Harsin and the PTB

[slyinsocal 831]

17 minutes ago, Mikey said:

Just what this board needed: Another self-proclaimed expert.

[au302 2,669]

While maybe not initially, I think we may be letting Harsin run the program right now without interference. Thoughts on other sites that the General is behind him and giving him basically whatever he wants. I have no insight, am most likely completely off base here. Just my own inferences from reading around. For better or worse, we're too far down the rabbit hole with him overhauling the program and need to stick it out at this point. Gotta stomach it for three years and then see where you're at, barring a 2012 like season next year

[AuCivilEng1 11,007]

6 hours ago, TigerHorn said:

I'd say it's more likely that the truth is unpleasant for Mason fans. CDM probably got absolutely shredded for his defensive collapse against MSU and failure vs USCe, didn't like it, and hit the road. He has enough money, he doesn't have to work, and he showed how little work he can put in against MSU. 

SC scored 21 on us. We scored 17. If Harsin shredded Mason after the SC game I would have told him to go **** himself and walked off right then. 

[Farmer Brown 2,391]

Too many people here are striving for relevance. I will remain irrelevant, and just say I don't know why Mason left. Mason is gone. Harsin is here. I will support him before others. It will not change his coaching trajectory one bit, whether I support him or not. Some are giving him one year and he had better win. If not, he will be gone, and not one of them will have any impact on whether he goes or stays. No one here is that important. There are a few here, who have some insight into the workings at Auburn, and it's easy to figure out who they are. It isn't Mikey or aught2win. These kind of ramblings have come to dominate this board. I don't know why I even clicked on this thread. Some of the knowledgeable guys seem to be suspiciously absent, lately. That is a lot of rambling on my part. but it makes as much sense as the rest of it. Over and out. LOL 

[WarEagleT 122]

1 hour ago, Didba said:

People on this board seriously underestimate how hard it is to defend a well coached NFL style offensive and defensive scheme.  This was #1 reason I was so excited to for Harsin at Auburn because I truly believe in teaching NFL scheme at the college level is the recipe for success.

Yep it’s the most highly evolved form of scheme if you have the coaches who can teach it. Saban, Kiffen, and Kirby all get it. 
 

[slyinsocal 831]

This might do the trick for Harsin. After all, this lifetime "Northerner" pulled it off......

 

[Revjb 0]

Just a thought; and it may have already been posted if so sorry to duplicate. But if the PTB were working behind the scenes to remove Gus; why wouldn’t they be behind the scene trying to influence other former HC’s on staff and CBH found out. 

[TeamZero77 1,784]

I'll be so happy when Auburn starts winning again so that these gloom and doom Harsin haters will go back into hiding because they've taken over most of these threads since the Mississippi State game. Funny how most of them rarely posted when we were 6-2 and had just beaten Arkansas and Ole Miss both by double digits. When we were 40th in recruiting and they all were negative and saying "I told y'all Harsin can't recruit the south" and then we ended up around 10th or 12th on early signing day, all they wanted to talk about then was how he still didn't get O-line guys and went to heavy on the defensive side of the ball. It never ends with these people. Anybody else notice how those certain members never chime in on the basketball threads? It probably kills them to see Bruce and our team kicking butt this year and for the past 5 years. But if he has a slip up and things even look a little bit bad, those gloom and doomed will be there ready to pounce!!! 

[WarEagleT 122]

1 hour ago, cbo said:

He hasn't landed anywhere yet. Again, he may even opt to take a year off. We will see how it works out in the end. 

Oh, and Oklahoma State won 12 games last year. Beat the #5 team in the Fiesta Bowl. Finished 7th.

So if Mason is the hot thing let’s see if he makes a difference in a conference where offenses rule. I’ll take the scheme from our new DC developed for Bama vs the zone and soft secondary coverage Mason used that was destroyed by Leach and others. 

[cbo 7,848]

1 hour ago, gman87 said:

You may have felt he was a home run hire but my attitude was more along the lines of "it makes sense I guess, could have done worse, maybe it works out".

If I recall, we were trying to get Venebels which would have been a home run hire.

Venables is now the head coach at Oklahoma. He was never going to leave Clemson to be a DC anywhere. If that’s your definition of a home run hire, you will never see one. 

[AUght2win 6,837]

5 hours ago, au302 said:

No one knows, but my personal guesses...

1. You're probably right. They probably weren't "forced", but maybe encouraged. That could be from a number of sources. Boosters, coaches that know both Harsin/Mason, maybe a common agent? Maybe it was just Harsin.

2. It seems like he may have been desperate to leave Boise. Think he and the admin were arguing pretty badly about moving up in conference, possible season cancellation due to covid in the MWC, etc. Published emails with him clearly pissed off. Think he may have simply felt like he reached his limit there.

3. Why are you comparing position coaches to the old coordinators? Let's assume you meant Schmed and Davis. Schmed is his dude. Supposedly an aggressive coordinator, which fits his mantra more than conservative Mason. Davis seems similar to a typical Harsin OC hire. Young guy that he can mold himself (Hamdan, Drink, Zak Hill). 

