College Football Hall of Fame INSERTS The Pirate

#26
#26
05_never_again said:
Unpopular take...I love Leach, but his record isn't that of a HOFer.
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One of the very few times that impact>winning

I agree he’s not a HOF coach in the traditional sense but every single FBS college football offense involves some version of what he ran. It’s impossible to overstate his impact on the game.
 
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#27
#27
zjcvols said:
One of the very few times that impact>winning

I agree he’s not a HOF coach in the traditional sense but every single FBS college football offense involves some version of what he ran. It’s impossible to overstate his impact on the game.
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Exactly this.
 
#28
#28
05_never_again said:
Why did he never have a big job, then? I guess it is possible he never wanted one, but I kind of doubt that because he was going to come to Knoxville until they pulled the plug on Currie. I think university admins were scared (and perhaps wrongly) by the offense he ran and the fact that he never was a 100-hour-a-week recruiting warrior. His personality, while endearing to fans (at least when he was winning), I could see as being off-putting to well-heeled boosters or if the team started struggling. If he coached us, can you imagine if after a tough loss to Kentucky he showed up at a press conference talking about pirates or what his favorite Halloween candy was?

Leach was a good coach, but taking bad programs and making them decent or pretty good isn't HOF material. The HOF is the HOF...it should be reserved for the greatest coaches of all time, and I don't think Leach is one despite unquestionably having an impact on how offensive football is played and generally being hilarious.
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Trust me, I understand your point. I also fully agree that Leach was never going to be offered a big time college job as he was a wild card. Never knew what he was gonna say-and that makes ADs very uncomfortable.

I'm just saying you have to have a place for both the Sabans and the Leachs of the world.

If you're gonna punish a guy for way overachieving at TTU (but not by enough), then what's the point really? Many of the guys with win percentages way above 85% grossly underachieved in my eyes. Chief among them is Fulmer . To go on a run like UT did in the 90s and early 00s and only play for one NC is downright criminal.

Ryan Day is another one-although he has a few years grace period after last year. Hard for me to really look at the entirety of his OSU history and all the tools he had to play with and not say only playing for/winning one NC is underwhelming. Now, they could go on an Alabama like run for the next decade and completely change my thoughts on him, but it's not likely.
 
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#29
#29
05_never_again said:
Unpopular take...I love Leach, but his record isn't that of a HOFer.
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He’s not getting into the Hall of Fame based solely on his career as a head coach. It’s that, in addition to the impact of the spread offense, which he helped create, on the sport. It’s a lot like Tex Winter making the Basketball Hall of Fame because of the triangle offense.
 
#30
#30
Boston Vol said:
He’s not getting into the Hall of Fame based solely on his career as a head coach. It’s that, in addition to the impact of the spread offense, which he helped create, on the sport. It’s a lot like Tex Winter making the Basketball Hall of Fame because of the triangle offense.
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Tex Winter also had an incredible amount of success as an assistant coach and a great 15 year run at Kansas St.
 
#32
#32
Ask yourself if guys like Barry Alvarez, Mike Bellotti, and Mark Dantonio scream HOF? Leach had the prerequisite .600 prior to joining the SEC, which just so happened to be the Covid Year. So if you remove that chaotic year then he still meets the .600 requirement.
 
#33
#33
If I was the CFHOF I would have made more a reference about him being the "pirate", instead of changing the record needed. do something like he "broke in", and have some fun with it.
 
#34
#34
VolPack22 said:
Ask yourself if guys like Barry Alvarez, Mike Bellotti, and Mark Dantonio scream HOF? Leach had the prerequisite .600 prior to joining the SEC, which just so happened to be the Covid Year. So if you remove that chaotic year then he still meets the .600 requirement.
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Why wouldn’t those guys scream hall of fame? Alvarez took over a dead program and won three B10 titles and went 3-0 in Rose Bowls. Dantonio built the best MSU program since the 60s. Bellotti has the weakest of the three resumes, but he still did a damn good job at Oregon.
 
#35
#35
05_never_again said:
Tex Winter also had an incredible amount of success as an assistant coach and a great 15 year run at Kansas St.
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Winter is in the College Basketball Hall of Fame for what he did at KST. He’s in the Basketball Hall of Fame because of the triangle offense.
 
#36
#36
Boston Vol said:
Why wouldn’t those guys scream hall of fame? Alvarez took over a dead program and won three B10 titles and went 3-0 in Rose Bowls. Dantonio built the best MSU program since the 60s. Bellotti has the weakest of the three resumes, but he still did a damn good job at Oregon.
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Were any of those programs on the same level as Washington State?
 
#37
#37
VolPack22 said:
Were any of those programs on the same level as Washington State?
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I don’t know what you’re arguing. I’m not saying that Leach doesn’t belong in the HOF. Just that you using three guys who do belong as an example didn’t make a lot of sense in my opinion. And yes, I would say that when Alvarez was hired, Wisconsin was every bit as bad as WASU was when Leach took over.
 
#38
#38
SpookyAction said:
I did the math.
He was hired at BS programs and made them competitive and winners.

Texas Tech was 6-5 in 1999 when Spike Dykes retired. He had solid teams there. Leach took over and went 76-39, and was 11-2 his final season. He had that team ready to cause trouble in the BigXII.

WaST was 4-8 the year before Leach was hired. Went 55-36 . He won 8 or more games his last 4 seasons there. That program won 8 or more 4 other times since 2000. 3 of those were Mike Price.

He went 19-19 at MSSt. They were 6-7 the season before Leach was hired.

He was a good HC who won in places it is never easy. His legacy is all over CFB.
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Dan Mullen had more success at State.

His approach to play calling makes him a HOF. Not anything else.
 
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#39
#39
volfanhill said:
Dan Mullen had more success at State.

His approach to play calling makes him a HOF. Not anything else.
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Yeah. He hadn't turned them around yet.
I agree. His offense took hold for programs that needed an infusion of offense.

I think of it this way. Spurrier's passing game worked with blue chip talent. The Air Raid worked with average talent and an above average QB.
 
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#40
#40
SpookyAction said:
Yeah. He hadn't turned them around yet.
I agree. His offense took hold for programs that needed an infusion of offense.

I think of it this way. Spurrier's passing game worked with blue chip talent. The Air Raid worked with average talent and an above average QB.
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I'm not even sure Leach needed an above average QB-just a fairly smart one

His system was basically a forerunner of Heupels. The ability to process information quickly is the most important thing. Arms strength, etc is great but not vital.

Now when you can pair lightning quick decisions with a good arm, then magic can happen-as we saw when we drunkenly stumbled into two years of HH.
 
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