Texas Aggie Football

Thoughts from the Arkansas Game

I absolutely love an Aggie win, especially when it’s over Arkansas. Love it or hate it, the Arkansas series in Jerry World, since we entered the SEC, has been WILD.

I mean WILD.

Somehow and someway, the Aggies have been on the winning side of 10 of the 11 Arkansas games played in JerryWorld. It’s been dicey at times, but we keep pulling out victories in this series. I can’t imagine being an Arkansas fan going into this game. Especially afterwards. Just totally deflating.

With all of that, I will sound like a wet blanket. Despite the win, none of my concerns for the rest of this season changed.

Arkansas isn’t a bad team, but they’re not very good. They didn’t really test the Aggies at all.

This game really reminds me of last year’s game. Arkansas took a few shots early on, but then our defensive line harassed their quarterback so much that he never got comfortable. With this loss, I don’t think Arkansas will go bowling this season.

I feel like we just beat a 5 win team. It’s hard to know if that translates to anything positive for the rest of the season.

I hope I’m wrong, but our next game is set up like Alabama last year. They came to Kyle after we beat Arkansas with a fantastic performance from our defensive line. Alabama slowed down our pass rush and exposed our secondary, walking out of Kyle with a win.

Luther Burden against our secondary frightens me. He’s not a superstar receiver, but as we saw with Isiah Bond last season, it doesn’t take a superstar receiver to have a great day against the Aggie secondary.

We’ll worry about that on Saturday, but let’s talk more about Arkansas.

I’m still not sure about Mike Elko. I wanted more out of this Aggie team against Arkansas, but we played just well enough to win. It was very Jimboesque in my mind. I keep waiting for something to happen that will differentiate Elko from Jimbo, but I haven’t seen it.

My two biggest issues were Arkansas’s fake punt execution and our walking off the field at the end of the first half.

The fake punt by Arkansas was simply wonderful coaching by Arkansas and TERRIBLE coaching by Texas A&M. It technically wasn’t a fake. Still, in their film, Arkansas picked up a tendency that our punt return team released to block downfield before the ball was kicked. That’s lazy coaching on A&M’s part. Incredibly lazy. You must ensure the ball is gone before turning your back and heading downfield.

Even worse, one of our guys stayed engaged with an Arkansas player while the punter with the ball ran right by him. Just lazy, lazy special teams. Remind you of anyone?

Don’t forget the blocked punt against Bowling Green last week. For the second week in a row, we had a special teams snafu that could have changed the outcome of the game. I’m not sure what’s going on with our special teams, but it’s pretty clear opponents have picked up weaknesses on film. That’s on our coaching staff.

At the end of the first half, Elko raised the white flag rather than take a chance on scoring. I get it was 3rd and 19 on our 43-yard line, but we could have easily run another play. You never know. Walking off the field in that moment is the sign of a coach who has little to no confidence in his offense.

It was tied 14-14. Elko felt there were more negatives than positives that could happen by snapping the ball. Remind you of anyone?

I’m not saying Elko is a defensive Jimbo, but after five games, things look more similar than different. I’m ready for things to be different than they used to be.

Offense:

I won’t spend much time on this offense because it’s not worth it. Five games in, Colin Klein looks like an absolutely horrible hire.

I’ll admit there are some flashes of excitement, like our third touchdown, but most of Klein’s play calls are unimaginative and becoming increasingly predictable.

We had 14 possessions in this game.

Three possessions resulted in touchdowns.
Two possessions ended the half and game.
NINE possessions resulted in punts.

Do you notice anything? We didn’t attempt a single field goal in this game. In ten possessions, we couldn’t even maneuver the ball into field goal range once. That’s a MASSIVE concern in my mind. I don’t like kicking field goals, but I like kicking field goals more than punting.

We could not consistently move the ball on a very average Arkansas defense.

Our first touchdown was an excellent move by Noah Thomas to juke his defender and then was able to outrun the other defenders to the end zone. The pass itself was less than 20 yards in the air.

Our second touchdown was thanks to an amazing play by our defense, which gave the offense the ball at the ten-yard line. It was a total gift from the defense. It was nice that the offense converted it, but they didn’t do anything to move it there.

Our third touchdown was a nice 75-yard drive, but 46 yards were gained on three straight carries by Le’Veon Moss. Moss basically carried the offense on his shoulders for three plays, running over and through the Arkansas defense. The touchdown pass to Tre Watson was a beautiful play but plays like that were few and far between.

Other than that drive, there was a lot of sputtering around by our offense. Just absolutely uninspiring offensive football. An average Arkansas defense shut us down.

I have ZERO confidence this offense can come back from a deficit of 14 points or more. A two touchdown deficit and we’re cooked I think.

The receivers aren’t getting consistent separation, running backs not named Moss aren’t cranking out yards, and Marcell Reed struggles to throw a pass longer than 10 yards. You really only have to defend this team in a 20-yard box.

Like his predecessor, Elko is running an offense that he hopes doesn’t make mistakes and can somehow put up one more point than his defense allows.

Maybe it turns out differently this time, but insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, hoping for a different result.

As for the quarterback situation, here is my take: Conner clearly isn’t healthy. He hasn’t suited up the last two games and, according to most reports, isn’t taking any practice snaps. Or if he is taking practice snaps, they’re minimal.

He’s clearly hurt.

Until he’s fully healthy and Reed struggles or stumbles, you won’t see Conner under center.

I believe that Reed will start against Missouri, and things will be reassessed during the bye week.

I don’t have a preference on who plays quarterback. At this point, I have no idea who the best quarterback is for this system. I’d say it doesn’t matter. The whole scheme is a MUCH more significant issue than who’s under center.

We focus on the quarterback because it’s the most obvious position, but Elko and Klein’s decisions are much bigger concerns than who’s under center.

Defense:

I can’t fault the defense for how they played on Saturday. The front four were completely disruptive and got Taylen Green out of rhythm. Green’s stat line doesn’t look bad; he completed 23 passes in 41 attempts for 279 yards. That’s not a bad day passing.

We’d certainly take that from a quarterback right now.

However, when it mattered, Green had to avoid pressure and never completed a big pass other than on the third play of the game, when he connected for the 75-yard touchdown. He was worried about avoiding pressure over finding open guys.

The defensive front four brought pressure the whole game. It was the main reason the Aggies walked out of JerryWorld for the final time with a win. Without their effort, I’m not sure the Aggies win.

The absolute play of the game was Shermar Stewart forcing the fumble on the 10-yard line. Somehow, Arkansas didn’t touch him, and he ran wide open to the backfield, where he took out the running back and quarterback—two guys at the same time. It was a beautiful play.

I don’t think we would have won without that play. It allowed us to tie the game, which swung the momentum from Arkansas to A&M. It was that big.

Nic Scourton only had two sacks, but he spent much of the game chasing Green out of the pocket. He was a force.

The unsung hero of the front four is Albert Regis. He doesn’t have the physical talent of the other three, but his motor and effort are unreal. He never slows down when he’s in.

Much like last year, my fear is that this Arkansas game is the most disruptive game of the year from our defensive front, and we won’t have the same results in another game. We’ll spend the rest of the season wondering where the pressure we saw in the Arkansas game went.

Beyond the defensive line, the rest of the defense played well enough. Our linebackers did fine, but I’m still slightly concerned about them against better teams. Scooby Williams can be quite disruptive at times, as he loves crashing the line of scrimmage.

Lee and Ricks seem like an upgrade over last year’s corners, but I’m still concerned about their ability to cover big-play receivers. We’ll find out this weekend when Luther Burden comes to town.

I liked what Elko and Bateman did as the game wore on. They seemed to adjust and bring additional pressure at the right time and in the right place. That did seem to be missing in the previous four games, where some of our blitzes weren’t getting there. They worked virtually every time against Arkansas after the first quarter.

Arkansas rushed 30 times for 100 yards, the longest for 25 yards. One run for 25 yards and an average of 2.6 yards on the other 29 carries. It’s a significant improvement over what we saw against Bowling Green and Notre Dame.

I still have questions about this defense, but I can’t fault anything they did on Saturday. They’re far and away the reason we won the game.

Looking Forward:

I’m excited about Missouri coming to town. We are essentially getting another shot at Notre Dame, a Top 10 ranked team that’s probably ranked a little higher than it should be. I do think Missouri is better than Notre Dame, but not by a large margin.

Missouri is the better team, but we’re completely capable of beating them.

I hate the 11 a.m. start time at Kyle Field, but it’s part of all the TV money we get.

If we’re going to be better than 8-4 this season, we must win this game. I think Missouri is the most likely win of the big games left at Kyle this season. I worry about LSU and Texas’ passing attacks. I don’t think our sputtering offense can win a shootout.

Elko needs to advise Klein to work up some wrinkles to win this game. The standard Run Pass Option or Zone Read that he’s running will not work. That Arkansas defense clearly knew the keys we were looking for and shut us down for the most part.

Something has to be different about our offense this Saturday.

If not, there will be a lot of disappointed Aggies around 3:00 on Saturday afternoon.

You know, just like it used to be.

Quarter Season Assessment

Not sure where to begin with that Bowling Green game. On one hand, we dominated Bowling Green from a defensive standpoint in the first half. Then, like in Gainesville, we came out in cruise control and got bit in the second half.

Three real games this season. We’ve given up two touchdowns in the second half while not giving up any touchdowns in the first half in each of them. Three games certainly feels like a trend.

This game felt a lot like the Notre Dame game to me. It was a night game at Kyle Field that wasn’t truly decided until the end. No team was ever really comfortable until their final possession.

The only real difference between Bowling Green and Notre Dame, other than the talent of the two teams, was the Aggie offense did just a little bit more than in the Notre Dame game to secure the win.

Still, by most accounts, the Aggie faithful felt highly disappointed after a night game at Kyle Field for the second time this season. Two games and two disappointments even if one resulted in a win. That’s not the way things are supposed to be for night games at Kyle Field.

Aggie fans want a change. They want to walk out of Kyle Field confident about the team they saw on the field. What a difference a week makes.

We’re a quarter of the way through this season and I’m still not sure what to think of this Aggie team. I wanted the hope that was found after the Florida game to continue building. The Bowling Green game simply reminded me of the concerns I had coming into the season.

The reality is this isn’t a truly talented football team. It doesn’t mean it’s a bad football team. It’s simply not an elite level college football team in 2024.

Talent Concerns:

Let’s take a look at each group compared to the 2023 squad:

Quarterback:
I honestly can’t grade this because there’s so many variables due to injury and games under center. Marcell Reed could develop with each game or he can regress because defenses learn how to defend him. Conner could get healthy and take back the starting job. He could be gone all season due to Reed’s play or his own health. I’m going to call this a push simply because it’s more of the same. We haven’t the foggiest idea what we truly have at quarterback right now.

Running Back:
Despite the loss of Rueben Owens; Moss, Daniels, and Smith have been serviceable. They’re certainly not carrying this team as they’re not a homerun threat every time they touch ball. They’re the least of the worries on offense though. They’re grinding out yards as best they can. I call this a slight advantage.

Offensive Line:
Last year’s unit was so bad that everyone is now enamored with the 2024 Aggie offensive line. It’s absolutely better but I’m still not sure how great it is. It’s far from the 2012 and 2020 offensive lines in my mind. How much better this unit is than last year’s remains to be seen. I’ll just call this unit some degree of better and hope it can improve even more.

Wide Receiver:
Oh boy. Through four games this unit is definitely worse than last year. We miss a playmaker like Ainias in a big way. Maybe Reed and these guys just need to get on the same page. A quarter of the season in, and this unit looks like a non factor for moving the ball and scoring points. This unit is definitely worse than last years.

Sure, there’s been a few good receptions but they’re few and far between. We need a lot more production out of this unit if we’re going to have a great season.

We need better receivers but how do you recruit better receivers if the current receivers you have aren’t producing? What kind of receiver recruit wants to come here? They want a productive passing game. That hasn’t happend in College Station for a while.

I felt like Elko really missed on getting a great receiver in the portal. Isiah Bond seemed like the obvious choice after hiring is position coach from Bama but he wound up in Austin. That made no sense to me why he didn’t land in College Station. Is the perception that bad or did Elko and Wiggins not pursue him or miss out on him?

I’m not saying Bond would have dramatically changed the outlook for this team but there’s no way Elko and Wiggins could have thought he wouldn’t be a positive addition to the wide receiver room. Bond would have absolutely been a positive addition to the wide receiver unit.

Whatever happens this season, Mike Elko needs to address our wide receiver situation in the absolute worst way. This position has been stuck in neutral since Jimbo arrived in 2018 and it’s time to figure out a way to put it in gear.

Defensive Line:
I think a lot of people would say this unit is better than last years. I don’t know if I would go that far. Last year’s defensive line was pretty elite. I don’t think this unit is worse than last years but it’s different. We don’t have the run stopper like we had with MacKinnley Jackson but Albert Regis is doing a damn fine job. Shermar Turner is doing a damn fine job taking over Walter Nolen’s spot. Scourton and Stewart are doing just fine on the edge. I’m going to call this one a push. That’s not a bad thing. It’s actually a good thing they’re similar to last year’s unit.

I don’t really care about the lack of sacks with this unit. If you’re watching the game you know what this unit is doing. Quarterbacks aren’t setting up shop in the pocket and it’s clear offenses are doing everything they can to slow this unit down. I attribute the lack of sacks to the respect offenses are paying this unit and the lack of plays by the other parts of the defense.

Linebacker:
I was worried we would miss Edge Cooper and I feel we do. I think York is struggling being the main guy offenses can focus on. He’s a smart player but he’s not nearly as physical as Cooper. Offenses seem to be able to take him out of plays where Cooper was much tougher to take out.

Besides York, it’s a rotation of mostly Scooby Williams and Daymion Sanford. They’ve been okay, but like York, they can be taken out of plays. I’m afraid this unit is going to get exposed by the better SEC teams on our schedule. This unit is definitely worse than last year.

Secondary:
My greatest fear for the 2024 Aggie football team is this unit has not been tested. Which means it may not have been fully exposed. I think we’re slightly better than last year but this unit was so bad last year that’s not saying much. This unit has blown coverage at times and seems to struggle to tackle on broken running plays. I’m going to call this unit incomplete but I think we find out a lot on Saturday.

Bobby Petrino has tried to be very balanced with his quarterback this season but against Oklahoma State he aired it out. I think he’s going to take some big swings early in the game so this unit better be up for the challenge. If not, it’s going to be a long game and season for the Aggies.

As a whole, I think this team is about the same as last year just in different ways. Oline is improved while wide receiver and linebacker are worse.

Last year was a 7-5 team for reference.

One more thing on talent while we’re here.

How many NFL draft picks do you think are currently on this roster? I mean absolutely certain NFL draft picks? I count three in the Shermar Brothers and Nic Scourton.

There’s certainly some other guys that could get drafted, but if I had to wager money on guys right now, those are the only three I’m wagering on.

Season Outlook:

Here’s my breakdown of remaining games:

No doubt – New Mexico State
Should wins – Arkansas, Mississippi State, and Auburn
Tough wins – Missouri, LSU, and South Carolina
Longshot right now – Texas

I feel like there’s 8 wins in there and maybe even 9, but this coaching staff is going to have to pull their heads out of their rear ends and realize the Jimbo style of coaching ain’t gonna work. They need to admit this isn’t an overly talented team and start taking some chances on offense. At least start desiging creative plays instead of just trying to establish the running game in hopes the passing game follows it.

