5 assistant hires that got a Vols head coach fired

#54
#54
Hasn't Trooper Taylor sort of vanished from the collective radar screen? I'm not buying that he would have been a slam-dunk hire in '08.

So many worried about Kiffin possibly being a problem with the NCAA, yet they hoped like hell Trooper would be a coordinator and he couldn’t be allowed to even stay on the road recruiting at Auburn . Somehow he is now on Cut’s staff.

I never saw his worth as an x’s and o’s guy.
 
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#55
#55
Fulmer giving Sanders the OC job and sticking with him when it was obvious to the rest of the world he was over his head was worse than his Clawson debacle.


I may not have known enough at the time to know if Sanders actually knew what he was doing, but I always did think then that sanders was a good OC mind that was just hand cuffed by Fulmer. Dunno. But, Sanders seems to have done well in all his positions elsewhere.
 
#56
#56
Are you serious? Look at Butch's staff in 2017. And don't forget, Shoop coming to UT was universally seen as a huge win for UT in 2016. Butch could've made a bigger hire with the OC but to say no one would come to UT is just wrong. Brady Hoke joining the staff was another high-profile coach on the staff.

Dooley's OC was Jim Cheney...you know the guy who is back at UT. His DC hire would've been Steele, IMO, hadn't Clemson giving up 70 points in the Orange Bowl to W. VA. Using a single game to determine whether a guy can play/coach, etc. is wrong, IMO.

Should have hired Steele anyway. Coaches have off days. You can’t win them all
 
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#57
#57
Amazing how much I dislike Butch Jones. He won exactly 1 SEC game during his time here without Josh Dobbs. He had Sam Pittman wanting to stay yet let him go for Don Mahoney. After the 2015 season where we almost won in Tuscaloosa, Bama says we were the toughest most physical team they faced. He then proceeds to run off Dave Lawson and hire Mike Szerchen who is now a trainer at a high school in Minnesota.

Well said
 
#58
#58
The offense's bad performance in 2008 was just the proximate cause of Phil's firing. The program had been slipping ever since 2001 because Richt, Urban, and Saban among others started eating Phil's lunch on the recruiting trail. You don't get fired because of one bad OC hire.

Phil's decline was a long, slow slip into mediocrity, not something that happened overnight.
Exactly!!!
 
#64
#64
Larry Scott LOL
If totally accurate, that was sobering. After the fact we now know the extent of the mess Butch oversaw. But if Helfrich was truly interested in signing up and installing a pure spread, and Butch balked because he needed a puppet to run that slow developing pro concept garbage he refused to tinker with? Nothing redeemable imo. Will always believe that DeBord had an agreement to implement the offset I into the offense...which would have benefitted Hurd, Kamara and Kelly. Defenders wouldn’t have been able to tee off on Hurd and Kamara would have been devastating running out of both sets with the defense off balance. They ran it 2-3 times during the season and no more. That’s why DeBord “retired” and took the Indiana OC job a month later imo. Butch had more than enough chances to get it right but he couldn’t overcome his nature.
 
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#67
#67
Fulmer giving Sanders the OC job and sticking with him when it was obvious to the rest of the world he was over his head was worse than his Clawson debacle.
Yep, could have hired any OC in the country and good ole Phil found after an exhaustive nationwide search the best OC in the country was on his staff.
 
#68
#68
Yep, could have hired any OC in the country and good ole Phil found after an exhaustive nationwide search the best OC in the country was on his staff.
Sanders did well during the NC game and tbf that modus operandi had served him well with Cut and Chavis. Until the last two seasons it appeared lightning had struck again. The only fault I’d give Fulmer is not recognizing that it was regressing. Theories abound that Fulmer second guessing and micromanaging contributed to the dysfunction...not fully subscribed. Next guy up policy hasn’t hobbled
Clemson.
 
#69
#69
I dont understand Marmie on the list. He was a good DC at Tennessee. Fulmer kept him from Majors staff and while the defense was never great, he did about as good as he could with the talent that was there then.

I guess you've gotta have 5? No assistant cost Majors to get fired. Johnny did that to himself.

The 82 defense with Reggie, Bill Bates and Mike Cofer was worst in the SEC under Bobby Jackson. Marmie came in and they went from worst to first in 83. Pretty damn good job I would say.
 
#70
#70
Tennessee football: 5 assistant hires that got a Vols head coach fired


1. Dave Clawson – 2008
Head Coach: Phillip Fulmer

Position: Offensive Coordinator

image



"We began this list with the hire of Phillip Fulmer undoing the career of Johnny Majors. Well, 16 years after Fulmer became Tennessee football’s head coach, his own offensive coordinator hire undid him.

Fulmer’s career in Knoxville was marked by stability. At his best in the 1990s, he had David Cutcliffe and John Chavis as offensive and defensive coordinators, two guys he promoted from within. When Cutcliffe left for the Ole Miss Rebels, Fulmer promoted Randy Sanders, who was there through 2005.

A bad 2005 season resulted in Sanders resigning, but Fulmer then was able to bring back Cutcliffe. So when Cutcliffe left after 2007 to take the Duke Blue Devils head coaching job, Fulmer decided to go national for the first time in his career. And it was a mistake.

Trooper Taylor, a highly successful assistant, had been studying under Cutcliffe. Fulmer should have stuck to his philosophy one year after a 10-win SEC East title season and promoted Taylor. Instead, he went for the splash.

That splash was an FCS coach in Dave Clawson. Now, Clawson, like we said with Larry Marmie, actually has a brilliant offensive mind. The problem is his emphasis on versatility and cerebral decision-making to get the ball in playmakers’ hands clashed with what Cutcliffe was doing the year before. Everywhere Clawson goes, the offense requires three years to get going.

So with Jonathan Crompton stepping in for Erik Ainge in 2008, disaster struck in this new offense. Tennessee football lost its opener to the UCLA Bruins. Then they lost 30-6 to the Florida Gators and 14-12 to the Auburn Tigers.

By midseason, they were 3-6, failing to break 10 points in three of their losses and failing to break 15 points five of them. Oh, and one of their wins was a 13-9 win over Northern Illinois. They couldn’t get things going at quarterback, alternating between Crompton and Nick Stephens.

The resulting disaster prompted Mike Hamilton to fire Fulmer. How did Tennessee football respond? They suffered their most embarrassing loss of the decade, falling 13-6 at home to the Wyoming Cowboys. The Vols won their final two games to finish 5-7 and send Fulmer off right, but this was a disastrous offense.

Clawson would actually go on to have success with the Bowling Green Falcons and is now thriving with the Wake Forest Demon Deacons. So he can actually coach. But he wasn’t the right fit for Tennessee football at that time. His scheme clashed with the personnel far too much, and it resulted in the Vols firing Fulmer and entering a decade of futility. So it tops this list."


For those of you that don't like slideshows here's the list

5. Phil Fulmer
4. Larry Scott
3. Larry Marmie
2. Sal Sunseri
1. Dave Clawson

Dooley and Butch's fortunes could and probably would have been very different if they had hired Steele and Helfrich. Dooley probably wins 9 or 10 games in 2012. Does Butch survive 2017 with Helfrich? The summer is long and I enjoy what if scenarios.





Sal Sunseri is in 1st Place, in my Book!
What a disaster to watch
 
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#71
#71
The 82 defense with Reggie, Bill Bates and Mike Cofer was worst in the SEC under Bobby Jackson. Marmie came in and they went from worst to first in 83. Pretty damn good job I would say.




You have an excellent point, great logic, sound good to me, last to first, will work all day long
 
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