Randy Edsall’s first season fractured Maryland football; can he repair it?

[Palatine]

anytime you refer to Edsall lovers or Edsall worshippers you're fabricating opinions, and i'm pretty sure you've done both several times. if not i apologize as i may be confusing you someone else

Have you ever read this board? There were numerous poster who thought that Edsall did as good a job as anyone could have. Exactly that opinion. That opinion by the way is a superlative because it implies no one could have done better. And was voiced by more than one poster.

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

Have you ever read this board? There were numerous poster who thought that Edsall did as good a job as anyone could have. Exactly that opinion. That opinion by the way is a superlative because it implies no one could have done better. And was voiced by more than one poster.

I'm calling BS on this. I don't recall one poster stating that.

That's your interpretation of what someone said defending Edsall from the ridiculous attacks.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Any coach we were to hire/retain at that time was going to be their goal.
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-8313847.html

That what was stated from the consultant from the SEC during and as an argument for the upgrade it. I believe it recides in the same article from which you quoted.

I didn't see this repsone before. I did admit my mistake, and I fully agree that Edsall may very well have been given the charge of building a competitive big east football program upon his hiring, based on the timing of events around the hire, but I still disagree that he was ever formally given that task upon his hiring, but none of us were actually in the room when he was hired. Lew Perkins most definitely did say "Here's the keys to the program, there's no owner's manual"...though.

But your dates are wrong, and I don't like when my memory gets tested like that so I"ve been digging for a little while to make sure I"m not cuckoo yet.

Feel free to check and see if any of this is wrong.

The big east invited UConn and Villanova to join the big east football in 1997, at a future date to be determined, conditional upon upgrading football to 1-A status. The BOT did not approve of an upgrade to 1-A until after that invite came in 1997, voting in favor in mid-october. The whole idea of the upgrade began in 1990-1991 when the big east was actually forming a football conference initially, and with the change in conference landscape at the time, there was worry about the future of the.... at the time, infant UConn basketball programs among the big boys, and on top of that, the academics at the university, that actually favored the upgrade (and there were very few), recognized that the largest public reserach universities in teh country, with the largest endowments, also happened to have 1-A football programs, but there was a big push AGAINST upgrading by the university faculty and administration.

It all started, when Perkins at the request of the university president and BOT, in his first few months on the job in 1990, was asked to put together a detailed report on upgrading from 1-AA to 1-A which was delivered back to the president and BOT in 1991. The entire concept never made it past public forum discussion stages until Rowland became governor in 1995 and started getting involved with pushing for state bonding and funding for facilities. The Oct. 1997 BOT vote established North Campus at the time to become the new stadium location. That set off the town of mansfield local government into a frenzy, the town of Mansfield eventually shot down the on campus facility by late 1998, and it took Rowland bundling Rentschler field into the Adrien's Landing state funding project of summer 2000 before an actual stadium capable of qualifying for D-1A standards was even funded.

The location of a stadium was completely in the air, as was funding, at the time, when Edsall was hired. Edsall was hired on 12/21/1998, pproximately 14 months after the upgrade was approved, and the school was still searching for both a location and funding for the stadium. The upgrade was very close to not happening, at the time Edsall was hired.

I think many would be surprised to know who else was interviewed for the job besides Edsall. Brad Childress, Kevin Gilbride, probably wanted more money than the university was willing to spend on a coach at that time of uncertainty.

Edsall did a great job for what was needed. We've enjoyed great success because of him. We also found ourselves with situation our program was in on Jan. 2, 2011 in ending the 2010 season and going into the 2011 season because of him.

That's all I've got to say on that.

 

[noeynox]

Plenty of posters expressed that sentiment.

There was also the fear that the next hire, if he was GROB like could set the program back to the trailer age.

 

[CAPS]

Randy needs to rewind Randy and listen! Man has become the new definition of the word egomaniac!

 

[whaler11]

Have you ever read this board? There were numerous poster who thought that Edsall did as good a job as anyone could have. Exactly that opinion. That opinion by the way is a superlative because it implies no one could have done better. And was voiced by more than one poster.

There is not a single person in the world who believes this. Zero. None. You and some others may have invented them and they sit on your shoulder like the Great Gazoo.... but no sentient being believes nor has stated what you claim above.

 

[ZooCougar]

There is not a single person in the world who believes this. Zero. None. You and some others may have invented them and they sit on your shoulder like the Great Gazoo.... but no sentient being believes nor has stated what you claim above.

Nonsense. The next time BusinessLawyer tells us that Craig James and company think Randy is great, then I'll reference this post.

 

[whaler11]

Nonsense. The next time BusinessLawyer tells us that Craig James and company think Randy is great, then I'll reference this post.