They need to figure out how to get their defense to play smart football for 4 quarters and not give up second half plays because their players were in the wrong position to defend the play. They need to admit there’s holes in the linebacker group when it comes to defending the run and holes in the secondary for defending passes.

If you didn’t know Mike Elko and a whole new staff were on the sidelines, you’d think this was another Jimbo season but with motion from the offense. There’s nothing new with this staff four games in.

We’re going to find out a lot this weekend in Arlington. You better believe Pittman and Petrino smell blood to salvage their season. They need an A&M win to get to six wins and go bowling this season.

They need to beat one of the currently ranked teams on their schedule to go bowling. We’re the lowest rated of those teams. When you look at their remaining games, we’re the most obvious sixth win.

They’re going to stress the Aggies and we won’t win if we don’t change our approach.

If we lose this weekend, we’ve dug a massive hole for the 2024 season.

We win and we’ll have taken the best punch from someone smelling blood and can feel much better about the rest of the season.

One game at a time.

Coaching Concerns:

I love Mike Elko as a person. I don’t know about him as a head coach though.

If you ask any Aggie why they love the Elko hire there’s three main things:

1) He was a wonderful defensive coordinator under Jimbo.
2) He elevated Duke as their head coach.
3) He gets A&M.

Only one of those three things actually matters to being a great head coach and that’s his time at Duke. He was 8-4 in his first season and 7-5 in his second season so he actually regressed in his two years. I know he lost Leonard but we can’t give Elko a pass on his losing his QB when Jimbo had the same issue.
The reality is his time at Duke was pretty good but it wasn’t amazing or elite. Doesn’t mean he can’t become amazing or elite but we certainly haven’t seen it.

I’m in no way calling for the firing of Elko. Not even close. He’s our head coach for at least four seasons due to financial reasons. Plus, we’re not like some other programs who change their head coach at the drop of a hat. Elko will get plenty of time to prove himself as the Aggie head coach.

I hope the light comes on for him as a head coach and he finally elevates the Aggie program to a level we haven’t seen since the late 80s and early 90s.

Yes, it’s really been that long.

My greatest fear with Elko right now is he’s some version of Wade Phillips. A lovable person with an amazing mind for defense including exotic blitzes. However, he’s just missing something as a head coach.

I’m not saying he’s another Wade Phillips. His head coaching tenure is too short to really know. I’m just saying there could be some similarities if Elko doesn’t flip a switch as a head coach. Two seasons at Duke and four games at A&M aren’t trending well if you’re truly being objective and looking under the hood a bit.

He’s responsible for the hiring of Klein and Bateman. Right now, neither hire looks that great.

Klein is running a VERY vanilla offense. What does this offense look like without Reed’s mobility? It’s very possible we’re 2-2 and maybe even 1-3.

It’s a stagnant offense if not for Reed’s legs. And don’t give me everyone is getting used to it. What was the point of the off season if it takes actual games to get used to it? I do understand it takes time so you’re going to see some hiccups from time to time. However, there is NOTHING we’ve seen from this Klein offense. It’s a vanilla offense that has no wrinkles or urgency.

It’s not the same, but the end result is a Jimbo style offense. But with motion. The on field performance is all that matters. It’s not there four games in.

I get Elko wants to win with defense because he’s a defensive coach. The reality is this defense might not be as good as Elko thinks. We have played four pretty bad offenses. We’ve got a couple more in Mississippi State and Auburn thank goodness.

However, I don’t think this defense can hold up to the stresses that Missouri, LSU, South Carolina, and Texas will put on it. If our offense isn’t ready to swing back then we’re going to lose those games.
My greatest fear right now is Petrino pulls something out of the hat this weekend and by the time we get to Auburn in November, Freeze has found a quarterback that doesn’t turn the ball over.

If that happens, there’s a chance we don’t go bowling and recruiting is going to take a massive hit.
If Elko can’t see that and get Klein to start designing and calling plays with some creativity and urgency; then this Aggie team could be in big trouble.

I hope he’s aware after four games that 8-4 is very possible. However, it’s nowhere near a lock and it’s going to take some adapting from the first four games. If he’s stubborn like his predecessor and keeps trying the same thing, it’s going to be a long season.

We’ll find out a lot over the next two weeks with Arkansas and Missouri. Both winnable games if this coaching staff is willing to admit reality and take come chances. If not, they’re both losable.
We know the talent on this team. The wins and losses will come down to coaching the rest of the way.

The Elephant in the Room:

While talking about the talent issues, there’s a main culprit that everyone has forgotten about or doesn’t want to remember.

The greatest recruiting class in the history of college football. That’s right. The vaunted 2022 recruiting class.

The 30 guys that were supposed to elevate this program to a sure national championship. They would be in their third year in the program. It’s not a stretch to think half of our starters this season should be from that class.

Care to guess how that class went?

7 guys have started this season. Only 5 are currently starting due to the injuries to Weigman and Nabou. Shermar Stewart, Le’Veon Moss, Theo Ohrstrom, Bryce Anderson, and Noah Thomas. That’s it.

There are seven other guys still rostered. I think only Brownlow-Dindy and Donovan Green of this group stand any chance of starting at any point in the future. I know Green’s injury knocked him back quite a bit, but there are five guys from that class still rostered who will likely never see meaningful minutes for the Aggies.

The 16 others are gone pecans. Over half the 30 guys in that vaunted class are no longer on the roster.
Third season and half the class has vaporized for whatever reason.

That’s where the talent drain happened. I get it’s a new era with NIL and the transfer portal but that’s pretty pitiful. A class of elite prospects mostly wiped out with little to show for it from the transfer portal.

OUCH!!!!

What a massive failure that class was. Not just on the field but financially. That class is a massive reason Jimbo got his big extension. We couldn’t let Jimbo go to LSU and have that class dissipate. I get the why.

Everybody just looked at the stars and not under the hood. I’ll admit I looked at the stars like everyone else, but I don’t get paid to look under the hood when offering contracts to coaches. I was just being an excited fan hoping things were finally turning for Aggie Football.

That class is THE biggest reason we’re in the shape we’re in for the 2024 season. We don’t have the talent that elite college football teams have. It never materialized and we never even came close to replacing it.

We can pretend we have the talent of elite programs, but that would be foolish. I certainly agree we have more talent than a lot of college football teams, but I’m ready for Texas A&M to be elite. I’m tired of this cycle we seem to be stuck in other than an outlier season every now and then.

To become elite will require creative and aggressive coaching. Doing the same thing the previous staff did but with a defensive mindset is not going to work.

NIL is no longer an advantage for us. Everyone else in the SEC has money too. We can’t tout that advantage anymore. Sure, we can still spend with the best of them but it’s not a unique advantage.

We need WINS!!!!

WINS is what will make the difference in recruiting and building the program to an elite level. We can’t keep selling we have great resources and it’s only a matter of time story. I’m tired of Groundhog Day.

WINS will come with great coaching. That’s on Elko on his staff. We need WINS now more than ever.

I sure hope a light went off in Elko’s head at Kyle Field on Saturday night.

If not, I’m afraid it’s gonna be just like it use to be.

Florida Fodder

This is a tough game to truly analyze for a few reasons:

1) It was more of a 3 period game than a 2 half game. It’s not a big deal, but definitely didn’t have the flow of a normal game. Not sure if that had any effect on either team but it felt like it did.

2) Florida was horribly coached. Billy Napier is firmly on the hot seat and he decided to rotate his quarterbacks on a regular schedule. It was clear Graham Mertz was the better quarterback on his series. Why Napier kept trotting out D.J. Lagway and not ride Mertz in the second half is beyond me. And I’m a massive D.J. Lagway fan. I wanted him to come to A&M and do think he’s going to be a great college quarterback somewhere. In my mind, Napier certainly didn’t seem to be coaching to win this game. Mertz gave him the best option to win in the second half and he didn’t seem to care or be aware.

3) Florida was missing their best receiver. I have no idea if he would have made any difference but I certainly would have preferred to be tested at full strength.

4) I think this Florida team is completely beaten down. Two weeks ago, they were embarrassed by Miami, and A&M came in and controlled the game from the start. They certainly didn’t seem to put up much of a fight, especially in the second half.

With all of that being said, Texas A&M’s win was EXCELLENT. I expected a little more from Florida, but I’m not going to downplay A&M’s effort and execution in this game.

Texas A&M was far from perfect on Saturday. Yet, they controlled Florida the entire game in their house. There’s no way to minimize that.

A&M cleans up their mistakes and they can beat anyone on their schedule. They’ll need to play a perfect game against a couple of teams or near perfect game against the others but what I saw on Saturday gives me some hope this team and coaching staff can improve as the season goes on.

I certainly wasn’t feeling great after the first two games. Really, just since Notre Dame because McNeese showed us absolutely nothing they were so bad.

Three weeks into the season, I think it’s obvious the easiest wins for A&M are Florida (duh), Arkansas, and Mississippi State. I think Florida might be the most talented of those three but the worst coached. Just a terrible showing from the Gator coaching staff on Saturday.

I feel much better about A&M going at least 6-6 this season and think 8-4 is a real possibility. I wouldn’t even put 10-2 out of reach based on what I saw on Saturday. 10-2 is still a pretty big reach but I do think it’s possible.

College football is crazy, so things can change in a week’s time. Just ask a host of teams from last Saturday.

Wins in the SEC don’t come easy, so there’s no easy win. If you’re not ready to perform, you’re going to get a loss.

With that, here’s how I would rate the coaching staff on A&M’s wins and losses for the rest of the season:

5 wins or less – Terrible
6-6 – Below average
7-5 – Average
8-4 – Good
9-3 – Really good
10-2 – Great
11-1 – Amazing

I’m not going to guess where those wins and losses come from but that’s my current scale for grading this coaching staff. My expectation at this point is 8-4 but I’m all for it being better than that.

We’ll find out a lot more in the next three games.

Let’s talk about some specifics of the game and the most obvious question first:

• I don’t know how Marcel Reed isn’t the clear and obvious starting quarterback. I had questions about him during the McNeese State game but what he did on Saturday was impressive. I have no idea if he can keep this up as we saw what happened to Jaylon Henderson last season. He had an amazing first start against Mississippi State. Then struggled against LSU, got hurt on the first play of the Texas Bowl, and then lost his backup job to Reed ove the spring and summer. The list of quarterbacks who’s first start was their best start (see Kenny Trill) is long, but you have to find out if Reed is for real. Until Reed has any level of struggles, he should be the starting quarterback with no questions asked. I don’t care what Elko says during the week. I only care how he manages his quarterbacks for the next couple of games. Reed needs to start and play the large majority of the snaps against Bowling Green assuming he’s having similar success. You have to ride the hot hand and Reed is hot.

• As for Reed’s specific play, he was terrific. He wasn’t perfect in his decision making but he was really damn good most of the night. I knew he could run like a deer and has a great arm but was really impressed with his accuracy. He obviously had some big plays with wide open guys but his passes were on the mark. We’ve seen plenty of quarterbacks miss wide open guys but Reed made the passes when the big play was there.

• The play of the offensive line was also impressive. Even if the Florida defense was mailing it in. Rolling up 310 yards of rushing is impressive. Our backs certainly deserve some credit, but most of the credit is due to our offensive line controlling the line of scrimmage and opening holes. The most impressive thing without a doubt was the 99 yard drive in the rain in the second quarter. That drive alone broke what little will the Florida defense had. The offensive line deserves massive kudos for their play in this game.

• Crownover and Fatheree were rotating at right tackle early in the game but it looked like Fatheree took most of the snaps in the second half. Not sure if that means he’s won the job or something was wrong with Crownover but I’d love to see someone take over that job. I could be wrong on that and their snaps were equal, but it seemed like a I saw Fatheree more in the second half.

• T.J. Callahan looked really good at center. I’m big on him because he seems to play with a mean streak. It bit him on that 99 yard drive with his personal foul, but he got bailed out thanks to a targeting call. I don’t think Callahan will be a big drop off if he has to play center full time for us.

• Thanks to some creative play calling and routes, we finally saw some receivers running wide open against a Power 5 opponent. I can’t tell you how long I’ve been waiting on that. Some of it was the offensive line giving Reed time and Reed’s ability to extend the play, but it was nice to see.

• The first two games felt like the same old plodding Jimbo offense. This offense felt different than those first two games from the start. No doubt Reed’s athletic ability opened up some things, but the play calling in this game felt a little more forceful. The most obvious was the big TD pass to Cyrus Allen after the Florida score in the second half. I assumed we were going to run the ball most of that series. So did Florida, but Klein called a motion route out of the backfield that completely leveraged their safety cheating to the run. Reed read it perfectly and made a great pass to Allen who utilized the space to find the end zone. It was the perfect play call and execution. If Florida had any thoughts of making a comeback, that play put those thoughts to bed. Just a wonderful play in that moment.

• We only had 178 yards passing but we leveraged the running game perfectly to create two big passing touchdowns. I believe we’re going to need to leverage the passing game more as the season wears on, but I have no issue running down the throat of a team with no will and using the passing game to make sure they’re put away.

• I think you’ll see teams focus more on Reeds ability to run which is fine. I believe we can leverage that via the passing game. There’s nothing more dangerous than a quarterback in the pocket that can pull the ball down and run like a deer when the middle of the field is open. I believe that’s going to open up our passing game as linebackers and safeties have to watch for Reed taking off but we’ll see.

• Defensively, that was a tough game to analyze with the extended breaks. They were dominant in the first and second quarters and then kind of had some issues in the second half. I think this defense would have looked different had we not had that long break between the 1st and 2nd quarter. They seemed to come out a little flat in the second half because the game seemed in hand. We also appeared to rotate a few more of the backups in the second half so I think that was a factor as well.

• I think the most impressive thing I’ve seen from this defense is the adaptation to the fact the defensive line is not going to get pressure on the quarterback by themselves. That’s a tall order for four guys to beat five guys. Instead of just repeatedly hoping it happens, Elko and Bateman are using a 5th defensive lineman as a true edge rusher along with well timed and disguised blitzes to get pressure. It’s clear our defensive line can be disruptive, but it’s also clear that offensive lines are going to do their best to not let it be disruptive. When that happens, you have to be creative in getting pressure. I see that happening. The use of Cashius Howell and Rylan Kennedy has been really good. They’re technically defensive ends but they’ve been used as edge rushers on passing downs like linebackers. They’ve been really effective.

• We need to get used to Nick Scourton getting held to a degree. I saw several times where Scourton would make an inside move and the tackle would just kind of swallow him up with a hug. It’s not an obvious hold but it’s a hold. The refs weren’t calling it so Florida kept doing it. I was actually impressed with the technique Florida was using and don’t blame them for doing it. You can bet other teams are going to try the same thing until it gets flagged.

• I still have questions about this defense’s ability to defend the pass because they haven’t truly been tested, but their plan and execution for shutting down Florida was impressive. At least in the first half. I still think Arkansas is a going to be a good test of this passing defense, but I feel much better about this unit after watching them shut down Florida for a half.

• I think Elko and Bateman’s intention of applying pressure will also help this pass defense. D.J. Durkin had a terrible knack of relying only on the front four to bring pressure. You can’t do that if it’s not working. You have to bring pressure from other areas and it seems Elko and Bateman recognize that. A comfortable quarterback is a dangerous quarterback so you can’t let him get comfortable.

