I haven’t disagreed with anything you’ve said. i’m just pointing to a fact that recruiting directly equates to winning. fact.
Stoops has done a GREAT job building this program
- Thread starter mg0721
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As I pointed out in another post: Not including Billy Napier, who is looking pretty shaky, Florida has hired five coaches since Steve Spurrier left. They fired four of them. Finding the right one is a lot harder than you seem to think. It’s possible we could hire a better one than Mark Stoops. It’s far more likely that we’ll hire one who we’ll fire four or five years later.
I really didn’t have anybody in mind. I’m just tired of a lot of out fan base thinking we are a second class program and settle for where we are now because of our past. We should have higher expectations.
Do you think a big time coach would come here? Just being honest but I doubt it. We very well could regret replacing Stoops.
No big time coach would come here. And I’m not saying to replace Stoops. I’m just saying he’s an average coach, middle of the pack.
In every practical respect, this question is irrelevant. Stoops is the winningest coach in UK football history, and is signed to a long term contract. He is a far better coach than this thread suggests. People don't appreciate what they have until they lose it. Stoops recruits far better classes than previous UK coaches could. Stoops has the backing of the Board and President Capiluoto. He doesn't want to leave, and he isn't going anywhere.
To answer the question, though, there is no standardized definition for "big time coach" and opinions vary. If our HC position was open, which it won't be anytime soon, people would be surprised at the quality of the candidate list. All of UK's football facilities have been modernized, Our conditioning facilities are very high level. The roster is good enough that a smart new coach could come in and win immediately as long as he connected with the returning Wildcats. The snafu has always been that UK's core recruiting territory is problematic and limited. But our recruiting budget has increased steadily, and Stoops has proven UK can attract good players out of adjacent states as well as MI, PA, FL, and GA.
Of course, the negative posters insist UK could not attract a "big name coach" in the context of this thread. But many negative posters, probably including some of these same people on this thread, have campaigned in the past for UK to hire Steve Spurrier, Bobby Petrino, and Jim Tressel. So it is a hypothetical question that hasn't been tested since 2012, and the situation has changed since then.
Are you aware of Claiborne, Curry, and Brooks accomplishments prior to UK? They were certainly considered above just average and never accomplished near what Stoops has at UK.
Yes but you can’t just look at the records and say that’s the end all be all. Back then we only played 11 games so they got one less cupcake. And back then we played almost exclusively a P5 schedule (Rutgers, UNC, Indiana, etc) so they didn’t get to feast on cupcakes. And the SEC was much tougher back then. We didn’t get to beat up on a down USCe, Mizzou, etc every year.