There are a lot of national media who think that Edsall did a good job at UConn. That is hardly the same thing as thinking that NO ONE could have been better. There are plenty of coaches who could/would have been better. This is a dumb argument even by Pal's standards - but I'll let him get back to chasing windmills and calling out people who don't exist.

 

[Duncan Idaho]

I didn't see this repsone before. I did admit my mistake, and I fully agree that Edsall may very well have been given the charge of building a competitive big east football program upon his hiring, based on the timing of events around the hire, but I still disagree that he was ever formally given that task upon his hiring, but none of us were actually in the room when he was hired. Lew Perkins most definitely did say "Here's the keys to the program, there's no owner's manual"...though.

But your dates are wrong, and I don't like when my memory gets tested like that so I"ve been digging for a little while to make sure I"m not cuckoo yet.

Feel free to check and see if any of this is wrong.

The big east invited UConn and Villanova to join the big east football in 1997, at a future date to be determined, conditional upon upgrading football to 1-A status. The BOT did not approve of an upgrade to 1-A until after that invite came in 1997, voting in favor in mid-october. The whole idea of the upgrade began in 1990-1991 when the big east was actually forming a football conference initially, and with the change in conference landscape at the time, there was worry about the future of the.... at the time, infant UConn basketball programs among the big boys, and on top of that, the academics at the university, that actually favored the upgrade (and there were very few), recognized that the largest public reserach universities in teh country, with the largest endowments, also happened to have 1-A football programs, but there was a big push AGAINST upgrading by the university faculty and administration.

It all started, when Perkins at the request of the university president and BOT, in his first few months on the job in 1990, was asked to put together a detailed report on upgrading from 1-AA to 1-A which was delivered back to the president and BOT in 1991. The entire concept never made it past public forum discussion stages until Rowland became governor in 1995 and started getting involved with pushing for state bonding and funding for facilities. The Oct. 1997 BOT vote established North Campus at the time to become the new stadium location. That set off the town of mansfield local government into a frenzy, the town of Mansfield eventually shot down the on campus facility by late 1998, and it took Rowland bundling Rentschler field into the Adrien's Landing state funding project of summer 2000 before an actual stadium capable of qualifying for D-1A standards was even funded.

The location of a stadium was completely in the air, as was funding, at the time, when Edsall was hired. Edsall was hired on 12/21/1998, pproximately 14 months after the upgrade was approved, and the school was still searching for both a location and funding for the stadium. The upgrade was very close to not happening, at the time Edsall was hired.

I think many would be surprised to know who else was interviewed for the job besides Edsall. Brad Childress, Kevin Gilbride, probably wanted more money than the university was willing to spend on a coach at that time of uncertainty.

Edsall did a great job for what was needed. We've enjoyed great success because of him. We also found ourselves with situation our program was in on Jan. 2, 2011 in ending the 2010 season and going into the 2011 season because of him.

That's all I've got to say on that.

Carl, I was researching the article and posted after you had already done so. my aplogies. The point I was trying to make was in mid 1990's Perkins got the go for a D1 program. he stated he wanted BCS and BE ASAP well before 2005. An appropriate sized stadium was needed to make the move . The on campus proposal failed. The 65k stadium in Hartford for the Pats was approved by the General Assembly before the Edsall hire. He thought he had his stadium. You dont hire or go into a endeavor this big with little or no expectations or goals. The SEC consultant(commissioner) told them that bulding a relatively competative D1 football program would be the most difficult in college sport but would be worthwhile to any school if successful. My take on the handing over the keys with no owners manual reference, is that there existed no template, model to follow because this was something that was never done before. ( a school going from D1AA to a BCS school. Being competative or mediocre is a fair and reasonable goal for the short term. I didnt agree with all the things Edsall did here but that goal was accomplished in my opinion. Now I want to move on to being good, very good then great. I think you are a great fan of UConn football, Carl and I'm a big fan of your postings.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

Funny to read the history - Perkins, 1997, Randy in the early years, Villanova & UConn getting invites to the BE. Sad part is UConn should have gone big time decades before. When Penn State was emerging and Syracuse was emerging, UConn should have been emerging (probably UMass as well). Unfortunately, small time New England thinking prevailed - that and the "wanna be just like the Ivy League" foolishness.

 

[noeynox]

There is not a single person in the world who believes this. Zero. None. You and some others may have invented them and they sit on your shoulder like the Great Gazoo.... but no sentient being believes nor has stated what you claim above.

A poster I happen to think is very fair and balanced suggested we should build a statue of Edsall outside The Rent, rather than question if he should be on the hot seat.