• An offense that can actually score points will be a big factor in how this defenses plays. Being up a few points or having an offense with the ability to respond to a big play is a massive advantage for a defensive. You can play much more aggressive knowing the offense can pick up your slack. Aggressive defenses are better defenses. We saw that on Saturday.

It’s amazing a how a single win can change your outlook on the season. The establishment of hope is an amazing thing. We have hope again.

There’s no way to truly know what this win means for the rest of our nine games. Hopefully, it’s a launch point like 2020, but we could also look back and realize Florida is a beat down team with terrible coaching. No matter what, this win is INFINITELY better than a loss.

That much is for sure.

Even more than just a win, was the play of an offense that finally showed the ability to make plays. There’s no way to know if this is sustainable. All we can do is wait until our next test against Arkansas to know if this was a blip or a trend.

I have hope it’s a trend.

Musings from McNeese

This game’s write-up will have a little more rambling and musing than a structured one.

I’m not sure what I saw on Saturday, so it’s hard to fully diagnose that game. McNeese is a bad football team—a very bad football team.

It was nice to see A&M dominate McNeese, but I’m not sure what positives there are to the game. Sure, dominating is better than struggling against McNeese, but that was a glorified scrimmage against a much inferior opponent. There’s just not a lot of good that can come from playing a game like this.

In addition to not gaining anything by playing McNeese, Some Directional Illinois beat Notre Dame in its stadium.

So, I still don’t know what the hell to think about the 2024 Aggies. The concerns remain, and the Notre Dame loss only compounds them.

Can’t even really call the Notre Dame loss a “good” loss anymore. We got beat at home by a team that got beat at home by Some Directional Illinois the following week. Those mental gymnastics rationalizing a Notre Dame loss seem to be out the window right now.

As for the McNeese game:

• Good to see Conner get back on track. I know it was just McNeese, but seeing him go 11/14 for 125 yards and two scores was nice. He missed a few passes, but he was really on the mark for the part of the game he played. I have no idea if it translates to a tougher defense but it’s sure better than him struggling against a team like McNeese.

• I thought it was moronic he got pulled when he did. He had a chance to run a 2-minute drill before the end of the first half. Then, come out for a series or two after the half to see how he responds after sitting for a bit. I understand getting Reed some snaps, but I thought Conner should have received all the snaps a couple of series into the third quarter.

• As for Marcell Reed, it’s pretty clear Conner is the unquestioned starter. I love Reed’s athleticism, but he went 5 for 11 for 71 yards. Against McNeese.

• I’m still not sold on this offensive line. It’s certainly improved from last season, but Crownover and Fatheree split time in the first half. I don’t like that at all. Our starting line needs to be set. That tells me there’s still uncertainty on who the right tackle should be. That’s a liability that will likely haunt us at some point this season.

• I’m also still worried about this line as a whole. They’re going to get tested this season, and I hope they respond. Just because they’re better than last season’s version doesn’t mean they’re a really good unit.

• I thought Moss and Daniels looked good. I still don’t think they’re elite-level backs, but I do think they will be fine for the 2024 Aggies.

• Cyrus Allen and Noah Thomas had some nice catches. We had a Moose sighting, but who knows if it will last. I think there’s some decent talent at receiver, but I’m unsure about the scheme and coaching. I expected a lot more two games in.

• If I didn’t know Elko and a new staff were running this offense, I’d think it’s still a Jimbo offense but with motion. I know it’s only two games in, but I don’t see anything different or special about this offense. It still looks like a slow, plodding offense with no creativity or wrinkles.

• Defensively, it’s really hard to judge this squad during that game. I believe McNeese was playing their backup quarterback, as their starting quarterback was banged up.

• We did have a couple of nice interceptions, but then again, it was McNeese.

• Overall, there seemed to be a dramatic difference in the quality of play when the second and third teams entered the third game. This doesn’t speak well to our depth.

Looking forward:

• Nothing changed my mind that 8-4 is the ceiling for this team. Unless there’s a dramatic change on offense, we’ll find ourselves on the short side of at least three more games. That’s not going to be a good season. We need some sort of urgency to show things are different.

• We’ll find out a lot more this weekend against Florida. Florida isn’t a good team, but they’re wounded. That scares me a bit. I’m also a little worried that pulling our starters early in the game will return and bite us in Florida. I understand the value of getting the backups some playing time, but I also want to know if our starters are prepared for 4 quarters of football. I’m not saying we’ll lose to Florida, but I don’t see it as an easy win. I hope I’m wrong and the Aggies stomp in The Swamp.

• I’m a little concerned about the Arkansas game. I know they lost to an Oklahoma State team that’s probably overrated, but Bobby Petrino will try to take advantage of our defense. I’m still not totally sold on our defense. There’s some definite talent along the starting defensive line, but I’m not sure how elite it is. I think we might be pretty susceptible to a good running team. Our linebackers and corners might struggle to defend the pass, so we’ll need our defensive line to pressure them. I know that sounds obvious, but Arkansas will tell us a lot. Bobby Petrino will find and try to attack the weaknesses.

• There’s no way to project much beyond the Florida and Arkansas games right now. Let’s see what happens in The Swamp this Saturday before we spend more time deciding more about the 2024 Aggies. It’s just not worth our time and effort right now.

Thoughts from the Notre Dame Game

Hello darkness, our old Aggie friend
I’m writing another blog about disappointment yet again

I hate to say I saw this loss coming, but if you read my pre-season ramblings, I certainly knew it was possible.

You can read those here – https://rcwouldhavegonefor2.com/2024/08/28/ramblings-and-musings-for-the-2024-aggies/

This wasn’t a horrible loss by any stretch, but to say it was disappointing is an understatement.

The Aggie football team had most of college football watching to see if they could make a statement. Aggie fans everywhere were full of hope, hoping to see a sign that things would be different.

There was no statement and indeed no sign. This was just another Aggie team with a chance to take a massive leap in the hierarchy of college football. But like so many times before, that step simply slipped away.

Same thing, different season. Great seasons appear to be an anomaly and not a standard.

A fan base that yearns for more respect in college football with a football program that rarely delivers. Expectations and reality are completely out of whack.

Sure, the Aggies can still salvage this season, but what was on display on Saturday night suggests that this team will struggle to reach eight wins.

Notre Dame is a really good football team, but it’s not elite. It’s a storied program with a schedule that only tests them in 2-3 games. The rest of the way, Florida State and USC are their only ranked opponents. They likely punched their ticket to the College Football Playoff with that win last night because they’re probably going 10-2 this season, and they’re Notre Dame.

Even though they’re likely headed to the CFP, they were totally beatable. There will be some talk that might be the best defense A&M plays all season. That may be, but the Aggie offense was utterly inept against it.

I’m not even sure that’ll be one of the best three defenses we face all year. It’s certainly a defense that’s been elevated by its schedule.

I think the lack of offense was more due to the Aggie offense being completely inept than the Notre Dame defense being stifling. That’s a good Notre Dame defense, but that Aggie offense was MISERABLE.

I will put more structure into this blog rather than my ramblings and musings like last time.

Coaching:

I don’t hate the Elko hire, but I’ve always questioned if Mike Elko is an elite head coach.

What he did at Duke was impressive as he certainly elevated their football program, but it’s not like he put Duke football on a different level. They were 8-4 and 7-5 in his two seasons.

He had some nice wins over those two years, but he also had some disappointing losses they could have won, most notably Notre Dame and North Carolina last season.

What would Aggie fans have thought of the hire if he hadn’t been the Aggie defensive coordinator?

We love hiring coaches that “get A&M,” but I don’t know if that’s the best criteria.

I’m not saying we shouldn’t have hired Elko and I’m certainly not saying he should be fired. It’s not even close to that at all. We need to simply look at Mike Elko for what games he’s been a head coach and what they have shown us.

Mike Elko will be our head coach for a few seasons, but nothing in his sample set shows he’s an elite-level head coach. Elite-level head coaching was not on display on Saturday night.

I hope I’m wrong, but I can only go on actual results. Those results aren’t elite right now.

I think most people have seen the video clip of Elko waving the white flag on the final drive and yelling at whoever was on the head set with Colin Klein to run the ball. He was more spirited than that, but Elko was not happy with Klein’s play-calling.

I’m not worried about the emotion. I love the emotion.

I’m worried about our head coach and offensive coordinator not being on the same page even if it appeared to be a meaningless drive.

Throughout the game, Elko was on the sidelines with a headset. I assume he has direct contact with his offensive coordinator. I hope he has regular conversations with his offensive coordinator during the game.

We can argue about Elko waving the white flag on the final drive, but at that moment, why did the offensive coordinator not know what his head coach wanted to do? Or was Klein acting in defiance of what his head coach wanted to do?

Maybe it was just a misunderstanding, but it’s a flag to me about how Elko handles the offensive side of the ball. I know Elko is a defensive coach, and I don’t want him calling the offensive plays. I ABSOLUTELY want him to give feedback and guidance to his offensive coordinator throughout the game, though.

That’s his job as head coach and should make the offensive coordinator’s job easier. This way, Klien can focus more on calling plays rather than spending time thinking through what direction he wants to call plays.

An elite-level head coach offers his coordinators guidance. His job is to watch the entire game, offer feedback on what’s happening, and give guidance on where to go.

I’ll get to the offense in a bit, but I hope what happened at the end was a misunderstanding and not a sign that Klein is operating the offense in a complete vacuum.

Mike Elko had a chance to make a statement on Saturday night and he didn’t. We knew the game was likely going to be an ugly offensive game. The Aggies as a whole looked really unprepared for that game. Especially on offense

I get that the coaching staff and a large part of the roster are new, but they’ve had plenty of time to prepare and look more crisp.

We certainly didn’t see elite coaching on Saturday night.

I suppose we can only go up from here, but we need to get there quickly. Mike Elko furthered the perception that the Texas A&M football team is not prepared to take that next step and make a statement. It looks like more of the same.

That will hurt our recruiting in a horrible way if it doesn’t turn around.

Mike Elko needs to win now in a huge way. sooner than later.

Offense:

Play calling:

Before I get to the obvious concern about the offense, I have to talk about the play calling.

This looked like a Jimbo Fisher called offense but with new and improved motion! Like when a crappy beer updates its can. It’s the same crappy beer, but there’s new vibrant colors on the can!

In all seriousness, there did not appear to be a comprehensive plan for this offense. It looked like a random selection of plays based on the play before it. Nothing was being set up, and it didn’t seem like this offense had any real idea of how to attack Notre Dame’s defense.

This offense looked slow, plodding, and not crisp at all. It looked like the last six years of Aggie Football.

I saw ZERO wrinkles that surprised Notre Dame. It was a straightforward offense that Notre Dame could defend.

To be fair, the quarterback play was not helping at all, but there didn’t appear to be any adapting to how the quarterback was playing.

It was like, “Oh shit. That play didn’t work. Try this one. Dang. That didn’t work either. Try this one. Crap. Okay, punt the ball, and we’ll see if we can figure out something for the next series.”

Just a bunch of haphazard plays that had no apparent rhyme or reason. If Jimbo Fisher was watching this game, he was nodding in agreement at the futility of this offense.

Just like he would have called, but with new and improved motion!

Quarterback:

First off, I don’t care that Conner threw up during the game. Sure, it’s not ideal your starting quarterback threw up during a big game. However, he’s not the first player to throw up during a game, and he won’t be the last.

I saw Elko say it was a puke and rally. That’s exactly right. It’s no big deal he threw up. I don’t really care about it.

I do care about Conner’s total lack of accuracy. He threw some really bad passes all night.

Completing 12 of 30 passes for 100 yards with two interceptions with no touchdowns shows an issue with accuracy. Visually, some of his misses were really bad.

He looked like a pitcher who couldn’t throw strikes with his fastball. Instead of trying different pitches for strikes, he just kept humming fastballs, hoping the accuracy would find its way. It never did.

Early in the game, he made two throws to the running backs, but he just gunned the ball too far in front of them. Neither running back had a chance to catch the ball. Those should be pretty high-percentage completions.

On one of his interceptions, he completely missed Noah Thomas high, which wound up in the hands of the defense back. Noah had no chance at catching the ball even though he launched himself into the air. The ball still sailed over his hands. Conner completely missed him.

Conner didn’t have a super clean pocket, but it wasn’t like he was super pressured all night long, running for his life. He had time.

He was also staring down receivers like he’d already decided where the ball was going before the snap. Primarily to Cyrus Allen on quick throws.

That’s okay to do from time to time but it looked more like he couldn’t process the defense in real time. He was just going to a guy he hoped would be open based on pre-snap reads.

I have no idea what the issue was on Saturday night, but a game from his past has scared me.

Last week, I wrote that Conner played four full games against a Power 5 opponent. In those four games, he either threw for over 300 yards or under 200.

I was looking at those games as half-full glasses. The two games in which he threw for over 300 yards were the reality, not the games in which he threw for under 200 yards.

The game that scared me the most, which I didn’t talk about, is the 2022 Auburn game.

In that game, the Aggie offense had to punt on its first 10 possessions. We never even got into field goal range on our first 10 possessions. Ten possessions and 10 punts to start the game—that’s the definition of inept.

Auburn had a decent defense, but it wasn’t super elite. However, the Aggie offense was so inept that it couldn’t move the ball inside field goal range on 10 straight possessions to open the game.

That’s the famous game where Moose was suspended for wanting to wear sleeves.

We finally got a field goal attempt on our 11th possession, but that was because of a defensive interception in Auburn territory. On that 11th possession, we didn’t even get a first down. The offense went three and out, only kicking a field goal thanks to the field position the defense secured.

The definition of inept.

In that game, Conner was 14 of 36 for 121 yards. That’s less than a 40% completion rate.

After that game, I remember thinking, “A great quarterback somehow finds ways to make plays.” Conner certainly didn’t make plays that game, but I chalked it up to stupid Jimbo because of the Moose suspension. It seemed like the perfect comedy of ineptness Jimbo was proving to be good at.

I never put any of it at Conner’s feet. Maybe I should have. Maybe Conner struggles against better defenses.

Ironically, the next season, he got hurt against Auburn on the last offensive play of the first half. In that game, he was 8 of 14 for 70 yards. I remember watching that game and thinking he was struggling. Then he got hurt, and I just chalked it up to not getting a chance to play a full game. He would have lit it up in the second half.

It’s crazy to think the game against Notre Dame is a definitive game. However, if you look at his five and a half games against Power 5 opponents, the glass is definitely half empty. There might even be a leak.

He’s undoubtedly feast or famine at this point.

I’m not giving up on Conner, but he’s no longer getting a blind pass when the Aggie passing game struggles. The data suggests there’s a good chance he’s part of the problem.

I hope he turns it around, but the trend right now is a massive red flag.

Insane to think the guy everyone assumed would be the savior of Aggie football isn’t that savior.

Welcome to Aggie football.

Offensive Line:

The offensive line has been everyone’s biggest concern coming into this season.

However, most folks blamed it on Steve Addazio; everything would be fine.

Welp, Steve Addazio was nowhere near Kyle Field on Saturday night, and the offensive line still struggled.

Last week, I discussed the shuffling as a specific concern. Well, that happened on Saturday night. Some of it was due to Mark Nabou’s apparent injury, but even before he got hurt, they were shuffling people.

You can’t do that. As a coaching staff, you must decide on the five guys you think are the best unit and let it roll.

