Okay, here's my opinion on why Gruden would be a good hire for UT. (Not that anyone cares, let's face it, we just all like to hear our own voice).
1) He does seem to have a love for the University. That's more than Dooley or Kiffin had, and certainly something that one can appreciate. Not that that makes him anything better than you or I, but it's better that then a guy who has no understanding of our tradition.
2) NFL experience does speak a lot. Even having a NFL coordinator as HC or a coordinator can sway a lot of recruits. Not to mention, you have seen what top talent is, and you have been paid to coach the pros. People are interested in learning from the ones who taught the best. When we had Charlie Baggett, imagine being a WR and hearing "Alright, now when Randy Moss struggled with this, here's how I helped him." It definitely has an undeniable appeal to it.
3) Gruden won a Super Bowl. As a head coach. Only 26 men can say that. He is one of them. He is among the ranks therefore, with John Madden, Mike Ditka, Tony Dungy, Dick Vermeil, Bill Cowher, Brian Billick, etc. You can say he won with Dungy's players, but Dungy didn't recruit those players. And to use that argument is moot, because he won the Super Bowl against the Raiders, who he had just coached. So if he won with Dungy's players, then he beat Gruden's players.
4) He is .540 in the NFL, including the playoffs. However, you must also realize, that's the NFL. If someone went .500 in college, that's pretty bad. Why? Because at least 3-4 games a year are cupcake games (Akron, Ga. State, etc.). Games you are supposed to win. If you're anybody, you're going to win at least 3 games a year against cupcakes. But in the NFL, there is really not a cupcake team. Maybe a team will struggle one year (Colts last year), but there's not a team that doesn't have players who are not good enough to get paid millions. There are no "gimme" games in the NFL. So, over his coaching career, given what he was dealt, .540 isn't that bad. Dooley is .449 in his coaching tenure here, and at least 9 of those wins came against Cupcakes (I counted Kentucky and Vandy as cupcakes), when you consider (Akron, GA. State, Vandy twice, KY once, Montana, Ut-Martin, MTSU, Memphis). I would expect much higher than .540 from Gruden with the schedules college plays.
5) He is the most recognizable available coach we could hire right now. He has a connection to the college game in Gruden's QB Camp. He has a large presence in Florida from his days at Tampa Bay, seeing as no other team from Florida has been to or won a Super Bowl since he did. He is recognizable from Monday Night Football as well, which you know tons of people see. People know that he knows what he is talking about. Instant recognition to recruits and parents. Thats HUGE.
6) NFL Connections. If he brought in some NFL coaches as coordinators and position coaches, then our influence goes way up. That was one thing that Kiffin was right on. The more NFL experience you can offer, the better.
7) The NFL, in order to be somewhat successful, you have to know how to gameplan and how to adapt. You have to know how to shut down Peyton Manning, or how to negate Troy Polamalu. You have to be able to exploit the Steeler's Defense, or stop the Patriots offense. And when someone stops you, you have to think how to utilitize your other pieces. It takes an incredible amount of knowledge of the game, and a brilliant mind. I think Gruden would bring that type of game plan and adjustments to the table to keep us in games.
8) Really, what are the major differences in college and pros? Yes, the talent is not as dense, as we recruit kids straight from high school, whereas they draft players after watching them play much tougher competition. Yes, there is recruiting. But I really don't think that Gruden would have a problem with that because of the aforementioned reasons. The schedule is not as difficult or as long as an NFL schedule. It would be possibly harder to implement schemes and styles with college kids, since they aren't practicing 10 hours a day. But I don't see the huge differences. I think if a coach can win on the NFL level, it would be easier to win on a college level, than vice versa. As long as they don't have the personality of a stick, they should be able to win some games.
All of course, just my opinion.