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(1) Hillary Clinton as President, but that's a subject for another thread...

(2) Now that we have apparently lost PJ, we have a major problem.

Let me first say that if we stole PJ from Navy, and could out-bid GT and Duke, it would be a major coup and that Orisini, Turner, et al. would be geniuses.

But that is not the case (at least if you believe the latest reports). We lost PJ. The fact of our pursuit of PJ is well-known in the college football world. We flew him and his wife here and from all accounts the red carpet was rolled out to impress them. That we were willing to throw money at him -- lots of money -- has been widely reported although exact details were never disclosed.

After all of this, we still lost our man. The message this sends is that no matter what is offered, a top quality coach isn't willing to risk his career by coming to S.M.U. The perception was and still is that S.M.U. is a career-killer, and the exercise with PJ only reinforces that.

By shooting high (and I am NOT saying it was wrong to do so) and getting shot-down, have we done ourselves more harm than good?

My biggest fear is how the heck are our boys going to concentrate on our upcoming bowl. Oh wait, problem solved.

We lost to Georgia Tech, a BCS school with a recent history of winning, support, and bowl games. No shame in that. Orsini will find our guy.

Michigan and Arkansas have both been turned down several times in their coaching search.

ponydawg wrote:My biggest fear is how the heck are our boys going to concentrate on our upcoming bowl. Oh wait, problem solved.

We lost to Georgia Tech, a BCS school with a recent history of winning, support, and bowl games. No shame in that. Orsini will find our guy.

Michigan and Arkansas have both been turned down several times in there coaching search.

The Michigan and Arkansas turn-downs are similar at first glance, but there is one big difference. Those schools approached and were turned down by coaches who chose to stay with their current schools. We lost PJ not to his current employer but to another school - he was looking to leave Navy unlike, for example, Miles and Schiano.

I think we have been played by Johnson's sports agent and PJ never really had any interest in coming hear in the first place..........My only fear is that we have shot ourselves in the foot by turning down the good former coaches that really wanted to come hear....

When Biggin was first posting his "nobody wants the job" posts, my thought was that we only need one person to be interested in it. It seemed that Johnson was that one person, now that he's gone, we're [deleted] ed.

-CoS

westexSMU wrote:My only fear is that we have shot ourselves in the foot by turning down the good former coaches that really wanted to come hear....

Yep, we may as well have played nice with them.

-CoS

What happened to us has happened to hundreds of teams, is not a reflection of us, and was known a long time ago to be a potential outcome.

When you go out to hire a senior executive for your company, guess what? They are usually looking at other opportunities.
So, you never go down the road with one candidate.
The candidate may decide to take a counter and stay with their current employer or go somewhere else for a LOT of reasons other than money.

Guarantee we have been working plan B, C, D before and after Johnson left Dallas.

Arkansas was turned down from Tuberville, Bowden, and Grobe.
Michigan was turned down by Miles and Schiano.

Would you rather just ask the fugly girl to go home with you because you know she will say yes, or would you rather shoot for some hotties first before you settle and take the fugly one home.

We just lost our 1st guy to a BCS school who matched our offer and has a recent tradition of winning, support, and bowl games.

This is the first TRUE coaching search that we have been thru in forever, I am glad we are aiming high.

If rejection can happen to Michigan and Arkansas it will certainly happen to SMU.

We are aiming very high and are going to get a few no's. We came down to the wire with the hottest coach in amercia and lost out to a BCS school. There are still qulaity coaches out there who can win at SMU

I think we need develop a list to decide who we want as our next coach and offer the position to a couple of different candidates letting them know exactly that and that the offer stands until the position is filled. That way we give ourselves a chance but don't compromise our position.

ponydawg wrote:Arkansas was turned down from Tuberville, Bowden, and Grobe.
Michigan was turned down by Miles and Schiano.

Would you rather just ask the fugly girl to go home with you because you know she will say yes, or would you rather shoot for some hotties first before you settle and take the fugly one home.

We just lost our 1st guy to a BCS school who matched our offer and has a recent tradition of winning, support, and bowl games.

This is the first TRUE coaching search that we have been thru in forever, I am glad we are aiming high.

If rejection can happen to Michigan and Arkansas it will certainly happen to SMU.

I would've begun and concluded my negotiations with the hotties within the first hour of the party, so that I could start sorting through the best of the rest, then close the deal.

Orsini stated his desire to be a Top 25 program. I applaud him for that.

Not attempting to hire a HC who 2 weeks ago did not even have another offer because of fear of rejection is a LOSER mentality.

Never let 20 years of futility cloud the fact that SMU CAN BE a Top 25 program (Top 35 in FB, Top 25 in others).

SoCal_Pony wrote:Orsini stated his desire to be a Top 25 program. I applaud him for that.

Not attempting to hire a HC who 2 weeks ago did not even have another offer because of fear of rejection is a LOSER mentality.

Never let 20 years of futility cloud the fact that SMU CAN BE a Top 25 program (Top 35 in FB, Top 25 in others).

I'm not questioning that SMU can be a Top 25 program. However, the reality is that we will have one of the worst recruiting classes for the 2008 signing date unless we get a coach soon.

my greatest fear? bears.

or snakes!