That’s apparently what Notre Dame did. I wasn’t explicitly watching their line, but they appear to have stuck with the five guys they deemed the starters for the last two weeks. They were young and inexperienced, but they were more effective than the Aggie offensive line.

The Aggie offensive line wasn’t horrible on Saturday night, but it seemed like a microcosm of the entire Aggie offense philosophy, which has no clear plan or identity.

Sometimes, they looked okay, and other times, they struggled to pass protect or blow Notre Dame off the ball. They certainly did not have an identity of what they wanted to do to the Notre Dame defense, which caused a lot of confusion and uncertainty at times.

I believe that’s mostly tied to confusion and uncertainty about who’s playing where.

Head Coach Mike Elko needs to instruct his offensive coordinator and offensive line coach to pick the best five guys for what they want to do and stick with them. There should be no more mixing and matching.

Not during the game and not during practice.

These are the starting five for at least the next four games. Let’s see if we can finally build cohesion on the offensive line.

Running Back:

Running back was exactly what I thought it would be. Decent enough, but nothing spectacular. Moss led the way with 20 carries for 72 yards and a touchdown.

My biggest beef with Moss was that midway through the fourth quarter, we had a third-and-9. Conner hit him on a short pass out of the backfield, and Moss stepped out one yard shy of the stick. He didn’t even fight for the extra yard to get the first down.

This is your feature back?

Middle of the 4th quarter in a tie game where conversions and possession matter and your lead back isn’t fighting for a first down?

In my mind, that’s more about coaching than Moss. He needs to be aware of what’s on the line and fight for it.

It’s more of an example of an offensive that has no clue about its identity. And that’s on coaching.

Daniels showed he still has his burst, and E.J. Smith looks like a nice change of pace.

I’ve said this unit won’t carry the team, and I still believe it. They do look serviceable, but the offensive line needs to be identified to help these guys.

Wide Receiver:

I was concerned about this unit coming into the season, but I saw nothing from them. I know Notre Dame has a good defense, and Conner struggled with his accuracy, but these guys did nothing to get open.

We had 12 completions for 100 yards. Our longest completion was for 18 yards to a tight end.

Remember when I said I’m tired of tight ends leading any portion of our receiving unit? Well, I’m still tired of it.

We never once tried a deep ball in a man-coverage situation. Motion is supposed to expose the defensive coverage, and we never once went for a big play.

We never tested the safeties and linebackers on seam routes down the middle of the field.

Is that a mark on the players or is it a lack of confidence by the offensive coaching staff with their personnel? I know Conner was bad but he never had a truly wide-open receiver down the field he completely whiffed on.

All of Conner’s misses were in traffic. Our receivers were not getting open either due to a lack of talent or poorly designed routes. Maybe both.

Like the running backs, I don’t expect much from this unit, but I was hoping for something different beyond their pre-snap motion.

Noah Thomas was in the slot most of the night. Maybe my assessment is wrong, but I feel he’s our most talented receiver. He needs to be on the outside looking for man coverage down the field. We need to see if he can be a guy that defenses have to account for on the outside.

We can put to bed whatever hope we had of Moose turning into a player under a different coaching staff.

New coaching staff and the same missing Moose.

Let’s move on.

Moose ain’t ever getting loose.

Defense:

Defensive Line:

The defensive line was expected to be the best unit of this Aggie team, and they certainly lived up to those expectations.

They were, far and away, the best unit of the Aggies on Saturday night.

They didn’t register any sacks, but that’s because Notre Dame smartly used the run and quick passes, so we never had a chance to tee off on Riley Leonard. They certainly applied pressure on passing plays.

The only thing I can say about this unit is a concern for defending the run. It’s not a massive knock but I think they’re so focused on just being disruptive they lose gap integrity on obvious running situations.

Notre Dame rolled up 214 yards on 34 carries. That’s an almost 6 yard per carry average. That was the difference in the game. There were two big touchdown runs but those tend to happen when a team is committed to leaning on the defensive line for much of the game.

I’m curious if better offensive lines will have even more success running the ball against this defense. Obviously, our inept offense allowed Notre Dame to stay committed to the run, but if there’s an apparent weakness on this defensive line, it’s defending the run.

One of the night’s biggest surprises for me was the play of Cashius Howell and Rylan Kennedy. I thought they looked outstanding in the snaps they got.

We knew our starters would be good, but it’s nice to see some apparent depth and talent to give those starters a break.

Linebacker:

I thought our linebackers were okay but not dominant. I know York blames himself for the missed tackle on the long touchdown run, but there were a lot of missed tackles on that run.

We rotated a lot of guys at the linebacker position all night so it was kind of tough for me to judge how they all performed.

I’m against mixing and matching the offensive line, but I’m okay with mixing and matching the linebackers based on what we expect the opponent to do coming into the game and what we see during the game.

Other than York, we’ve got three guys whose in-game ability we’re not really sure about, so it may take a little time to develop.

I think this unit’s whole existence this season will be spent cleaning up what the defensive line misses.

So, no matter who and how they play, they have to get better at tackling and staying in position.

Secondary:

This unit didn’t get tested thanks to A&M’s inept offense and Notre Dame’s smart offensive plan.

Notre Dame threw for 158 yards on 18 completions with a long pass of 20 yards.

I don’t think we can really judge this unit from this game.

Like I’m curious what an experienced offensive line that’s committed to the run will do against our defensive line, I’m also curious what a pass-happy offense will do against this secondary.

I still fear our corners are a liability, and an effective pass-happy team can light this secondary up.

I hope I’m wrong, but Notre Dame was definitely not an effective pass-happy team that put this secondary to the test.

Looking Forward:

I have no idea if A&M will rebound from this loss. I’d like to think we will, but I have no clue.

I know the 2012 team lost to Florida in their first game, but that loss felt different, and that team was totally different. It had loads of talent on offense and a ton of seniors on defense.

I remember seeing some flashes from Johnny that game. We certainly didn’t see flashes from Conner on Saturday night. I honestly don’t know how a quarterback can have that bad of a game and completely turn it around. It’s possible, but it’s going to be a massive concern right now.

I know the 2020 team struggled in its first game against Vandy, got soundly beaten by Bama, and then turned it around against Florida, never losing the rest of the way.

That team was also different in its third year with Jimbo. It had a senior offensive line with an experienced senior quarterback. It also had two really good running backs, Isiah Spiller and some guy named Devon Achane.

This 2024 team looks more like the other years that aren’t 2012 and 2020.

We’ll learn more about this team in two weeks against a very beatable Florida team. But it’s an SEC game on the road, which I don’t need to tell you about our current losing streak in those games.

I’m also slightly concerned about facing an actual Bobby Petrino offense in Arlington. We’ll learn more about them this week as they take on Oklahoma State, but Arkansas may not be an obvious win.

We have four games before Missouri comes to town, and that will be a much tougher game than people expect.

While Notre Dame might be one of the best defenses we face all season, I also think their offense will be one of the worst we see all season—at least of the SEC teams left on our schedule.

Our defense is going to face much bigger tests.

I still contend this feels like an 8-4 season. With the loss, we skew to the 6-6 side, not the 10-2 side.

We had an amazing night. Kyle Field was flat out rocking, and we could have made a statement. We did what Aggie Football has done in forever: We stubbed our toe.

It doesn’t mean our season is lost, but it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be concerned.

We just have to wait until September 14th to see another data point for this team.

A Month of Mike Elko

In my initial analysis of Mike Elko after his firing, I stated I felt the Aggies finally got the hire right. This was after four failed attempts with Fran, Sherman, Sumlin, and Jimbo. I’m going to retract the statement I think we finally hired the right guy.

I’m not retracting my statement because Elko was a bad hire. I’m retracting my statement because I have no idea if Mike Elko will be successful at Texas A&M. We all HOPE Elko was the right hire, but nobody has any real clue if he was the right hire or not at this point. Everybody is just guessing.

We all know Mike Elko appears to be a tried and true football coach. He doesn’t seem to be some slick salesman or some dude who has ridden a hot hand he didn’t have much to do with.

Mike Elko has got to where he is because he’s a tried and true football coach. He’s a football coach above everything else. That I don’t question.

I believe Mike Elko can succeed at Texas A&M, but I wonder if he will be. I’m looking at Mike Elko with a more objective lens than I did with the previous coaches. I drank the Maroon Kool-Aid way too early with Fran, Sumlin, and Jimbo.

What’s the saying? Fool me once; shame on me. Fool me three times; shame on you, Aggie Football head coach, hiring decision-makers.

Like the coaches before him, Mike Elko will be judged on the 12-game schedule and whatever bowl games he attends. The offseason matters, but it doesn’t matter in the grand scheme. The off-season, including signings and practices, is fodder until the games are played.

What matters for Mike Elko is how many wins and losses he’ll have over the next few years. That’s impossible to predict right now.

The biggest epiphany in changing my mind about how I see Elko came the night of the Texas Bowl. Many folks will say it’s a meaningless bowl game, but I’m afraid I have to disagree after watching it.

My greatest takeaway in watching that game was the massive talent deficiency of the Aggies. It was MASSIVE.

Sure, the excuse is there were quite a few injuries, opt-outs, and folks entering the transfer portal. That’s right, but most folks are missing the point – This is the base from which Elko has to work. We lost to a pretty bad Oklahoma State team that night. We lost because we had a severe talent deficiency.

I know we lost our third-string quarterback on the first play, but our cornerbacks got worked by a pedestrian set of receivers and quarterback. Our defensive line and linebackers got very little pressure. We did an excellent job of slowing Oklahoma State’s running game, but the pass defense is a massive concern for me going into 2024.

Offensively, we did decent passing the ball but struggled to establish the running game. Our running backs combined for 15 carries and 47 yards. That’s slightly better than three yards per carry. That’s not a great Oklahoma State defense, and we couldn’t establish the run.

We were down most of the game, so we had no choice but to make up ground through the air. I still would have liked to have seen us establish the run. We abandoned it too soon, but what little we did run could have been more impressive, so that could be a reason.

While 372 yards of passing isn’t terrible, I’d like to present two stats: 1) No passing touchdowns and 2) Max Wright had the longest pass completion of 40 yards.

That isn’t a knock on Max Wright. He’s a good football player who embodies what a Fightin’ Texas Aggie should be. The problem is Max Wright is a tight end and not what one would call a passing threat. This is the second game in a row where he’s had the longest pass completion.

That’s a massive concern for me regarding our receiving corps. It needs to be discussed because there are some plays where these guys flash, but this receiving corps, as it stands right now, is pedestrian. I’m serious. We continue to need more elite-level receivers.

Ainias Smith is the lone exception to the receivers in the six years Jimbo was at the helm. I don’t see that changing anytime soon. You must have receivers who can take on the best secondaries to excel in college football. The Aggies still need to be elite through the air right now.

We can move the ball at times, but for the most part, we can’t routinely press secondaries with our receiving corps. That has got to change and change quickly. I don’t see it happening, though.

Coming out of the Texas Bowl against a VERY beatable Oklahoma State, I have these concerns:
1) An inability to bring pressure by the defensive front.
2) Can’t cover at all.
3) Can’t establish the running game.
4) Receivers can’t consistently dominate.

Other than that, it wasn’t all that bad…

That was not a meaningless bowl game. It was an eye-opener to where things stand with the Aggie football program. It’s not good.

Many of you think Elko will fix it with the transfer portal. While I will give Elko credit, he’s doing everything he can via the transfer portal. However, I equate it to an NFL expansion team trying to bolster its roster via the expansion draft. It really is.

Mike Elko is going to sign roughly 20 guys from the transfer portal. 25% of his scholarship roster will be guys from the transfer portal.

These aren’t SEC starters are even SEC two deep guys he’s signing. Most of these guys are coming from non-Power 5 conferences. They have yet to face elite talent like they’ll be facing in the SEC. They’re all going to go through a massive learning curve if they actually survive the learning curve.

One guy can be an immediate contributor, and that’s the defensive end from Purdue, who led the Big 10 in sacks last season. He looks like the real deal and an excellent get from the transfer portal.
Other than him, these guys have yet to produce much in a major conference.

I like the corner from Kansas State, but we’ll see if his skills transfer to a more physical league with better overall talent.

The rest of these transfers? There are a couple of guys with promise, but I have a question on whether they’re that much better than the guys they will try to replace.

Why does this worry me? The top teams in college football don’t have to load up in the transfer portal. The argument will be they don’t have to because they’re a good football team. That is precisely my argument. They’re not coming off a 5-7 and 7-6 season. Texas A&M has a losing record over the last two seasons.

A&M has received a bad rap related to the transfer portal over the last two years, but you can’t objectively deny that flipping over a roster every year is not the recipe for success. You should use the transfer portal to add talent in critical areas. You shouldn’t use the transfer portal to replace 25% of your roster in one season.

That’s where Texas A&M is right now. Our depth and a few critically talented individuals have left the program. Elko is forced to fill the roster with people from the transfer portal.

I’m sorry. That’s just not ideal.

I fully get the argument Elko is trying to mold the roster with “his guys.” The problem is we are still determining if Elko can truly identify and develop talent. We don’t know that, as there’s no track record of him doing it.

We have two seasons of Mike Elko at Duke, where he went 8-4 and 7-5. That’s pretty decent for Duke, but he also coached in what could be the worst Power 5 conference. I know he lost his quarterback for parts of this season, but didn’t Jimbo lose his quarterback as well?

Why do we give Elko the benefit of the doubt in losing his quarterback but not Jimbo? I’m not defending Jimbo. I just want a head coach where we don’t have to routinely defend the loss of our starting quarterback for the win-loss record.

What Elko did at Duke is impressive, but it’s not like he won the ACC or even a division. His time at Duke is promising, but it’s certainly not definitive for having success at Texas A&M.

As for the 2024 schedule, it is easier because Alabama isn’t on it. However, the Saban news changes that. The 2024 schedule is still a big challenge for a team with around 40% of its scholarships filled with guys who have never taken a snap for the Aggies. I’m including the high school signees and the transfer portal guys in that number.

FORTY PERCENT OF THE ROSTER WILL HAVE NEVER TAKEN A SNAP IN AN AGGIE UNIFORM.

I’m sorry. That’s not ideal.

Elko is bringing in a ton of guys, hoping and praying they can fill half a dozen starting spots if not more. That’s roughly 25% of the starting spots. He needs transfer players to win the job and then play at a high level to win ten games.

I don’t see that happening in Mike Elko’s first year. That doesn’t mean he can’t be successful long term, but it’s much easier to be successful in college football with some early excitement from a coaching staff that wins football games.

This will be more of an 8-4 team in 2024.

When we fired Jimbo, I thought the right coach could come in and win right away with our roster. Mike Elko has decided to take a different approach and turn this into a 2-3 year build. If that pays off, I’m good with it, but I have massive questions right now.

While the transfer portal is new, Mike Elko is attempting to do something that nobody else is doing. I don’t know of any other team overhauling 40% of their roster in a single season. It’s a bold move, for sure.

Once the final roster is set with transfer portal players and the final signing class is done, I’ll look at how the team shapes up.

I believe we’ll be worse off going into the 2024 season than in 2023. I hope I’m wrong, but after watching the Texas Bowl and realizing what Elko is doing with the roster, I have some concerns about what Aggie Football is capable of in 2024.

The Aggies have to compete with all of college football, and if you accurately compare where things stand right now, it could be better. In a vacuum, it seems exciting to get all new players. There are concerns when you compare it to the rest of college football.

Only time will tell if those concerns are real.

