cougarguard.com — unofficial BYU Cougars / LDS sports, football, basketball forum and message board - Since it is boring and Jay Santos has his voice on this site....

- Football (http://www.cougarguard.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=7)

- - Since it is boring and Jay Santos has his voice on this site.... (http://www.cougarguard.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4572)

Quote:

Originally Posted by jay santos (Post 40199)

Looking back, these are the key points, which have been hashed and rehashed.

1. Changed the passing offense from being balanced between WR/TE/fullback/running back to a WR based system too quickly with no WR talent to do it. The Chow offense was predicated on timing and route running. The Crowton offense was based on offensive threats and matchups. We didn't have the talent in the system to make that switch.

2. Failure to use JC quick fixes at key positions, especially OL.

3. Failure to utilize Norm Chow holdovers Reynolds, Bosco, etc to help him acclimate to BYU and help him ease into things slowly and not change too much too fast. Success in 2001 probably did him in there.

4. Lack of QB development. Probably not all his fault, because he didn't have the most to work with, but the biggest mistake was going from Engemann to Berry. Engemann to Olson would have been OK, but Engemann to Berry was a nightmare decision.

5. Not going conservative in 2003 and running with Braithwaite, Whalen, and Vakapuna when the passing game is not there and run and playing defense will win you the game. i.e. Stanford, AFA, Wyoming 2003 and 2004 UNLV

6. Pissing off fans by continually making excuses for everything.

7. Hiring Bronco instead of KW. A good defense in 2004 probably would have gotten him a winning record and kept his job.

Things that weren't his fault.

1. Recruiting thugs. Nobody set out to recruit thugs and the guys that got in trouble all promised to sign the Honor Code, and most of them were perceived to be good character guys.
2. Making sure his kids kept the Honor Code.

I don't think the HC scapegoat thing was fair for Crowton--or for Hale.

The Honor Code scapegoat was mormon ninniness at its finest. Throw in the HC issues because then it demonstrates that we at the BYU are interested in higher issues. However, the reality was that he just was not a very good coach and his shortcomings were exacerbated by the situation.

P.S. though I was very upset about the status of the program 2002-2004 (well actually up until a week ago), I never did demand or wish that he be fired. I was always about, "I hope he can get it right, and this is what he needs to do better". Even at the end, I was marginal about him getting fired because of the turnaround in the offense middle 2004. I would have only fired him if I would have known Chow or Whittingham were in the bag. I thought the Bronco hire was not an upgrade in the position.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jay santos (Post 40199)

Things that weren't his fault.

1. Recruiting thugs. Nobody set out to recruit thugs and the guys that got in trouble all promised to sign the Honor Code, and most of them were perceived to be good character guys.
2. Making sure his kids kept the Honor Code.

I don't think the HC scapegoat thing was fair for Crowton--or for Hale.

I find that funny because, in the end, that is ultimately what seales his fate.

One thing that I don't think has been discussed, but is what REALLY did him in, was the fact that he had SO MANY players turn on him. Why do you think one of the first things that Bronco did was establish the "fully invested" philosophy? It is because that was one of the biggest problems with the team when he took over.

I think that all of those points that Goat and Jay mentioned are what led to the players quitting on him, but I also think that had the players not quit on, he would have won more games and he likely would have kept his job.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheSizzle36 (Post 40205)

Team unity is the most overrated concept in sports, IMHO.

Show me a team that's not unified going into a season. I can show you quotes from the papers that said "this is the most unified we've ever been. last year we had guys doing their own thing, but now we all hang out together and there's a great team feeling". I can show you this quote every August going back to the late 80's when I started following the Cougs religiously.

Also, show me a team that's unified when you've had three losing seasons in a row or at the end of the season when the team has underachieved drastically.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheSizzle36 (Post 40205)

I don't know if Bronco will finish as a quality head coach, I think he will but there is a lot of time to go. However, while he used the fully invested and all his special words, I think the guy would follow a similar pattern wherever he was.

Bronco appears to have some strong leadership traits and I think he would utilize that God given skill wherever he was. It would be packaged differently, but the intent would be the same.

I will say that I thought he did get some mileage off of dancing on Gary's grave to some extent in illuminating how things would be different.

I think it's a good thing for players to have a healthy fear of their coach.

The players and some of the coaches simply didn't have that fear or respect for their coach.

You don't have that, you don't have a team.

Coach Crowton.

He wasn't my first choice, but I happily bought into the hype that soon followed. 2001 gave some positive early season returns, but after the wheels came off, that was a sign of things to come.

He was the worst of all coaches, as a head coach, nothing bad about him personally, so one couldn't dislike him but not forceful or properly organized enough to command the HC job. He might be better served as a career OC. Norm Chow has done okay with that, so no shame in it.

His mistakes, seem to be selection of a divisive assistant coach, failure to exercise tight control over the troops, the QB shuffle, the Reno disaster, Stanford disaster, inserting Beck too early, not backing Berry enough and the inability to provide guidance during the bad days.

Again, appears to be a very competent OC, but may not be cut out for HC.

Crowton was not the steady, guiding hand.

He was the mad genius who couldn't see the forest for the trees.

Soon he became the desperate genius, taking uncalled for risks that didn't pay off.

Once he had lost his team, he couldn't get them back.

Could Crowton have regained the team last year, enough to match Bronco's record? Could he have matched Bronco's record this year? Hard to argue that he couldn't have.

But sometimes a group needs a new leader, regardless of the quality of the current leader. Look at the Yankees. No one is going to argue that Torre is a bad manager. But sometimes you need new ideas and a new direction.

Without going too far off on a tangent, the Yankees problem is that they have way too many overpaid and aging players that didn't provide a return on their investment. The Yankees decimated their farm system to obtain some of those players. Many of these players are too expensive and/or too old to deal for younger prospects.

They are in a controlled death spiral. Expect worse results in the future and it has nothing to do with Torre.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Indy Coug (Post 40222)

Keep the good news coming. A death spiral for the next eighty years would be pleasant to witness.