Healthy Expectations

[corchjay 5,311]

What do you see as an Auburn fan as being a healthy expectation for the football program?

In my opinion here are some medium baselines for the program.  Consistently be a Top 25 program.  That's means every 4 out of 5 years.  Every year we should be in the top 20 in recruiting.  Legitimately competing for a conference championship every 5 years (in the championship game). Playoff appearance 1 out of every 10 years.  No losing seasons ever unless some tragedy happens.  

That's my opinion however I would gladly take greater accomplishments.  I want to win every game every season.  Auburn has beaten all the odds stacked against it.  The  best program in football as it's arch rival no other team could compete against those odds.  The step child in the "Big 6" within the conference by not being the state name school.  We more then hold our own within the conference.  It's amazing the change in culture for Auburn since the 70s.  Teams didn't even respect us enough to even come to our home field.  Now we are regularly discussed as a national championship caliber team.  We, as all championship teams, need a couple calls a couple bounces and a few breaks to go our way.  

I say all that to say War Eagle fellas.  Let's win us a 'ship this year.  

[McLoofus 35,182]

Keep up in recruiting and never walk away from a game embarrassed. Gus has accomplished one of those things.

[kd4au 1,145]

51 minutes ago, corchjay said:

What do you see as an Auburn fan as being a healthy expectation for the football program?

In my opinion here are some medium baselines for the program.  Consistently be a Top 25 program.  That's means every 4 out of 5 years.  Every year we should be in the top 20 in recruiting.  Legitimately competing for a conference championship every 5 years (in the championship game). Playoff appearance 1 out of every 10 years.  No losing seasons ever unless some tragedy happens.  

That's my opinion however I would gladly take greater accomplishments.  I want to win every game every season.  Auburn has beaten all the odds stacked against it.  The  best program in football as it's arch rival no other team could compete against those odds.  The step child in the "Big 6" within the conference by not being the state name school.  We more then hold our own within the conference.  It's amazing the change in culture for Auburn since the 70s.  Teams didn't even respect us enough to even come to our home field.  Now we are regularly discussed as a national championship caliber team.  We, as all championship teams, need a couple calls a couple bounces and a few breaks to go our way.  

I say all that to say War Eagle fellas.  Let's win us a 'ship this year.  

I credit coach Dye with that change of culture.As someone who started being a true Auburn fan in the seventies when Pat and Terry were setting records, the Barfield era was hard to take but coach Dye came in turned the program around.The young fans don't realize how far we have come since then.I think we are all ready one of the top 25 programs in the country,though we may not finish in the top 25 every year we usually come close if we don't.As for expectations I expect to win every game but I know that won't happen.

[AURex 1,984]

As one of those older grads of Auburn, I've been through a lot of ups and downs. There have been some great years and some really embarrassingly awful years, as well as too many (IMO) mediocre years.

My baseline expectation is consistency. Auburn should AVERAGE 9.5-10 regular season wins year after year after year. That means an occasional 8 win regular season would be okay, but most regular seasons would be 9, 10 or 11 wins. And by "most regular seasons," I mean MOST REGULAR SEASONS. There is no excuse, NONE, for this continuing mediocrity of 6 and 7 win seasons.

As Winston Churchill once said, "I'm easily satisfied with the very best." It's the unacceptable losing that is unhealthy. Gets my blood pressure up.

[CameronCrazy 1,058]

My healthy expectation is to have back-to-back 10 win seasons for once in my lifetime. I would otherwise agree with everything else that you mentioned.

I think this program has come a long ways. But I believe that we can take some additional "giant" strides if we would get out of our own way. We need clear leadership at the top that is going to give us the resources and put us in the best position to win. 

Finally, I don't expect to consistently beat Alabama under Nick Saban, but I expect to be competitive. And I think if we shoot for being the best by beating the best then we can consistently beat the rest of the teams in our conference, including UGA & LSU.

[gr82be 14,402]

I'll keep it simple. Never lose more than 1 game per month, period, which means never losing to Georgia and Bama in the same season. That should give us 9-10 wins a season and mix in a 12 win season every 4-5 years. 

[DAG 33,955]

This year? We should win at least 10 games IMO. Quite frankly, come November we should be one of the drivers to be playing in Atlanta. Other than this, I am fully aware we are an 8-9 win program with a sprinkling of 10 plus win seasons. However, we should not be winning less than 8 games, unless there is Chizik turmoil. We should also be competitive in 90 percent of our games at the very least.