4. If Derek Mason was actually repulsed by how Harsin runs the program, should we take that as a negative? I mean, I like DM as a person and coordinator, but he was horrible at Vandy, even for their standards. Bobo also failed miserably at Colorado State. Coaches have egos, so maybe hard for two SEC veterans to take criticism from a younger newcomer in Harsin who is a very blunt guy? We'll never know, but hopefully the ship gets steadied.

Good stuff.

The point with 3 is to counter the argument that now CBH has expunged all of his "non-guys" that he didn't want. If that was the case, the new position coaches would be from the Boise tree.

Disagree big time on 4. Vandy has been to 9 bowl games in 130 years of football. CDM took them to 2, and did it when it's never been harder to win in the SEC. Guy can coach. 

[AUght2win 6,837]

5 hours ago, Didba said:

Another thing I'd like to point out as fans we are emotionally invested but for many players, and coaches. Football is business and they treat it like a business in everything they do.  For people like Harsin and Mason parting ways could be just another aspect of the football business no different then a CEO and a CFO parting ways in a corporation.  These guys put 0 emotion into their business. "its business, nothing personal" sounds hokey but sometimes that really is all it was.  Just business.

lol

[AUght2win 6,837]

2 hours ago, gman87 said:

Buddy, home run hire is about as far from the truth as you can get. It was a decent hire due to the fact Mason did good work as DC at Stanford and was a pretty good HC for Vandy with presumably SEC recruiting connections. But let's not pretend we were fighting off NFL teams for his services. He may have become an analyst at $puat or another mid-level SEC team had we not hired him. Bobo was hired for more recruiting than mad OC skills. Neither were great hires, Bobo less so than Mason but seriously.....

I can't believe people are seriously making this argument. That's a different way to cope. 

Derek Mason was absolutely a home run hire. He almost went to LSU last season and took a hard look at the NFL. In what terms or context is CDM anything other than a great hire for a coordinator spot???

[AUght2win 6,837]

2 hours ago, gman87 said:

You are ASSUMING he wanted out.

That is one of 3 options. 

He wanted out.

He wasn't wanted.

Some of both.

You have a 33.3% chance of being right because the people that know obviously don't feel YOU need to be told on a public forum and the ones that don't can only give their opinion.....which is exactly all you are doing.

Facts are facts and one of them is CDM's defense sh*t the bed against MSU. I wanted him gone after that fustercluck.

Most likely is he wasn't getting it done to CBH's expectations, much like Bobo, but was given a graceful exit because he's a decent coach and good guy.

Gooootcha.

Man. I didn't realize how the whole donor thing worked. I've been meaning to donate for a while but didn't know there was actually a different board.

No wonder this place has gone absolutely downhill. 

[AUght2win 6,837]

2 hours ago, Farmer Brown said:

Last I checked, he hasn't been hired as the DC for Okie State, unless I missed it. You are grasping for straws. 

Just saw a pic of him in the Stillwater airport with Gundy. I'd say that's essentially a done deal unless CDM doesn't want it.

Also reported by Auburn beat writers that he was confirmed on Okie State campus last week.

Edited January 24, 2022 by AUght2win

[AUght2win 6,837]

1 hour ago, AuCivilEng1 said:

SC scored 21 on us. We scored 17. If Harsin shredded Mason after the SC game I would have told him to go **** himself and walked off right then. 

Mason was brilliant aside from 2 performances - PSU and MSU.

Penn State, there is no excuse. MSU was in large part due to Bobo's ineptitude continually putting the D back on the field 3 and out after 3 and out. 

59 minutes and 3 points against Bama. No touchdowns in college Station. 17 on the road in Columbia. Shut down Corral and Kiffin. And even in the bowl we held them to 17 dead gum points. 

[AUght2win 6,837]

1 hour ago, Farmer Brown said:

Too many people here are striving for relevance. I will remain irrelevant, and just say I don't know why Mason left. Mason is gone. Harsin is here. I will support him before others. It will not change his coaching trajectory one bit, whether I support him or not. Some are giving him one year and he had better win. If not, he will be gone, and not one of them will have any impact on whether he goes or stays. No one here is that important. There are a few here, who have some insight into the workings at Auburn, and it's easy to figure out who they are. It isn't Mikey or aught2win. These kind of ramblings have come to dominate this board. I don't know why I even clicked on this thread. Some of the knowledgeable guys seem to be suspiciously absent, lately. That is a lot of rambling on my part. but it makes as much sense as the rest of it. Over and out. LOL 

Yeah this board has become insufferable. Used to there would be legitimate debate, insight offered, and opinions, at the very least, tolerated. Now you have people such as yourself, Didba, provibe, etc. that just make this place terrible for conversation.

You can go look at my track record as a poster. I've never once gone to a thread and complained about its existence. I've never discouraged people from wanting to talk about Auburn football or ask questions. There's been a stark change in participation and lack of substantive discussion. 

If the decent stuff really is on the donor side, @DidbaI'm totally down. You guys have made a miserable impact on what's left on this side.

[slyinsocal 831]

7 hours ago, AUBwins said:

Can somebody sum this up?  I'll hang up and listen, thanks.

