The Harsin Question

[Mikey 16,566]

12 hours ago, bigbird said:

My position is you're obsessed with defending Gus. You defend anything and everything said against him. No matter the forum, the thread, or the subject, there you are, ever vigilant to defend Gus.

Only when the criticism is erroneous, which it mostly is. I gave two excellent examples above.

[AU-24 3,063]

4 hours ago, Mikey said:

Only when the criticism is erroneous, which it mostly is. I gave two excellent examples above.

It’s just funny that he talks about how you defend Gus, when the real story is: he absolutely despises Gus! I mean at the very minimum Gus was at least an above average coach. Eight years at Auburn he was the second or third best coach in the SEC West, third or fourth best coach in the SEC. Big Bird can’t even admit that he was an above average coach. Then again, at the same time, he can’t admit that Harsin has been a below average coach. 😂

That is the reason he gets so bitter when he thinks you’re defending Gus. (with true facts) He hates and despises Gus so bad, he can’t stand to see anyone defend him, even when the defense is 100% true!
 

On a side-note, Auburn is currently dead last in the SEC in recruiting!

https://flywareagle.com/2022/09/14/auburn-football-4-star-wr-decommits/amp/

[ThurstontheWelshCorgi 576]

2 hours ago, AU-24 said:

 

On a side-note, Auburn is currently dead last in the SEC in recruiting!

https://flywareagle.com/2022/09/14/auburn-football-4-star-wr-decommits/amp/

That is frustrating, it's not Reuben Foster decommiting frustrating but gives me flash backs to losing that guy.

Harsin has a real chance to get things righted this year. He's going to take some losses no doubt but if he can capture some magic he can potentially reverse the curse. I believe this is his only chance this year, when you have the rb's we currently have then you have a chance but I'm skeptical TJ can pull it off. If he doesn't pull out a few miracle wins and get the recruiting momentum rolling then it's essentially over as far as I'm concerned in terms of a young generation getting to roll toomers corner and experience relevant auburn football. 

[bigbird 60,460]

3 hours ago, AU-24 said:

Big Bird can’t even admit that he was an above average coach.

Pssst, there's a log in your eye...

[gravejd 3,270]

I can't wait until we actually have a coach who is good at recruiting AND knows how to run a div1 program. When we see what good looks like all this arguing over Gus and Harsin is going to look very silly. This is like arguing if the green or yellow skittle tastes the best when the answer is they are both fillers and palette cleanser for the good flavors!

[AU-24 3,063]

7 hours ago, ThurstontheWelshCorgi said:

That is frustrating, it's not Reuben Foster decommiting frustrating but gives me flash backs to losing that guy.

Harsin has a real chance to get things righted this year. He's going to take some losses no doubt but if he can capture some magic he can potentially reverse the curse. I believe this is his only chance this year, when you have the rb's we currently have then you have a chance but I'm skeptical TJ can pull it off. If he doesn't pull out a few miracle wins and get the recruiting momentum rolling then it's essentially over as far as I'm concerned in terms of a young generation getting to roll toomers corner and experience relevant auburn football. 

We just need the right coach, the right hire. Auburn is a great place, hopefully our new A.D. and president will get this right!

[AU-24 3,063]

6 hours ago, bigbird said:

Pssst, there's a log in your eye...

Sad when that is the best you have. The truth hurts, doesn’t it?

[NWALA Tiger 3,535]

3 minutes ago, AU-24 said:

We just need the right coach, the right hire. Auburn is a great place, hopefully our new A.D. and president will get this right!

So u Mcglynn will hire a coach?

[gr82b4au 5,568]

6 minutes ago, AU-24 said:

We just need the right coach, the right hire. Auburn is a great place, hopefully our new A.D. and president will get this right!

I agree it is a great place. I also think it is the hardest job in college football. Comes with expectations to be great while also having the two best teams as our rivals. It will take someone that is not afraid Who can recruit #1 and coach. Not easy to find that. 

[AUFightingSoldiers 685]

2 minutes ago, AU-24 said:

Sad when that is the best you have. The truth hurts, doesn’t it?

