't tell the whole story. There were also close calls to Boston College, Wake Forest and Miami, all unranked teams. The Noles won all three, but the wheels were clearly beginning to squeak. Scored only 14 points at BC. Won by 8 at Wake as an 18 point favorite (2 WF turnovers were killer there). As an 8.5 point favorite, had to come from behind at home to win in the 4th quarter against a Miami team that ended the season 8-5.

Taken individually, each of those can be explained away. Taken collectively, it's clear that there were cracks.

2016

More erosion, with three ACC losses.

Lost by 43 to #10 Louisville and Lamar Jackson. It's not the loss so much as being blown out 63-20. And a look at the stats will tell you the game wasn't even that close. FSU was down 63-10 before scoring 10 points in the last five minutes -- including an embarrassing FG inside of 2 minutes while down 63-17.

Lost to unranked UNC at home. Lost to Clemson -- again, no shame there.

The best win looked like at #10 Miami....until Miami followed up with three straight subsequent losses to unranked teams.

They beat Michigan in the Orange Bowl, which created the expectations for the 2017 season (cue ominous music).

2017

The wheels had been squeaking. This is where they fell off.

First game: A loss to Alabama that wasn't as close as the score. FSU never could generate any offense, and a porous OL was getting Francois pounded all night. Sitting in a low row, I actually had a decent feel for the beating he was taking, and it was brutal. Why Fisher left him in the game after it was no longer in doubt is beyond me. He was already beat to a pulp when his knee (and FSU's season) finally blew out.

Follow that up with five more losses and an embarrassing argument over whether an FCS game could count toward bowl eligibility (the NCAA said it could). Giving incontrovertible evidence that his mind had been elsewhere, Fisher de-camped for aTm before the regular season was even over -- an assistant coached the final regular-season game against La Monroe, as well as the bowl.

And all the more damning is the combination of material he had to work with and the overall weakness of the ACC (outside of Clemson, of course).

24/7 Ranking of FSU's recruiting classes leading up to Fisher's exit:

2017 #6
2016 #3
2015 #3
2014 #4
2013 #11

That performance, in that conference, with that material, is dismantling a program.
 
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selmaborntidefan

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When FSU hired Taggart he had a head coaching record of 47-50.... I do not see how this was a good hire regardless of what occurred in the Fisher and Bowden era. Taggart did a good job of helping to rebuild USF, but I still don't see how hiring a coach with a losing record in 97 games coached is a good move

Taggart MIGHT get FSU to a 9 win team by his 4th or 5th season, but with the way they have been recruiting at OL, DL, and QB... it's not going to happen
If you include Gene Stallings's NFL tenure, he was 50-89 when Alabama hired him.

If you go only off college head coaching, he was 27-45, substantially worse than Taggart.


I don't disagree with your assessment, I just think the details are all wrong.


A lot of folks don't seem to realize that success at a Boise St or USF does NOT transfer into "this coach can win big." Sometimes (Tressel) it does - sometimes it does not.
 

FairlyAmazing

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LOTS of crap going on in Fisher's world.

His wife was screwing Taylor Jacobs, a former Florida receiver.

Bunch of drama with that.

Covered up police incident reports, etc., etc., etc.,.................
 

81usaf92

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Take a look at the rankings of the recruiting classes that were on that 2017 team. All Top 5. Jumbo Fisher is way OVERRATED.
You must also think this:

"Take a look at all of the future hall of famers on the 2008 New England Patriots team that didn't make the playoffs due to Tom Brady being injured in the first game... Bill Belichick is way OVERRATED."
 

rgw

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I agree. I never quite understood the love affair with Jimbo, take away J. Winston and what's left is just another 8-4 ACC program.
I disagree. He immediately pulled FSU out the ditch Bowden's leadership malaise.

Bowden's last three seasons: 7-6, 9-4, 7-6.

Fisher's FSU tenure: 10-4 (ACCCG appearance), 9-4, 12-2 (ACC title), 14-0 (ACC and BCS title), 13-1 (ACC Title, CFP semis appearance), 10-3, 10-3, 7-6.

