Is there a 25-second clock on hiring college coaches?

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Is there a 25-second clock on hiring college coaches?
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By John Bridges

Thursday, November 29, 2007

We must've missed the advertisement. Since when did FedEx start delivering college football coaches?

Overnight, it seems, is the only way to go.

First, Texas A&M made its quick hire of Mike Sherman after a grueling interview process that lasted all the way from Friday night to Monday morning. It was such an exhausting ordeal that Sherman had to take a break to fly to Cleveland to coach in a football game.

And then Ole Miss made A&M look downright plodding. It hired Houston Nutt virtually sight unseen. Nutt's departure at Arkansas was announced Monday night. By Tuesday morning, he had a new job in Mississippi at a $1.7 million salary that nearly doubled his predecessor's.

We're not hiring burger flippers here. After all, McDonald's has a tougher screening process than college athletic directors do.

No, this is how we go about filling the highest-paid jobs on the public payrolls. Among state workers in Texas, Sherman's $1.8 million salary will be second only to Mack Brown's and will be roughly triple what A&M pays its next president. That office, by the way, remains vacant.

We can't hire a prez in 12 months, but we can hire a coach in 12 hours. That sure says a lot about our priorities.

What's the rush? Are Mike Sherman and Houston Nutt really in that high of demand? Did college football put a 25-second clock on hiring?

Usually, state jobs in Texas must be posted for 10 days. A&M Athletic Director Bill Byrne was able to get a special exception by deeming his opening an emergency. The emergency? Recruiting.
Never mind that Sherman is going to spend the next five weeks coaching for the Texans.

Here's a suggestion to end all the doubletalk: Establish a National Firing Day, similar to National Signing Day.

At the stroke of noon on this magical day every December, coaches can be fired and hired. Sell the broadcast rights to ESPN. Available candidates could be seated in a soundproof room, squirming like Brady Quinn on draft day. There might even be room to let in a couple of black coaching candidates.

It's really no more ludicrous than the current process — a process that rightly has the Black Coaches Association and state Sen. Royce West raising questions about minority hiring practices.

They would like for colleges to follow the NFL's lead and at least include minority candidates in the conversation.

Shoot, at this point, it'll be progress if there is more than one candidate of any color in the conversation.

Byrne said that Sherman was the only coach interviewed for the A&M job; Ole Miss probably just left Nutt an offer on his voice mail. ("This is Houston. I'm probably on the other line with another school. If you're an AD, just leave your best offer at the tone.")

But we can cut Byrne some slack on the minority-hiring thing. He said that he had never met Sherman until he walked into a Houston hotel room Friday night.

Given how much time he'd spent on the matter, perhaps he was surprised to see that Sherman was a white man.

Bridges is American-Statesman sports editor