The truth is that Gus was a good hire before the substitution rule change. His entire offensive scheme was centered around forcing a mismatch through quick substitutions. Once that was gone it became a preparation, in game adjustment, development, and recruiting job. He came up short too often in a few of those areas. His OL recruiting and coaching choices caused 3 years of bad OL play that eventually lead to his firing. He refused to adapt to the talent of his players and instead wanted plug and play pieces in an offensive scheme that seldom worked without all world performances from certain areas (2017 is a very notable exception). We were mediocre in 2015, 2016, 2018, and 2020. I would argue his response to the end of 2020 was the final straw. 

I have no clue what will happen with Harsin. Right now things need to pickup if he wants to stay here. If they don't he will walk out the same door that Gus left out of. He'll just have to do it knowing the last guy produced every third year and got to stay around 4x longer for it.

[Didba 5,256]

11 hours ago, AU-24 said:

I mean at the very minimum Gus was at least an above average coach. Eight years at Auburn he was the second or third best coach in the SEC West, third or fourth best coach in the SEC.

IMO, Gus was an above average coach until the rules changed to limit his offense (substitution rule and the OL downfield rule) and he failed to adapt/change/improve his offense after that. 

Once it was apparent he couldn't adapt his offense to the new rules or bring in an OC to revamp it into a hybrid offense, he became an average or below average coach depending wholly on his personnel each season.

[AUwent 3,747]

41 minutes ago, AU-24 said:

We just need the right coach, the right hire. Auburn is a great place, hopefully our new A.D. and president will get this right!

That begs the question--what if we do, well, as expected this season, and we don't have a permanent AD in place by December? Should we give Harsin a third year if he wants? From what WDEWDE has said, I really don't want Rich making a HC hire.

Obviously if we do better than expected this season, starting with a big victory over the Nits this weekend, which jumpstarts recruiting (Russaw and Smith), all the better! I'm just not expecting it.

Edited September 15, 2022 by AUwent

[au302 2,669]

On 9/13/2022 at 10:51 PM, Mikey said:

Please.....check things before putting foot in mouth. Leading WR Javon Baker, transfer from bammer brought in by Gus.

Ryan O'keefe a senior, Heupel holdover

Jaylon Griffin Freshman brought in by Gus

 Xavier Townson, freshman brought in by Gus

Those are the only four WR that have recorded a catch this season. Only one of them is a Heupel holdover. The other three are Gus's guys.

You got me. But even still, is that scenario that much better? The freshmen Gus has recruited to a G5 school are better on day 1 than his best receiver at an SEC school that he had a year to develop? When he was getting classes that were high in rank

[aubaseball 2,590]

1 hour ago, AUFightingSoldiers said:

The truth is that Gus was a good hire before the substitution rule change.

Gus was (at best) a questionable hire.  He was at the time a safe hire for some that thought he was the reason Auburn won a NC.   He was an unproven HC that had experience at Auburn and in the SEC as an OC.   Gus was part of some incredible things and incredible seasons during his time as HC.   He was also part of some of the dumbest things that I have ever seen from a major college HC.   From the sidelines, he appeared to be easily swayed by some of the influential people at Auburn, example being, his continuous changing of OC’s and his back and forth with play calling.  
When it gets boiled down to it, Gus was an 8-4 coach nothing more nothing less.   I don’t know what Harsin is going to be only time will tell.   It currently doesn’t appear to be a great hire but can we give the guy at least a few years to see if it was the right hire.  We gave the last guy 8 and the 3-9 HC before him 3.  

[toddc 13,194]

Pete Thamel, Rece Davis weigh in on Bryan Harsin’s future beyond 2022

Chandler Vessels•about 22 hours

Andy Lewis/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

The future for Bryan Harsin at Auburn is clear to Pete Thamel and Rece Davis. No matter whether Harsin wins 10 games this season or five, he will not be the coach of the Tigers in 2023.

That is the conclusion the two ESPN insiders made together on Wednesday’s edition of the College GameDay podcast, citing offseason drama in which Auburn attempted unsuccessfully to fire Harsin for cause. With the resignation of athletic director Allen Greene in late August, Thamel believes a loss to No. 22 Penn State on Saturday could be the beginning of the end for Harsin.