We Finally Got Our Guy

The Aggies hired Mike Elko on Monday, November 27, 2023, but not without a major fiasco.

We’ll get to Mike Elko in a bit, but let’s first go through the fiasco that was the hiring process.

All reports led into last weekend that Texas A&M was finally conducting an actual hiring process for their head coach. For the first time since Jackie Sherrill, the powers that be appeared to be considering a lot of potential coaches rather than starting with the end already known.

In my last blog post, I mentioned how every hire since Jackie Sherrill resulted in the most obvious hire with no apparent due diligence into that coach and any other candidates.

In Monday’s press conference after introducing Mike Elko, Ross Bjork indicated at least 30 potential coaches had been considered in some form, shape, or fashion. That doesn’t mean they interviewed or talked to 30 coaches; it just means many coaches were considered.

That sounds like a wonderful coaching search.

The rumored plan headed into the last regular season of college football was there were some key targets, and Saturday’s games needed to be played to see if that changed any interest in coaches on the coach’s side or A&M’s side.

Once again, this is a wonderful plan for a coaching search. We’ve got a little time, so let’s wait one more weekend to see if someone has a different level of interest once their season ends and they have no shot at the College Football Playoff. Or at least a minimal shot after losing in a rival game.

It seemed that the Aggies would make a very well-thought-out and intelligent hire.

Wellllllllllllllllllllll, on Saturday night around 8:48 p.m., the wheels didn’t just fall off the coaching search wagon; they blew up like a 90s-era Ford Explorer and turned the coaching search wagon completely upside down.

Reports started flowing out that the Aggies and Mark Stoops agreed for him to become the new Aggie head coach. His name surfaced late Friday night on the Internet and Saturday morning during the pre-game shows, but nobody thought it was real.

Based on what I can tell, Billy Liucci with TexAgs was the first to say anything at 8:48 p.m. He posted this on his premium forum, so it wasn’t technically public knowledge. I’m not a premium subscriber, so I didn’t see it, but I was sent what was posted. Liucci never publicly Tweeted anything, but when he breaks something that big in his premium forum, it’s basically public information.

Mark Passwaters, another well-connected reporter following Aggie sports, publicly Tweeted at 8:51 that Mark Stoops looked like the next Aggie head coach “barring a last-minute collapse.” By this time, every national reporter was also Tweeting that Mark Stoops was all but officially the next head football coach at Texas A&M.

The Mark Stoops to Aggieland train was running full steam down the tracks.

Social media lit up with Aggies everywhere, including players, ridiculing the hire. I mean, it just absolutely blew up. This is the first time I’ve seen something like it where there wasn’t an Aggie to be found that was supportive of the hire.

Many sports reporters were questioning the hire, but Aggies everywhere were lambasting the hire. And for good reason.

My cell phone blew up from friends, but I found it hard to believe. Surely, the powers that be weren’t that stupid. I’ll get to why hiring Mark Stoops made no sense later, but I couldn’t believe we would fire Jimbo Fisher to hire Mark Stoops.

It seemed real, but it also seemed odd.

I was pretty tired from a full day of watching college football, so I went to bed around 10:30, assuming/hoping I would wake up to different news. Luckily, that was the case, but let me finish how the night played out.

At 10:48 p.m., Brent Zwerneman of the Houston Chronicle Tweeted, “Any reports that say Mark Stoops to Texas A&M is a done deal are premature and inaccurate.”

Precisely two hours after Billy Liucci posted it looked like Mark Stoops would be the next head coach; a very well-connected Brent Zwerneman said reports of Mark Stoops were inaccurate. Now, mind you, Brent jumped on the Stoops to Aggieland train an hour before, saying it was also a done deal.

Somewhere along the way, I feel like there were reports that Mike Elko had told the Duke administration he would be staying at Duke. All signs pointed to Mark Stoops getting the Aggie gig.

What happened in that hour that Brent posted Stoops was coming, and then he wasn’t, I have no idea. Brent changed course quickly.

Brent has a connection at the highest level of Texas A&M. I don’t have proof of it, but Brent has broken some pretty big news related to Texas A&M. He would also officially announce the hire of Mike Elko the next day before anyone else.

Brent is connected.

When Brent Tweeted out the news it was premature, I believe it slowed down the train, but you don’t stop trains. They have to roll to a stop over a pretty good distance. The Mark Stoops train kept moving, and people’s fury had not fully calmed down.

At 11:16 p.m., a Kentucky reporter tweeted that Mark Stoops was staying in Kentucky. At 11:20 p.m., Billy Liucci confirmed that report. It looked like the Mark Stoops train to A&M was stopped and not going anywhere.

At 12:02 a.m., Mark Stoops tweeted that he had listened to a potential opportunity but would stay at Kentucky. He never denied the reports or consideration. That’s key, which I’ll get to later.

If you still couldn’t believe the reporters, the man himself had spoken, he wouldn’t be the next Aggie head coach. He never stated the specific school, but what he talked about was obvious.

What a WILD 3 hours that was. The Mark Stoops era at Texas A&M will be any Aggie head coach’s shortest but most exciting tenure. Maybe he wasn’t officially the head coach, but three very well-connected reporters all reported it was all but a done deal waiting on official approval.

So What the Hell Happened?:

Only a few people know what happened, but it’s possible to piece together what likely happened.
I do not know Ross Bjork led this, but Ross Bjork has never denied that Mark Stoops was a finalist. In his press conference on Monday, Ross Bjork stated he didn’t know how the reports got out and that the list of finalists and the finalist was “fluid.”

He never mentioned Mark Stoops by name, but he also never denied that final terms were being discussed with Mark Stoops. He also never said Mike Elko was the clear finalist heading into Saturday evening. He simply said everything on Saturday evening was “fluid.” That’s a non-denial if I’ve ever heard one.

So, the rest of what you’re about to read is all speculation on my part, but I have a solid basis for my speculation.

Ross Bjork seemed to be working independently or with a few people and had decided on Mark Stoops as the next Aggie head coach.

The problem appears to be that Bjork hadn’t informed enough of the folks who would make the final approval to see their thoughts. In the couple of hours of this going public, final approvers made their intentions known internally that they would disapprove of Mark Stoops as the head coach of Texas A&M.

I don’t specifically know who those people are, but it’s safe to assume those people have some combination of money and power. Certainly more than Ross Bjork.

Some of it might have been the public sentiment in those couple of hours, but if the news of Mark Stoops being the finalist had not been made public, I still don’t think it would have been approved. It was unanimous and widespread amongst Aggies that Mark Stoops was not the answer to the current issues with Aggie Football.

The exact time of death is up for debate, but the death of the Mark Stoops era at Texas A&M was between 10:48 p.m. on November 25, 2023, and 12:02 a.m. on November 26, 2023.

Like a rocket headed out of the Earth’s atmosphere, it didn’t last long, but it was full of energy. That was the Mark Stoops era at Texas A&M.

It’ll go down in Aggie legend.

Like most things on social media, the good news is that it’s all but gone and forgotten now. Sure, it’ll get brought back up occasionally, but it was so short and chaotic, along with nailing the Elko hire shortly after that, that it’s a mere blip.

It was an embarrassing blip by certain Aggie leaders, but it’s still a blip.

The future of Aggie Football lies with Mike Elko and his ability to win football games.

What the Hell Was Bjork Thinking?:

Nobody knows, including Ross Bjork. Whatever happened on Saturday night, Bjork dropped Mark Stoops like a hot potato. Stoops may say he declined, but final approval for him to decline was never coming. It could be an exercise in semantics that he removed his name from consideration before the final decision was made. Still, Mark Stoops never got an official offer to come to Aggieland.

The Mark Stoops to Aggieland train only has Bjork and I’m guessing, a couple of other ill-informed folks. I don’t know how many, but I don’t think Bjork had decided and started negotiating with Stoops in a vacuum. If that’s true, it’s even scarier Bjork thought he had that level of autonomy in this search.
I wonder how Bjork could conclude that Mark Stoops was the best candidate for Texas A&M.

I get guys like Dan Lanning, Ryan Day, and Kalen DeBoer weren’t coming to Aggieland. You do your due diligence and ensure there’s no possibility first. You start with the most proven and successful, even if their tenure as head coach is short. They’ve all accomplished more than Mark Stoops has, as they’ve all made it to conference championship games or better.

There’s a LONG list of coaches between those three guys and Mark Stoops.

Mike Elko, Elijah Robinson, and Jed Fischer were all rumored to be under strong consideration. Those guys are light years ahead of Mark Stoops for the Aggie job.

If Bjork wanted a sitting SEC head coach, the obvious hire was Lane Kiffin. I know people don’t like Lane Kiffin, but the dude would have won football games at Texas A&M. Winning cures everything, so Aggie fans would have gotten over Kiffin as their coach in short order. Kiffin would have taken the job as well.

In addition to Kiffin, Eli Drinkwitz should have been considered before Mark Stoops. I think Drinkwitz would have considered leaving Missouri for A&M. Those SEC head coaches are infinitely more qualified for the Aggie job than Mark Stoops.

How Bjork settled on Mark Stoops is beyond me and everyone I’ve read or talked to. Stoops has done well at Kentucky, but he hasn’t exactly killed it in Lexington. He has a losing record in the SEC and has spent 12 seasons in the SEC East, a much weaker division than the West. He should have a winning record in the SEC East, even at Kentucky, if he’s a great coach.

He’s never taken Kentucky to Atlanta for the SEC Championship or played in a New Year’s Six bowl game. He’s made Kentucky relevant and competitive in football, but he’s not excelled as their head coach.

The only thing I can think that swayed Bjork to settle on Stoops is that he’s a sitting SEC head coach. That does look like a strong move, but we saw what happened with Dan Mullen going from Mississippi State to Florida. That only sometimes works out.

If you want to play conspiracy, Bjork and Stoops briefly crossed paths in Miami in 2003. They may have made a personal connection there. Sports is a ton about personal relationships when it comes to hiring.

Maybe Bjork, like Scott Woodward before him, who hired his buddy, Jimbo, wanted to hire someone he knew well. He wouldn’t be the first, and he wouldn’t be the last.

If you want to go further down the conspiracy hole, both Bjork and Stoops are repped by Jimmy Sexton. Jimmy Sexton represents some of the top names in college football, so that he may have offered advice in Bjork’s ear.

I’ve tried to figure out what Bjork was thinking, but I can’t. I think Bjork is just an idiot.

Sure, he comes across looking and talking the part, but remember he was the Athletic Director at Ole Miss when all the Hugh Freeze stuff went down. He and the Ole Miss administration completely botched that. They had to fire Hugh Freeze because a lawsuit they created produced records showing Freeze had called an escort service from a University phone.

Bjork has gotten his head coach (Freeze) fired, thanks to a decision he was part of. He can add Mark Stoops to a head coach decision that was blown up when he brought it for final approval. Bjork’s track record could be better.

Once again, this is all speculation on my part with Bjork’s involvement, but it seems like he was leading the Mark Stoops decision with little feedback.

There’s nothing “fluid” about a list of finalists in a coaching search like this. Sure, there’s a little uncertainty, but at some point, you nail down your finalist and get them. It seems apparent that Stoops was Bjork’s finalist, but he quickly learned nobody else felt the same.

We’ll likely find out in the next 12-24 months if this is the case. If this wasn’t Bjork’s doing, he’ll remain the Aggie AD for a good period. The sports that matter are in good hands with good coaches. We need deep post-season runs by those sports other than one season for baseball, but the Aggie athletic department is humming along thanks to ticket sales and large donations.

I believe we’ll see Bjork move on within the next 12 months and Justin Moore promoted to Athletic Director. At this point, Bjork has lost all faith with the Aggie faithful. It will take some deep post-season runs in football, basketball, and baseball for him to win some favor back.

How Did We Get Mike Elko?:

This is all speculation as well, but after Bjork recommended the hiring of Mark Stoops, the powers that be told him to get Elko and be done with the coaching search. Don’t screw it up any worse than what you’ve already done.

When Mark Stoops was recommended and blown up, there were two choices:
1) Reset the whole process.
2) Make the most apparent hire right away, which was Elko.

I was leaning to number one on Sunday morning mainly because I needed to learn how botched things were. After seeing the results, I fully agree that number two was the proper path.

There was no need to complicate the process and make it worse. Who knows what coaches on the “fluid list” were still interested after learning about Mark Stoops and the blowback?

Mike Elko was the guy to get at that point. And we went and got him.

I’d like to know if initially focusing on Mark Stoops over Mike Elko costs us another million per year and an additional year on the contract. We could have had Mike Elko for five years at $30 million had he been the main target when the key games were done on Saturday. Instead, we gave him a six-year contract for $42 million.

It’s not a terrible contract based on the current market, but I was surprised to see the annual salary and length of the deal. Hopefully, it’s a moot point, and we’re not wondering if Ross Bjork cost us a few million thanks to his idiocy.

Is Mike Elko a Good Hire?:

After all the dust settled, Mike Elko was the best hire. I’m confused that Mark Stoops was even on the “fluid list” of finalists. I wonder how anyone could think Stoops was a better hire than Elko. It makes no sense.

Moving on from Stoops, I like Elko over Dan Lanning, Ryan Day, Kalen DeBoer, Jed Fisch, and even Kyle Whittingham, who entered the process late with sincere interest.

Lane Kiffin is the only other coach who would have been a great hire, but I get perception wouldn’t have allowed it.

I love the Elko hire for a host of reasons.

First off, he’s a football coach through and through. Not just some Xs and Os genius but a dude who understands the game of football from the players, the program, and the plays. His two years at Duke were fantastic; he learned much about being a head coach. He’s a more well-rounded football coach than when he left Texas A&M. It’s almost like we sent him to finishing school for two years.

In addition, Elko is young and hungry.

This is the thing we missed the most on Jimbo. Jimbo is a football coach but wasn’t hungry when we hired him.

Jimbo’s problem was he was so focused on making his offense work in today’s game that he wouldn’t evolve. He didn’t have to because he had a national championship and a massive guaranteed contract. He could dig in trying to make his offense work because he didn’t have to worry about anything from an accomplishment or monetary standpoint. Sure, he ruined his legacy at two schools, but he’s got a national championship ring and earned well over $100 million in his career. Jimbo wanted to prove a point rather than evolve because he wasn’t hungry for success.

Elko appears to be the exact opposite. Sure, he’s got a fat contract that can take care of a few generations, but he hasn’t won anything on the football field as a head coach. What he did at Duke the last two seasons is impressive, but in the grand scheme, it’s not much.

Mike Elko has a good decade or two of coaching football in front of him. He’s got an incentive-based contract where he can make more money than his base salary if he wins a national championship. He has all the world’s motivation to succeed at Texas A&M.

He’s only two seasons removed from the Aggie program, so he has more familiarity than any potential head coach. Elijah Robinson has the most, but he would never be the head coach with Elko in the mix. Elko makes more sense than Robinson because he’s done it for a couple of seasons.

Elko’s familiarity with the Aggie program is going to pay massive dividends. We’ve already seen it with the team and recruiting. In the first few days since his announcement, there has yet to be a mass exodus to the transfer portal or de-commitments in recruiting. Sure, some players are likely going to transfer, and maybe a couple of kids will de-commit, but by and large, it looks like the players are committed to keeping this thing together.

That is HUGE because this Aggie team is loaded with talent. This isn’t a rebuild job. This isn’t a head coach driving the program into the ground, and the next coach has to rebuild everything. This is a situation where a head coach needs to walk in and keep the train on the track while making some modifications so the train runs better.

