Maybe Barnhart will give Stoops another raise and contract extension

[Joneslab]

This is a great question. I would think most people at the time thought Stoops was a great hire. I was really quite surprised to get someone who was as highly thought of to take the job.But with that hire also came expectations that were way too high, So when those expectations were not met then it became a bad hire. If everything were done in hindsight we all could be genius's

Stoops undoubtedly looked like a good hire.

And still may be, though it's doubtful.

The only thing is...and it's an important thing...is that while you can't judge something in hindsight, it is yet another failed hire by Barnhart if it indeed turns out that way.

We said "Barnhart didn't know early what he knew late" about Gillispie. Said a similar thing about Joker. Now Stoops. (Tubby Smith was also given a bad contract extension at one point.)

So while you've got to cut him a little slack for the hire itself, when you start stacking these bad decisions on top of one another it looks pretty dubious.

[DA#23]

Barnhart made $660 thousand dollars last year.

[Uncle Dave]

Barnhart made $660 thousand dollars last year.

Stoops will make $3,500,00.00 this year and $3,750,000.00 next year.

http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/11797551/mark-stoops-extension-worth-more-3m-year

The market for coaches everywhere in major sports is absurd. Be a spectacular failure.......become a millionaire.

[Joneslab]

Stoops will make $3,500,00.00 this year and $3,750,000.00 next year.

http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/11797551/mark-stoops-extension-worth-more-3m-year

The market for coaches everywhere in major sports is absurd. Be a spectacular failure.......become a millionaire.

This is why I mentioned money above.

Someone said it's irrelevant how much he's getting paid.

I don't think it is.

In the Ludicrous Contract Era, IMO you better perform. When you're making hundreds of times more than the people sitting in the seats and paying for your product, I think the leash should be tight and the expectations should be high.

AD's and coaches are big at pointing out how we live in a "microwave society" as a way to show how impatient fans can get.

Well, one reason we're impatient is we look at our paychecks and we look at the stupid-crazy paychecks these guys get and wonder if it's worth it when they start to flail.

[DA#23]

When I posted that, it was a thought that probably came to mind as sit here remembering how Barnhart has ridiculed the fans in the past. I wonder if he'll do it again...but this time he can't play the race card. We pay him over 600 thousand yearly and he has the guff to call us racists.

That annoys me. With this said, I still hope Stoops can hunker down and make something productive out of this team. Still like the guy for some reason, even though that shouldn't matter.

[DA#23]

on the pre-game show with tom leach this morning, mitch barnhart addressed the low attendance by thanking the “real fans” for coming to the game and said that those who are critical of joker must have “personal agendas.”

for the record, larry glover reports that today’s attendance according to the turnstiles was 19,688. That’s a far cry from 44,902.

link

[Old School]

You're awfully good at complaining.

That's about as constructive and enlightening as saying you're awfully happy about eating more of the same fresh steaming BS from Barnhart. If you disagree with any of what I or anyone else posted, maybe try saying why instead of going ad hominem.

What would your choice have been after the firing of Joker?

I'm not the guy that gets paid millions of dollars by UK to keep up with football coaches. But I'd say that better hires at that time would've included

Jim Mora
Todd Graham
Rich Rodriguez
Bill O'Brien
Larry Fedora
Brian Kelly
Ruffin McNeill
Doc Holliday
Kevin Sumlin
James Franklin
Kevin Wilson
David Shaw

And this last time around, and think you'd find some better hires among

Chris Petersen
Mark Helfich
Sonny Dykes
Kliff Kingsbury
Dave Doeren
Tom Herman
Justin Fuente
Tommy Tuberville
Willie Taggart
Matt Rhule
Paul Chryst
Bryan Harsin
Matt Wells
P.J. Fleck
Matt Campbell
Terry Bowden
Todd Monken
Gus Malzahn
Scott Satterfield
Willie Fritz
Bret Bielema

Other people can argue the merits of Bobby Petrino, Butch Jones, Charlie Strong, Kyle Whittingham, Paul Johnson, David Cutcliffe, Ken Niumataloo, Troy Calhoun, Bronco Mendenhall, Mike Leach, Art Briles, Hugh Freeze, Dan Mullen, Lane Kiffin, etc. in this thread if they want to. Compelling cases could be made for any of them (well, not so much Lane Kiffin...)

[Old School]

That's easy to say but hard to prove. I'm not trying to defend Barnhart. IMO he's on the cusp of being fired and should be if Stoops doesn't improve himself. But when a school suddenly drops their program and that team team is 1st up on your schedule the next season there just aren't too many alternatives. Just horribly bad luck for UK because as we know they need all the cream puffs they can get on their schedule.

