Post by Aggie One on Nov 25, 2005 15:10:31 GMT -5
The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow – Part One
by Craig R. Turner
bluedeathvalley.com
It has been both a tumultuous and emotional week for the football program at North Carolina A&T. In a move that some had forecast several weeks ago and that most recognized would be coming shortly after A&T’s season ending loss to South Carolina State capping a second straight disappointing 3-8 season and another lower division finish in the Mid Eastern Athletic Conference, Athletic director Dee Todd terminated George Small as head football coach as well as the rest of his staff with three temporary exceptions.
What we will attempt to do in this three part series will be to bring those fans who did not have the opportunity to follow the recent chain of events an up-to-date and a personal view as why Small was terminated, what is the current status of the program, and how soon will a new coach be hired and what kind of professional attributes will A&T officials be looking for that Small didn’t possess.
It really became public about two weeks that Small and his staff were in serious trouble during the bye week after returning home from Florida A&M. At that time,Todd answered the first questions regarding whether A&T would exercise the two year option clause in Small’s 3-year contract or would he be replaced.
She would neither confirm nor deny that Small was standing on shaky ground, preferring to wait until the end of the season before making comment or a decision on his status. She intimated that she would examine both the good and the bad aspects surrounding Small’s tenure and make a swift decision within a few days after the last game of the season.
It became obvious that a final decision had been made by the middle of last week as all football recruiting operations were suspended immediately on Wednesday morning before the South Carolina State game. Truth be told, anyone with a lick of sense knew when that action was taken, Small no longer would be head coach after that weekend and his fate had been sealed, perhaps weeks before.
Surely the seeds of his demise were sewn in early season losses to North Carolina Central and Elon but the real killers were successive one sided losses to Delaware State, Howard, and Bethune Cookman. Losing five straight to finish out the year compounded by a 6-16 mark over the last two years was not going to fly very well with the vast majority of the Aggie faithful while masquerading under the guise of as progress.
On the field, play was ragged and disorganized and showed nothing but regression as the season went on.
Those two main factors took a huge toll on on the public perception of Small's competency especially in the confidence department and officials and supporters alike began to wonder whether there had been a viable plan put into place for improvement by Small or even if his staff had any kind of clue as how to go about undertaking such a task.
On Monday morning, Small and his staff were given the news he was out in what was described as an amiable meeting or least as much as it could be when a firing occurs. As anticipated, the local media jumped on the story and it was the lead story on all the network affiliates over the next two ensuing days.
While the electronic media reported the story pretty much straight forwardly and stayed balanced, the print arena, namely the Greensboro News and Record used it as an opportunity lambaste Dee Todd and then to personally attack Chancellor James C. Renick for what they described as “meddling” with athletics of which supposedly he knows nothing about and even questioned his leadership as the university’s CEO, it’s 100 million dollar fund raising effort and the university’s integrity as a whole.
Never mind the fact that Renick has overseen the most dramatic renaissance of any HBCU in the nation since he begin his stint as A&T’s leader in 1999.
Never mind the nationally recognized doctoral programs brought on line during his administration, the mass influx of millions of research dollars, an enrollment that is hovering near 12,000 students, and on-going capitol improvements to the football program that has made Aggie stadium the premier 1-AA all purpose athletic facility in the nation.
Nope, according to the gospel of Ed Hardin, Dr. Renick doesn’t know what he’s doing. Good Ole Ed and Pat Robertson are kindred spirits and didn't even know it.
All joking aside, the attack came as no surprise to this columnist considering the storied history of particular writers on the News and Record’s payroll with a long standing obsession in attacking leading black institutions whenever there was a move to improve and advance themselves dating back to the days of Jim Crow.
It is pretty apparent that this cular torch and tradition has been passed along, at least in certain circles within that newspaper.
Their writers seized upon the chance to use George Small’s parting comments to try to portray him as a victim of short sighting ness and of shrinking recruiting dollars as the sole reasons for his failure and ultimate dismissal. There was a feeble attempt to draw a comparison of fate between Small, who whined about having only a $40,000 in his recruiting budget to that of former coach Bill Hayes who worked with $18,000 at the time of his dismissal in 2002.
But let’s look a little closer. There are four major problems with Ed Hardin’s grand conspiracy theory and why Small was let go.
Point One - Bill Hayes won football games. Oh sure he certainly wanted more money to work with. What coach wouldn’t but he won just the same.
He did it with less because he understood that he had to the undisputed king of recruiting in-state and didn’t hesitate to go after prospects, ACC not withstanding. He was a classic football icon and understood you had to outwork the other guy because that is how you compete.
Hayes was never let go from A&T for wins. That was a private matter but no one can ever question his coaching abilities. His intensity showed up each and every week and led his team with passion and it carried over to his players. Small never seemed to grasp that sense of urgency and it waned dramatically after 2003 as the years went by.
