There's a certain arrogance among some of the VN that Tennessee can and should land a coach who will make a "big splash."
Who the hell are we, anyway? Take a step back and do some subjective and honest self-evaluation. Sure, we have a huge stadium, lots of games on TV, a great fan base, great facilities, etc. But being in the SEC cuts both ways. It's an elite conference, but the competition is the toughest there is.
When Saban arrived at LSU, he talked about how many great players from Louisiana he had seen in the NFL, and said he could build a winner just by keeping the state's best talent in Red Stick. He proved to be correct. Conversely, Tennessee cannot rely on in-state talent alone, and the situation has been exacerbated by the closing of our pipelines to neighboring states.
Tennessee has two national titles and was a dominant team in the 90's when it wasn't playing Florida, Penn St. and Nebraska, but it is not in the uppermost echelon that includes the likes of USC, Notre Dame, Ohio St., Michigan, Texas, Oklahoma, Nebraska and Alabama. Sure, some of those programs have had down cycles and a couple are down now, but in the overall history of college football, Tennessee is not in the "first tier". Sorry if the truth hurts, but there it is.
So, why would Tennessee be the dream job for any coach who would be classified as a "home run" as soon as his hiring was announced? And what business do we have expecting it to be?
True, enough money might land a big fish, but I'd see such a guy as mercenary after nothing more than a fat check and a chance to massage his ego by pointing at Tennessee 5 or so years down the road and saying "Look what I did". Such a coach would end up looking at UT as a ticket punch on the way to an even bigger gig, and the only positive thing about his stay in K-town, other than the W's, would be to elevate the attractiveness of the HC job at UT. If we can pull off such a thing, then more power to us, but somehow I can't picture any of the heavy hitters picking up the phone after the CPF firing presser to call their agents and direct them to open the back-channels of communication.
As much as I'd love to see Cowher or Gruden roaming the sidelines clad in orange, I can't picture that with my head out of the clouds. When it comes down to it, the hire will be more of who we can get than who we want to get. And I'd rather it wasn't someone who had to be lured here with $$$. I'd like it to be a guy to saw Hammy pull the trigger and said to himself, "I want to be the next head coach at Tennessee" before the first feelers ever came his way.
Great coaches don't just suddenly fall out of the sky, they have to make the journey. Perhaps the best we can hope for is that Hammy gets it right and our guy becomes "the next great coach".
I sure as hell don't want to go through a Zook before we get to a Meyer, or worse, go through the Alabama experience, but let's be realistic. Our next coach is going to be a dice roll that not everyone will be enthusiastic about.