Who was Southern Miss going to play in Week 1 before dropping them for UK? That team would've come to Lexington.

Texas State would've dumped Ohio for a trip to Lexington and a paycheck, and vice versa.

Same for ULM and Southern. Georgia State and Ball State. Georgia Southern and Savannah State. North Texas and SMU. UTSA and Alabama State. Old Dominion and Hampton. Buffalo and Albany. Eastern Michigan and Mississippi Valley State. UNLV and Jackson State. UCF and South Carolina State. Wyoming would've ditched the trip to Northern Illinois for a bigger check from UK. I'm sure there are others. I'm not saying all of those are optimal first game opponents, but a tune up against one of them would've been better for this team than the loss to USM was.

[Old School]

That's the million dollar question. Who was a better alternative at the time and who is a better alternative now? I think Stoops will be successful here and I think a big part of his failures to this point are at DC. I saw his 12-25 record brought up. I don't think it's fair to count his first year because I'm not sure Saban or Billicheck could've won more than three or four with that team. The staff is bringing in the talent to compete and win. I think we just need the right DC because Eliot clearly isn't getting it done.

You're high on Stoops. I'm interested to know your perspective on a few things.

Did you blame Dawson last year?

If Stoops is back next year but Eliot isn't, who likely gets the blame in 2017?

I would love to see this team win at the Swamp this weekend and go on a roll. I'd love it. If that doesn't happen, though, what record at what point this season makes you doubt that Stoops will be successful here?

Losing to a CUSA team in Year Four doesn't indicate to me that it's clicking. Nothing would taste better to me than a fresh dish of crow with a side of fried gator tomorrow. But I'm really disappointed at this point, and curious why people who are still high on Stoops feel that way.

[Spiritof96]

That's about as constructive and enlightening as saying you're awfully happy about eating more of the same fresh steaming BS from Barnhart. If you disagree with any of what I or anyone else posted, maybe try saying why instead of going ad hominem.



I'm not the guy that gets paid millions of dollars by UK to keep up with football coaches. But I'd say that better hires at that time would've included

Jim Mora
Todd Graham
Rich Rodriguez
Bill O'Brien
Larry Fedora
Brian Kelly
Ruffin McNeill
Doc Holliday
Kevin Sumlin
James Franklin
Kevin Wilson
David Shaw

And this last time around, and think you'd find some better hires among

Chris Petersen
Mark Helfich
Sonny Dykes
Kliff Kingsbury
Dave Doeren
Tom Herman
Justin Fuente
Tommy Tuberville
Willie Taggart
Matt Rhule
Paul Chryst
Bryan Harsin
Matt Wells
P.J. Fleck
Matt Campbell
Terry Bowden
Todd Monken
Gus Malzahn
Scott Satterfield
Willie Fritz
Bret Bielema

Other people can argue the merits of Bobby Petrino, Butch Jones, Charlie Strong, Kyle Whittingham, Paul Johnson, David Cutcliffe, Ken Niumataloo, Troy Calhoun, Bronco Mendenhall, Mike Leach, Art Briles, Hugh Freeze, Dan Mullen, Lane Kiffin, etc. in this thread if they want to. Compelling cases could be made for any of them (well, not so much Lane Kiffin...)

Those three in bold... LOL No more failed / failing SEC coaches please.

Bielema!?! Why in the world would he leave Arkansas to come here? Further why would most of the guys on that list leave their better jobs to come to Kentucky?

[Old School]

I wonder about talent evaluation along with player development. Leavitt was thought to be a no brainer for the two deep. Hatcher was if anything worse when he left. Elam. Doran Baker. Towels was a guy that likely kept Joker Phillips around one more year.

It just seems an inordinate number of our recruits are beaten out by walk on kids, new freshmen, and transfers that don't even know the system.


Just more concerns.

In fairness, while Leavitt hasn't been what was hoped for or expected, that happens with JUCO kids, and he just got here. And some of the JUCOs this staff picked up were really good. Stamps, C.J. Johnson, Flannigan, Za'Darius, Melvin Lewis and Blue are a pretty good JUCO haul so far.

Brooks and his staff really spotted and polished some diamonds in the rough, and I think a program like UK has to succeed at that. I think so far Westry, Baity, Asafo-Adjei, look like they're going to exceed expectations. Hopefully we'll see others do the same.

