Who are the worst college football hires of the last 30 years?

Slimy Lew Perkins' decision on Turner Gill is quickly turning sour. Not that I mind one bit.

 

I'm guessing those Big 12 schools may be learning a lesson about hiring guys away from small schools where they were successful.

 

Maybe. But it did eventually work out for Mizzou.

 

I'm not ready to write Gill off yet. Hawkins has been a shit the bed level fuck-up. He'll be lucky to ever coach at a big school ever again.

 

Taking the -- decision to hire and not results - approach, which is the correct one --

Greg Robinson was a disaster in just about every job he held - yet Syracuse turns to him to ressurct that program? Horrible, horrible decision.

Ditto with Ray Sherman at Texas A&M

And then there is Bill Callahan, who might have been the worst since Gerry Faust.

One guy who appeared to be a horrible hire but has actually worked out to some degree is Bill Stewart at WVU. The university regents hired the guy when they were drunk (true story) and celebrating a Feista Bowl win over Oklahoma. He was a terrible coach at VMI or wherever and was destined to retire as a non-descript assistant somewhere.

And I'll say this -- I thought Michigan hiring Rich Rodriguez was a horrible decision because he is just not the right fit in the Big Ten or at Michigan. I think he is an excellent coach - for an SEC school, given the kind of football he wants to play and his willingness to, um, overlook some rules and character flaws in players in order to win.

Along those lines - if Penn State hires Greg Schiano, as has often been rumored, they should just burn down the place because that has disaster written all over it.

 

Fulmer at South Carolina.

(If you're talking about the next 30 years.)

 

Mike Sherman

 

Certainly didn't have the national implications as many listed here (Callahan at Nebraska might top my real list), but Ron Prince, at Kansas State, was a freaking clown. He brought enough bravado to conquer the world, but had a nasty habit of getting beat by 50 points. His teams were disgustingly lacking in fundamentals and toughness. He recruited a bunch of kids no recruiting service (not that they are the be-all, end-all) had ever heard of and seemed to view it as his job to do things as different from Bill Snyder as possible. That was probably true to some degree — seems like I heard when Prince took over, the football program had like 5 computers, no cell phones and billions of pages of handwritten notes — but, still.

Shockingly, he beat a descent Okie State team once, and a top-10 Texas team twice, but got obliterated by everyone else.

You got to be doing something really, really wrong to get canned midway through your third year when you have two wins against top-10s and you went to a bowl game in year 1.
Bill Snyder himself, as much as I want to name a child after the man, might make the list some day, too. Gary Patterson, as I understand, was in the bag, but insane squabbling among University big wigs helped tank it. Who knows if Patterson would have panned out, and Snyder's been good for the program, again, but that could in time prove to be a big fuck up.

 

Shula @ Bama.

Bob Stull @ Mizzou

Hackett @ USCw

And Dooley @ UT is a distinct possibility.

 

Oops, my bad. Got the Shermans mixed up - but Mike Sherman is a disaster.

Wasn't Ray Sherman a bad coach somewhere too?

And yes, Tigervols, as bad as the Lane Kiffin hire was - I forgot to mention him - I didn't understand the Dooley hire.

Kiffin belongs on this list because he accomplished absolutely nothing at all and he is handed one of the ten best jobs in the country - which I think Tennessee would probably be in that category -- it made no sense.

 

I don't think Tennessee is a top 10 job. Hell, it might be the sixth or seventh best job in the SEC.

Tier 1
Florida
Alabama
LSU
Georgia
Auburn

Tier 2
Arkansas
Tennessee
South Carolina

Tier 3
Ole Miss
MIssissippi State

Tier 4
Kentucky
Vandy

 

Bobby Valentine. [/crossthreading]