Link: The decline of Steve Spurrier

[BigTex]

The long decline of Steve Spurrier, part one - Dr. Saturday - NCAAF - Yahoo! Sports

Interesting read.

 

[4Q Basket Case]

I've posted this before, but in summary, I think Spurrier is finished as an effective head coach.

In his term at Florida, he turned the SEC upside down with an entirely different approach to the game. Nobody had ever seen this sort of thing before.

Combine that with the talent base in the state of Florida, and his good fortune to have Danny Wuerffel in his glory years and Bob Stoops as a DC, and you have the perfect storm.

But defenses slowly began to catch on. Danny Wuerffels come along only so often. Bob Stoops moved on. Spurrier's deficiencies in and distaste for recruiting any position other than QBs was unmasked.

His last years at Florida were good, but not up to his early 1990s standard. Spotty performance ensued, and they were no longer feared.

So the Ball Coach tried his luck in the pros, and was a bust on the order of Tony Mandarich. Sat out a year, and came back to a second-tier D-1 team. Looking back, you had to wonder why USC-east? Surely he could land a better gig somewhere else.

So today, he's at a school he believes is beneath him. He doesn't have the natural recruiting advantages that Florida HS football offers. Defenses have caught on. Neither Danny Wuerffel nor Bob Stoops are available. He's even having a tough time recruiting big-time QBs to USC-e.

He's actually a sad shadow of what he once was. Take him off the grill. He's done.

 

[THE BAMA IRISHMAN]

Coach Spurrier's climb to greatness could have been much greater had he not played musical Quarterbacks. He continued this practice into the NFL and now South Carolina. I want to tell him USCe does not have the talent of a Alabama or Florida. You play musical QBs at South Carolina and you forfeit the season. I was so excited when Spurrier and Rodriquez turned down the Tide. I was doing cart wheels. I wanted Coaches Nick Saban or Paul Johnson.

I got my wish.

The only reason Coach Spurrier was successful is the state of Florida is its loaded in Talent. Top 100. South Carolina has a Top 30. The shear number of recruits is mind boggling.

He would have done good things at Alabama but the climite would not be near what it is now. Coach Saban was the right choice at the right time. Thank God. :BigA:

 

[crimsonaudio]

I was so excited when Spurrier and Rodriquez turned down the Tide.

 

[Crimson Cat]

I'm somewhat of a Spurrier fan, but if Spurrier still has a passion for the game, I've often wondered why South Carolina...
If he chose it for the golf, then he's probably at the right place. If he's in it for football, he should have waited for a much better gig. I don't think he's into it like he was a UF. He had to have known recruiting to USCe would be tougher there than at UF, unless his ego led him to believe otherwise. UF had some good teams in the past prior to Spurrier but he's the guy that really put their program into relevance in the 90's, so maybe he thought he could replicate that again with USCe. I'm one who thought he'd have a little better success than what he's had there but I'm not suprised really. Recruiting is all important these days and he's lost ground to some aggressive recruiters like Meyer, Saban, Carroll, Miles and a host of other coaches who not only enjoy it but excel at it. His name alone isn't going to cut it anymore. You're going to have to be aggressive in your approach.
I've also questioned his assistant hires. He hasn't had that Stoops-type assistant coach since being there, unlike at UF. It just seems he's had left-over type coaches on his staff and not really anyone that stands out. JMO.

 

[Drewy26]

This thread makes me wonder how serious the courtship between Spurrier and Alabama was after Shula was dismissed as coach.

Any insiders care to comment?

 

[Outlaw]

Two words really capture the demise of Steve Spurrier's domination : zone blitz. As the principles of the zone blitz filtered into college ball, Spurrier's offense became less and less effective.

 

[Hal Bennett]

I remember a pre-med student in college, whom I respected very much, asking a freshman biology student, "What [grade] do you want out of this course?" Steve Spurrier might have been asked a similar question: "What do you want out of coaching college football?"

I thought when Spurrier won his national championship at Florida that he was going to challenge Bear Bryant for the honor of best coach ever. About that time, a "sound off" writer to the Birmingham News sports page claimed that Spurrier was a better coach than Bryant. Of course, someone else wrote in and said, "I'll take on one that one," and he proceeded to argue the case for Bryant.