“If they lose, does this start — their AD search is going on now and there’s a lot of people buzzing about that in AD circles — does this start what we all assumed is the inevitable exit of Bryan Harsin?” Thamel asked. “Which is not some manufactured media thing. They tried to get rid of him through that totally ridiculous, baseless witch hunt in February. They brought the program spiral upon themselves and now it’s just sort of how do they begin some sort of exit. 

“If Penn State goes in and wins authoritatively, that is where this Auburn season sadly goes. They completely Tonya Harding-ed his knees for lack of a better way to put it.”

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Harsin took over in 2021 after spending seven seasons at Boise State. He got the Tigers off to a solid 6-2 start, but they dropped their final five games of the season to finish 6-7. Ultimately Harsin kept his job, but the bizarre attempted firing this offseason puts immense pressure on him entering Year 2. 

Davis took it a step further than Thamel by saying that even if Auburn finds a way to beat the Nittany Lions and turns this into a successful year, he will leave on his own accord. 

“The Harsin exit is going to happen one way or the other,” Davis said. “If I’m wrong about Auburn and they play better in the passing game and beat Penn State and go on a run and have a really good season, then Harsin’s gone because he’ll find another job to take. If it goes the other way, then he’s gone for the reasons you say. This is going to happen. The question is when and how, at least to me. 

“There’s no coming back from what happened in the offseason long term. If there is any reprieve, it’s temporary. …I would be stunned if it’s not over one way or the other at the end of this year. It could be at the end of a 10-win Auburn season or at the end of a mediocre one. I think they’ve got decent talent — they’re not gonna go out and stink it up any game that they play. But this is not going to last long term. The powers that be there didn’t want it to last. They pushed out one of the best athletic directors in the game for some inexplicable reason. Now they get to do what they want, and they’ll start over and get different guys.”

Finally, Thamel pointed to one last sign that Bryan Harsin’s future at Auburn is in jeopardy. Despite bringing in the seventh-best recruiting class in the SEC in 2022, the Tigers rank 13th for 2023 according to On3 Consensus. The ESPN senior writer believes that shows that recruits are scared of making a commitment to a coach that likely won’t by there by the time they arrive. 

“In composite recruiting rankings right now, Auburn is 14th of 14 SEC schools,” Thamel said. “That is not an indictment of Bryan Harsin, that is an indictment of lack of faith in recruits. If you’re a high school coach, it’d be hard in good faith to send a player to Auburn and say, ‘Hey, this is what it’s gonna look like your next five years.’ This should be when his recruiting is really hitting its stride, and instead they are well behind Vanderbilt.”

[AUwent 3,747]

12 minutes ago, aubaseball said:

Gus was (at best) a questionable hire.  He was at the time a safe hire for some that thought he was the reason Auburn won a NC.   He was an unproven HC that had experience at Auburn and in the SEC as an OC.   Gus was part of some incredible things and incredible seasons during his time as HC.   He was also part of some of the dumbest things that I have ever seen from a major college HC.   From the sidelines, he appeared to be easily swayed by some of the influential people at Auburn, example being, his continuous changing of OC’s and his back and forth with play calling.  
When it gets boiled down to it, Gus was an 8-4 coach nothing more nothing less.   I don’t know what Harsin is going to be only time will tell.   It currently doesn’t appear to be a great hire but can we give the guy at least a few years to see if it was the right hire.  We gave the last guy 8 and the 3-9 HC before him 3.  

We're not getting a "proven HC," sorry. Unless you consider Freeze "proven."

Edited September 15, 2022 by AUwent

[aubaseball 2,590]

2 minutes ago, AUwent said:

We're not getting a "proven HC," sorry.

And this my friend is why they call it JABA.   Because even after years of success with Dye, Auburn hired a D1AA coach.   

[AUwent 3,747]

11 minutes ago, aubaseball said:

And this my friend is why they call it JABA.   Because even after years of success with Dye, Auburn hired a D1AA coach.   

