Skid Marks Everywhere
So, yeah, Saturday happened. Brigham Young University had a record night rushing against the Texas Longhorns and while watching it looked like they deserved every inch of every yard they were tattooing across Burnt Orange defenders figurative backsides. BYU’s Quarterback, Taysom Hill, looked like the second coming of Tim Tebow consistently breaking off demoralizing runs that left Texas’ defense gasped and often, grasping for air. It was bad y’all. Bad enough to understand why folks were calling for heads. Manny Diaz’s defense looked terrible.
But.
But why is it when we’re winning it’s Mack Brown and the Longhorns but after more than a couple of seasons of mediocrity at best is it Applewhite’s offense, and Diaz’s defense that catch a whole lot of heck while Mack Brown is relegated to a recruiting/self help guru? Some personal responsibility for the man who’s had a revolving door of coordinators seems to be in order.
Yes he’s done a lot for the program but…
Manny Diaz and the defense was terrible, but they looked terrible at the half and I don’t think a head coach should have to watch game tape to see if his team made any defensive halftime adjustments. How about, as the head coach, you tell your defensive coordinator, “Hey Diaz I think we need to stack the box, and stop the run first”. Also you know who else looked terrible up in Provo? The offense, David Ash looks tentative and our offensive line looked anemic. Who is to blame when you’ve cycled through multiple coordinators on both sides of the ball?
Mack Brown has now thrown multiple coordinators under the bus but really, at this point, it only serves to highlight the real problem is Mack Brown. Now I know the rebuttals because I’ve offered them myself in the past, “Mack Brown led this team to a national title, x wins, x conference championship, we wouldn’t have these expectations if it wasn’t for Mack Brown in the first place.” Which, is fine as far as it goes but doesn’t really serve to answer what the growing chorus of critics are asking, “Is he the best fit for this program right now?” I think by any measure of success other than dollars the answer has to be no.
The second line of the “You can’t fire Mack Brown” argument is that there isn’t any coaches currently available to the Longhorns that would be an improvement over Mack Brown. I find this very implausible but nothing in life is certain. I’ll be taking some time over the next week or so to help old DeLoss Dodd’s and Texas fans who fear what change may bring down to the Forty Acres by looking at some excellent head coaching candidates in more detail.