[Didba 5,256]

31 minutes ago, AUght2win said:

Yeah this board has become insufferable. Used to there would be legitimate debate, insight offered, and opinions, at the very least, tolerated. Now you have people such as yourself, Didba, provibe, etc. that just make this place terrible for conversation.

You can go look at my track record as a poster. I've never once gone to a thread and complained about its existence. I've never discouraged people from wanting to talk about Auburn football or ask questions. There's been a stark change in participation and lack of substantive discussion. 

If the decent stuff really is on the donor side, @DidbaI'm totally down. You guys have made a miserable impact on what's left on this side.

 

[BJCrawford 1,568]

1 hour ago, AUght2win said:

Mason was brilliant aside from 2 performances - PSU and MSU.

Penn State, there is no excuse. MSU was in large part due to Bobo's ineptitude continually putting the D back on the field 3 and out after 3 and out. 

59 minutes and 3 points against Bama. No touchdowns in college Station. 17 on the road in Columbia. Shut down Corral and Kiffin. And even in the bowl we held them to 17 dead gum points. 

Not going to argue about the offense and actually not the defense so much, BUT Kiffin handed that game to us with those bone headed calls and not taking points. They had close to 500 yards on us….and Ga state was not exactly stellar.  I have no opinion as to how great mason is. Hasn’t been a DC in 7 years.  

[auburnphan 6,050]

5 hours ago, AUght2win said:

Good stuff.

The point with 3 is to counter the argument that now CBH has expunged all of his "non-guys" that he didn't want. If that was the case, the new position coaches would be from the Boise tree.

Disagree big time on 4. Vandy has been to 9 bowl games in 130 years of football. CDM took them to 2, and did it when it's never been harder to win in the SEC. Guy can coach. 

The SEC East was down his entire tenure and there are more bowl games than ever.

[Hay Field 101 630]

4 hours ago, Didba said:

 

That's better because if they ever run out of face palms and Ha Ha's you want anything left to post. 

[ThurstontheWelshCorgi 576]

7 hours ago, AuCivilEng1 said:

SC scored 21 on us. We scored 17. If Harsin shredded Mason after the SC game I would have told him to go **** himself and walked off right then. 

especially with that 4th and 1 disaster call --

that said .. I think we gave up a TD to them on a 4th down screen play to their running back but nothing about that game should have lead to a shredding of the d coordinator -- the game before, sure.

[meh130 1,043]

Regarding Mason. There was some criticism of Mason early on, based on the fact he was a DC in a PAC-12 school which is not in the same category as SEC or B1G football. He had defensive issues at Vandy, and for a significant part of his tenure, he was both HC and DC.

I lost faith in Mason during the Georgia State game. There was something very wrong with our defense and our game plan in that game. While our season defensive stats may look good, GSU and MSU exposed serious scheme and game plan issues. The use of a 3-man rush against MSU was a real eye-opener.

Obviously, the defense was adapted for the Iron Bowl. Who was responsible for that? Who knows?

Why was Mason hired in the first place? I think because he had SEC experience, the thought was he would benefit recruiting. Same with Bobo.

Did the PTB force Mason on Harsin? I doubt it. Whenever a new coach comes into a new geography, they need to hire some assistants in that geography. That explains Mason, Bobo, and Cornelius Williams.

Obviously, there were mismatches there.

Did the PTB force Bobo on Harsin? Possibly, as Bobo's name had come up as the likely OC for Steele, if Steele got the job.

This churn does not bother me. I think Mason's defensive scheme was too much for our existing players to adapt to, and misused their skillsets. I think Mason figured that out over time, and changed his game plans. But it many have been too little, too late.

What does bother me is the continued lack of recruiting in the offensive line. That simply has to be fixed, or the offense will not improve. We lost 5 games by 28 points or less, 4 games by 24 points or less, and three games by 21 points or less. In 3 of those games, one additional touchdown would have won them.

[ThurstontheWelshCorgi 576]

8 hours ago, TeamZero77 said:

I'll be so happy when Auburn starts winning again so that these gloom and doom Harsin haters will go back into hiding because they've taken over most of these threads since the Mississippi State game. Funny how most of them rarely posted when we were 6-2 and had just beaten Arkansas and Ole Miss both by double digits. When we were 40th in recruiting and they all were negative and saying "I told y'all Harsin can't recruit the south" and then we ended up around 10th or 12th on early signing day, all they wanted to talk about then was how he still didn't get O-line guys and went to heavy on the defensive side of the ball. It never ends with these people. Anybody else notice how those certain members never chime in on the basketball threads? It probably kills them to see Bruce and our team kicking butt this year and for the past 5 years. But if he has a slip up and things even look a little bit bad, those gloom and doomed will be there ready to pounce!!! 

when you're on a 5 game losing skid and have players going live on social media dumping on the coach / primary and ancillary coaches being fired / leaving, than you're going to have to expect an enormous swarm of "hey just what the h*ll is going on here". The only remedy is to win and robby Ashford could be just what doctor Harsin needs otherwise goodbye boss.