You act like we're unique in the SEC in that regard. There are five coaches in the league who had P5 HC experience beforehand.

Edited September 15, 2022 by AUwent

[Old fan 47 769]

3 hours ago, AU-24 said:

We just need the right coach, the right hire. Auburn is a great place, hopefully our new A.D. and president will get this right!

While I still believe BH deserves 3 years, nothing from the prior years tells me that AU will get anything right, meaning hiring a really good AD who in turn hires a coach that will change anything. I believe the last good coach we had was TT. I didn’t always like what he did, but he lasted what 10 years and had a very good run. 

[Old fan 47 769]

55 minutes ago, AUwent said:

We're not getting a "proven HC," sorry. Unless you consider Freeze "proven."

No big time or winning coach in a major program wants anything to do with Auburn. Why is that? AU has been turned down so many times, it’s like there is a plague in the town. I have my thoughts on why, but I am definitely nobody with inside info, not that you have to be to notice the trend since TT was released. 

[Mikey 16,566]

5 hours ago, au302 said:

You got me. But even still, is that scenario that much better? The freshmen Gus has recruited to a G5 school are better on day 1 than his best receiver at an SEC school that he had a year to develop? When he was getting classes that were high in rank

We have no idea how Hudson stacks up. He's not dressing out for some undisclosed reason(s). He may or may not be better but there's no way to know at this point in time.

Edited September 16, 2022 by Mikey

[cbo 7,823]

6 hours ago, AUwent said:

We're not getting a "proven HC," sorry. Unless you consider Freeze "proven."

Freeze is proven. 

[AUwent 3,747]

8 minutes ago, cbo said:

Freeze is proven. 

Ok. Well, if we get a half-decent AD, we might be able to get him.

Heck, I'd keep an eye on Marshall.

Edited September 16, 2022 by AUwent

[cbo 7,823]

8 hours ago, gr82b4au said:

I agree it is a great place. I also think it is the hardest job in college football. Comes with expectations to be great while also having the two best teams as our rivals. It will take someone that is not afraid Who can recruit #1 and coach. Not easy to find that. 

Man, I like you but I hate this sentiment. Our old pal McLoofus (who I just messaged with and is doing great, for those interested), always made this argument and I feel the need to carry on his absence. 

Auburn is not close to the hardest job in college football. Vandy probably is. Look around the league. It's harder to win for at least half the teams in the SEC because they aren't football schools and have little to sell to recruits. There are only 5 or 6 schools in all of college football that have won a national championship since we did. And we played in another since then. 

Bama and Georgia won't be on top forever. And until they aren't, that should only mean two losses a season. None of this 8-5 and 6-6 s***. And, of course, we can beat them sometimes, as even Gus proved repeatedly. 

We just need the right coach. 

 

[AUwent 3,747]

9 minutes ago, cbo said:

Man, I like you but I hate this sentiment. Our old pal McLoofus (who I just messaged with and is doing great, for those interested), always made this argument and I feel the need to carry on his absence. 

Auburn is not close to the hardest job in college football. Vandy probably is. Look around the league. It's harder to win for at least half the teams in the SEC because they aren't football schools and have little to sell to recruits. There are only 5 or 6 schools in all of college football that have won a national championship since we did. And we played in another since then. 

Bama and Georgia won't be on top forever. And until they aren't, that should only mean two losses a season. None of this 8-5 and 6-6 s***. And, of course, we can beat them sometimes, as even Gus proved repeatedly. 

We just need the right coach. 

 

Nah, I agree with Loof. Unfortunately, too many people are obsessed with keeping the status quo that is ultimately harming us as a program. Literally the only argument is crossing our fingers and praying that at some point in the near future at least one of UAT and UGA somehow miraculously fall, when there is literally no indicator of that happening in at least the next ten years (Saban is an absolute workaholic and will likely be there at 80).

Because of that, here are roughly what our goals should be for the time being (this is assuming we get a low-level third permanent):

-Appearance in 12 team playoff once every five years

-9 wins incl. bowl three of every five years

-Bowl eligibility (the traditional, non-APR way) every year

Edited September 16, 2022 by AUwent