This team was a few points away from playing in Atlanta this season. The talent is there, and it’s clear that Elko’s familiarity with the players is a massive asset.

Beyond the players, Mike Elko knows the administration to a large degree. There have been some changes in two years, but for the most part, Mike Elko has a good idea of who does what from an administration standpoint. He doesn’t have to sit in his office wondering who to contact when he needs something. He already has a good idea, which will make his transition easier.

His family’s familiarity with College Station is also a positive. They likely have friends with whom they can plug back in and know where they want to live. We forget coaches are people with family that need to be taken care of. I’m sure Elko’s wife and kids can go about their way and not spend a lot of time adjusting to a new place.

That saves Elko from worrying about them.

I have no idea how successful Elko will be at Texas A&M. Nobody does. I’m not foolish enough to think he will win repeated national championships. He’s in a position to appear in the College Football Playoff, and that’s all you can ask for.

Most people have not realized it, but a MASSIVE change is coming to college football next season. The Big 10 and SEC are doing away with divisions, and the playoff is expanding to 12 teams.

For Texas A&M, that’s a massive gain because everything doesn’t go through Tuscaloosa and Atlanta anymore. Even if Nick Saban continues to dominate, it’s not our most significant issue. We can still carve a path to the College Football Playoff, which will be a massive step for the program.

Don’t get me wrong, I want to supplant Alabama and Georgia in the SEC, but that’s a tall order for next season. From day one, Mike Elko has a much easier path to college football relevance than in years past.
I’m bullish on the future of Aggie Football. Only time will tell if I’m right. I hope I’m finally right because I missed on Fran, Sumlin, and Jimbo. I was right on Sherman from the start.

I bought into the hype early on with the other three and thought each guy would return Aggie Football to national relevance. They had a blip of a great season but failed to do more over their entire tenure. They failed.

I’m hoping Mike Elko is different, but I think we finally got it right.

I can’t believe anyone with authority thought Mark Stoops was the answer. What a train wreck that would have been. No Stoops for us, thank goodness.

What a Fiasco

Someone in the Texas A&M Athletic Department took all the attention away from a pretty good day of college football, including one of the greatest endings in Iron Bowl history.

For 3 hours on a Saturday night, Mark Stoops had become the head coach of Texas A&M.

I don’t know exactly what happened, but it seems Ross Bjork had been discussing the position with Mark Stoops. He was doing this without the knowledge of his bosses and didn’t have full authority. Stoops and Bjork had reached an agreement. All that was needed was approval from Bjork’s higher-ups.

From what I can tell, Billy Liucci with TexAgs posted on his website that the hire of Stoops was all but done. Liucci is also the person who broke the news that Jimbo had been fired. He’s clearly connected to someone who said it was okay to post the information.

The hiring of Mark Stoops by Texas A&M hit social media, and all hell broke loose. I’ve never seen anything like it. My phone blew up from people asking what was going on. Twitter/X was full of people in disapproval. NOBODY was supportive of the hire.

For good reason. You don’t fire Jimbo Fisher to hire Mark Stoops. It makes ZERO sense that someone at Texas A&M was even talking to Stoops, much less finalizing details for his hiring.

Mark Stoops was never getting hired at Texas A&M. I don’t think he would have gotten the approval from those above Bjork. A lot of assumptions were made. It was a done deal, but it never was.

Either way, it’s an embarrassment. It’s further proof the chain of command at Texas A&M is broken and needs to be fixed. I don’t know precisely what needs to be fixed, but someone above Bjork better be super pissed off if this ever happened and get it fixed.

Watching Bjork’s initial press conference and interviews over the last couple of weeks made me think we had an actual plan for hiring Jimbo’s replacement. It’s now apparent we don’t. That’s frustrating.

The Mark Stoops era at Texas A&M provided and will provide a ton of good humor. Unfortunately, it’s an embarrassment of leadership. It should have never happened.

Where Do The Aggies Go From Here:

Believe it or not, this isn’t the first time something like this has happened in college football. Most people don’t know, but Alabama once “hired” Rich Rodriguez, who decided not to come. The guy they wound up hiring would be Nick Saban. It’s wild to think what would have happened if Rich Rodriguez had taken the job and not Saban.

There’s another instance where Tennessee “hired” Greg Schiano, but similar to A&M and Stoops, the fan base revolted, and Schiano didn’t take the job. The Volunteers would eventually hire Jeremy Pruitt, and we know how that turned out. It wasn’t good.

Is Texas A&M hiring the next Nick Saban? Probably not. But they can avoid hiring the next Jeremy Pruitt.

Someone needs to get their ass chewed on this morning. Then, immediately settle down and get re-focused on hiring the best coach for Texas A&M. If that means taking the keys from Ross Bjork, then so be it. It would be best if he were talking to Mark Stoops.

I believe Texas A&M had a plan to see how the games this weekend played out. Most notably, with Ryan Day at Ohio State and Kalen DeBoer at Washington.

Day lost, and DeBoer won.

The Aggie leadership needs to get back to their original plan. Reach out to Day and ask his interest and if he can make a decision in the next 72 hours. I still believe he’s the best hire for the job. Conform with DeBoer he’s deciding once Washington is out of the hunt for the College Football Playoff.

You reach out to Jed Fisch and confirm he’s still interested despite what happened on Saturday night. You tell him nothing was officially decided, and an erroneous report occurred.

You also put Elijah Robinson and Mike Elko back in serious consideration. I have some concerns with Elijah Robinson based on how the team played in his two games as head coach. Maybe there was just too much “Jimbo Stink,” but many apparent errors that somebody should have cleaned up weren’t. They still looked a lot like a Jimbo-coached team.

Robinson may need an entire off-season to change the program’s culture. I know the players want to play for Robinson, but there’s a massive difference between wanting to play for someone and winning football games. We don’t have enough information on what kind of coach Elijah Robinson could be. I wanted to see more out of him these last two games.

As for Elko, I still think he’s the ultimate fallback guy, but you can’t wait forever. He would stabilize a lot of the issues Jimbo left. This feels like a “lick your wounds” hire at this point, but there are much worse hires.

The other thing I would do at this point, but it won’t happen, is to reach out to Lane Kiffin and Eli Drinkwitz. If you’re going to talk to SEC coaches, this is who it should be. Certainly not Mark Stoops.

I know many people don’t like Kiffin, and I have issues with him, but he would elevate A&M’s football program from a Win/Loss standpoint.

The number one focus for the coaching search should be SOLELY on finding a coach that will improve the number of wins. That’s it.

Sure, there has to be some element to being a fit, but don’t let emotion miss out on someone that can elevate the program to national prominence. That’s what Bjork said was the mission in firing Jimbo and getting a replacement.

While what happened with Stoops on Saturday is an embarrassment, the A&M administration still has the opportunity to do what they set out to do – Improve the number of wins from Jimbo Fisher.

Someone in the administration needs to chew on whoever’s ass needs chewing on and then get everyone calmed down and back on the mission.

This whole thing can still be salvaged with the proper focus. Hopefully, that happens, and we can all look back on the last Saturday night of the regular season and laugh.

Right, Aggie leadership?

Is This Hire Gonna Be Like It Used To Be

As we wait on the white smoke from Kyle Field, I want to take a look back at previous Aggie Football coaching hires to see if this go-round is any different.

This is a monumental hire for Aggie Football. I know it feels like that every time but this time is truly different. The reason is the talent on the current team is capable of winning a national championship. It is.
The same thing existed in 2011 when we hired Kevin Sumlin but nobody realized it. We didn’t know what Johnny Manziel was capable of. This time is different because every coaching staff in the country knows what kind of talent is on the Aggie roster.

In addition, coaches know that Texas A&M is poised to compete at the highest levels in what college football is about to become. Money and support will matter now more than ever. You’re starting to hear from coaches that if a program doesn’t have money to spend it’s going to be limited in its success going forward.

Coaches understand what Texas A&M is capable of going forward even if most college football fans that can only look at past results don’t.

To get there I want to go back and look at who and how we hired coaches before this one. Having that frame of reference will help determine if we truly learn from past mistakes and do things differently.
Before I get going let me say I have very little inside knowledge. Most of my knowledge comes from public sources anyone can read. I think I consume a lot more stuff when it comes to Aggie Football but I don’t have any real inside knowledge other than a few things I’ve picked up along the way.

Previous Coaches:

Jackie Sherrill:
I’m going back as far as my knowledge will let me. I was alive when Jackie was hired but I wasn’t aware of the hire. In reading the history of this hire this was a MASSIVE hire. Bum Bright wanted a big name and wanted to flex the money muscle.

Bum was willing to make the next Aggie coach the first with an annual income of over a million dollars.
He tried to get Bo Schembechler first but he declined. Then he went and got Jackie Sherrill.

Jackie had just come off three consecutive 11-1 seasons at Pitt with three bowl wins where his teams finished in the Top 5. He was extremely successful at Pitt.

Jackie had great success at A&M but his hire was as big as it got at the time.

The search consisted solely of finding the most successful coach that would take the money.

It worked.

R.C. Slocum:
Slocum took over from Jackie due to some recruiting violations and internal politics.

Slocum was the obvious choice because the Aggies were rolling on the field and Slocum was the architect of the Wrecking Crew. No coaching search necessary.

Just give the keys to the machine Jackie built and see what he can do. The same formula has worked for OU giving the keys to Lincoln Riley and Ohio State giving the keys to Ryan Day.

Dennis Franchione:
Sandwiched between Jackie and the Jimbo hire, Dennis Franchione was as big of a hire as it got at the time.

He had been wildly successful at TCU and had some immediate success at Alabama. He looked like a no-brainer hire.

The story was the Franchiones wanted to come back to Texas. From a football standpoint Alabama was about to have some recruiting restrictions placed on them for things that happened before Franchione got there.

That all makes sense as to why Franchione would take the Aggie job over the Crimson Tide job. It was also deemed payback for Alabama luring Bear Bryant away from Texas A&M. The storylines were wonderful to paint for the media and Texas A&M.

There was a fallacy in this hire in that Fran was the only coach considered based on my knowledge of how things went down. It makes sense as on the surface Fran was a MASSIVE get for Texas A&M and the school hadn’t had a coaching search in 20ish years.

They didn’t want to screw up firing Slocum and missing out on Fran. Based on what I’ve read and heard including being very attentive at the time no one else was considered.

I wanted them to consider Brent Venables who was running OU’s defense to perfection at the time along with this coach at Bowling Green named Urban Meyer. Yes, Urban Meyer jumped from Bowling Green to Utah at the same time Fran went from Alabama to A&M.

To be completely honest I think even if the school did a legit coaching search with due diligence on multiple coaches Fran likely still gets hired. However, who knows what a true search with due diligence would have produced?

Fran didn’t work out because he was a fraud propped up by Gary Patterson at TCU and some pretty awesome talent left to him at Alabama. I don’t know if due diligence would have uncovered that but it would have been interesting to know.

Mike Sherman:
We got Bill Byrne as our AD right before we hired Fran but Byrne didn’t have much to do with the Fran hire other than stamp it and introduce him at the press conference. For Mike Sherman, I was told this hire was all Bill Byrne’s by someone who would know.

I trust that person immensely but the factors around the timing of the hire lend to that as well. Robert Gates had just left Texas A&M the year before and we had an interim President. Bill Byrne had sole control of the Athletic Department.

This hire also fits Bill Byrne to a T.

I could write 10 pages on Bill Byrne but the jist of Bill Byrne is that he seemed to never think Texas A&M was a Tier 1 athletic department. He would talk like it but his actions never showed it. He was mindful of finances which was very helpful from a profitability standpoint.

When it came to hiring coaches he never shot for the stars when it came to head coaching hires other than Billy Gillispie, Pat Henry, and Gary Blair.

While all three were EXCELLENT hires they were also easy hires. They were Texas guys that weren’t making huge salaries at the time. He just paid them more money and gave them the keys to their respective sports at a flagship Texas school Very astute hires but it didn’t take a lot of work on his part to make.

For every other hire at Texas A&M, Bill Byrne liked to show he knew more about hiring a coach than anyone else. He never went for the big names. He liked to find the diamond in the rough.

When Coach Fran announced he had been fired Bill Byrne said he was immediately starting a national search. Well, that national search took him to a hotel room in Hempstead to interview Mike Sherman. I shit you not that’s about as far as it really got.

Bill Byrne loved the Green Bay Packers and the offensive line. Mike Sherman fit exactly what Bill Byrne thought football should be.

While Mike Sherman is a fine person and offensive coach he was never made for college football. Especially at a program like Texas A&M. He certainly stabilized the program from what Fran had done to it but Sherman was never the long-term answer. I loathed this hire from a college football standpoint.

It’s been a while so I can’t remember who was available during that coaching cycle but there was another coach that could have been interviewed in Hempstead by the name of Art Briles. He was coaching in Houston just like Mike Sherman. I know Art Briles’ name is sullied now but at the time I don’t see how any person could have interviewed Briles and Sherman thinking that Sherman was the better college hire.
Byrne zeroed in on Mike Sherman from the start and never deviated.

The craziest part about that is EVERYONE knew Fran was getting fired that season. That was the year the news of his VIP email “leaked.” The leaders at Texas A&M had months to see who would be interested.

After Fran was officially dismissed, Bill Byrne simply drove 45 minutes down Highway 6 to meet with the guy I believe he wanted all along. His statement of a “national search” was a farce.

He was always hiring Mike Sherman in my mind. Nobody held Byrne accountable because there was no real leadership at Texas A&M when the hiring went down. Byrne did what he wanted.

Kevin Sumlin:
I don’t have a lot of insider information on the Sumlin hire.

The timing of it all was very strange. I do know there were no plans to fire Mike Sherman until after the loss to Texas on Thanksgiving night. The decision as I understand it was made pretty swiftly that night.

We were headed to the SEC. There were concerns about Mike Sherman being the guy to lead the Aggies into the SEC but he was going to get the chance. However, that loss to Texas made it obvious he wasn’t the guy.

To complicate matters, Bill Byrne was on his way out. Bill Byrne didn’t think the Aggies should go to the SEC so he was winding down as athletic director.

So we had a surprise firing and lame-duck athletic director. We were behind the ball from a timing standpoint and an athletic director who didn’t care about the results for that head coach.

I think Byrne headed up the search committee since he was technically the athletic director but there was a lot of input from various parties. As with most committees with a lot of input and little accountability, the results don’t turn out well.

I will say at the time Kevin Sumlin was a very hot name. He had great success at Houston and seemed to be on the rise. I don’t begrudge the hire at all but just curious what some due diligence would have done.

Sumlin was successful thanks to Case Keenum and Bob Stoops. You remove those two elements and he’s not the same coach. I don’t know that due diligence would have uncovered that but my guess is Sumlin was the hire all along because it was the easy hire.

To be fair, the obvious coaching candidates at the time were all pretty lame. Larry Fedora was the other name being thrown around and he didn’t do anything at UNC. It might have made sense for A&M to hire an up-and-coming coordinator or big name over an established coach at the lower levels.

There was a rumor Mark Richt was being considered and may have even visited campus but that seemed like a stretch to get him from Georgia. I’m also not sure Richt would have been the correct hire as his ceiling was pretty clear.

Either way, Texas A&M went with the easy and obvious hire in Sumlin.

