Who should our next HC be?

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Stone Cold said:
I want you all to try and understand something.  No one is wanting to walk into this s#!tshow, not anyone who is currently a successfull head coach at a drama free program.  Not ISU, Not Kentucky, Not Cincinniti, no one and why would they.  So you all better hope its Urban, because if its not him its going to be another unproven one and we all know how well all of that worked.
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I agree 100%. The only guys I could see coming who are currently head coaches elsewhere are ones who may feel they've reached their ceiling at their current school, which I guess is why Campbell is such a hot name.

 
Campbell has no national recruiting appeal sufficient to reenergize Neb.  That takes a bright star.   Campbell offers little more than Riley.   MJ likely a better choice.  
 

Whipple has a good offense.  He should stay unless Trev wants to seriously revive Neb FB with a Osbone 4.0 or something.  Whip might be able to run such but he hasn’t ever wanted to apparently.   
 

Trev needs to get a good set of parameters from the booster boys who have to fund recruiting, NIL, the cars, etc., and the jets.  Do they want 10 win NU in the future when Big Ten becomes BIGGER 20?   The road to championships is going to as difficult as ever. But undefeated won’t be a requirement.  11 or 12 reg season wins and a loss or two can suffice to get a playoff spot.  
 

Big time program requires big time coaching and all the rest.  

 
Some of y'all don't seem to grasp the concept of "odds of being successful" and just want to cherry-pick data points for whatever fits your argument. When you just look at pure "odds of being successful" based on total body of work, as far as realistic (maybe semi-realistic) candidates, it's Urban and everyone else is a distant second. If you can't see that, I don't know what to tell you because it's not even close. I don't care if you want to cherry-pick, "but he's 58" or "but Florida and Ohio St aren't the same as Nebraska" or whatever. He's got the best "odds of being successful" by a long shot. Does that mean he's a sure thing? No, there's no such thing. Hell, we could hire Saban and he may fizzle out because Nebraska just wasn't the right fit or he's gotten old and complacent or whatever. But the odds are best with Urban and that shouldn't even be up for debate.

That's not to say someone else can't be successful, but the odds go way down. Could an up-and-comer like Matt Campbell or Lance Leipold be the next Saban and Iowa State/KU is their Sparty? Sure. But for the few of those that hit, there are a ton more who never even come close. They could work, they just have a lot lower odds of working than Urban. A LOT lower.

Of the names I've seen thrown around, plus or minus a pro or con here or there, pretty much everyone after Urban has about the same odds of being successful. I've seen a lot of arguments for and against all of them and it really comes down to all of them being a total crap shoot. And I just can't get excited about (m)any of them because the result will most likely just be rinse and repeat of more of what we've been going through. None of them has a differentiating quality that move the needle much at all.

Which is probably why I'm all in on Deion Sanders after Urban. At least he's got some differentiating qualities that would excite me. He may be a bigger risk than the rest of the prospects (not by much) but he's also got a lot more upside if he does work. At least our recruiting would instantly skyrocket (can't honestly say that for any of the others). And even if we miss on him, which we're likely to do with any of them, at least he'd be entertaining as hell along the way and have Nebraska instantly in the spotlight once again. Something we haven't had in forever.

 
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The Scarlet Pimpernel said:
The main thing I don't like about Campbell is the inconsistency with his teams. One week they'll beat a top 10 team, and then the following week lose to a cellar-dweller. 
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Is the bolded actually correct?  I looked at his record from his record from his fourth year on because the majority of the players should have been his players.  In 2019, he went 7-6.  All but two of the teams he lost to were ranked in the top 15 at seasons end but two.  Those were KState who finished 8-5 and Okie State who finished 8-5.  I wouldn't call either of those two teams cellar-dweller.  All games lost in 19' were close games with the exception of Notre Dame in the bowl game.  In 2020, he went 9-3.  The three teams he lost to all finished in the top 20 at seasons end.  In 2021, he finished 7-6.  All but two of the teams he lost to were ranked in the top 25 at seasons end but two.  Those were West Virginia who finished 6-7 and Texas Tech who finished 7-6.  At Iowa State with his players, he has yet to lose to a team that wasn't bowl eligible.  He has only lost once to a team that finished the season with a losing record.  He has one top 10 finish.  Iowa State won just four conference games in the three seasons before Campbell became their coach.    

