Is there ample reason to be very concerned about the future of Texas football? Of course.
Have the prospects for 2016 dimmed considerably as a result of the dumpster fire which has emerged in 2015? That question might not merit an airtight “yes,” but it’s certainly more likely than not. It’s very difficult to see the Longhorns as 2016 Big 12 title contenders right now.
This obviously represents an adjustment of expectations, and when expectations are adjusted downward at the University of Texas — with football being the sport in question — no one should be happy.
However, the absence of happiness and the diminshment of progress — the progress which seemed to be just around the corner after the one-point loss to California — should not lead to a cattle stampede of panic, a Bevo burst of runaway anxiety.
If you’re a proud wearer of Burnt Orange and you think Saturday’s disaster against TCU should be cause for the firing of Charlie Strong at the end of this season, I can understand the passion and the concern. Gently note, though, that most of our worst decisions as human beings are made rashly and without sleeping on them for at least 24 hours, if not 48. Calling for Strong’s head right now is well-intentioned, but it’s nowhere close to the right response to this situation.
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The reality which has to be extremely difficult for any Texas fan to acknowledge — the same goes for any fan of one of college football’s old-money blueblood programs — is that a quick fix is not realistic.
Sure, a lot of the time, the resources available at a program of Texas’ stature and visibility can enable a coach to instantly get results. One should also acknowledge that if we’re talking about one of a select few coaches — the super-duper-star coaches you can count on one hand (Jim Harbaugh, Jimbo Fisher, Nick Saban, and Urban Meyer) — a quick fix becomes a much more realistic expectation.
Texas, however, has been far too disordered and chaotic — plagued by bad leadership from the athletic director’s chair (something which is in the process of being addressed) — to properly position itself for immediate success. The lack of a superstar head coach completely removes the idea of a quick fix from the equation.
This was known going into the season. It was known after the first two shaky games. It was still the case after Jerrod Heard sparked the offense in the loss to Cal. It was still true after another kicking-game lapse brought about the loss to Oklahoma State.
Saturday’s humiliating loss to TCU — complete with a 37-0 halftime deficit and easy scores such as this one from the Horned Frogs — doesn’t change the above reality in any way:
Trickeration! TCU mercilessly taking it to Texas #Big12 https://t.co/VxMfYYYZ9w
— The Comeback NCAA (@TheComebackNCAA) October 3, 2015
Can the 44-point explosion by the offense against Cal be viewed, in early October, as an aberrational occurrence? Yes. Was the emergence of Heard at quarterback oversold? Yes. That having been said, Texas’ defense is clearly a diminished version of last year’s unit. Attrition on that side of the ball, and the clearing out of problematic recruits against the backdrop of widespread instability in the program, have created a reality in which few coaches are going to instantly solve the puzzle.
Charlie Strong — who runs clean programs and, based on his experience at Louisville, has authored a full rebuild (but one which took time) — is guilty of one thing: He’s not a superstar coach the way Harbaugh, Fisher, Saban and Meyer are. Beyond that, however, he can’t be fired based on what you saw in the first half on Saturday in Fort Worth.
First, TCU is going to smash some people this season. Second, TCU got back a few of the 38 defensive starters it lost earlier in the season. (That #UNOFFICIAL number seems low, too.) Third, even though you could make the entirely legitimate and reasonable claim that with better kicking, Texas would have beaten Cal and Oklahoma State, you must also concede that those were relatively even games on the Longhorns’ own field. TCU represented a considerable step up in quality from the Golden Bears and Cowboys. The Horned Frogs were playing at home, one week after their defensive backups faced an excellent Texas Tech offense.
Plenty of people could have told you that Texas was already set up to get blown out in this game. Just because there’s a Longhorn on the helmet or Burnt Orange trim on the white road uniforms, that doesn’t mean Texas is automatically supposed to stay close in every game it plays this season. High-level teams have a good chance of thumping this version of the Longhorns, and such was the case a week ago or two weeks ago.
Did many of us in the pundit class think the Cal game — with Heard’s emergence at quarterback — was a sign of real hope for Texas? Yes. However, few if any of those same pundits (this one included) felt that the hope applied to this season — it was more about 2016.
The readjustment in expectations mentioned above has slid Texas’s calendar to 2017 in terms of being ready to challenge for the Big 12 title. That stinks for Longhorn fans, but if you fire Strong now, you’re not going to be able to move the calendar back to 2016 and improve your expectations…
unless that Saban fellow gets tired of Alabama and has a ninja flight plan to Austin in the back corner of his cranium.
Are you going to hope against hope, Texas fans, that Saban wants to coach at your program? Surely, that drama has played itself out.
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Let’s see where we are with Charlie Strong and Texas at the end of the 2016 season. Then we might revisit the topic of whether he should stick around or not.
Until then? Don’t expect a quick fix, mindful of all the chaos which has swirled around the program the past 18 months… very little of it the fault of the current head coach.
Be Strong, Texas.