Jimbo Fisher:
Kevin Sumlin went into the 2017 season on a massive hot seat. After he blew the game against UCLA in the Rose Bowl his seat was on fire and he was a dead man walking.

The whole season there was speculation on not if Sumlin got canned but when. The Aggies had plenty of time to get things lined out for a new coach.

Thanks to Scott Woodward who was the Athletic Director at the time they made a massive hire in Jimbo Fisher. I don’t know if anyone else was considered as it seems Woodward zeroed in on Jimbo Fisher and no one else. I think 99 times out of 100 you make this hire but there were some questions about Jimbo.

For me, I was mostly curious about how the Jameis Winston situation was handled. Art Briles had been let go from Baylor a couple of seasons ago so I was curious what Jimbo knew and how he handled it.

On the football field, Jimbo was having his worst season ever. Florida State was struggling to be bowl-eligible and had been passed up in the ACC by Clemson the previous two seasons. Florida State was in a clear decline from when Jameis was under center.

Everyone chalked it up to Jimbo being frustrated with the FSU administration. He was checked out because he knew he was headed to Aggieland. On the surface, it sounds reasonable but you would think a championship-caliber coach would have some personal pride to try and win football games. Especially when you’re still a big dog in the conference.

I think even with some due diligence you still hire Jimbo but I don’t think the administration did that.

Through Scott Woodward’s connection to Jimbo, the Aggies could make a massive flex by hiring a coach with a national championship to his name.

Like I said, 99 times out of 100 you make that hire but it would have been interesting to look under Jimbo’s hood and see who else might be interested and attainable.

Summary:
Other than Mike Sherman I believe every coach the Aggies hired would have been hired even with some more due diligence. They were easy and obvious hires but rooted in enough reason they would be successful as the head coach in Aggieland.

I just think it might have made more sense to not zero in on someone from the start. Have some flexibility in truly considering more than a single candidate should question marks emerge about the lead candidate. You never know what might happen when you don’t have a solution to the problem before working through the problem.

What We Know About This Coaching Hire:

In his initial “We Canned Jimbo” press conference, Ross Bjork laid out these items for what he deemed necessary for the next head coach in Aggieland.

1) Program Identity – Not sure what this means other than they need head coaching experience along with if they’re defensive or offensive oriented.
2) Great Interpersonal Skills – They don’t want to hire an asshole. I wonder if they’ll take a jerk that wins football games.
3) Track Record of Player Development – Assuming this means putting some guys in the NFL.
4) Commitment to Academics – Giggle.
5) Recruiting Machine – Obviously.
6) Supreme Organizational Skills – I think this is a shot at Jimbo.
7) Culture of Discipline – Another shot at Jimbo I believe.
8) Passion for the Game – I take it as they want someone not just looking for a paycheck. Wonderful idea.
9) Proven Winner With Strong Leadership Skills – This one seems obvious.
10) Involved in the Community – Eh. Let’s be real. Nobody cares about this one. Just win football games and the community can fend for itself.
11) Knowledge of Xs and Os – While important I’d rather they just have the ability to hire great coordinators, watch game film to understand opponents, and watch the game to offer adjustments to their staff. “Schematic Advantage” as Charlie Weiss once put it is way overrated for a head coach.
12) Ability to Capitalize on Today’s Modern College Athletics – I think this means someone with intimate knowledge of NIL programs and the Transfer Portal. We ABSOLUTELY need someone knowledgeable about that.

None of these items are truly insightful. All they tell me is the Aggies are looking for an established head coach with some kind of record if they can find one. It makes sense. Start with someone who has the most experience and work from there.

The Contract:
Ross Bjork has alluded to learning from the Jimbo contracts. First off, we don’t need to tie ourselves to a coach for 10 years. I don’t know the number Bjork has in mind but I wouldn’t go longer than 6 years. From an annual salary standpoint, I wouldn’t go more than $10 million a year.

I don’t want to give out a $60 million contract but it’s not far off from what the top coaches make. You are going to have to pay market value to get a top-notch head coach. If you can grab someone with a truly established track record don’t let money be the factor. Just don’t tie ourselves to a decade if it doesn’t work out.

In addition to the annual salary throw some serious incentives for 10 wins, SEC West, SEC Champion, College Football Playoffs, and of course a massive incentive for a national title. I’m saying you can make another $10 million if you win it all.

Pay them a ton when they’ve done something.

The Search Process and Candidates:
The rest of what you’re going to read is based on my reading of social media and various articles. I have no insider information on what’s going on. I do think I have a pretty good idea of what’s real and what’s not. I know who to trust in these processes and who not to.

I believe Dan Lanning was the number one target from the second we fired Jimbo. As both sides started talking I think it became clear Lanning isn’t going to leave Oregon for Texas A&M right now. Some of it is money and the other is he has serious momentum at Oregon. He’s got a potential Heisman Trophy candidate and a decent shot at playing for the College Football Playoff.

Should he lose to Oregon State this weekend or Washington next weekend he might come back around but I think that’s a long shot.

Because Lanning isn’t a serious candidate it seems the search committee broadened their search. Thanks to the standardization of Zoom and Teams it seems they have talked to several candidates last week. Based on what I’ve read they talked to actual candidates and not their agent which has been the norm in several coaching candidates.

Many times, agents got the coaches hired without administrations ever actually talking to the coach. It sounds like the Aggies are talking to actual coaches via video conferencing. I think this is a great move.
The Aggies also seem to be talking to coaches who have expressed interest in the Aggie job. It doesn’t hurt to talk to someone to see if they’re genuinely interested and have a plan. You never know who might impress you until you talk to them.

I don’t know what the result will be but so far I’m pleased with the process based on what I’ve read.
Based on what I’ve read and seen there appear to be three finalists in the moment. This is all very fluid as there are two more weeks of games. I’m not sure how a coach with a legit shot at the College Football Playoff leaves their program for Texas A&M. Stranger things have happened but it seems like a massive longshot for a coach to leave with a shot to win a national title.

Here are who I believe are the three finalists heading into the final weekend of college football:

Ryan Day:
This seems like a massive longshot but the more I’ve read on Day it seems like if he loses to Michigan on Saturday he’ll be named the Aggie head coach next week. Ohio State thinks he’s underachieving and will never win them a national championship.

To me, that’s crazy because he pushed Georgia to the brink in the Semi-Final last season. If his kicker makes that game-ending field goal they win the game and I’m convinced they would have beat TCU in the championship game.

This dude is a field goal away from a national championship and they’re still not happy. Sure, Ohio State has massive resources but Day is doing a pretty good job. They’ve only won two national championships since 1970. Twice in 50 years. Day isn’t doing anything more than any coach before him.

He’s recruiting well and has been in the College Football Playoff for 3 of 4 seasons. What more does Ohio State want? I have no clue how he could be on the hot seat but if I was him I wouldn’t be happy either.

In addition to his actual coaching, he’s become enamored with the SEC. Ever since losing to Alabama in the 2020 title game, he realized how he needed to adapt Ohio State to being more physical like the SEC. In his first test with an SEC team since that 2020 game with Bama, he took Georgia to the wire.

I don’t think he loses to Michigan this weekend so the Aggies never get a real chance to hire him. However, if he wants to come to Aggieland you make this hire all day every day.

The dude wants to win it all and he’s got the experience and is still plenty young and hungry.
Cheer for Michigan as this is the guy to hire.

Kalen DeBoer:
I don’t know much about this guy as he didn’t come onto the national scene until this year. He did well at Washington last year and has been damn good this year. If he can get by Oregon next week he’s headed to the College Football Playoff.

My biggest question with DeBoer is his lack of time at a major program without a stud at quarterback. Michael Penix, Jr is a stud so I’d like to see more of DeBoer without him.

I wouldn’t mind this hire but there are lots of questions in my mind for how he’ll translate to the SEC as well.

Jed Fisch:
Ironically enough, Jed Fisch took over the Arizona program from Kevin Sumlin. He went 1-11 in his first season, 5-7 last season, and he’s likely to go 9-3 in his third year at Arizona.

What he’s done in 3 seasons at Arizona is pretty impressive. I just don’t know what his ceiling is.
His pedigree is pretty impressive as he’s coached for a ton of successful head coaches.

He’s a roll of the dice hire. If he’s the floor it’s not a terrible floor.

It also gives me some hope the search committee didn’t go in with any preconceived notions about who should be the head coach. They’ve let the process play out like it should if Fisch is a finalist.

So What’s Going To Happen?:

At this moment nobody knows for sure.

Bjork has made it clear he’d like to hire someone by December 4th due to the transfer portal window opening up. That makes sense. The College Football Playoff will be set so no need to wait around on a coach in the playoffs. Make the hire once the playoffs have been set if not sooner with Day.

If Ohio State loses this weekend then I think Day is named next week. I don’t think that happens and Day stays at Ohio State. He’s the guy I want even above Lanning after thinking about it more.

Assuming Ohio State wins, I think we wait to see if Washington beats Oregon next weekend. If Washington loses then I think DeBoer is headed to Aggieland. I wouldn’t be upset at that either.

I do think both Ohio State and Washington make the College Football Playoff removing Day and DeBoer from consideration.

We’ll make one more run at Lanning before announcing Jed Fisch as the head coach on Monday, December 4th.

Maybe Fisch can finally be the guy to Make Aggie Football Great Again.

You Didn’t Win, Jimbo

Some of what you’re about to read I wrote before the Ole Miss game. I had outlined a piece called, “What to do with Jimbo Fisher.”

After the South Carolina game, I knew what was coming. We were headed for a 7-5 finish.

I didn’t think Jimbo would use the bye week to adjust and do anything differently. He hadn’t done it in the past so why would he do it this season? I did want to see if he would before passing the final judgment. The South Carolina game proved it to me. He was set in his ways.

After the Ole Miss game, I was dejected. The same old Jimbo we’ve seen for the last three seasons stuck to his guns and didn’t adapt a single thing. We were headed squarely for 7-5 because there was no way he was beating LSU in Baton Rouge.

I didn’t want to continue writing the same things I’ve written over and over again related to the deficiencies of what Jimbo has done the last three seasons. I’m focusing on the last three seasons because I feel that’s his true body of work. 2020 was great but that was ages ago and a single blip in his six seasons at A&M.

He’s had time to get his recruits in along with some longevity with his staff. He can’t blame anyone else for the state of the program over the last three seasons. It’s entirely on him. I also believe your more recent history is your most relevant history.

Jimbo’s last three seasons at A&M have fallen well short of expectations and it wasn’t going to change anytime soon. It wasn’t going to change anytime soon because Jimbo was going to stick to his guns trying to prove everyone wrong. He believed his way was still a way to win a national championship.

He couldn’t even sniff the SEC West but he routinely talked about how to win a national championship. That’s a coach detached from reality.

Mississippi State Game:

Before I get going on my thoughts about Jimbo Fisher I do want to briefly touch on the Mississippi State game.

Walking to the game with my buddies I said, “I wonder if Petrino tells Jimbo to take his hands off the offense. Henderson is his guy and he’s going to run the offense as he sees fit.”

I’ll be damned if I didn’t nail that one. We saw something out of a quarterback we hadn’t seen in some time. We saw a quarterback produce on the ground and through the air. We haven’t seen something like that in the last 3 years where our starting quarterback took over the game. Jaylen Henderson was damn impressive.

Sure, he missed a couple of deep passes but he had thrown 8 passes in his collegiate career before Saturday night. Those passes were 2 seasons ago so I’m not going to fault a guy who wasn’t perfect on the night. The dude showed up in a big way though.

I’ve had a feeling Jimbo constrained the offense all year. We didn’t see those constraints on Saturday night. We saw an offense use the zone read to neutralize the threat of a crashing defensive end. We saw an offense roll out a quarterback rather than drop straight back to keep pressure off of him.

We saw clear plays designed for this defense they weren’t expecting. We FINALLY saw creativity from an Aggie offense. It wasn’t without fault but by and large, it was damn effective.

I’m not saying Jaylen Henderson is the second coming of Johnny Manziel. He caught Mississippi State by surprise and LSU will be more ready for him.

It was just refreshing to see an offensive scheme that was unique and not the same old tired 20 plays we’ve seen the last 3 seasons from Jimbo.

That’s my quick thoughts on Mississippi State.

Back to the piece I had started on Jimbo.

All of the bold and underlined areas I touched on were my outline before Ole Miss. I had outlined these items as key discussion points for what I thought was the inevitable decision when he went 7-5. After reading them two weeks later I think the outline points are still relevant.

I know it’s a little confusing but just trying to show in two weeks nothing changed for Jimbo. At the time I wrote those words he could still beat Ole Miss and win 10 games including the bowl game. He took himse

You will read words in present tense that should be past tense today.

First off, believe it or not, this is not a post on firing Jimbo Fisher. I don’t want Jimbo Fisher fired. I want Jimbo Fisher to win out this season including a bowl game for 10 wins.

I want Jimbo Fisher to have the Aggies as the second-best team in the SEC West. I want Jimbo Fisher to close a really strong recruiting class. I want Jimbo Fisher to have some momentum going into the offseason for the first time in 3 years.

Beyond this season, I want Jimbo Fisher to routinely compete for the SEC West. I want Jimbo Fisher to go to Atlanta to compete for the SEC Championship. I want Jimbo Fisher to get into the College Football Playoffs and compete for a national championship.

I want a statue of Jimbo Fisher outside of Kyle Field.

I really and truly want all of that.

I just don’t think it’s going to happen. Should this season play out like I think where we go 7-5 losing to Ole Miss and LSU on the road I think the decision-makers have a serious issue on their hands.

What to do with Jimbo Fisher?

Execution vs Scheme:

Jimbo is convinced his offensive style is the only style that can win a national title. He said so much after last year’s LSU win at Kyle Field. In a season where he went 5-7, he spent some of his post-game press conference crowing about how his offense is the type of offense that can win national championships.

YOU JUST WENT 5-7 AND YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT HOW TO WIN A NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP FROM AN OFFENSIVE STANDPOINT???

His specific comment was, “We are so caught up in tempo. Name me a tempo team that’s won a National Championship. There’s not one in the last 15 years.”

Well, Jimbo…

The 2015 season title game between Alabama and Clemson was a 45-40 contest won by Alabama where Nick Saban himself said he believed his defense could not stop Clemson’s offense. This is the reason he called the onside kick in the 4th quarter. Clemson was running a tempo offense with Deshaun Watson.

Clemson didn’t win THAT game but they certainly stressed Nick Saban’s defense to the point he called an onside kick because he didn’t have faith in his defense. Clemson would win the national championship the next season which was the 2016 full season. That same Clemson offense won the national championship the following season after stressing Nick Saban so much he felt he needed some luck via an onside kick to win the game.

Maybe there’s a fine line between urgency and tempo in Jimbo’s book.

Either way, both are a long way from the slow, plodding offense that Jimbo likes to run. Teams with an offensive urgency have won national titles in the last 15 years.

You can’t tell me the following offenses didn’t have some sense of urgency in trying to stress the defense beyond that 2016 Clemson offense I previously talked about:

2018 Clemson

2019 LSU

2020 Alabama

Sure, those offenses had elite quarterback and wide receiver play but much of what they did was operate with a sense of urgency to stress the defense. I suppose you could argue their offenses weren’t true “Tempo” offenses but they ABSOLUTELY had a sense of urgency and used their elite talent to stress defenses by quickly lining up and calling plays.

They certainly weren’t offenses that tried to bludgeon their opponents with perfect execution on every play. It was to line the ball up and let players make plays.

