FanShot

When there is no turmoil, no threat that the coach won't be there tomorrow, players stay in the...

+

When there is no turmoil, no threat that the coach won't be there tomorrow, players stay in the program. They finish their 3-5 years, and they develop, and they become pros. But stability doesn't just give a team a leg up in developing the guys they have. It also gives the program time to develop the recruiting connections necessary to find the diamonds in the rough, to ignore Rivals ratings and keep an ear to the ground. It's how you get Chad Greenway or Bob Sanders or Shonn Greene, all players largely ignored by scouting services. When you can find guys who are untouched by everyone else, who have a desire to play, and who carry that chip on their shoulder from being ignored, your work in "developing" that player is half done. On the other hand, in the cauldron of the SEC and Big XII, where coaches are discarded constantly and with little more cause than one bad season, there is no continuity. The top programs still do fine in recruiting, due in no small part to the reasons espoused by Mr. Cook, but they still produce NFL players at or near the rate expected by the development ratio. The have-nots, with the same coach-killing fan bases and none of the recruiting cache, cycle through coaches at an ever-quickening rate, only ensuring more players leave via transfer. At places like Kansas State, Texas Tech, Kansas, and West Virginia, where meddling athletic directors dismiss coaches for any reason they can find, the results are underwhelming (even when programs like Tech and WVU win more than they should with the talent at their disposal).

Via College Football Player Development Part Two: What Does It Mean?. BHGP bringing the heat this week...(and every week, naturally)...

Trending Discussions