Gus’ Ceiling

[around4ever 4,139]

32 minutes ago, Gowebb11 said:

Our current roster is talented, but still lags behind Bama, UGA, and LSU. Not considerably so, but it does. And it shows up at at times. We have several members of our current O Line who would not start at those schools, and it was exposed yesterday. Same for DBs. To the original question of this thread, Gus’s ceiling can be higher with better recruiting. 

We will never recruit at the same level as Saban. There are extenuating circumstances in their recruiting.  That being said, we may have one or two DLinemen that could crack Saban's starting lineup.  Nobody else on our team could start for them.  Gus and the staff actually do a pretty good job of recruiting and playing with UAT. 

[kwagoner 214]

17 hours ago, Eagle-1 said:

 We have almost no slants, crossing routes, and elements of an intermediate passing game. I watch game after game of linebackers aggressively attacking the line of scrimmage, and no passes over the middle behind them. It makes me nuts!

That may have been more valid last year. I recall 2  3rd and 5+ where all our routes were short and intermediate. One, conversion. One, not.  They even used it as a talking point on the broadcast.  I think the critical area is OL like we can all agree on.

[AUFAN78 3,926]

3 hours ago, around4ever said:

We will never recruit at the same level as Saban. There are extenuating circumstances in their recruiting.  That being said, we may have one or two DLinemen that could crack Saban's starting lineup.  Nobody else on our team could start for them.  Gus and the staff actually do a pretty good job of recruiting and playing with UAT. 

This

[BigWhiskey91 632]

19 hours ago, Brad_ATX said:

Eh, bowl games are a crap shoot for matchups.  For example, we had no business being in the Sugar Bowl two years ago at 8-4, but someone from the SEC had to go.  OU was a much better team than we were.

Would’ve been nice if our QB didn’t break his forearm on the first drive of that game too.

[japantiger 4,051]

On 9/16/2018 at 9:35 PM, gr82be said:

My honest feeling is that if Chizik can win a championship then Gus can. For some reason Auburn has very rocky seasons. So far Gus is Rocky 1 and Chizik was Rocky II. I want to see Gus be Rocky IV. Sorry for the analogy but I've been watching Rocky movies the past few days. Seems fitting. 

 

Sorry, but Gus is more like Tommy Gunn in Rocky 5.....

[Mikey 16,738]

On 9/15/2018 at 9:19 PM, Zeek said:

Looking forward to the future what do you guys believe is Gus’ ceiling as a coach?

It's a documented fact that his ceiling can be no lower than 12-2 with an appearance in the National Championship game.

That aside, does any coach really have a ceiling? Acquiring a star player here, a couple of unfortunate injuries there or a lucky injury free season....those things have a dramatic effect on any season's record. I don't think coaches have ceilings. If they do then Terry Bowden's was higher than Pat Dye's. Did we name the field after the wrong guy?

[TigerFanAU 586]

I think he's already peaked. The only thing that's consistent with Gus is how he can't win the big games. Bama, LSU, UGA aren't getting any weaker.  Miss St is getting stronger and better. 

 

Gus is a middle of the pack caliber coach.

[Zeek 16,660]

2 hours ago, TigerFanAU said:

I think he's already peaked. The only thing that's consistent with Gus is how he can't win the big games. Bama, LSU, UGA aren't getting any weaker.  Miss St is getting stronger and better. 

 

Gus is a middle of the pack caliber coach.

I fear TAMU will be on the rise as well.

2 hours ago, Mikey said:

It's a documented fact that his ceiling can be no lower than 12-2 with an appearance in the National Championship game.

That aside, does any coach really have a ceiling? Acquiring a star player here, a couple of unfortunate injuries there or a lucky injury free season....those things have a dramatic effect on any season's record. I don't think coaches have ceilings. If they do then Terry Bowden's was higher than Pat Dye's. Did we name the field after the wrong guy?

True, and understood. That's why I included the qualifier "moving forward". One could argue that someone like Richt is pretty stuck at 10 wins and extremely unlikely to win the conference.

I don't think Gus wins another conference championship personally.

[oracle79 3,569]

Good is the enemy of great. Gus is good.

[Linayus 676]

I know everyone is fixated on hating Gus when we lose but look at who we play year in and year out. A lovely statistic that I was informed of this morning (by StatTiger, I think), is that Gus has had to face a ranked opponent in nearly half of his games at Auburn. Who else is doing that? Saban has gotten the benefit of teams they schedule not being any good the years they play and for Gus the opposite has happened. Kirby took over a good Georgia team that seriously has ZERO competition in the East right now.

Don't get me wrong, I see our struggles in big games. We pulled off big wins last season against Georgia and did it again against Bama but unfortunately we had to play Georgia again right after that and got our butts whipped. Part of that was on the coaching staff thinking we'd handle them with the exact same game plan but part of it was fatigue and injuries and just plain old bad luck. (Auburn also has this weird knack of having to nearly always play the winner of the East division twice when we win the West.)