They only lost more than 3 games twice his entire tenure and one of them was when they lost their starting QB in the first game and the wheels fell off as he decided to scoot out the door to College Station. I think his problem at FSU was less about player discipline - that program has never been great on that front yet still competed at a high level - but instead his constant battle with the administration to get more capital improvement funding and higher pay for his staff and himself. Eventually this fractured relationship at the administrative level became a problem at the team level because his commitment to "the guys" started to be questioned in the locker room. FSU is basically just telling on themselves here and unfortunately got backed into hiring a guy who will spend most of his time trying to scrub a half-century of bad culture before getting canned. FSU has a bad reputation for investing in their program because much like Spurrier I don't think Bowden really thought that stuff was necessary considering they're in Florida and you aren't that far from the beach.
 
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selmaborntidefan

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Quite frankly, I learned how insanely stupid Jimbo Fisher is when he called those timeouts in the final seconds of a "we have no prayer at winning this game" in BDS last fall.

It would have served him right for 3 of his best players to get carted off with season-ending injuries after that - and no, I'm not "wishing" that on any human being.

But football is a game that does awful things to the human body, and you don't run unnecessary snaps for precisely that reason.

If they had been 14 points down, I'd have still thought it kinda lame but at least in the grander scheme it would have made sense.

He was 22 down and there was literally chance of winning.


He was almost like the Bizarro Les Miles.
 

RTR91

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Quite frankly, I learned how insanely stupid Jimbo Fisher is when he called those timeouts in the final seconds of a "we have no prayer at winning this game" in BDS last fall.

It would have served him right for 3 of his best players to get carted off with season-ending injuries after that - and no, I'm not "wishing" that on any human being.

But football is a game that does awful things to the human body, and you don't run unnecessary snaps for precisely that reason.

If they had been 14 points down, I'd have still thought it kinda lame but at least in the grander scheme it would have made sense.

He was 22 down and there was literally chance of winning.


He was almost like the Bizarro Les Miles.
I put that more on his ego than stupidity. Sometimes it is difficult to tell the difference between the two, though.
 

selmaborntidefan

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I put that more on his ego than stupidity. Sometimes it is difficult to tell the difference between the two, though.
I am a cucumber cool person for real, even when I'm caught up in the stadium rush.


But I went on a Billy Martin level tirade on that one, screaming words I don't normally use.
Maybe it was just the sudden weather changes plus the game plus whatever, but that REALLY set me off.


And then after the game, his answer to that very question was Flat Earth level stupid.
 

bamamc1

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You must also think this:

"Take a look at all of the future hall of famers on the 2008 New England Patriots team that didn't make the playoffs due to Tom Brady being injured in the first game... Bill Belichick is way OVERRATED."
Patriots were 11-5 Jimbo 7-6. Left the program in horrible academic shape as well (almost postseason ban for academic progress). Good luck aTm.
 

81usaf92

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Patriots were 11-5 Jimbo 7-6. Left the program in horrible academic shape as well (almost postseason ban for academic progress). Good luck aTm.
Yeah and probably the greatest teams ever assembled still missed the playoffs because their quarterback went out in the first quarter. But you missed the point. The point is FSU would’ve most likely been a 10 win team with Francois instead of 7-6. Losing a qb can change a great season to a mediocre or crap season.
 

The Ols

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So what was his answer to the question after the game? (...and I love "FLAT EARTH LEVEL STUPID...stealing that!!!)
I am a cucumber cool person for real, even when I'm caught up in the stadium rush.


But I went on a Billy Martin level tirade on that one, screaming words I don't normally use.
Maybe it was just the sudden weather changes plus the game plus whatever, but that REALLY set me off.


And then after the game, his answer to that very question was Flat Earth level stupid.
 

selmaborntidefan

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So what was his answer to the question after the game? (...and I love "FLAT EARTH LEVEL STUPID...stealing that!!!)
He got asked why he called timeouts with seconds left in the game. Here's Jimbo answering why he did it:

“Trying to score points. The game isn’t over. You play the next play. Why would you not? If you can score points, you play. So you tell your kids to go play every play hard, give everything you got, and you’d let the clock run out? That ain’t what competitors do. That ain’t what Texas A&M’s gonna do. Texas A&M’s gonna play until the horn blows! That’s the way you teach it, that’s the way you coach it, that’s the way you are. Don’t talk intangibles and then not live it.”


But let me just point out why this is a bigger pile of crap than the dung pit in Hell.

1) When he was down by 22 points with 7:36 remaining, Fisher did not attempt an onsides kick.

That would be bad enough but then...

2) he didn't bother to call timeout on Alabama's next drive......but he had THREE of them.