Since he's been at Iowa State, they've pretty much fallen into the 50th-60th ranked recruiting class per 247.  In terms of coaching, he's doing a really good job with the talent he has.  Now, here's where the arguments could be had.  Can he recruit better to Nebraska than he has at Iowa State?  Only time will tell, but it appears he's a much younger version of Bill Snyder.  I think it is also a positive that he played defensive lineman, and he has coached offensive linemen.  These are the two areas where we are the most lacking.  I wouldn't be disappointed if he's named the next coach.    

 
Red Five said:
He has between 8,000,000 and 10,000,000 reasons to come here.
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I don't know about $8M - $10M reasons. He's making $3.4M a year now and there's no way we're paying him between $11.4M and $13.4M, but I see your point. Not sure why anyone would assume he's not an option (unless I've missed something like him saying he's never leaving Cincinnati or something).

He's pretty easily in my top 3. He's been to the CFP and has tons of ties to the B1G area. He's got a much better resume than Campbell or Leipold or any of the other up-and-comers that I've seen mentioned.

 
Red Five said:
He has between 8,000,000 and 10,000,000 reasons to come here.
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Fickell's 2011 season as HC is somewhat similar to Mickey Joseph's 2022 season with the exception that Fickell was handed the keys to a ferrari and Joseph was handed the keys to a Ford Pinto.  Cincinnati was doing relatively well with the exception of the last year before Fickell was named HC.  Sounds similar to UCF don't you think?    

 
junior4949 said:
Is the bolded actually correct?  I looked at his record from his record from his fourth year on because the majority of the players should have been his players.  In 2019, he went 7-6.  All but two of the teams he lost to were ranked in the top 15 at seasons end but two.  Those were KState who finished 8-5 and Okie State who finished 8-5.  I wouldn't call either of those two teams cellar-dweller.  All games lost in 19' were close games with the exception of Notre Dame in the bowl game.  In 2020, he went 9-3.  The three teams he lost to all finished in the top 20 at seasons end.  In 2021, he finished 7-6.  All but two of the teams he lost to were ranked in the top 25 at seasons end but two.  Those were West Virginia who finished 6-7 and Texas Tech who finished 7-6.  At Iowa State with his players, he has yet to lose to a team that wasn't bowl eligible.  He has only lost once to a team that finished the season with a losing record.  He has one top 10 finish.  Iowa State won just four conference games in the three seasons before Campbell became their coach. 
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That's a lot of "all buts" and "exception ofs". Now do Frost.

 
junior4949 said:
Fickell's 2011 season as HC is somewhat similar to Mickey Joseph's 2022 season with the exception that Fickell was handed the keys to a ferrari and Joseph was handed the keys to a Ford Pinto.  Cincinnati was doing relatively well with the exception of the last year before Fickell was named HC.  Sounds similar to UCF don't you think?    
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Yeah, let's just ignore what Fickell has accomplished in the 10 years since then. And no, Ohio State wasn't a Ferrari that year. They were a s#!t-show. Not as bad a s#!t show as Nebraska right now, but it was a mess that Fickell was asked keep on the rails for that one lame duck season. There's a reason Urban kept him on after that and it wasn't because he sucked.

 
junior4949 said:
Is the bolded actually correct?  I looked at his record from his record from his fourth year on because the majority of the players should have been his players.  In 2019, he went 7-6.  All but two of the teams he lost to were ranked in the top 15 at seasons end but two.  Those were KState who finished 8-5 and Okie State who finished 8-5.  I wouldn't call either of those two teams cellar-dweller.  All games lost in 19' were close games with the exception of Notre Dame in the bowl game.  In 2020, he went 9-3.  The three teams he lost to all finished in the top 20 at seasons end.  In 2021, he finished 7-6.  All but two of the teams he lost to were ranked in the top 25 at seasons end but two.  Those were West Virginia who finished 6-7 and Texas Tech who finished 7-6.  At Iowa State with his players, he has yet to lose to a team that wasn't bowl eligible.  He has only lost once to a team that finished the season with a losing record.  He has one top 10 finish.  Iowa State won just four conference games in the three seasons before Campbell became their coach.    

