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Former coach at Utah State, Louisville, and most recently Michigan State. Now working as an analyst for the NFL Network, he would most likely consider the SMU job. Really put Louisville on the map in football and laid the foundation for Bobby Petrino's success, probably should have stayed there but struggled at MSU with the competition of Ohio State and Michigan. I'm not saying he's the one for the job but I'm surprised his name hasn't been mentioned here unless I missed it.

SMU has better alternatives that fit the job better.

Stallion wrote:SMU has better alternatives that fit the job better.

Why do you say that? I think Louisville (pre Big East) is the model for non-BCS D1 programs considering the success they found in a relatively short period of time, and John L. Smith was a big part of that success. Granted, he struggled at Michigan State but he undoubtedly knows the difficulties facing non-BCS programs and has overcome them in the past to field winning teams.

I think he would be a better choice than Terry Bowden, who has been out of coaching for ten years and isn't familiar with the discrepancies between BCS/non-BCS programs, and I think that it is important to bring someone in with prior head coaching experience. One drawback to Smith would be that he doesn't have experience recruiting in Texas, although his hiring would generate interest in the program and he would be cheaper than the likes of Bowden. In terms of facilities, institutional prestige, and location we have a lot going for us, we just need a coach who understands the situation we're in and can implement a system which will turn the program around. Smith has done this before at Louisville with great success, and I think he could do it again here. Obviously anyone we bring in will most likely move on to a bigger program at some point if they achieve some measure of success at SMU, but we haven't seen success here in over 20 years so I think we might as well go with someone who has a proven track record, which Smith does.

Smith? Never heard of him. And that would be most folks' reaction.

"Inside football" choices can work, but not in our situation. We need a splash and we need it now.

Whoever we hire should require no introduction. It should be, "Holy crap, did you hear who SMU hired?" A Bowden or Spurrier would do that.

mr. pony wrote:Smith? Never heard of him.

If that's the case, you don't pay much attention to college football.

mr. pony wrote:Whoever we hire should require no introduction. It should be, "Holy crap, did you hear who SMU hired?" A Bowden or Spurrier would do that.

What makes you think someone of Spurrier's stature would consider SMU?

mr. pony wrote:Smith? Never heard of him. And that would be most folks' reaction.

He must be a prolific recruiter. He signs into hotels all over the country.

mrydel wrote:

mr. pony wrote:Smith? Never heard of him. And that would be most folks' reaction.

He must be a prolific recruiter. He signs into hotels all over the country.

A+

Smith runs an undisciplined program. At L'ville and Michigan St., his teams constantly led or were at the top of the conference or in the country in penalty yardage per game.

Also, his team don't respect the game. The stunt MSU pulled at Notre Dame by sticking the flag at the 50-yard line was low class. (Can't believe I'm defending Notre Dame here).

And he was quoted in a NY Times story questioning Illinois' recruiting tactics and taking shots at Ron Zook. The reason? Michigan St. lost to Illinois on its homecoming in 2006.

No thanks.

CA Mustang wrote:

mr. pony wrote:Smith? Never heard of him.

If that's the case, you don't pay much attention to college football.

Not THAT much.

CA Mustang[quote="mr. pony wrote:Whoever we hire should require no introduction. It should be, "Holy crap, did you hear who SMU hired?" A Bowden or Spurrier would do that.

What makes you think someone of Spurrier's stature would consider SMU?[/quote]

For the challenge and to add to an already heady resume -"The coach that returned SMU to glory." And $$$$$ of course.

This is from wikipedia.org. Perhaps we should look elsewhere.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_L._Smith

mr. pony - seek professional help so you don't continue to make a fool of yourself

Lets put aside, for one minute the actual person we hire, what does he need to do? come in and clean house? implement his own offense(clearly not going to keep the one we have)? put the players we have in the best position to win (obviously) but how? go the I-back? spread it out and run Demyron on sweeps? change to the option?

do we want a figure head who hires great assistants or a head coach who runs the offense and ALLOWS someone to call defense signals?

thoughts?