When Spurrier left Florida, he gave up the chance to challenge Bryant's record. Could he have won five more national championships at Florida? I think it was possible. I just don't think he wanted it enough. By going to the Redskins, he exploded his chance to be mentioned in the same breath with coaches like Bryant and Wilkinson. He did exactly what Bryant did NOT do, go to the pros. If Bryant had taken the Dolphins job in about 1970, he would have left college football with (only) three national championships. When Spurrier went to Washington, he was a younger man that Bryant was in 1970.

I have lived long enough to watch two revolutions in SEC football: the "helmet-busting, hell-for-leather" style of Bryant's, described by Shug Jordan in about 1960 as "the only thing that will win now in this conference"; and the throw-the-ball-all-over-the-field-and-score-sixty-points-if-possible style of Spurrier's that changed defensive backfields forever in this league. Bryant stayed the course and died a month after he quit coaching; Spurrier gave up a goldmine while still a relatively young man.

 

[capnfrog]

WOW! And I figured USC-e to be the SEC sleeper this year. Maybe they won't give up and will at least give us a good game. SOS won't win the SECCG but if we aren't expecting a game from the Gamecocks we might be in for a long day. Same as any SEC school, go on the field thinking about how good we are and what we are going to do to them and we're setting ourselves up for a butt whipping.

 

[Pluck and Grit]

Spurrier came along with a new offense which nobody was running and defenses and their coordinators didn't know how to defend, and did so at a school where there was loads of talent. We saw the results.

By the time he left UF, his offense was no longer revolutionary, and defenses had caught up. He cannot repeat the success he had at UF unless he comes up with an equally new and inventive style of offense at an equally talent rich school.

Unlike Coach Bryant, Spurrier has been unable to adapt and change with the times. Many thought CPB's day was done around 1969 or 1970, before he dispelled all doubt about his greatness. If Spurrier were going to pull off something like that, I think he'd have done it already.

 

[mlh]

In his term at Florida, he turned the SEC upside down with an entirely different approach to the game. Nobody had ever seen this sort of thing before.

Combine that with the talent base in the state of Florida, and his good fortune to have Danny Wuerffel in his glory years and Bob Stoops as a DC, and you have the perfect storm.

But defenses slowly began to catch on. Danny Wuerffels come along only so often. Bob Stoops moved on. Spurrier's deficiencies in and distaste for recruiting any position other than QBs was unmasked.

That pretty much sums it up.

 

[bamanut_aj]

Spurrier still hasn't found 'his guy' at qb at usc. And with the way he treats his qb's, he probably won't. Kids just don't want to take that kind of abuse these days.

 

[GrayTide]

I too have been a long time fan of Coach Spurrier, he revolutionized the game of football in the SEC and IMO would still be a force at UF. He was successful during the time period that both FSU and Miami were perennial national contenders. He had to share the talent rich instate recruits with UM and FSU.

I am not taking anything away from Urban Meyer, but before and since his arrival at UF, both the FSU and UM programs have become almost irrelevant nationally and in the state of Florida. IMO this is SOS last season, nobody can make USC a perennial contender in the SEC.

 

[Alasippi]

I'll be the first to admit that Spurrier was my first choice, even when Coach Saban's name was first mentioned.

I personally think he is an outstanding football coach. I've often said he is the only modern coach who can "take his and beat yours and then take yours and beat his". He's pulled some pretty big upsets and he's won some huge games.

But now that Coach Saban has been here a couple of years, there's not a doubt in my mind that he was the better choice, because he's pretty much proven to me that he's the best football coach in America.

What he's done at the university is nothing short of amazing.

