Football question

[WichitaSooner]

A $95 million bet gone wrong: Inside Brian Kelly’s last days at LSU

Brian Kelly overhauled Notre Dame once to great success. His approach failed massively at LSU. Why?

www.nytimes.com

Interesting article about how bad Kelly was and how disliked he was. Most of the stuff in the article doesn't apply to OU because Brent isn't a jerk like Kelly is, but this passage caught my eye because of the discussion the other day on the board where some were downplaying the significance of coaching and arguing that we should just pour money into the portal. IMHO, the below stuff is where we have fallen short. We wasted money on Ott. Mateer hasn't been good. And the in-game coaching, and the offense in general, hasn't been good.

“It’s not the old days — and when I say the old days, I mean like five years ago — where you could just load up on talent and have depth, you could win 70 percent of your games with your C-plus game,” the first LSU staffer said. “It’s like the NFL now. You’ve gotta hit on your evaluations, especially the big-money guys, your five-stars, you gotta hit there.

“Coaching matters. Scheme matters. And where we missed here, is those guys that are really getting paid money, they have to want to play for you. Or else it’ll be transactional to them. And that matters when it comes to coming together as a team.”

 

[SoonerBounce13]

“Coaching matters. Scheme matters. And where we missed here, is those guys that are really getting paid money, they have to want to play for you. Or else it’ll be transactional to them. And that matters when it comes to coming together as a team.”

So you are back on board with the SOUL mission I take it

 

[WichitaSooner]

So you are back on board with the SOUL mission I take it

Like I said, the only real culture is what you put on the field/court. The rest is just fluff. It doesn't hurt, but the soul mission is about as (un)important as the culture wall or any of the other million slogans that coaches come up with.

 

[SoonerBounce13]

Like I said, the only real culture is what you put on the field/court. The rest is just fluff. It doesn't hurt, but the soul mission is about as (un)important as the culture wall or any of the other million slogans that coaches come up with.

Seems to go against what you just bolded in the quote

 

[WichitaSooner]

Seems to go against what you just bolded in the quote

90 percent of the bolded quote is about needing to hit on your evals, not missing on your big money guys, and the importance of coaching and scheme. And who says our guys want to play for Brent any more than the players on most teams around the country want to play for their head coach? Sure seems like it was transactional for Ott. Dolby and Barnes are pretty clearly not wanting to play in a fifth game because they want to preserve eligibility so they can transfer after the season. There was all sorts of talk last year that some of the WRs could have made it back to play before the end of the season. Everyone just seems to assume that our players will run through a brick wall for Brent, but what evidence is there that they are any more committed than most teams?

 

[Eielson]

I understand what you're getting at. We had some players in 2019-2021 who were talented enough to at least get a serious try at the next level...and then there was a dropoff starting in 2022. Murray was our best pro prospect at LB we've had since Lofton, though saying his NFL career is "solid" is probably generous. He's a fringe starter who will likely be on his 4th team next year since his year in Dallas is not going well. Ronnie Perkins was a guy who looked like he would develop at the next level, though that never happened. N Gallimore also played a season under Grinch. Tre Brown was probably our best corner in the last decade, and he played under Grinch. I singled out Bonitto because he pretty much played entirely under Grinch.

Murray isn't a star, or really lived up to the 1st round billing, but he's started 75 games. I doubt we've had many start that many games. I don't imagine any active LBs do that, and Stutsman is already half year behind on starts.

There really aren't many starts for true linebackers that arent pass rushers nowadays, so landing a spot in the NFL a college style LB is no small feat. Many teams only start 2.