All I really know is that I'm fatigued of the love/hate Gus gets every season. I'm fatigued of losing to our biggest rivals in games where we were the better team (for whatever reason it might be.) I'm fatigued of even imagining Auburn with a different coaching staff because I have no clue who we could get to come face off against freaking Nick Saban, Kirby Smart, and Jimbo Fisher every freaking year and expected to win them all year in and year out.

What I DO know.. is that I love seeing Michigan lose with Harbaugh. I love seeing FSU struggle to win anything (did Jimbo jump ship knowing this was coming or did the program implode when he left?). I love seeing Miami lose again with Richt. I love seeing Clemson struggle against teams they shouldn't. I love watching other teams lose with us!!

[aubaseball 2,652]

I’m with you linayus.  It’s almost a tie, but I really do get a lot of satisfaction seeing Alabama lose just as much as Auburn winning.  

[Brad_ATX 13,654]

3 hours ago, TigerFanAU said:

I think he's already peaked. The only thing that's consistent with Gus is how he can't win the big games. Bama, LSU, UGA aren't getting any weaker.  Miss St is getting stronger and better. 

 

Gus is a middle of the pack caliber coach.

This is where emotion trumps reason.  As HC at Auburn, Gus has won six games against teams that were ranked inside the Top 5 at the time, with three of those coming against a #1 ranked opponent.  Half of those wins were also away from JHS.  If those don't qualify as "big games", I'm not sure what does anymore.

[TigerFanAU 586]

5 minutes ago, Brad_ATX said:

This is where emotion trumps reason.  As HC at Auburn, Gus has won six games against teams that were ranked inside the Top 5 at the time, with three of those coming against a #1 ranked opponent.  Half of those wins were also away from JHS.  If those don't qualify as "big games", I'm not sure what does anymore.

Now tell me his records against Alabama, LSU, and UGA.

[Brad_ATX 13,654]

8 minutes ago, TigerFanAU said:

Now tell me his records against Alabama, LSU, and UGA.

2-3, 2-4, and 2-4 (including SECC).

LSU and UGA records have room for improvement (2015/2016 UGA chap my butt).

However 2-3 against Bama is pretty freaking incredible considering what that program has going on right now.  Do you realize that Bama has been ranked #1 or #2 every time we've played them under Gus?  That's crazy!

[Mikey 16,738]

2 hours ago, TigerFanAU said:

Now tell me his records against Alabama, LSU, and UGA.

Now you tell me the coach who has done better than Gus against those three schools.

[TigerFanAU 586]

2 minutes ago, Mikey said:

Now you tell me the coach who has done better than Gus against those three schools.

That's kinda hard to do since we're the only ones who play them every year, but Orgeron is 0-2 against Saban, but Orgeron 2-0 against Gus. Gus is 1-3 against Kirby,  2-3 against Saban. He's not a top caliber coach. Oh and 1-4 in bowls. 

[Mikey 16,738]

Just now, TigerFanAU said:

That's kinda hard to do since we're the only ones who play them every year,

Gee, there just might be a message in there somewhere, ya' think?

[TigerFanAU 586]

Just now, Mikey said:

Gee, there just might be a message in there somewhere, ya' think?

So since they're tough schools, we give him a pass for having a losing record against them? No wonder we've been a traditional 8 win school, the fans accept it lol.

[KolchakAU85 430]

On 9/15/2018 at 9:24 PM, AidiAU said:

Now, after a 1 pt loss, is probably the best time to pose this question. I expect totally rational, non-emotional responses. 

It 's very difficult to respond to a pathetic loss like that with "ration", unless you're making the millions off Auburn that Gus is making.  His ration is "you can't win them all".  All while his wife is browsing lakefront properties online.

I think Gus is challenged, even with a great team.  He has the QB he salivated over, excellent assistant coaches, a good roster, and we had LSU at home and we were favored by double digits, and for good reason.

And Gus once again blew a 2nd half, double-digit lead.  At home this time.

His ceiling depends upon luck.  Nick Saban DEMANDS excellence.  Gus simply hopes for it.

I don't know.  I'm close to empty inside over Auburn football.  I'm a freaking, raving lunatic.  All I know is that Saban and Bama make winning look boringly easy, and we blow convincing leads at home.

Gus might get lucky and win an SEC title.  But I think we're in for more of the same: not ready to play a big game.

[CameronCrazy 1,085]

Gus does not have the relentless, killer instinct that an elite coach needs to have. It’s reflective in his players. OL & DL players said that that they “lost focus” or “let up” on their opponent in the 4th quarter. He’s never been able to finish off an opponent when he has them on the ropes going back to the 2013 National Championship Game. I’m sure Gus is a great guy, husband, father, Christian man, but I don’t think he has it in him to be relentless. All we heard this past week is that this wasn’t going to be a revenge game. What about next year? True competitors look for anything they can to motivate them and their team. 

