When we think of failures we think of New Coke, the Magic Hour and the Carter administration. We think of those because they're highly publicized, highly visible examples of failure. They crashed and burned in a spectacular manner. What we don't think of are the lesser failures, those that peter out with nary a reverberation felt my most humanoids out there. Were we to chronicle these events in the annals of history, Maryland football would be deserving of at least a footnote in the chronicles. This post intends to examine the recent failures of the aforementioned program. To wit:
-Naming James Franklin as Head Coach in Waiting: Naming a head coach before firing the old one (or having him announce his retirement) is an odd proposition to begin with. It may make sense when you're FSU and you hire a Jimbo Fisher and everyone knows that Bobby Bowden is going dadgum stop coaching soon enough. It makes sense when you have an assistant so coveted (Will Muschamp) that he was good enough to be named the coach at Florida to succeed Urban Meyer. But for Maryland, with James Franklin? That makes less sense. I was never as down on Franklin as others. I thought he would have been a perfectly viable candidate during an open search. But that's the key - during an
open search. For all the negatives that Debbie Yow had during her tenure as Athletic Director, locking the football program into this situation may well have been the most egregious. Even worse was the $1M guaranteed to Franklin were he to have stayed and not been named head coach for the 2012 season. Yikes. I've never run a business admittedly, but I simply can't imagine many good reasons for saying "hey, you've never done this job before, but I'm guaranteeing you a position doing just that, even though it isn't currently open. And for doing me the favor of taking this extremely well-compensated position, I'm going to give you seven figures if someone else gets the job. Cheers!" The scrilla strip mall will NOT be run like that.
-Bringing back Fridge following a 2-10 season: Sure, there were reasons for this, ranging from the capital Fridge had earned over his first eight seasons to (much more importantly) the ostensible lack of money to cover a buyout and hire a new coach at a competitive salary. But coming off a season where the program only wins once in eleven tries against I-A opponents, significant changes needed to be made. Instead, essentially the entire coaching staff, from the head man on down to the coordinators and assistants, were brought back. Does this sound like a program that wants to win? I remember a quote about doing the same things over and expecting different results, but we all know how that one goes.
-Guaranteeing Fridge's return in 2011: Now we get into the Kevin Anderson era. An era that once seemed so wildly promising in its salad days. Giving Fridge a positive vote of confidence that included his return for 2011 seemed like the right thing to do at the time, I'll admit. And it's certainly understandable that decisions change based on the facts on the ground themselves changing. Despite that, it's imperative that when such a declaration is made, the Athletic Director shouldn't be going back on his word a mere month later. But when Anderson said what he did about the future, the dismal attendance and the lack of a long-term, post-2011 succession plan were both well known. Yet by the end of December, with Franklin's departure, it seemed as if plans had been thrown into disarray, even though Anderson had made some less-than-subtle comments that called into question the idea of Franklin succeeding Fridge. Just what was the plan or did it not exist at all? Clearly a Fridge extension was not on the table, nor was Franklin getting the job. A lame duck coach in 2011 may have been the only thing worse than what actually transpired (excluded the parallel universe where Chuck Amato was extended an offer).
-The Press Conference: Kevin Anderson made his decision. Whether or not it was the right one is besides the point. He made a bold move and now it was his turn to sell it. To his credit, he and Dr. Loh did so by rallying the fanbase talking about the need for "transformative excellence" in the words of Loh. That was awesome, no doubt. The idea was that Maryland had slid into mediocrity under Fridge. Love or hate the big man, it was a true statement irrespective of a top 25 ranking this season. Given the stature (or lack thereof) accorded to Maryland football, the candidates weren't exactly lining up to take the post. There was one man, and only one man, who represented anything approaching proven excellence, and that was Mike Leach. Hiring him was the easy move. But instead, we...
-Hired Randy Edsall: Just like any of the above items, I'm willing to accept this in isolation. Edsall is a fine coach. His team finished playing in a Fiesta Bowl not a week earlier. He built a program from a I-AA also-ran to the champion of a BCS conference. Kudos to him, but his overall record is worse than that of Friedgen. While the comparisons may not be exactly analogous, it's hard to sell the new coach as an upgrade when the most fundamental comparison and indicator of quality, wins and losses, does not tilt in his favor. Perhaps Leach wasn't the right guy. I'm willing to take a chance on a loose cannon, but by many emerging accounts, Leach's interview went poorly and took him from the presumptive favorite to out of the running. Speculation about the powers-that-be and their motives and preferences aside, there have been enough questions raised about Leach to help understand the rationale, but even then, it's a bitter pill for the fans to swallow.
-The first 90 days: The real impetus for this post was the latest indignity for the program - losing fantastic DC Don Brown. As if losing him weren't enough, he made a lateral move to "go home" to be take the same position at ... UCONN! Again, perhaps the stated reasons for Brown's departure (desire to go back to New England, where he had coached all his life) are legitimate. Maybe this is explainable. But Brown was the most respected coach on last year's staff by fans but seemingly players as well. Just two weeks ago it was announced the Brown would be back, but somehow he never quite got around to signing a new contract before the expiry of his previous one on February 1. And what makes this all look even worse is that it went down just two days after National Signing Day. Had it happened last week, it would be a safe bet that at least a couple of Maryland's newly signed recruits would have been looking elsewhere. Not good, at all.
The next step is obviously to fill Brown's shoes, and that needs to be done with a big hire from outside the program, preferably one with local ties as Edsall's staff has only its two holdovers - OL coach Tom Brattan and WR coach Lee Hull, the newly minted local recruiter - who can claim any sort of local ties. Will Edsall make the right hire here? I'm not exactly sure what that is, but after the past two years, here's hoping the Maryland football program can do something to show us that the people in charge have a clear idea how to move from mediocrity to something a little better.
At least there's everybody's All-American, Danny O'Brien.
