This needs a thread. It's going to be important to understand what happened under Erickson to know how to judge Graham.
I keep seeing suggestions that the problem was Erickson was too old, that he mailed it in. I could not disagree more. Erickson was a man on a mission, and running out of time. He wanted two things: 200 wins and a Rose Bowl trip. That's why he came to ASU. He wanted to be in the Hall of Fame. This is a man who worked very, very hard to make it happen here.
ASU was Erickson's longer tenure at a program, tied with Miami. He desperately wanted to go out on top, or at least with a big fat stamp of approval on his resume.
The problem with Erickson was the same problem with Koetter and, to a certain degree, Snyder post-1995. They were all playing old rules, rules that had changed while they were here, and still are changing. The age of the head coach is over. I think it officially ended with the uprising of the Internet in the early 90s, but we've only really seen this new era come into focus in the last 10 years.
This new era is about the staff. The staff. The staff. The ability and abundance of recruiters on staff is directly related to how much talent you have on your roster. Bob Stoops got that. Shoot, I think Spurrier is the one who started this by hiring Stoops to be his DC and letting him do whatever he wanted. Coordinators have never had so much power, and the staff they hire to support them define the program.
Head coaches don't do the game planning anymore. They don't draw up X's O's. They don't coach each player. They don't identify talent, they don't manage recruiting, and most often times they've never met a recruit in person until the final in-home. They're now just responsible for hiring (and often times replacing if the program is successful) the people who are in charge of all that.
ASU has been staff poor since Snyder's first group came to ASU from Cal. That staff was LOADED with recruiters who specialized in the region. They also understood what worked in the Pac-10, at least at first. Snyder used '91 Washington as a template. Well, schematically, that was really the last team that did it well, particularly the 46 defense. But I don't want to get bogged down in semantics there.
Erickson never got it. You could tell by his staff that he was taking a job because he wanted one last gasp, and apparently didn't think about the cost of hiring a competent staff. He hired his friends because ... that's the way he'd already done it before. It cost him his job and ASU a much-needed bounce back.
Graham doesn't have 5 years. He has two -- tops. They better win 8 games next year, or there will be hell to pay in the AD. Maybe Graham keeps his job because ASU can't afford to move him, but the people that brought him here will have the names erased from history if it's anything less. Fair or not, that is now reality, because ASU can't afford another mediocre year, and I don't know of any particular ASU fan that has any patience left. This better be a home run.
I keep seeing suggestions that the problem was Erickson was too old, that he mailed it in. I could not disagree more. Erickson was a man on a mission, and running out of time. He wanted two things: 200 wins and a Rose Bowl trip. That's why he came to ASU. He wanted to be in the Hall of Fame. This is a man who worked very, very hard to make it happen here.
ASU was Erickson's longer tenure at a program, tied with Miami. He desperately wanted to go out on top, or at least with a big fat stamp of approval on his resume.
The problem with Erickson was the same problem with Koetter and, to a certain degree, Snyder post-1995. They were all playing old rules, rules that had changed while they were here, and still are changing. The age of the head coach is over. I think it officially ended with the uprising of the Internet in the early 90s, but we've only really seen this new era come into focus in the last 10 years.
This new era is about the staff. The staff. The staff. The ability and abundance of recruiters on staff is directly related to how much talent you have on your roster. Bob Stoops got that. Shoot, I think Spurrier is the one who started this by hiring Stoops to be his DC and letting him do whatever he wanted. Coordinators have never had so much power, and the staff they hire to support them define the program.
Head coaches don't do the game planning anymore. They don't draw up X's O's. They don't coach each player. They don't identify talent, they don't manage recruiting, and most often times they've never met a recruit in person until the final in-home. They're now just responsible for hiring (and often times replacing if the program is successful) the people who are in charge of all that.
ASU has been staff poor since Snyder's first group came to ASU from Cal. That staff was LOADED with recruiters who specialized in the region. They also understood what worked in the Pac-10, at least at first. Snyder used '91 Washington as a template. Well, schematically, that was really the last team that did it well, particularly the 46 defense. But I don't want to get bogged down in semantics there.
Erickson never got it. You could tell by his staff that he was taking a job because he wanted one last gasp, and apparently didn't think about the cost of hiring a competent staff. He hired his friends because ... that's the way he'd already done it before. It cost him his job and ASU a much-needed bounce back.
Graham doesn't have 5 years. He has two -- tops. They better win 8 games next year, or there will be hell to pay in the AD. Maybe Graham keeps his job because ASU can't afford to move him, but the people that brought him here will have the names erased from history if it's anything less. Fair or not, that is now reality, because ASU can't afford another mediocre year, and I don't know of any particular ASU fan that has any patience left. This better be a home run.