[GwillMac6 20,607]

1 hour ago, corchjay said:

What do you see as an Auburn fan as being a healthy expectation for the football program?

In my opinion here are some medium baselines for the program.  Consistently be a Top 25 program.  That's means every 4 out of 5 years.  Every year we should be in the top 20 in recruiting.  Legitimately competing for a conference championship every 5 years (in the championship game). Playoff appearance 1 out of every 10 years.  No losing seasons ever unless some tragedy happens.  

That's my opinion however I would gladly take greater accomplishments.  I want to win every game every season.  Auburn has beaten all the odds stacked against it.  The  best program in football as it's arch rival no other team could compete against those odds.  The step child in the "Big 6" within the conference by not being the state name school.  We more then hold our own within the conference.  It's amazing the change in culture for Auburn since the 70s.  Teams didn't even respect us enough to even come to our home field.  Now we are regularly discussed as a national championship caliber team.  We, as all championship teams, need a couple calls a couple bounces and a few breaks to go our way.  

I say all that to say War Eagle fellas.  Let's win us a 'ship this year.  

This will come across as very harsh but I feel like when the majority crowd who try so hard to be the anti bama and act like it is cool to care less about being excellent in football dies off that are the PTB or on the BOT or administration  Auburn will be a lot better off. I feel like we are as good as we are as a program basically by accident. There is no commitment to excellence across the board. Never has been. The closest was Dye in the 80's. That is the type of demanding personality  we need at the head of our program who is also a quality coach.  People care so much about beating bama that matter but not about just being great overall as a program. Winning 8 games and beating bama does not qualify as a successful season for me like with tubs in 03. Tubs who I love and adore and is my favorite auburn coach as a person is basically the epitome of the auburn fanbase IMO and administration/BOT how his career spanned. He had 1 great year 1 really good year and the rest were just above average. Since he beat bama 6 times in a row he got a pass for the most part sans jetgate. From the fans point of view from where I stand that is what most people cared about is O well he beat bama 6 times so I can forgive underachieving most of his years.  We can be as great as we WANT. I hate this notion I have seen on here and other places in the Auburn online community that winning at all costs like ANY big time fball program does would take away from what makes Auburn great as a university with all of the family feel our class and integrity. We have to get off this high horse and stop acting like we are some morally superior university.  News flash. Every alumni/fan thinks this about their own school. Just win.  Be in the grey area sure like any program worth their salt does. Never blatantly cheat and we will be in business CONSISTENTLY as a top tier program. I see CONSISTENT greatness in Auburn. For goodness sakes we won a national title with Eugene Chizik as our head coach. He will be a trivia question with larry coker for the rest of his life. Just think what we could do with a really good one. College football is all about the head coach just like in the NFL it is all about the qb. I do not think Gus is the guy to get us where we want AU to go but he is not a bad coach. Stidham is the real deal. I think we see at least 10 wins this season but nothing is guaranteed with Gus.

[ClaytonAU 4,606]

15-0 ship or bust... duh 

[aucanucktiger 1,789]

Unfortunately in sports it's not just how good you are but how good you are compared to your opponents. We play both national title game teams plus LSU, UGa and aTm. If we stay healthy we could field a terrific team and still lose 5 games - all to top 15 teams. Sounds familiar. IF our young LBs and QBs are special,  IF starters across the board stay healthy and IF we get a lucky moment or two, we could waltz into Iron bowl  with one loss. IMHO.  

[SaltyTiger 7,764]

9 hours ago, kd4au said:

I credit coach Dye with that change of culture.As someone who started being a true Auburn fan in the seventies when Pat and Terry were setting records, the Barfield era was hard to take but coach Dye came in turned the program around.The young fans don't realize how far we have come since then.I think we are all ready one of the top 25 programs in the country,though we may not finish in the top 25 every year we usually come close if we don't.As for expectations I expect to win every game but I know that won't happen.

Agree 150%. Anyone around at that time could sense the change with Coach Dyes arrival to campus. He pretty much let all know that the "playing field" was about to be leveled in the state. Recall that Dye did not make a lot of friends early on but he did not give a rip.

[alexava 6,973]

Be competitive. Be classy. Win some games compete for championships. Maybe win some. Always have a chance going into a season. 

[SaltyTiger 7,764]

25 minutes ago, alexava said:

Be competitive. Be classy. Win some games compete for championships. Maybe win some. Always have a chance going into a season. 