As far as national media goes, there were many among them who suggested the Packers were crazy for letting Bret Favre go for some kid, that while he may be good, is not likely to ever be Favre. Just because someone has a national forum doesn't always make them right and I know Edsall did do a good job here, but I think Palatine's point about Edsall not believing in UConn gets lost because people want to disagree with everything he says here. More than once Edsall went in the Media and insinuated that UConn fans had no right to have expectations because UConn "had no history." P or no one that comes after will have the same job security that Edsall did here and that is a GOOD thing. No one should be allowed to cash seven figure paychecks and at the same time talk about there "shouldn't be any expectations". Edsall was a fat cat here at UConn, that could blast the media, fans, players, etc here, without any residual blow back. He has found a totally different reality at his new gig. Expectations are a good thing, unless you're Randy Edsall.

 

[TouchdownHusky]

Simple really. Randy Edsall did do a terrific job of getting UConn from 1-AA to 1-A. He was there during the early years and probably sped up the "growing curve".

But his "ship" started taking on water when he did not (or could not) recruit a worthy successor to Dan Orlovsky. Since Dan left after the '04 season, this key position has been mediorce (at best) to outright poor. The WR corp soon followed the same path. And utimately the offense's became somewhere between boring and ineffective with precious few glimnces of excitement and success (last half of '09 for example).

Randy managed to keep it afloat with solid running, a mauling OL and an adequate (sometimes outstanding) defense. These players can more often be found in the "under-the-radar" department. RE deserves credit for finding enough of them and coaching them up.

All in all though Randy took UConn as far as he could. There are only so many OL, so many LBs and so many Safety's you can recruit. At some point you gotta land the Aaron Hernandez's of High School football because signing two, three or four other lesser TE's isn't gonna make up the difference.

 

[mattp]

Nonsense. The next time BusinessLawyer tells us that Craig James and company think Randy is great, then I'll reference this post.

so craig james saying he's great is the same as saying nobody could have done a better job? you must have some real difficulty with comparisons and a sense of perspective if you think those two statements are even close. i'm pretty sure even Craig James would think Urban Meyer and probably more than a dozen or twenty others could have done a better job. now whether we had a shot in hell of getting those dozen plus guys is a different matter

 

[Palatine]

I'm calling BS on this. I don't recall one poster stating that.

That's your interpretation of what someone said defending Edsall from the ridiculous attacks.

Please do not blame me for your faulty memory. These types of statements were made by posters numerous times.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Carl, I was researching the article and posted after you had already done so. my aplogies. The point I was trying to make was in mid 1990's Perkins got the go for a D1 program. he stated he wanted BCS and BE ASAP well before 2005. An appropriate sized stadium was needed to make the move . The on campus proposal failed. The 65k stadium in Hartford for the Pats was approved by the General Assembly before the Edsall hire. He thought he had his stadium. You dont hire or go into a endeavor this big with little or no expectations or goals. The SEC consultant(commissioner) told them that bulding a relatively competative D1 football program would be the most difficult in college sport but would be worthwhile to any school if successful. My take on the handing over the keys with no owners manual reference, is that there existed no template, model to follow because this was something that was never done before. ( a school going from D1AA to a BCS school. Being competative or mediocre is a fair and reasonable goal for the short term. I didnt agree with all the things Edsall did here but that goal was accomplished in my opinion. Now I want to move on to being good, very good then great. I think you are a great fan of UConn football, Carl and I'm a big fan of your postings.

True. The whole Patriots and Bob Kraft/Rowland relationship and flirtation with bringing the Patsy's to Hartford played a big role in the d-1A upgrade discussions in the early 90s, but it initally all began independant of each other. The money that was going to go to building an NFL venue (which would have seated approx 65k) - although I think it was proposed to actually be in downtown hartford right near the intersection of 84 and 91, that also became the site where it was proposed that the d-1A Huskies were to play football - after the on campus stadium proposal was shut down. The money approved by the GA for construction of that NFL facility went away for good in late 1999, and at the same time, actually a year earlier, the town of mansfield, through lobbying the state government, among other tactics, effectively shut down the possibility of an on campus football stadium. So, even though the BOT had approved the upgrade in 1997, and there was a goal to play in the big east in the early 2000s, the upgrade was dead in the water as of new years day in 2000. Y2K. There were no plans to build a division 1-A stadium and no funding for a stadium at that time, 2 years into Edsall's tenure.