3) when Hurts fumbled and Najee recovered with 3:53 left, he didn't call timeout even though he had three. It was fourth and 14 and everyone on planet earth knew we were punting. He got the ball back with 3:05 left, meaning he burned 48 seconds. Forty-eight seconds is a lifetime in a college football game with the clock stop at the first down marker.

But Fisher, who tells us he was so damned gung-ho to fight to the final whistle packs it in with less than four minutes to go.....but it gets better.

4) When ATM got the ball back, Numb Nutz pulled his starting quarterback and sent in the backup.

Mr fight to the finish, never give up, put in the player who presumably wasn't as good. And I'm sure this didn't have a damned thing to do with his FSU quarterback getting hurt in the fourth quarter against Alabama in the 2017 opener.


Up to this point, every single thing Fisher did was reasonable and defensible IF you figure, "Hey, he's playing it safe, he's using it to evaluate his second stringer and keep his stud healthy." Except....

5) His backup QB was throwing MOSTLY to......backup receivers.

But even then, he didn't call the FIRST time out until there were THIRTEEN SECONDS left in the damn game. What made this even more ridiculous is that there were 20 seconds left when the receiver got tackled for the first down. ATM was so gung ho, they let the ball get set and ran seven seconds off the clock and THEN Fisher calls his first timeout with 13 seconds left.

He calls a short out...NOT a pass in the end zone...complete, and he calls TO with ONE second left.


So a guy pulls his starting QB, throws mostly to his NOT stud receivers (or backups), lets the clock run.......and pours out a bull snot excuse like the one above.


I'd have had more respect if he'd have said, "I was just being a jerk." It would have the virtue of accuracy.
 

teamplayer

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Heard about this on the radio this morning. Very interesting. Announcers and the link above, said Jimbo's failure to reign in Crab Legs was a major factor in the programs decline. Disgusting.
Yeah, I can't see Bimjo in any other way. It was the same with AU and Cam and FSU and Winston. They knew what was going on and just sold their souls to grab a title. Bimjo will always be slimy to me, but, hey, it worked for him because he got paid major bucks by A&M. His reward is just another of the type of thing that causes me to like college football a little bit less each and every year. Obviously, I have loved college football for a long time, but the things that make me love it seem to be shrinking while the things that make me not like it as much seem to be growing.
 

Al A Bama

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Jameis W. would probably be a much better QB now, IF he had had a Head Coach who DISCIPLINED him for Crab Legs and everything that he got away with. Coach Bryant would have been perfect for him.

Yep, I was watching that game where he had been suspended and showed up anyway. Coach Jimbo was a WIMP in dealing with that situation. Jameis had the TALENT, but he LACKED SELF-DISCIPLINE and needed a head coach who was not afraid to DISCIPLINE him.

I enjoyed reading the article that RTR91 posted.

Now, is Texas A & M a CHANCE for Jimbo to RESTORE his name and CREDIBILITY as a head coach? I guess we will see. To do what he did at FSU and get the kind of $$$$$$$$$$$ he's getting at TA&M, wow. Will Jimbo be the Next Fran at TA&M or will he get it together. Hopefully, he learned some lessons in dealing with SUPER Athletes. With all that said, Texas A & M is looking better. I'm sure that LSU vs A&M game last year COULD be the TURNING POINT for them. That was a hell-of-a game to win.

Well, one other COMMENT. University of Texas head coach stated this week at the B12-2 that he'd like to see UT vs TA&M restore that rivalry. I hope it NEVER happens that they meet again UNLESS they are both in the NCAA Championship Playoffs. Give UT at least 100 years to lose some of their ARROGANCE.
 
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DawgByte

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I think it goes back farther than Fisher, to Bowden and the whole "coach in waiting" fiasco. IIRC, Fisher was impatient and repeatedly attempted to undermine a senile Bowden. Then he recruits Winston who was a locker room cancer from day 1. As for FSU returning to its glory years I am not so sure. Look how long Miami has been a footnote in college football. The rise of USF, UCF, Florida (under Mullen) and possibly Miami (under Diaz) is going to make it tough to get the best recruits out of Florida. As for Taggart, he hasn't been anywhere long enough to see if can rebuild and sustain a broken program. We dodged a bullet when Winston signed on with FSU.
I haven't read all the responses, but the assessment above seems like it hits the mark.

I also question Taggert's ability to turn this program around. I remember a quote from a kid we were recruiting who had poignant criticisms about the way Taggert was running things at FSU. Most notably, he didn't feel that either the staff or players had a championship mentality - they were too casual.
 

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