And no 11:00 AM games other than the occasional HC patsy

[I_M4_AU 7,769]

"Healthy", interesting choice for the title.  If I had any say in what Auburn's Football program does I can agree with @GwillMac6, alas, I don't (which is good for the Auburn Football program).  Therefore, for my mental health, at the start of any football season I look for at least 8 wins at a minimum.  My expectations changes when Auburn plays its first game and changes with each successive game in the season.  It is fun to speculate, but I wait to see if the hype matches the product on the field (see the 2015 season).

[McLoofus 35,182]

10 hours ago, GwillMac6 said:

Be in the grey area sure like any program worth their salt does. Never blatantly cheat 

FTR, I completely agree with this. I have no problem with playing the recruiting game to win. I have no problem with stealing signals if we can. Hell, let's deflate some footballs. There are the rules in the book and then there are the real boundaries that book exists somewhere within. I get that. As for what I don't deal with as well, I've gone on enough about that elsewhere.

As for the PTB pulling the strings at Auburn, I don't know the inner workings. I've heard enough, though, to form the opinion that they care, they're just not terrible adept at fostering success. It does seem that the massive inconsistency of our program in the post-Dye era points to issues at the very top. Fire coach, new coach wins big, new coach loses big, fire coach, new coach wins big... 3 of our last 4 coaches went undefeated or reached a title game in their 2nd year or sooner. All 3 went significantly downhill afterward. Tubs showed a more normal trajectory, but it can't be ignored that- as you said- it was during bama's probationary period. Maybe Gus gets it on track this year.

BUT... to speak strictly to the OP, and what I expect from the team- no matter how they arrive there- it's simply to be a talented team (we're there) and to look like a competently coached team (we're not there, and we haven't been for a 3 season stretch in 10 years). 

[DAG 33,955]

4 hours ago, aucanucktiger said:

Unfortunately in sports it's not just how good you are but how good you are compared to your opponents. We play both national title game teams plus LSU, UGa and aTm. If we stay healthy we could field a terrific team and still lose 5 games - all to top 15 teams. Sounds familiar. IF our young LBs and QBs are special,  IF starters across the board stay healthy and IF we get a lucky moment or two, we could waltz into Iron bowl  with one loss. IMHO.  

If we are healthy, at the most, we should only lose two, maybe three. No terrific team loses 5 games . Maybe a decent team.

[kd4au 1,145]

2 hours ago, McLoofus said:

FTR, I completely agree with this. I have no problem with playing the recruiting game to win. I have no problem with stealing signals if we can. Hell, let's deflate some footballs. There are the rules in the book and then there are the real boundaries that book exists somewhere within. I get that. As for what I don't deal with as well, I've gone on enough about that elsewhere.

As for the PTB pulling the strings at Auburn, I don't know the inner workings. I've heard enough, though, to form the opinion that they care, they're just not terrible adept at fostering success. It does seem that the massive inconsistency of our program in the post-Dye era points to issues at the very top. Fire coach, new coach wins big, new coach loses big, fire coach, new coach wins big... 3 of our last 4 coaches went undefeated or reached a title game in their 2nd year or sooner. All 3 went significantly downhill afterward. Tubs showed a more normal trajectory, but it can't be ignored that- as you said- it was during bama's probationary period. Maybe Gus gets it on track this year.

BUT... to speak strictly to the OP, and what I expect from the team- no matter how they arrive there- it's simply to be a talented team (we're there) and to look like a competently coached team (we're not there, and we haven't been for a 3 season stretch in 10 years). 

Not to derail the thread but why do you think this pattern happens?Why can't the new coaches keep things on track and keep winning after having big starts?

[Tiger 8,817]

25 minutes ago, kd4au said:

Not to derail the thread but why do you think this pattern happens?Why can't the new coaches keep things on track and keep winning after having big starts?

I'm obviously not McLoofus but I have a theory:

 

We generally always have talent. And in the first 2 years at a program, as Lou Holtz put it, "the first 2 years as a HC at a program is when you do your best coaching job because you have no obligations other than to win and play the best players available to you" After that 2 years coaches have all of a sudden found themselves having to navigate the web of things they said during recruiting, dealing with parents, families, etc. Favorites come in to play as they start to lose their objectivity regarding kids' football ability and start playing kids who may not be as good but are buying in more to what the coaches are saying, or to fulfill a promise made to a kid or his family -- which could be ego growth after a good first 2 years. That is one thing, the next is that for some reason our coaches have this weird pattern of, once reaching high success, to going ultra-conservative and going away from what brought us the success (Chizik trying to go pro-style, Gus no longer running a true hurry up, Tubs trying to win games 3-2 instead of being the Riverboat Gambler). Then for some reason it seems we have people in the administration that once we start doing really well start itching to be a part of the program and then it seems like there is meddling going on from somewhere in the athletic department offices. Obviously I can't confirm any of this as factual but it's what I've gathered over the puzzling pattern we have been experiencing with our coaches. 