Point Two - Morgan State is in the top three among spending on football recruiting in the MEAC, doubling A&T’s budget and routinely grabbing players from all over the country. Yet the Bears lost two of three games to A&T under Small, as did Howard, and Norfolk. Dollars don’t necessarily translate into victories. More money as a direct route to success is not a self fulfilling prophecy. Intelligent coaching and decision making is.
What plagued George Small was coming in behind Hayes and winning a championship out of the chute with the bulk of the players he left behind.
What doomed him was his failure to maintain the level of competitiveness and to keep the program least on an even level as he had found it.
Point Three - Much has been said of the civility and likeable nature of George Small which made him an affable person. But there were problems in his coaching philosophies and actions that left doubt in many minds and some of those well intention personality traits did not serve him well as a head coach.
He remained single minded in believing his system method coaching would work by simply plugging players into roles and have them they run the same play over and over again and imposing his will over an opponent.
That works with robots but athletes aren’t robots and smart coaching tacticians tailor their schemes to fit their personnel’s strong suits to get the most productivity possible.
Bethune Cookman’s Alvin Wyatt alluded to that very fact in post game press conference after viewing film of A&T before their meeting this year. Wyatt said he thought that A&T would make some changes after their 2004 collapse but found they had made no changes at all “so it was easy for us to do what we wanted.”
Point Four – Small wasn’t exactly endearing to all of his players, some citing favoritism taking the lead over actual talent. Another question in his judgment arose with an episode that didn’t sit well involved a young player who stepped into a starting role for the first time against Elon, had a very creditable game and solid overall performance but was publicly ridiculed by Small in his weekly press conference for not running plays as diagrammed.
No coach worth his salt would or should ever publicly slam a college kid to the press or in public. This is not the National Football League.
Now I know that some fans would disagree with me, some intensely, with my arguments, but if taken in their general context as a whole, it should give you a clearer idea of why there was a coaching change this week without all the emotional baggage that comes attached to such a event.
There really wasn't much of choice to be made. Two more years of this same type of coaching performance would have caused irrepairable damage to the football program. A&T is in need of a different mindset, a different approach, and a non-traditonalist motivator.
The old ways of doing things simply won't do in today's modern college football world. Nowadays the mantra is simple for coaching success - Adapt or die.
Coming Saturday Part 2 – Where Do We Go From Here?
by Craig R. Turner
bluedeathvalley.com
It has been both a tumultuous and emotional week for the football program at North Carolina A&T. In a move that some had forecast several weeks ago and that most recognized would be coming shortly after A&T’s season ending loss to South Carolina State capping a second straight disappointing 3-8 season and another lower division finish in the Mid Eastern Athletic Conference, Athletic director Dee Todd terminated George Small as head football coach as well as the rest of his staff with three temporary exceptions.
What we will attempt to do in this three part series will be to bring those fans who did not have the opportunity to follow the recent chain of events an up-to-date and a personal view as why Small was terminated, what is the current status of the program, and how soon will a new coach be hired and what kind of professional attributes will A&T officials be looking for that Small didn’t possess.
It really became public about two weeks that Small and his staff were in serious trouble during the bye week after returning home from Florida A&M. At that time,Todd answered the first questions regarding whether A&T would exercise the two year option clause in Small’s 3-year contract or would he be replaced.
She would neither confirm nor deny that Small was standing on shaky ground, preferring to wait until the end of the season before making comment or a decision on his status. She intimated that she would examine both the good and the bad aspects surrounding Small’s tenure and make a swift decision within a few days after the last game of the season.
It became obvious that a final decision had been made by the middle of last week as all football recruiting operations were suspended immediately on Wednesday morning before the South Carolina State game. Truth be told, anyone with a lick of sense knew when that action was taken, Small no longer would be head coach after that weekend and his fate had been sealed, perhaps weeks before.
Surely the seeds of his demise were sewn in early season losses to North Carolina Central and Elon but the real killers were successive one sided losses to Delaware State, Howard, and Bethune Cookman. Losing five straight to finish out the year compounded by a 6-16 mark over the last two years was not going to fly very well with the vast majority of the Aggie faithful while masquerading under the guise of as progress.
On the field, play was ragged and disorganized and showed nothing but regression as the season went on.
Those two main factors took a huge toll on on the public perception of Small's competency especially in the confidence department and officials and supporters alike began to wonder whether there had been a viable plan put into place for improvement by Small or even if his staff had any kind of clue as how to go about undertaking such a task.
On Monday morning, Small and his staff were given the news he was out in what was described as an amiable meeting or least as much as it could be when a firing occurs. As anticipated, the local media jumped on the story and it was the lead story on all the network affiliates over the next two ensuing days.
