I can't believe Kirby Smart is staying at Alabama through the playoffs

Submitted by SAMgO on
So it has been reported that, despite the official announcement from Georgia naming Smart their new HC, he will continue to coach the Tide's defense throughout the playoffs. How in hell is Georgia allowing this? The National Championship Game is on January 11 and NSD is February 3rd. He's also helping a conference rival and a school they regularly recruit against try to win it all. Is there and precedence for this whatsoever? I can't remember another coach doing this before. I'd be quite mad if I were a UGA booster helping to pay his salary.
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I Like Burgers

December 6th, 2015 at 3:38 PM ^

Had Durkin stayed with Michigan, he wouldn't be recruiting for Michigan.  So we'd be down a recruiter.  With him leaving early, Harbaugh was able to promote Partridge to coaching staff, which allows him to recruit off-site -- filling the hole Durkin left.

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JonnyHintz

December 6th, 2015 at 7:27 PM ^

But if he stayed on staff only to coach the bowl, how effective would he be in recruiting? 1. He's going to Maryland. He has no incentive to get these guys to Michigan. If anything, he would talk Michigan down a little bit and potentially recruit for Maryland while representing Michigan. 2. How serious is a recruit going to take being recruited by a coach who isn't going to be there in a month? 3. Would Durkin even consider spending time recruiting for Michigan, when he could be assembling his staff and recruiting for Maryland? Not only is it a good move for Michigan to have Durkin off the payroll, but it is good for Durkin as well. Alabama is a bit different because they are playing for more and Smart has been at Bama forever. Durkin doesn't have a single starter on his defense that he recruited to Michigan.

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UM Fan from Sydney

December 6th, 2015 at 3:30 PM ^

Uh, yeah. I would stay, too. Alabama has a chance to win another title, which is another thing to put on Smart's résumé. He would be a fool to not coach the playoff game(s).



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charblue.

December 6th, 2015 at 3:56 PM ^

on ABC with Mack Brown and Mark May offering some interesting perspective on this very topic. The question was whether it was smarter for a coach to just take over his new duties or split his work effort on his new and old team. And May noted that while he was at Pittsburgh, Jimmy Johnson was on staff and then hired to coach at Oklahoma State. He said that Johnson basically took half of Pitt's staff with him and those staffers didn't prepare well for their bowl game, giving what he described as half effort during bowl practices and even during their game. His head coach was Jackie Sherrill who lit into the staff and team at halftime of their bowl game, and basically fired the staff and turned the game over to the youngest members of the team.

And Brown said that he once tried to split his duties after getting hired at UNC and said it was bad decision, because you can't give of yourself sufficiently to either job, and so he suggested the best decision is to simply do what DJ Durkin did, and just leave for your new position.

Bascially, I think Harbaugh handled that situation perfectly last year when he simply decided to put off a formal public decision on his hiring by Michigan until after his season was complete with the 49ers. That is the best way to handle it in my opinion. But you expect no less from a Michigan man.

What's more, I think Michigan will benefit from Smart's decision to stay on at Alabama, getting a leg up on a couple of Georgia recruits. So, I have no problem with it.

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JonnyHintz

December 6th, 2015 at 7:38 PM ^

That's a hard thing to do these days. You can't wait on the decision of a coach for that long and have it work out in your favor. Harbaugh is a special case. He has an attachment to Michigan that cannot be paralleled. But you can't expect Georgia to wait until possibly January 12th to name a head coach. Waiting that long and going solely on the word of the coach is an incredible risk to take. With Harbaugh not signing an agreement until he was on a plane here, we put ourselves in great risk. You can't expect a school to do that for just anybody. What if Harbaugh changed his mind at the last minute? You then wasted all that time, energy, and resources. All the other openings are filled. All the top candidates are gone. Now you can't reasonably expect Georgia to do the same. Smart waits until after the national title, and then changes his mind. It is now January 12th, you have no candidate for your coaching position, and signing day is in less than a month. All your recruits jump ship if they haven't already. Harbaugh did it right. But only because it was the perfect man for the perfect job. If it was anyone other than Harbaugh, there is no way in hell I would be comfortable taking the situation how it happened. I wouldn't trust anyone that didn't have the attachment to Michigan that he has, to do it the way he did it. No chance in hell.

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LSAClassOf2000

December 6th, 2015 at 4:06 PM ^

Like others have said, other coordinators / assistants have done this very thing and I've always assumed that it must be part of the negotiations for the jo they intend to take. I very much doubt that it would be a dealbreaker if a school said, "No, we'd rather you begin right away", but if your destination school is cool with the idea of you finishing out your playoff run or bowl or whatever, why wouldn't you do it? I get the recruiting implications (you're then walking into the end of the dead period), but I guess you weigh that in the discussion too. 

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CompleteLunacy

December 6th, 2015 at 4:14 PM ^

Of coaching hires in general. South Carolina was looking at Lincoln Riley (Oklahoma OC) in addition to Muschamp. Discussion on the Oklahoma radio was...in the event he gets offered, would he stay in Oklahoma through the end of the playoff run? And the consensus seemed to be no because Reilly was too young and didn't have the track record of someone like Smart to make that demand (Georgia must really want Smart, otherwise I can't imagine they would be too happy to allow this). 

What's the solution? If you want an NFL coach, you have to wait for the NFL season to be over. But with college it's open season, and that's completely unfair to the kids. It's unfair to Georgia having to wait. It would be unfair to a team like Alabama or OKlahoma if that coordinator leaves before the playoffs are over. It's unfair to Michigan that Durkin had his mind on another job during the biggest week of the year. It's in general unfair to college players who can't leave for another school without sitting out a year, but college coahces can just up and leave whenever the hell they want to.

To me the solution is simple: no coaches can be contacted for job offers until the season is completely over (after the championship game). This causes recruiting issues I'm sure...but  maybe that slows down the amount of coaching turnover, and maybe a simple solution is to push back LOI day by a month. 

 

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TheReal_GR3

December 6th, 2015 at 6:29 PM ^

This is an agreement every coach on Nick Saban's staff makes. If you take a job you finish the season. Period. Every coach under Nick Saban has done the very same thing at LSU and at Alabama. This is not new. 

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UMProud

December 6th, 2015 at 6:30 PM ^

This is the way it should be. These fucking coaches leaving their times wriggling before a bowl game needs to stop. The NCAA should stop the headhunting until the friggin season is over!

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bigl133

December 6th, 2015 at 8:23 PM ^

I have a hard time with some of these coaches leaving at the end of the regular season after these young men have busted their tails all season playing for them. When a chance to be a national champion is at stake I think the NCAA owes it to these young men, who are making them money hand over fist, to have the best coaching staff in place to win. A chance at a national championship is only available for four teams. Brian Kelly had coached Cincinnati to, I believe an undefeated season, before leaving his team before the bowl game to head to Norte Dame. Cincy then got destroyed in the bowl game where the players felt that the coach just abandoned them.

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Brendan71388

December 7th, 2015 at 12:36 AM ^

It's the timing of it all. The stretch from now to signing day is so crucial that if the coach stayed through the bowl he would miss a lot of valuable time for recruiting at his new school.

It's definitely a shame for the players though.



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