OTOH Elam, Krok, T.V. Williams, Bone, Firios, Tucker, LaRubbio, Long, Nick Richardson, Dorian Hendrix, Hatcher, Hytchye and Timmons may all leave UK having come up far short of what was expected of them.

Your last point is really solid, especially at WR (so far).

[Old School]

Stoops will make $3,500,00.00 this year and $3,750,000.00 next year.

http://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/11797551/mark-stoops-extension-worth-more-3m-year

The market for coaches everywhere in major sports is absurd. Be a spectacular failure.......become a millionaire.

With its next football hire, whether it's 2 years or 22 years from now, UK should offer a very heavily incentive-laden contract. If the guy can win 8 games here without breaking rules, pay him a lot, and more than he'd make elsewhere; offer to pay him what Saban makes if he can win 9. But if he can't break .500 let him make far less, and sock away the difference for someone who can. An up and coming coach ought to go for that. Some hungry coach who takes that deal and makes good on it is going to get a ton of press and punch his own ticket for wherever he'd like to go next, whether or not it's UK. IMO that beats throwing millions at someone regardless of results.

[Old School]

This is why I mentioned money above.

Someone said it's irrelevant how much he's getting paid.

I don't think it is.

In the Ludicrous Contract Era, IMO you better perform. When you're making hundreds of times more than the people sitting in the seats and paying for your product, I think the leash should be tight and the expectations should be high.

AD's and coaches are big at pointing out how we live in a "microwave society" as a way to show how impatient fans can get.

Well, one reason we're impatient is we look at our paychecks and we look at the stupid-crazy paychecks these guys get and wonder if it's worth it when they start to flail.

Spot on, and if you ever, ever make any kind of sports wagers, the safest one on the horizon is that some schools are going to have some dire financial crises in their athletics programs before too long. Mark it down. The one-way ratchet of coaches' salaries getting more and more exorbitant is unsustainable. TV revenues will do not and will not grow at the same rate. Retrenchment is a given at some point.

[Old School]

Those three in bold... LOL No more failed / failing SEC coaches please.

Bielema!?! Why in the world would he leave Arkansas to come here? Further why would most of the guys on that list leave their better jobs to come to Kentucky?

50 coaches listed, and you take issue with four of them. Thanks for the validation.

By the way, those are absolutely false premises on your part.

Tuberville is 25-14 at his current school and 155-91. That's far from a failure, especially compared to, say, 12-25.

Bowden has taken a 1-11, 1-11, 1-11 team - 3-33 over 3 years, at a program with no winning seasons since 2005 - to 8-5 last year. His departure from Auburn was a fiasco; they were literally down to sixth string offensive linemen due to injury that year, after several years, and a hothead with too much influence on their board got him fired and sunk Auburn into a years-long mess without him. Oh, and he went undefeated in the SEC one year. That's far from failure.

Malzahn took Auburn to the BCS Championship Game. If that's a failure, please tell me what Stoops' 0-8 SEC record the same year was.

Bielema was not at Arkansas at the time.

Which of those listed coaches do you think was at a better job than Kentucky at the time?

[Spiritof96]

50 coaches listed, and you take issue with four of them. Thanks for the validation.

By the way, those are absolutely false premises on your part.

Tuberville is 25-14 at his current school and 155-91. That's far from a failure, especially compared to, say, 12-25.

Bowden has taken a 1-11, 1-11, 1-11 team - 3-33 over 3 years, at a program with no winning seasons since 2005 - to 8-5 last year. His departure from Auburn was a fiasco; they were literally down to sixth string offensive linemen due to injury that year, after several years, and a hothead with too much influence on their board got him fired and sunk Auburn into a years-long mess without him. Oh, and he went undefeated in the SEC one year. That's far from failure.

Malzahn took Auburn to the BCS Championship Game. If that's a failure, please tell me what Stoops' 0-8 SEC record the same year was.

Bielema was not at Arkansas at the time.

Which of those listed coaches do you think was at a better job than Kentucky at the time?

a. I misunderstood your post was a current suggestion list for replacing Stoops.

b. As such I was taking issue with those four and 90% of the other names on the list based on where they are now.

As for Tubberville, he went 110 and 60 in his time as an SEC coach 64 and 50 in SEC games. He had several great years and several not so great years ending in his resignation. While I would certainly take his record at KY most of his wins came at Auburn. Bill Curry was 26-10 overall and 14-6 in SEC play at Bama... (That didn't work out so great)

Bowden hasn't played a nationally relevant game in forever.

Malzahn (like his predecessor) has had one great SEC season. One...


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Bielema would NEVER have left Wisconsin to come here. He got killed for taking the AK job.