Anyone feel free to tell me I'm wrong as it's just a theory

[lionheartkc 6,150]

37 minutes ago, kd4au said:

Not to derail the thread but why do you think this pattern happens?Why can't the new coaches keep things on track and keep winning after having big starts?

It's all about the players, to begin with. We've had a history of recruiting for now and forgetting about the future.  We've also had a history of failing to consider that our best players might leave early. Then, when we slip, just a little, the PTB come in and start throwing their weight around and make it worse.

3 hours ago, McLoofus said:

I've heard enough, though, to form the opinion that they care, they're just not terrible adept at fostering success.

They suffer from what I call "Old South" syndrome.  They can't get it through their heads that the way they did it back in the "good 'ol days" may not be the way to do it now. When they stick their noses in, they are trying to recreate the early 80s 

[CCslim 56]

10 Wins every year

With Division Championships mixed in consistently

Top 10 Recruiting Classes.

 

SO Basically i expect consistency 

 

 

[lionheartkc 6,150]

8 minutes ago, Tiger said:

the next is that for some reason our coaches have this weird pattern of, once reaching high success, to going ultra-conservative and going away from what brought us the success (Chizik trying to go pro-style, Gus no longer running a true hurry up, Tubs trying to win games 3-2 instead of being the Riverboat Gambler).

I'm with you on everything but this... It wasn't that the coaches inexplicably went conservative, it's that their point of highest success featured the perfect combination of players to run the system at the optimum level, and when they lost those players, they had to dumb it down. It really looks like Gus has figured out how to reload instead of rebuilding in recruiting.  Hopefully, over the next few years, we'll see our roster filling up with guys like Davidson, who can just step in when their predecessor leaves, with no drop off or even some improvement.

[Tiger 8,817]

5 minutes ago, lionheartkc said:

I'm with you on everything but this... It wasn't that the coaches inexplicably went conservative, it's that their point of highest success featured the perfect combination of players to run the system at the optimum level, and when they lost those players, they had to dumb it down. It really looks like Gus has figured out how to reload instead of rebuilding in recruiting.  Hopefully, over the next few years, we'll see our roster filling up with guys like Davidson, who can just step in when their predecessor leaves, with no drop off or even some improvement.

Good point. Also, it seems our HC's seem to inherit experienced teams. So I think what contributes to our coaches being fired is that they usually have a about 2 years of subpar on-field product while, for some reason, our starting 22 is inexplicably and overwhelmingly YOUNG after the starters he inherited have left. So the coach is fired after he fails to make it work/match the bar he set with younger players which he recruited -- making the HC look even worse bc they are his guys. Then within the next 2 years the new coach is playing with those same players but instead of freshman/sophomore versions of these kids its junior and seniors. If you look back our best teams were our most experienced, per Stat Tiger. 

I think Gus survived the 2 year window where his teams were less experienced than most of our competition. Now he has the benefit of playing with experienced versions of the players he brought in.

 

Also, why are we only on the favorable side of experience once every ~4 years instead of having experience sprinkled across our roster in a more balanced fashion?

[lionheartkc 6,150]

5 minutes ago, Tiger said:

Also, why are we only on the favorable side of experience once every ~4 years instead of having experience sprinkled across our roster in a more balanced fashion?

That is a direct reflection of the recruiting I was talking about. Coaches had a bad habit of riding the top guys they had for 4 years and only looking to replace them year 3 instead of picking up top guys every 1-2 years in all positions... except at running back.  We've always seemed to recruit high end talent there.

[kd4au 1,145]

Thanks for the input.Hope Gus figures it out and can become a consistent coach.

[lutzcammed 469]

My expectations:

I expect our players to give 100% on the field.

I expect our team to look like it was coached by quality coaches and not a bunch of first graders.

I expect our coaches to recognize when an injury is detrimental to the chances of our team winning and be prepared and make a change. 

I expect our coaches to give the players everything they need to develop both as players and human beings.

I expect our coaches to do what they are paid to do. Coach at a high level.

I expect not to lose to inferior teams with inferior talent.

I expect to compete: always -with teams having equal or superior talent to our own.

I expect when I turn on the tv to watch our game that I Believe we will win.

I expect that if all my other expectations are met. We Will have the chance to play for championships