While the electronic media reported the story pretty much straight forwardly and stayed balanced, the print arena, namely the Greensboro News and Record used it as an opportunity lambaste Dee Todd and then to personally attack Chancellor James C. Renick for what they described as “meddling” with athletics of which supposedly he knows nothing about and even questioned his leadership as the university’s CEO, it’s 100 million dollar fund raising effort and the university’s integrity as a whole.
Never mind the fact that Renick has overseen the most dramatic renaissance of any HBCU in the nation since he begin his stint as A&T’s leader in 1999.
Never mind the nationally recognized doctoral programs brought on line during his administration, the mass influx of millions of research dollars, an enrollment that is hovering near 12,000 students, and on-going capitol improvements to the football program that has made Aggie stadium the premier 1-AA all purpose athletic facility in the nation.
Nope, according to the gospel of Ed Hardin, Dr. Renick doesn’t know what he’s doing. Good Ole Ed and Pat Robertson are kindred spirits and didn't even know it.
All joking aside, the attack came as no surprise to this columnist considering the storied history of particular writers on the News and Record’s payroll with a long standing obsession in attacking leading black institutions whenever there was a move to improve and advance themselves dating back to the days of Jim Crow.
It is pretty apparent that this cular torch and tradition has been passed along, at least in certain circles within that newspaper.
Their writers seized upon the chance to use George Small’s parting comments to try to portray him as a victim of short sighting ness and of shrinking recruiting dollars as the sole reasons for his failure and ultimate dismissal. There was a feeble attempt to draw a comparison of fate between Small, who whined about having only a $40,000 in his recruiting budget to that of former coach Bill Hayes who worked with $18,000 at the time of his dismissal in 2002.
But let’s look a little closer. There are four major problems with Ed Hardin’s grand conspiracy theory and why Small was let go.
Point One - Bill Hayes won football games. Oh sure he certainly wanted more money to work with. What coach wouldn’t but he won just the same.
He did it with less because he understood that he had to the undisputed king of recruiting in-state and didn’t hesitate to go after prospects, ACC not withstanding. He was a classic football icon and understood you had to outwork the other guy because that is how you compete.
Hayes was never let go from A&T for wins. That was a private matter but no one can ever question his coaching abilities. His intensity showed up each and every week and led his team with passion and it carried over to his players. Small never seemed to grasp that sense of urgency and it waned dramatically after 2003 as the years went by.
Point Two - Morgan State is in the top three among spending on football recruiting in the MEAC, doubling A&T’s budget and routinely grabbing players from all over the country. Yet the Bears lost two of three games to A&T under Small, as did Howard, and Norfolk. Dollars don’t necessarily translate into victories. More money as a direct route to success is not a self fulfilling prophecy. Intelligent coaching and decision making is.
What plagued George Small was coming in behind Hayes and winning a championship out of the chute with the bulk of the players he left behind.
What doomed him was his failure to maintain the level of competitiveness and to keep the program least on an even level as he had found it.
Point Three - Much has been said of the civility and likeable nature of George Small which made him an affable person. But there were problems in his coaching philosophies and actions that left doubt in many minds and some of those well intention personality traits did not serve him well as a head coach.
He remained single minded in believing his system method coaching would work by simply plugging players into roles and have them they run the same play over and over again and imposing his will over an opponent.
That works with robots but athletes aren’t robots and smart coaching tacticians tailor their schemes to fit their personnel’s strong suits to get the most productivity possible.
Bethune Cookman’s Alvin Wyatt alluded to that very fact in post game press conference after viewing film of A&T before their meeting this year. Wyatt said he thought that A&T would make some changes after their 2004 collapse but found they had made no changes at all “so it was easy for us to do what we wanted.”
Point Four – Small wasn’t exactly endearing to all of his players, some citing favoritism taking the lead over actual talent. Another question in his judgment arose with an episode that didn’t sit well involved a young player who stepped into a starting role for the first time against Elon, had a very creditable game and solid overall performance but was publicly ridiculed by Small in his weekly press conference for not running plays as diagrammed.
No coach worth his salt would or should ever publicly slam a college kid to the press or in public. This is not the National Football League.
Now I know that some fans would disagree with me, some intensely, with my arguments, but if taken in their general context as a whole, it should give you a clearer idea of why there was a coaching change this week without all the emotional baggage that comes attached to such a event.
There really wasn't much of choice to be made. Two more years of this same type of coaching performance would have caused irrepairable damage to the football program. A&T is in need of a different mindset, a different approach, and a non-traditonalist motivator.
The old ways of doing things simply won't do in today's modern college football world. Nowadays the mantra is simple for coaching success - Adapt or die.
Coming Saturday Part 2 – Where Do We Go From Here?
