The million-dollar answer

There were a fair amount of coaches that were fired after last weekend’s games ended. And at least one of those guys’ team won. Coaches get hired to win championships and beat their in state rival.

Just listen to the next big hire talk about the plans they have for the school and I’m sure you will hear, “I’m coming here to win a conference championship and compete for a National Championship!”

The questions from the sports reporters in the room should start out with, “Okay, how many years will that take you?” “Will you be able to win with the last coach’s recruits?” “If you can’t win with the other guy’s kids then how many recruiting classes will you need to develop your team to win it all?”

What? A lot of those questions go unanswered, as the coach will merely say something like, “I intend to evaluate the returning scholarship athletes and sit down with the upper classmen and talk about goals. We will work hard to change the atmosphere (attitude) in the locker room.”

Did your team fire its football coach? Is your football coach considering going to one of those big time schools that needs a new coach?

If they are looking at going somewhere new is it because of the money they are promising to pay or for the challenge? Is this a dream job you’ve wanted for 20 years or is it closer to where you really want to live?

Think about his for a moment or two if you care, fired UCLA football Coach Jim Mora will receive $12 million for not winning enough football games and failing to win the Pac 12 championship.

He got the Bruins to the championship game a few years back but his team came up short on the scoreboard. And his last three games versus USC were losses for the Bruins.

Makes you wonder if Mora failed or if the Bruin fans failed. We can’t stand you so we’ll pay you $12 million to leave UCLA.

Heck, I could feel bad for not winning enough games for that amount of money. In the long run he did pretty well for himself.

When a coach comes into town and starts winning right away and gets the fans excited more times than not the coach gets a raise and a couple more years on his contract for a security blanket so to speak.

Three or four years later those extra years on the contract might come back to haunt the athletic department.

There are some rabid fans that have enough of losing and hold the school hostage by saying something like, “Well I’m not donating another dime to this school until you can hire a coach that brings back a winning football team!”

Nebraska is in that situation right now. It fired two coaches that the fans did not like and brought in Mike Riley, the former Oregon State coach.

Success at the Lincoln campus was minimal and this season turned abysmal and Riley was fired by former WSU AD Bill Moos who replaced the AD that hired Riley.

Hopefully I didn’t go too fast for you there. The Cornhuskers are paying off the contract of fired coach Bo Pelini, fired AD Shawn Eichorst and fired Coach Riley.

Understand one thing that is a lot of money but the folks from Nebraska seem to be able to handle that.

There will be a lot of shuffling of coaches in the next few weeks. Coaches have been fired and athletic directors are under a lot of pressure to get a big name coach that will fit in at fill in the blank University.

When those vacancies are filled there will be more vacancies from a few colleges whose coach jumped ship for a bigger payday that has a 100,000-seat stadium and unbelievable athletic facilities that helps a coach recruit top-notch athletes.

The million-dollar answer that you will hear from the next big coaching may likely be, “This is a dream coaching job for me. I’ve always wanted to be here!”

But don’t forget to ask those questions that are important to the teams’ fans or four years from now you’ll be welcoming the next great coaching hire.

How long can a school afford to do that?