In the initial proposals, there were three sites that were looked at to build a d-1A football facility. Two were on campus, and the third was Rentschler. Rentschler was the least desireable option of the three. John Rowland didn't give up though. He pushed the Rentschler field money through the state GA attached to the vote for the Adrien's landing project that went through the Assembly in late spring/summer 2000. When the adrien's landing vote passed, that's then the d-1A upgrade finally became a reality. Summer 2000. 11 years ago. John Rowland deserves more credit for upgrading the UConn program to d-1A than any coach or university staff member past or present does.

What's also interesting, to note, regrading our football facilities, is that Shenkman and Burton, is that the vast majority of the money that was put into those two facilities, I think $35 million or so, came from UCONN 2000 program (Not sure what the actual name of the program was, I think uconn 2000) money also pushed through the state assembly by Rowland. THere were millions and millions of dollars earmarked for upgrading all of the buildings and infrastructure set aside by the state.

THe money that was used to build Shenkman and Burton, most of it came from money set aside in the multimillion dollar, maybe billion dollar plan, the money was set aside for use by on-campus recreation, intramurals, and stuff like that. To this day, I believe that when the football team is not using the facility, it should be open to the students for general use and intramurals because of that.

Shenkman and Burton donated a tone of money, millions, but it was a fraction of the total construction cost. Edsall was given an integral say in what and how he wanted things built.

 

[J187Money]

Please do not blame me for your faulty memory. These types of statements were made by posters numerous times.

People said a lot of things. I think what people generally meant is that they were surprised how well we fared during the transition, and the program far exceeded most people's expectations up until the last couple of years. On an absolute basis, I don't think anyone ever meant to say that if we had Nick Saban (for example) that we wouldn't have ended up with a better record and better recruits.

But I think it is fair to say that most people feel that Edsall did a very good job during the transition, and if there was someone out there (that we could have actually hired at the time which I think is an important point) that could have done a better job it would have probably been marginal. And this is where I stand.

 

[Carl Spackler]

With the way the things were shaking out around upgrading and building a stadium in 1998, 1999 and 2000, can anyone have any wonder at this point why Edsall going 4-7, 3-8 and 2-9 in consecutive seasons was largely ignored?

What was happening on the football field was irrelevant to what was happening off the football field, and that was essentially the case for the first several years of Edsall's tenure.

This guy has the audacity to get up in front of the Maryland/DC press and say that what he's going through in Maryland, he's gone through before. Nope, Randy, they're not going to ignore what's happening on the field down there, especially given that the entire athletic department's future is riding on the success of that football program in generating money.

Very different situation than what we've got at UConn, and what we had early on.

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

People said a lot of things. I think what people generally meant is that they were surprised how well we fared during the transition, and the program far exceeded most people's expectations up until the last couple of years. On an absolute basis, I don't think anyone ever meant to say that if we had Nick Saban (for example) that we wouldn't have ended up with a better record and better recruits.

But I think it is fair to say that most people feel that Edsall did a very good job during the transition, and if there was someone out there (that we could have actually hired at the time which I think is an important point) that could have done a better job it would have probably been marginal. And this is where I stand.

Leave him alone. He's almost done building his strawman.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Last tidbit of Randy Edsall history, according to me, is that the fall 2000 football season was the first sason played as d-1A independant. There were provisions made w/ the NCAA to allow that to happen, bleachers had to be installed at Memorial stadium. Stuff like that. That season was going to be played as a 1-A independant, regardless of what the other stuff was happening around the program. The future of 1-A football was majorly in question. A big IF, that adrien's landing project doesn't pass through the state legislature in summer 2000, there would have been no future stadium for uconn football to be division 1-A in the ncaa's view, and the entire upgrade most likely falls apart and we go back to a 1-AA conference for football in 2001.

That summer and fall of 2000, after that stadium funding was finally approved, also happens to be the same time that Edsall was able to do the most important (in my opinion) single thing he ever did for the UConn program, and that's successfully recruit Dan Orlovsky.

If that stadium legislation doesn't pass, Orlovsky most likely never suits up for UConn, and it's no coincidence that Edsall's string of consecutive losing seasons turned around we started having significant success in 1-A football after successfully recruiting a QB that could play at the level. (I'm not saying you only need a QB, please nobody take this in the wrong direction) but everything snowballed from there.

This football program, the facilities, all of it, trully belong to the State of Connecticut, as it's division 1 football program at the state land grant university. THat's something that I hope, becomes more and more evident under new leadership at the athletic department, university and head coach level. Every resident of this state needs to have pride in that program. Jim Calhoun did build UConn basketball. But the state of CT built the football program. Not Randy Edsall.

It bothered me to no end, to see how Edsall turned UConn football into everything about him, and how people, bought into it.