RTR! sip

 

[TommyMac]

I'm somewhat of a Spurrier fan, but if Spurrier still has a passion for the game, I've often wondered why South Carolina...
If he chose it for the golf, then he's probably at the right place. If he's in it for football, he should have waited for a much better gig. I don't think he's into it like he was a UF. He had to have known recruiting to USCe would be tougher there than at UF, unless his ego led him to believe otherwise. UF had some good teams in the past prior to Spurrier but he's the guy that really put their program into relevance in the 90's, so maybe he thought he could replicate that again with USCe. I'm one who thought he'd have a little better success than what he's had there but I'm not suprised really. Recruiting is all important these days and he's lost ground to some aggressive recruiters like Meyer, Saban, Carroll, Miles and a host of other coaches who not only enjoy it but excel at it. His name alone isn't going to cut it anymore. You're going to have to be aggressive in your approach.
I've also questioned his assistant hires. He hasn't had that Stoops-type assistant coach since being there, unlike at UF. It just seems he's had left-over type coaches on his staff and not really anyone that stands out. JMO.

I think that's it in a nutshell. He could be lackadaisical at Florida about recruiting because the state is teeming with talent and Florida is the biggest draw in the state. He could pretty much pick and choose when it came to recruiting and I think his ego made him think that blue chippers would be lining up to play for him at USCe. Bad decision, especially after his rep took a hit in the NFL.

I never really considered him a great HC anyway, just a glorified OC who was at the right place at the right time.

 

[Tide-one-on]

All I know is we better be ready for South Carolina when the time comes ...:rolleye2:

 

[bamachile]

I respect Spurrier's abilities, but I have to admit (and I'm sure I'll catch a bit of flak for this) that I've never been able to become a fan of SOS football. Perhaps it's just a personality thing; I'm too much of a smash-mouth, slobber-knocking, victory-by-brute-force kind of guy at heart to ever truly embrace the whole "it's all about the offense" style of coaching.

Am I wrong for being secretly happy that SEC defenses caught up with the fun-'n'-gun? Is is perverse that I enjoy seeing a MLB flatten a QB, or a FB flatten a MLB? Perhaps. But I'm not willing to take down the Earl Campbell poster just yet, or quit idolizing Mean Joe Greene. Three yards and a puddle of blood sounds like a good offensive strategy to me. Defensive game plan? Kill 'em dead and stomp their guts out. Smash-mouth is where it's at, baby, and I'll take what we've got over what we could've had ten times out of nine.

 

[TiderB]

If my memory's correct, it seems like the LSU job came open just a month or two after Spurrier was hired at USC.

I'm sure LSU would have hired him. I wonder how much more success he would have seen had he been hired in Baton Rouge instead of Columbia?

 

[Bamabuzzard]

Sometimes "timing" is everything. SS came into the SEC at the right time with a different offensive approach that the SEC hadn't seen. He also was at a school that was dead in the middle of some of the best talent in the country. This "new" approach combined with the access to gobs and gobs of talent was a perfect situation for the Ole Ball Coach. SS's talent was what made his "system" work so well. The flaw's of his system were exposed in the NFL where the talent level more equal. No one really saw these flaws at UF because talent made up for it and masked it.

Now that he's at USCe those flaws are resurfacing AND his talent level is down. Bad combination when you're wanting to win 10+ games a year.

 

[Crimson Cat]

Sometimes "timing" is everything. SS came into the SEC at the right time with a different offensive approach that the SEC hadn't seen. He also was at a school that was dead in the middle of some of the best talent in the country. This "new" approach combined with the access to gobs and gobs of talent was a perfect situation for the Ole Ball Coach. SS's talent was what made his "system" work so well. The flaw's of his system were exposed in the NFL where the talent level more equal. No one really saw these flaws at UF because talent made up for it and masked it.

Now that he's at USCe those flaws are resurfacing AND his talent level is down. Bad combination when you're wanting to win 10+ games a year.

I totally agree. I almost wrote something similar about the timing issue but my post was already lengthy enough.
Meyer is doing something similar now with the spread. Its all about timing and where he is. For all those who can't get enough of the "spread" offense, you can expect to see the same happen in time. Right now its the best trendy thing since sliced bread, but defenses will catch up to it and it will become extinct just like the fun-n-gun. Right now Meyer has the perfect set-up with superboy who pretty much carried UF into a championship. I'm one who thinks he or the spread won't be as successful in a couple of years.