Jimbo has the weapons at his disposal but he refuses to utilize them to his advantage. He has an antiquated style of offense he needs to evolve.

He hired Bobby Petrino to run the offense but nothing has appeared to have changed. The only thing that appears to have changed is that all of his playsheets and notes are with Bobby in the coaching booth. The style of offense is the same.

That’s all on Jimbo.

Look around college football. Everyone is running some kind of offense with an urgency that can stress the defense. They’re attacking sideline to sideline to make the defense defend the entire width and length of the field.

They’re doing it urgently so the defense doesn’t have time to rest or get set. You don’t have to run this pace the whole game but there’s absolutely a time and place to have some sense of urgency with your offense in a game.

Jimbo simply talks about perfect execution. Seriously. Execution is all he talks about. Thanks to the power of the Internet we have proof:

A compilation of the 118 times Jimbo Fisher has said the word “execute”

(1/2) pic.twitter.com/VTdGtGaENM
— Aggie Highlights (@aggie_highlight) October 24, 2023

118 times in 19 games Jimbo has referenced execution as the sole reason for the success or lack of success for his offense.

At what point does Jimbo admit some scheme issues are leading to all of these struggles and not just straight-up execution?

Jimbo needs to get with the times. His slow and plodding offensive style is antiquated. Defenses know what to expect with his offense which makes execution by his players more difficult.

It’s more scheme than execution despite what he thinks.

Humps vs. Hills:

A common argument is just to give Jimbo more time. There’s a long list of college coaches who won after years of being at their schools.

That’s not true. Most coaches that have won national championships in the last 20 years have done so in the first 5 years.

Mack Brown and Dabo Swinney are kind of the outliers taking longer than that but in the time it took them to win their first national championship they were routinely winning 10 games and were the second-best team in their conference.

Jimbo Fisher is a long way from routinely winning 10 games and being the second-best team in his division.

It’s not a hump that Jimbo is just trying to get over. He’s got a hill bordering on a mountain he needs to get over.

Now we’re back to the present tense.

As I read all of that two weeks later I believed it was even more accurate after what happened at Ole Miss and what we showed against Mississippi State with a different quarterback and offensive scheme.

The decision-makers at A&M decided to make the change with Jimbo. I applaud them for what they did. It needed to be done. It’s a painful thing to admit due to the money involved but for the sake of the football program it needed to be done.

Jimbo was not going to wake up one day and adapt to what he needed to do. He was stuck in a time warp from over a decade ago.

A&M needed to make the change.

I’ll keep moving on to the topics I planned to write two weeks ago.

Blaming the Players:

I can’t tell you how tired I got of Jimbo blaming the players. Obviously he routinely blamed lack of execution which is blaming the players.

His BS about fighting for inches got old too. They’re only fighting for inches because they’re talented and your coaching sucks.

I got tired of him dressing down quarterbacks. There’s a time and place for it but he spent the whole damn game yelling at his quarterback. So much so he quit paying attention to the ball in the Auburn game because he wanted to yell at Max Johnson and was standing on the field while the play was alive.

After the Ole Miss game, he blamed Randy Bond for kicking the ball an inch too low on the potential game-tying field goal attempt. Never mind it was the FIFTH blocked kick of the season. Couldn’t have been the lack of special teams coaching or scheme. It was the player’s fault for not anticipating a potential block and kicking it higher.

The photo I used for this piece is Jimbo dressing down Max in the Ole Miss game. The dude was getting hammered and Jimbo was just piling on. I’m sure it got old being dressed down like that the entire game.

He pretended to blame himself as well but he never truly meant it. Which is why he wouldn’t change his ways.

Most Coaches Are Interchangeable:

The sad reality in college football that nobody wants to admit is every coach other than Nick Saban and Kirby Smart is interchangeable. They’re the two outliers in college football.

Sure, there are tiers of coaches in the college ranks but the dropoff from Saban and Smart to the rest of college football is pretty far.

Everybody wants to talk about Urban Meyer as an elite level coach but do you see any drop off from him to Ryan Day at Ohio State? I don’t. Urban was a VERY successful college coach. However, if he never gets Tim Tebow to Gainesville I’m not sure he sniffs a national championship at Florida and he doesn’t get the job at Ohio State. He likely flames out.

Ohio State is a perennial winner because of its location and conference. Some of it is coaching for sure but several people have had the same level of success Urban had at Ohio State. Ohio State while REALLY good under Urban only won one title.

He certainly never attained the level of success Saban and Smart have had at their schools.

Urban’s time at Jacksonville in the NFL shows me while he was a solid coach he had some really good timing at Florida with Tim Tebow and the defensive talent Ron Zook left him. I’m not trying to take anything away from Urban but just trying to show there are a lot of external factors to most coaches winning it all.

Urban had great timing.

Moving on from Urban let’s talk about Dabo Swinney. I know he’s a piñata right now but Dabo is THE perfect example for the reality of most college coaches – You’re only as good as your coordinators and starting quarterback.

With Brent Venables running his defense and Deshaun Watson and Trevor Lawrence under center he won two national titles. He also played for two more which is an amazing accomplishment. From a success standpoint, Dabo is the third most successful coach in college football.

The coordinator and quarterback luck hold for Ed Orgeron, Jimbo Fisher, Gene Chizik, and Mack Brown. All four of those guys had great coordinators and a Heisman winner or runner-up as their quarterback.

I’m leaving off Les Miles because he’s essentially the Barry Switzer in the NFL of college football. Much like Switzer taking over from Jimmy Johnson, Miles took over from Saban. Only a fool wouldn’t have won a national championship with what was left to them.

Outside of Saban and Smart, the coordinator and quarterback are just as, if not, as important as the head coach.

Despite all of that, colleges are paying coaches like Nick Saban and Kirby Smart to grow on trees. You just have to find one and pay them before they win it all. They don’t grow on trees. It can be fool’s folly to pay someone to be something that they’re not.

In reality, just hire a coach who’s got some recruiting ability and the smarts to hire top coordinators. Then you roll the dice every season and hope some luck with an amazing quarterback finds you.

It also helps if you’re in the SEC.

Recruiting Momentum:

One of my greatest concerns with holding on to Jimbo was his recruiting momentum was about to slow down big time.

Texas A&M has a solid NIL machine but kids still want to win games. The 2022 recruiting class was sold on winning a national championship. Two seasons later they couldn’t be further from that goal with Jimbo as head coach.

If Jimbo were to start losing recruits which I suspect was about to happen, elite recruits in future classes would be harder to come by. When you lose recruiting momentum in college football due to not winning enough it’s hard to get it back. If ever even get it back. That’s where Jimbo was about to be with recruiting.

I think we were also staring at a lot of transfer portal entries this go-round. Not the backups we saw last season but starting talent looking to go somewhere and win football games.

Don’t think opposing coaches weren’t going to use 5-7 and 7-5 to their advantage.

I’m positive it was about to get bad. Three seasons of failed expectations spoke for itself.

As we’ve seen with other coaching staffs once you lose recruiting momentum you’re a dead man walking. The hole for the next coach is that much bigger.

Now vs Later:

If the Aggie decision-makers can make a solid hire they can hold a portion of this team together AND keep the recruiting machine going. A&M is recruiting at a level it hasn’t seen but momentum is still a very real thing. I think some of the elite recruiting was Jimbo but let’s not kid ourselves that A&M is VERY competitive on the NIL front.

Let’s give another coach a shot at doing something with the talent on the team and in the pipeline rather than come in a year or two later with a total rebuild.

A competent coach and staff can win big next year. The talent is on the team and in the recruiting pipeline if we can hold it.

I don’t think there’s any way Jimbo was going to hold a good portion of the talent. A new coach at least has a chance.

That’s why the move needed to be made now and not later.

Those That Came Before Him:

In the end, Jimbo Fisher will be no different than those who came before him in Aggieland.

He did recruit at a superior level compared to the coaches before him but his on-the-field performance was the same or worse. He had one good season out of six but didn’t do enough with the resources he had.

Why that is I have no idea but we need to try something different with this next hire.

We need someone who is truly hungry. None of the guys we’ve hired since R.C. Slocum were truly hungry.

Fran was too caught up with the perception of himself and had already won a national championship in his mind. Mike Sherman while a fine person was not a college head coach. Kevin Sumlin was never equipped to be a big-time college head coach.

Jimbo wanted to prove to everyone he could win a national championship in his style. He didn’t want to adapt and instead took a big paycheck to prove people wrong.

Let’s get someone who hasn’t won anything and is super hungry to win it all. How you identify that I’m not totally sure but give me someone who hasn’t won anything of real substance or thinks too much of themselves and is willing to put in the work to win a national championship.

Dan Lanning:

Dan Lanning has been my key target since I started thinking Jimbo might get let go this season. I was actually on the Elko train for a bit but that had more to do with finances and reality.

I like Lanning the most because he’s coached in the SEC under Saban and Smart. He’s had pretty good success at Oregon. I think it’s important to have had some time as a head coach at a big program to show you can do it. He checks that box.

He’s not been perfect as a head coach but that’s okay. He’s won a lot more than he’s lost and hopefully learned some coaching lessons along the way.

He’s young and appears to understand the recruiting game. After all, he hired away the architect of Jimbo’s vaunted 2022 class.

Yes, you read that correctly. Lanning hired the guy who was the key component to that 2022 class at Texas A&M. His name is Marshall Malchow. He also spent time with Lanning at Alabama and Georgia.

Lanning’s Offensive Coordinator also has heavy Texas ties. He’s been at UTSA, Lake Travis, and Texas. I know time spent at UTSA and Lake Travis doesn’t seem like much but he’s continued Bo Nix’s development and is familiar with the state of Texas.

There’s a lot to like about Lanning considering his success as a head coach at Oregon, his time spent under Kirby Smart and Nick Saban, and having some staff he’d likely bring that has strong awareness of Texas.

I think he’s a coach that would hit the ground running in no time.

I believe Lanning is THE key target and it’s okay to “break the bank” on. I’m not saying give him a 10-year deal at $9.5 million per year but I do think it’s fine to give him an 8 million dollar-a-year contract for 6 years. That’s $48 million total guaranteed.

I know he has a $20 million buyout but that’s the cost of doing business for a guy like him.

I’m also fine throwing in some serious incentives for 10-win seasons, College Football Playoff Appearances since it’s going to 12 teams, Division Championships, Conference Championships, and of course a MASSIVE incentive for winning a National Championship.

I’m talking about throwing a $10 million carrot for winning it all.

I do have questions if Lanning would take the job considering he’s in the hunt for a Pac-12 title and berth in the College Football Playoff. I know he also came out and said he had no interest in leaving Oregon. We’ve heard that before from other coaches so take that for what it’s worth.

If I do have one concern about Lanning it’s that he’s a bit prickly. He’s not the smoothest talker but I don’t care. I want someone more interested in winning football games than winning press conferences. He also has a slight Tom Herman vibe but not going to hold that against him as he’s won at a big program.

Either way, he’s the candidate I make tell me no before I move on to anyone else. Even if he said he’s not interested. He may not have realized what he was saying no to.

At least say we tried everything we could to hire him.

The Others:

Mike Elko – Mike Elko has always been my safety hire if we needed to fire Jimbo and save some bucks. What he’s done at Duke is remarkable. My biggest question with Elko is if he has a limited ceiling. He seems like that 9-3 to 10-2 coach at A&M. That’s MUCH better than we’ve experienced in the past but I don’t know if it’s enough. The man can coach football but I’m not sure he’s geared for what a perennial national title contender needs.

Jeff Traylor – Much like Elko, he seems like a safe hire who will improve from where Jimbo was but I believe has a ceiling. If we wound up with Traylor I wouldn’t be upset but I think we’re looking at a perennial 9-3 and 10-2 coach because he doesn’t have the elite level experience.

Lane Kiffin – I LOVE Kiffin as a football coach. He’s got a great football mind but it ends there. When things don’t go his way he becomes very petulant. He seems to think he’s got a ceiling at Ole Miss which is true but he doesn’t need to verbally express it every time something doesn’t go his way. Pass on him.

Deion Sanders – I thought Deion was the perfect hire for Auburn last season. They screwed that up. I don’t have a problem with his flash but I do wonder about his ability to coach in games. We just don’t have a good sample set due to a host of reasons. I know the shine is off him right now. The reality is other than getting stomped by Oregon they’ve been pretty competitive in the rest of their games. They blew a MASSIVE lead to Stanford but other than that they’ve only lost to ranked teams. This was a 1-11 team last season that’s now 5-5 in a pretty good conference this season. He’s someone I wouldn’t take off the list just yet. Like most things in life don’t let the media narrative around him influence the decision making. What he’s done at Colorado is REALLY impressive when you remove the flash and talking heads. He needs to be considered as the process plays out. I don’t think he’s the guy but I’m not going to dismiss him solely because of perception. He’s better than a LOT of college coaches. I do think he’d be better off at a program that needs more of a rebuild which isn’t A&M right now. I don’t want to see him at Arkansas or Mississippi State though.

Elijah Robinson – This is my heart-string candidate. This guy seems to have that Terry Price aura to him. Those guys don’t always make good head coaches but as the coaching search plays out and he gets to coach two games let’s see what happens. If Lanning doesn’t take the job and Robinson beats Brian Kelly in Baton Rouge I think he’s all of a sudden a serious candidate assuming players aren’t entering the transfer portal and recruits are holding. My biggest question with Robinson beyond his ability as head coach is what does he want? If he’s never truly wanted to be a head coach it’s not a gear he can just turn on. It’s something he should have been building to.

Kalen DeBoer – This guy seems like a winner but his body of work at a massive program is pretty small. He won big at Sioux Falls over a decade ago and then bounced around coordinator positions at minor programs before getting the Fresno State job for a couple of seasons. He then landed the Washington job where he’s done pretty well but with an outstanding quarterback. I have no clue if he has any interest in this part of the world and the SEC. This guy is the wildest of wildcards. I just don’t know enough about him and don’t think anyone does either.

Glenn Schumann – Schumann is THE assistant coach in college football simply because he sits next to the throne of college football in Kirby Smart. He’s young at 33 but has Texas ties having graduated from McKinney Boyd. His dad was a football coach and Schumann started his coaching career at Alabama under Saban where he got tight with Smart and moved with him to Georgia. Schumann is by far the biggest roll-of-the-dice candidate out there. He’s got no skins but his pedigree is as good as it gets for any assistant in college football. If you’re going to gamble on an assistant he’s the guy without question.

Jake Spavital – Just wanted to give you a giggle if you’re still reading this.

Summary:

Jimbo needed to go. The money is an unfortunate thing but the move had to be made for the health of the Aggie football program. It was pretty clear Jimbo wasn’t going to get it done. He was stuck in the past and stubborn to the point he wanted to prove doubters wrong. That’s a bad combination.

Had we waited to let him go we might have saved some money but we would have put the program in a bigger hole for the next guy. It would likely have cost us more money over time. It was time to make the move.

This will be THE defining hire of Ross Bjork’s career. Even he doesn’t know who it’s going to be right now. If he did we’d know about it.

Whoever it is will be walking into as good of a situation as you get in college football. That is assuming they can sell the current players and committed recruits. If they can do that AND coach modern-day college football we’re going to see a massive spike in wins next season.

Now we just sit back and see if it happens.

Sorry, you didn’t win, Jimbo.

R.C. Would Have Gone For 2

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