Since he's been at Iowa State, they've pretty much fallen into the 50th-60th ranked recruiting class per 247.  In terms of coaching, he's doing a really good job with the talent he has.  Now, here's where the arguments could be had.  Can he recruit better to Nebraska than he has at Iowa State?  Only time will tell, but it appears he's a much younger version of Bill Snyder.  I think it is also a positive that he played defensive lineman, and he has coached offensive linemen.  These are the two areas where we are the most lacking.  I wouldn't be disappointed if he's named the next coach.    
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Good read. People just like talking out of their a$$ and say things they don’t think anyone will research and call them out on.

Facts don’t matter to many. It’s all “this side good” and “that side bad”.

 
Red Silk Smoking Jacket said:
Some of y'all don't seem to grasp the concept of "odds of being successful" and just want to cherry-pick data points for whatever fits your argument. When you just look at pure "odds of being successful" based on total body of work, as far as realistic (maybe semi-realistic) candidates, it's Urban and everyone else is a distant second. If you can't see that, I don't know what to tell you because it's not even close. I don't care if you want to cherry-pick, "but he's 58" or "but Florida and Ohio St aren't the same as Nebraska" or whatever. He's got the best "odds of being successful" by a long shot. Does that mean he's a sure thing? No, there's no such thing. Hell, we could hire Saban and he may fizzle out because Nebraska just wasn't the right fit or he's gotten old and complacent or whatever. But the odds are best with Urban and that shouldn't even be up for debate.

That's not to say someone else can't be successful, but the odds go way down. Could an up-and-comer like Matt Campbell or Lance Leipold be the next Saban and Iowa State/KU is their Sparty? Sure. But for the few of those that hit, there are a ton more who never even come close. They could work, they just have a lot lower odds of working than Urban. A LOT lower.

Of the names I've seen thrown around, plus or minus a pro or con here or there, pretty much everyone after Urban has about the same odds of being successful. I've seen a lot of arguments for and against all of them and it really comes down to all of them being a total crap shoot. And I just can't get excited about (m)any of them because the result will most likely just be rinse and repeat of more of what we've been going through. None of them has a differentiating quality that move the needle much at all.

Which is probably why I'm all in on Deion Sanders after Urban. At least he's got some differentiating qualities that would excite me. He may be a bigger risk than the rest of the prospects (not by much) but he's also got a lot more upside if he does work. At least our recruiting would instantly skyrocket (can't honestly say that for any of the others). And even if we miss on him, which we're likely to do with any of them, at least he'd be entertaining as hell along the way and have Nebraska instantly in the spotlight once again. Something we haven't had in forever.
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Enjoyed your thoughts ... but of course, I'd be willing to stomach Urban.  I don't think he would be that bad.

Here's what I'd do.  I'd see if he would bite on something like what Frost was given.  Maybe, just a bit more.  Now, before you throw stones ... please, let me finish.

From there, I'd make a contract that was filled with incentives.  In that would be a bonus for B1G conferene record, a bonus for winning the East side of the conference, a bonus for winning the B1G and on upwards.  I'd also put a bonus in there for a timeline on the turn around.  In all this, I would make it specific to a period of years being around 3-4.  

I haven't really seen a contract for a coach that would be really geared more toward a "performance contract".  I would set out a course for his record and then as well a few aspects related to character and the state of the program that will be maintained [and bonuses there as well].

Because he has a shorter window ... and a successful track record, this is how I would take on Urban as a coach that I think provides some necessary safe guards.

Would/will that happen ... I doubt it!  It's at least a view and an idea.

 
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