The uconn football program, while never consistently a championship contending program for any extended period of time in it's 120 year existence up to 2001, had PLENTY of history. The story of how it transitioned from the yankee conference division 1 status in the 70s, through the 80s, and then into the 90's and then back to 1-A, Edsall is a very small part of that.

The program exists as it does right now, not because of Randy Edsall, but because the governing body of the state of CT, our representatives, decided by majority vote, that they wanted it, and because one of our home grown players, Orlovsky, decided to stay home and be the most significant player to start laying bricks in the foundation of the program.

Players build programs, not coaches. Coaches just drive the ship for a little while.

 

[jpm25]

it doesn't get more likes because most of the opinions regarding Edsall were fabricated by Palatine. by far the most annoying part of thinking Edsall did a good job (which even Pal admits he did) was that i was constantly told that i love him, don't think anyone else could do the job and that i think he should be coach for life. i never heard one person say anything like any of that, expect Pal and a few others when attributing it to the "apologists". all i've heard people say was that he did a good job and probably a better job at building the program than most (that means more than 50%, not 99.9%, and when you consider 50% of coaches are probably fired in 3 years it's hard to argue that he didnt do a better job than most would). all the superlatives have come from Pal and his anti edsall cronies, not from the apologists

Statements like this is why apologists get a bad rap

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

Statements like this is why apologists get a bad rap

In your world of make believe....what do you think mattp is trying to say there? Please share with the rest of us what your false interpretation of that quote is.

 

[jpm25]

People said a lot of things. I think what people generally meant is that they were surprised how well we fared during the transition, and the program far exceeded most people's expectations up until the last couple of years. On an absolute basis, I don't think anyone ever meant to say that if we had Nick Saban (for example) that we wouldn't have ended up with a better record and better recruits.

But I think it is fair to say that most people feel that Edsall did a very good job during the transition, and if there was someone out there (that we could have actually hired at the time which I think is an important point) that could have done a better job it would have probably been marginal. And this is where I stand.

I believe that one other finalist that was not chosen in favor of Edsall went on to be a head coach in the NFL and achieved some moderate success. Another is still an NFL coordinator on a successful team. Neither would likely have been marginal and either could have matched or exceeded Edsall's achievements.

 

[jpm25]

In your world of make believe....what do you think mattp is trying to say there? Please share with the rest of us what your false interpretation of that quote is.

That 50% of coaches are failures and make the top half possible, so Randy is automatically no worse than "better than most". A typical, grossly misleading and non-factual apologista argument.

 

[jpm25]

In your world of make believe....what do you think mattp is trying to say there? Please share with the rest of us what your false interpretation of that quote is.

Are you now going to provide your false interpretation, too?

 

[mattp]

That 50% of coaches are failures and make the top half possible, so Randy is automatically no worse than "better than most". A typical, grossly misleading and non-factual apologista argument.

?? that's not what i said. Edsall did a good job. actually looking at the 2008 new BCS HC hires they pretty much break down as follows:
good job: Petrino, Briles, P Johnson, Pelini (really the jury is still out on this one, but i'll give it to you)
fired/close to fired:Cutliffe, RRod, Nutt, Sherman, Neuheisel, Stewart

4 out of 10 have done what could be considered a good job. the success rate for hiring a BCS coach good enough to keep his job is less than 50%. that's why i wanted to keep a coach that did a good job rather than torpedo the whole thing by hiring GRob II. that's what us apologists call "rational thinking". now the edsall bashers translate that into "i want Edsall to raise my kids because he can do everything better than anyone else" and that's just plain ridiculous

 

[Carl Spackler]

Edsall might be the luckiest college football head coach in history. He managed to find a situation in his first head coach job where he was able to take a recently successful football program and go 4-7, 3-8, and 2-9 and then 6-6 in his first four seasons and not be in any danger of losing his job whatsoever, due ot circumstances off the field, to another situation where he can take a recently successful football program and go 2-10 in his first season and still have very little threat to his job security at any time in the near future due to circumstances off the field in the athletic department.

Only difference in Maryland is if the public will allow it.

 

[mattp]

his job here is different than his job in maryland. he did well at building something here, but that's a lot different than taking something to the next level. even besides that difference if RRod (or Chizik) can teach us anything it's that success (or failure) at a past job doesn't at all translate into future success (or failure).

either way lets just kick Maryland's ass next year so we can move on

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

That 50% of coaches are failures and make the top half possible, so Randy is automatically no worse than "better than most". A typical, grossly misleading and non-factual apologista argument.

My interpretation of this comment leads me to conclude that it's not possible to carry on a rational conversation with you on this topic.

 

[Dann]

lol

 

[Brad Palmer]

"This is real life.”​

Oh Randall...this is just college football.​