[bigbird 60,580]

To me, it's a hard question to answer without acknowledging certain situations that affect the final answer. First, the SECw is by far the toughest division in football and it's not close. Secondly, the two schools we primarily recruit against and measure our success against are in peak form with nothing on the horizon that will slow them down. Using those 2 mitigating factors, my realistic expectations must be lowered. 

With Bama, where they are, at best, we can hope for 50% win pct. Also, I've said for years that TAMU is a sleeping giant. Well, they've now got a coach that is capable, focused, and hungry to prove himself. LSU is a talent rich school that has one of the absolute best DCs in the game and a HC that let's his Coordinators coach and his talent play.  Add in UGA and we're now up to 4 games that will, at best, be toss ups.  

What's Gus' ceiling?  IMO, Championship caliber. That said, he very easily could lose 4 a year.  10 years ago, against those coaches and competition, he would have run the SEC like Saban.  Unfortunately, it's not 10 years ago and we have to live with what we have as well as what others are bringing.

I do not expect to win every game. To me, that's ridiculous because your opponent believes and has worked towards the same thing. What I do expect is that our preparation, work, and focus has been good enough to make the team competitive in each and every game with a legitimate chance to win. As well as enough flexibility and creativity to put the players into the best position for them to suceed. Then, if everything falls into place and we create a little luck I'd hope to win.

As of now, the preparedness, focus, and creativity seems to have been missing for a couple years and that is what bothers me.

JMO

[Auhud08 596]

17 hours ago, TigerFanAU said:

So since they're tough schools, we give him a pass for having a losing record against them? No wonder we've been a traditional 8 win school, the fans accept it lol.

Hes2-3 against bama and uga. No he doesnt get a pass, but if barfield or shug or dye had done that against bear bryant then he wouldnt have been nearly as loved as he is. I give saban credit for the system hes built, but i also dont give him as much credit in that hes never gone undefeated. Somehow last year they make it into the playoff despite losing convincingly in their last game. Historically that team would fall to #5-6 and never see a championship. People want to say malzahn got lucly in ‘13 and give him ZERO credit for taking a team that went 3-9 the year prior and going 12-2 and being in the nat’l championship. Let me tell you, going 3-9 sets you back a few years. Hes made mind boggling mistakes along the way but if you cant see that our overall talent level is better then thats on you. Nothing that happened saturday IMO was on Gus. It wasnt even on steele or lindsey to me. The players didnt execute. It happens. 

[TigerOne 1,152]

13 hours ago, KolchakAU85 said:

It 's very difficult to respond to a pathetic loss like that with "ration", unless you're making the millions off Auburn that Gus is making.  His ration is "you can't win them all".  All while his wife is browsing lakefront properties online.

I think Gus is challenged, even with a great team.  He has the QB he salivated over, excellent assistant coaches, a good roster, and we had LSU at home and we were favored by double digits, and for good reason.

And Gus once again blew a 2nd half, double-digit lead.  At home this time.

His ceiling depends upon luck.  Nick Saban DEMANDS excellence.  Gus simply hopes for it.

I don't know.  I'm close to empty inside over Auburn football.  I'm a freaking, raving lunatic.  All I know is that Saban and Bama make winning look boringly easy, and we blow convincing leads at home.

Gus might get lucky and win an SEC title.  But I think we're in for more of the same: not ready to play a big game.

and that my friend is the key difference. The fierce passion to win is missing from Auburn's coaches. No doubt they want to win but have accepted the

"you can't win them all" philosophy. Its not Gus dna to chew somebody out, might offend them or they will mope and leave the program.

Stidham need to get his ass chewed for still not being the QB he can be. Think dreams of his honeymoon have become his top priority.

 

[oracle79 3,569]

11 hours ago, bigbird said:

Well, they've now got a coach that is capable, focused, and hungry to prove himself.

 

11 hours ago, bigbird said:

a HC that let's his Coordinators coach and his talent play.

 

11 hours ago, bigbird said:

enough flexibility and creativity to put the players into the best position for them to suceed

You just nailed the 3 biggest problems in our football program. Unfortunately after seeing it for 5 years, I'm beginning to finally understand, it's not changing. under Gus.

[jAUSon 2,836]

I'm sort of beyond wins and losses these years, I think our schedule murks our ability to gauge ourselves. I just keep longing to see some changes. Come out opening day slashing. Find the right weapons in camp instead of week three. Actually train a quarterback. In game adjustments. Stop forfieting games by proxy, because the plan has failed, even when the players are up to the task. Give actual offensive experience for qb2 in mop-up. On and On and On.

To me the trouble isn't the wins and losses. It's that the majority of our losses dating back to Clemson '16 (toss in UGA '14) have an asterisk beside them- they look like shoulda-wons, and there was an argument to be made that they were each coaching boondoggles. 

So far nothing really has changed.

Still, amazingly his ceiling is 15-0.