Behold the pale horse. The man who sat on him was death, and Hell followed with him.
Olevet Posse Pistolero
Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize 2015.
The monster shrugs and says...meh.
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
I've been disappointed by OU football in the Stoops era too many times that I'm to the point that I should never expect the Sooners to win another national title until it actually happens.
I think Bob Stoops is a good coach, I don't know if a new coach would do any better, but there comes a point where a change has to be made, whether that's expectations or coaches.
I realize it's very hard to win a College Football National Title, but you can't keep using that excuse year after year, especially when it's going on 15 years now.
Something has to change.
Hmmm. "Is" being a singular verb, I guess that means that only one OU fan is faithful - so I guess that's me. Am I satisfied? No. But if the alternative is to have no ethics, then make that a yes.
For any of the non-faithful, there are less-than-ethical teams/programs/coaches aplenty out there. 'Bama's always looking for more bandwagon fans, and you can keep all your crimson gear.
And before anybody wonders if I am saying that nobody should post anything negative, blah-blah-blah, I am not. I am responding to a question that, considered grammatically, was being directed solely to myself, as "the OU faithful."
And they say grammar isn't important. Hah!
How do you know if you get there, if you don't know where you are going?..oh and I had 1,713 post on the "other board"..I hate being a rookie again!
The current state of OU football program is that it is spinning it's wheels.
The original subject of this thread is exactly right, OU hasn't been in serious national title contention since 2008. Since then the Sooner Nation has been forced to live through 2-3 loss seasons. I'm not someone who expects a national title every year, but you can't keep using the excuse of it's hard to win one year after year.
Something has to change, expectations or coaches.
I just state a general truism of how anyone earns their pay. I don't know what the goals used to be or what they are now. My guess is that it is more related to revenue than winning percentage. It's great that OU has built this big money machine in the entertainment industry, but the cost of running that machine is high as well. If revenue from TV/tickets/merchandise wane, it won't take long for the costs of staff, facilities, equipment, scholarships etc, to become red ink. Fan displeasure is directly tied to W/L and is a leading indicator, but the revenue flow is a trailing indicator as it takes a while for that emotion to close wallets.
I think it is a mistake to assume that NC's are the be all and end all of what makes a great coach. 10-3 for the year is pretty good. If you have 10 -3, 11-2 type seasons year after year then you become considered one of the best. Check and see how many coaches can do this. It's not unique to football. In baseball if you hit 35-40 home runs you won't win a home run title. You hit 35-40 home runs for 12-15 years you end up in the Hall of Fame
Two points:
1. 10-3 is a pretty good year. Does Bob get paid "pretty good" money or really, really good money? He is second only to Saban, so I would argue the latter. So it seems incongruous to keep getting paid really really good money for a string of pretty good years.
2. Unless things have changed, I thought OU was a heritage program that expected to regularly compete for National Titles. Not expected to win one each year, or every two years, or even every three years or four years. But it's now been 6 years since OU competed deep into November for a National Title. I would classify a 6 year dearth as HIGHLY irregular.
OU was #7 in football revenue in 2013, so you could argue Stoops is a little high by that measure. But that's actually a pretty good number considering (if I'm correct) that our conference payouts are not as good as the deal the SEC got. Saban is also a bit high as Bama was #3 in football revenue but Saban is the highest paid coach by a good bit. So clearly resume over time is a factor as well. Strong and Sumlin are right up their with Stoops on pay - would you prefer they coach OU? Oh, wait. You think recent W/L records are the only thing determines pay. Nevermind.
BTW, I'm sure you realize there are some hefty bonuses in Stoops (and staff) contract directly tied to the current year's results. Wins, conference titles, quality of bowl invite, bowl win, and I'm sure the BCS title has been rewritten to cover the new playoff format. Those bonuses are cut and dried and immediate in impact.
I'm not sure what you would want done here. Bob Stoops, like other coach's contracts, are forward based not drafted on how the current season is going. They might have some incentives built in but that would be spelled out in the individual contracts. I seriously doubt that even if you could do it that cutting Bob Stoops salary would in any way be helpful to putting a better team on the field do you? There are so many other variables that the administration considers as important as any season's W-L record. Graduation rates and running a clean program. Urban Meyer won two NC's at Florida but left scorched earth that Florida is still trying to recover from, and they have the built in advantage of being in one of the best recruiting grounds in the country.
While we all here may love Norman I don't think we give much thought to the task at hand to get West Coast Kids or the Florida Kids to put Oklahoma on their radar. To Texas kids a little easier sell but still stiff competition. Once they get here most are glad they did. The fact that OU is a premiere program makes the recruiting job easier to be sure. I would think it's much easier to recruit to a 10-3 team where these recruits could envision themselves being the difference in a in 10-3 and a NC type team.
This is where I think continuity and putting a good team on the field is critical even if it isn't NC caliber. Going all in for the brass ring by bringing in the latest hot coaching commodity has by in large not been successful for most teams and the ones where it has been successful have not had much of a choice or their previous coaches were less than stellar. To this point only two head modern era coaches have picked OU up off of the mat and brought them back to National prominence. One is dead and the other is our current coach.
I guess my point is, that all factors considered, Bob Stoops string of good years does warrant his pay. Even if it didn't the contract has been signed so that is something that would need be addressed next contract negotiation if the brass felt he wasn't performing as expected.
Bob's salary will never be cut. It may stagnate as well as missing out on incentive bonuses, but it won't be restructured. If it is deemed he is not doing his job, he will either quit or be encouraged to retire ala Mack Brown.
All these points are good and well received. And having considered them, it helps me focus on what REALLY bothers me about this year. The sense…actually the reality, that the coaches just don't have the act together. The best example is the continued sloppy/inefficient use of coach-called timeouts this season. Sometimes it's been to avoid a penalty because a player didn't line up correctly….sometimes it's been because the play wasn't relayed down quickly enough and the play clock was about to expire. Whatever the case, it's been unmistakeable how OU has been burning through the timeouts. And when this happens, I can't be the only one thinking, "Geez, what does $5.2 million/year buy in coaches nowadays?" At the very least shouldn't that include mastery of the basics. What if you checked in to a Four Seasons and there was no ironing board or iron in your room? Wouldn't you think, "WTF?"
Snrnhouston, at least you're doggedly consistent. What is it with Stoops pay? Are you writing the checks? I would expect good organization and management from any coach at OU to maintain a high level program. I don't really give a ratz azz if he is paid $10M or the lowest of all D1 coaches. I would expect that as part of the requirements of being the coach at OU. But then, I am not writing the checks, so there's that.