Big 12 Foolishness

If I were a fan of Big 12 football, I'd be really ecstatic about the coaching hires of my rivals Nebraska and Texas A&M. Both are classic examples of how not to hire a coach.

Nebraska hired Bo Pelini to replace Bill Callahan. The reason--Pelini is a Nebraska guy. Great. Does that mean anything in terms of ability to win? No. Admittedly, Bill Callahan was a disaster. But people didn't like him anyway because he's not one of them. He ended the walk-on progam. He didn't do the good ol'boy thing. And my God, he passed the football! Again, he is a bad coach and deserved to be fired. But the hiring of Tom Osborne as athletic director means that Nebraska fans care more about doing things their way instead of winning. The only coaches they even considered were Pelini and Turner Gill, another Nebraska guy.

While Pelini could turn out to be a great hire, my guess is that Nebraska is going to struggle for a long time. Nebraska fans are living in the 1980s, when a few teams dominated college football. Those days are over. Nebraska faces an unfortunate geographical disadvantage for recruiting since Nebraska is far from a hot spot. They used to go into Texas all the time and get their great players, but that's not so easy anymore. If they return to conservative offenses and doing things "The Nebraska Way," they could well find themselves again searching for a new coach in 4 years.

There was an obvious choice for Nebraska. That is Dennis Erickson. Sure he's only been at Arizona St. for a year, but he'll always leave for the big money. His style perfectly fits the personnel that Callahan has recruited. He'll only stay for a few years, but by that time, Nebraska will be really good again and they could go and get the truly great coach.

But no, they'd rather have someone who makes them feel like Nebraska.

Meanwhile, Texas A&M, always desperate to compete with Texas, hired former Packers coach Mike Sherman. Why? What do they possibly expect to accomplish with this move? He hasn't been in college football for a decade. Failed NFL coaches do not make good college coaches, with few exceptions. Callahan? Chan Gailey? Not good. The exception is Pete Carroll, but he failed in the NFL because he was a college guy and that didn't translate to the NFL.

So if was a fan of Texas, Colorado, Oklahoma, Kansas St., Missouri, or any other top Big 12 team, I'm real happy today and I'm laughing at Nebraska and A&M. Luckily though, I'm not a Big 12 fan. Rather, I know the Pac-10 is where it's at.