Saw this on the O-Zone. Thought it was interesting. I'm not very computer-savvy, so a mod might want to clean it up.
Ray McNulty: UM job not that attractive anymore
Ray McNulty
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October 1, 2006
Can the University of Miami find a better football coach than Larry Coker?
Probably.
Can the school's suits get one of those better coaches to take the job if Coker is fired after this season?
Maybe.
But it's far from a sure thing.
Truth is, bringing a great coach to UM ? and keeping him there ? won't be easy.
Because it's not a great job.
It's not a job that young coaches dream about. It might not be in college football's top 25.
Certainly, it's not as good a job as Hurricanes fans think it is.
If it were, all of those terrific UM coaches of yesteryear ? Howard Schnellenberger, Jimmy Johnson, Dennis Erickson and Butch Davis ? wouldn't have left.
At the very least, one of them would've stayed for more than five or six years.
But none of them did.
And why did they leave?
For better jobs.
There are plenty of them out there . . . and not just in the NFL.
That's what too many Hurricanes fans ? especially those "Fire Coker" yahoos responsible for the banner-dragging airplanes that circled the Orange Bowl before UM's game Saturday against Houston ? don't understand.
They've deluded themselves into thinking every top-shelf coach in America wants to come to Coral Gables.
They talk about those five national championships. They talk about all those first-round draft picks. They talk about the wealth of home-grown talent in South Florida and the mystique of the Orange Bowl.
It's what Hurricanes fans don't talk about, however, that makes UM a second-tier job.
They don't talk about the increased competition, from both inside and outside the state, for the local talent.
They don't talk about the lack of an on-campus stadium.
They don't talk about a fair-weather fan base that clings to unrealistic expectations and abandons the season after one loss.
To an established coach who already has proven he can win, those things matter.
He wants the best players in the area and around the state to want to come to his school. He wants an on-campus stadium filled with devoted fans that stand by their team. He wants to build a classy, winning program everyone at the school can be proud of.
Yes, UM has a tremendous winning tradition. But rooting for the Hurricanes is like rooting for an NFL team. There's no rah-rah, college-football feel to the program.
Can you even hum the fight song?
So it's silly to think the Hurricanes might steal a premier coach from a marquee program.
Bob Stoops isn't going to leave Oklahoma to come to UM. Same goes for Georgia's Mark Richt. Heck, the Hurricanes might not be able to get Bobby Petrino away from Louisville.
But, hey, I hear Gary Barnett is available.
Chances are, though, UM will either find some young coach on the rise or promote someone from within the program, such as defensive coordinator Randy Shannon.
If the Hurricanes go young, however, you can expect the new coach will stay only as long as he needs to ? which means until he gets a better offer from the NFL or elsewhere in college football.
And if they stay within the UM family? There's no guarantee that things will get better.
The UM suits again could find themselves sitting in that eyesore known as the Orange Bowl, looking up at airplanes dragging banners telling them to fire the football coach.
The coaches change. The yahoos don't.
