Wonder who he'll have winning his brackets this time around...
Wonder who he'll have winning his brackets this time around...
I hope he does well and proves his critics wrong.
If not, he's got no one to blame but himself.
He'll be the second dirtiest coach in the city of LA.
makes perfect sense. A homecoming for Neuheisel and a program in need of a top notch coach. He's got credentials, now if he can just stay out of trouble.
I think we should set up a pool over when UCLA goes on probation.
--Jason
I think that Cutcliffe was an excellent hire for Duke but my question is before Cutliffe was hired and potential candidates were being mentioned, when Neuheisel's name was brought up, he was severly dissed. Why was he OK for UCLA and not for Duke ?
Is that a serious question? You're asking why someone with a record of questionable integrity was not a good fit for Duke? It's a high bar that Neuheisel's baggage [whether one believes it is well deserved or not] prevents him from clearing...
First of all, the NFL has no concerns about integrity issues and coaching staffs. The Ravens likely didn't think twice about his checkered past, because it has no bearing on NFL coaching. Maybe they should've paid attention to his mediocre success as a coach--Baltimore's offense didn't exactly set the league on fire under RN.
But, to answer your question, this wouldn't have been a second chance. It would've been a third. He has ethical issues at both Colorado and Washington. Because of his history, UCLA is actually the perfect place for him. He's an alum and who else would you expect to give him another try? Further, the Bruins got Neuheisel on the cheap. He's being paid less than Duke is paying Cutcliffe (which isn't to suggest that Duke is going cheap; it isn't, I just note that as a reference).
At the end of the day though, RN isn't as good a coach as Cutcliffe and that, in and of itself, is enough to end the discussion. It isn't a "holier than thou" attitude; it's smart decision making. If you really want to read up on the views of RN here, you should read the thread about him from a few weeks ago.
Short answer? Yes...
Longer answer--the alumni base, the athletic department, and the administration believe that we should be able to win while playing by the rules and retaining our solid academic reputation in the process... Neuheisel might be a guy who can help you to win, but one has to ask 'at what cost?' given his history... So you have a choice--do you want tainted goods from the outset or someone with an impeccable reputation who you also believe can lead you to the promised land? It's a no brainer in my book... Coach Cut was a brilliant hire... I'm a huge ND fan, and was quite bummed when he had to leave Weis's staff due to health reasons--I thought he was the best assistant on that coaching staff, bar none... He'll make an outstanding Head Coach (as he has already demonstrated down at Ole Miss--who had to compete in the SEC, easily the toughest football conference year-in/year-out in the land)...
As for second chances? Neuheisel is getting them right now... We'll see how well he does at UCLA, and how he decides to conduct his business there, and then we can assess whether he's changed stripes...
Not in the slightest. I think that Cutliffe is a terrific hire and I would have hired him over RN . I just wanted to know why he was so dissed before. Now I know although on a personal level if he was the best candidate I would have given him a second chance as UCLA has done.
Please stop calling it a second chance. It is a third chance.
Rick Neuheisel has been a head coach at 2 other schools in his career (Colorado was his first head coaching job) and both of those jobs ended in probation, shame, and disgust. He's 2-for-2.
Duke's standards are higher than that. Winning in not everything.
--Jason "additionally, I think that if Cut succeeds here, he may stay whereas Slick Rick would have bolted at the first sign of a better job" Evans
Agreed. You're not going to see Duke hire a guy like Neuheisel. I would be interested to see how far he had the Blue Devils going in that NCAA pool...
Neuheisel definitely broke the rules at Colorado, talking to recruits outside of the accepted window (perhaps more, but that is what I believe he was fired for doing), but he didn't break the rules at Washington as far as I know. He was fired for doing something which most of us have done, which is entering a March Madness pool. He had requested permission first, and been given approval, but when the news broke that he won big the school fired him. As a result, they and the NCAA lost a $4.5 million lawsuit which he brought against them.
Now, I think that UCLA is more willing to take chances on someone who has a slightly spotty history (things haven't always been pristine, such as under Toledo). I also think that it helps that Neuheisel's dream has always been to coach at UCLA. A friend of mine played 9 holes with him one afternoon last year and they discussed football after my friend let on that he recognized Neuheisel, and he proclaimed that it was his dream job. You put those two together, and UCLA makes more sense than Duke.
Clipsfan - Neuheisel broke the same rules at UDub as he did in Colorado, he just didn't do it as often. The Buffs ended up on probation as the result of multiple secondary violations and Neuheisel was found to have committed the same violations at Washington.
Also, the NCAA and Washington didn't "lose" that lawsuit - they settled. When you look into it a bit more and find out why they settled it doesn't clear Neuheisel's name at all. The reason they settled is that the NCAA lawyers failed to produce their bylaws in the discovery stage of the trial, something that was key because those bylaws required investigators to tell forewarn subjects why they were being interviewed. In this case the investigators didn't tell Slick Rick he was being interviewed for his participation in the pool so that, combined with the fact that the lawyers didn't disclose the requirement in the discovery, made it prudent for defendants to settle.
None of that changes the fact that when those investigators confronted Neuheisel about the pool he lied. Or, as his attorney in the lawsuit termed it, he played dodgeball. If you're scoring at home, he played dodgeball with NCAA investigators at Washington and was just "being creative" with the NCAA regulations at Colorado.
Really, he's a complex guy who was just misunderstood all these times.
Even if you want to give Slick Rick another chance, and feel that he's a better college coach/recruiter than Cut you still have the problem of Neuheisel's loyalty to Duke. If he was successful at Duke (which is the goal I hope) he'd be looking around for a new job within a couple of years and I doubt he'd stick around more than four years. Duke doesn't need that kind of instability right now. Coach Cut may not be a "lifer" like Coach K, but I get the sense that he has a bit more loyalty than RN would (I could be proven wrong of course).
I was in Seattle for Slick Rick's coaching career at UW. I would not have wanted to see him at Duke. Too many things could go wrong.
And besides, it really works out best for everyone involved - RN gets his dream job at UCLA where he played and Duke gets an excellent football coach.
I agree, I wouldn't have wanted RN at Duke at all, but I do think that he'll be good for getting UCLA back into the top tier of football. I'm still not renewing my season tickets, though...and I agree with Carlos' unstated assumption that it's probably just a matter of time until RN gets caught doing something where he is "misunderstood". Thanks for the clarification on the UW mess, Carlos.