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SC hires Clay Helton - washingtonismoney - 11-30-2015

https://twitter.com/BruceFeldmanCFB/status/671353189569060864

Thanks Pat!

USC - pcgoode - 11-30-2015

Clay Helton has been named "permanent" head coach of Trojans, whatever that means.

Re: Under Stanford Control - French Rage - 11-30-2015

Good.  We play better against permanent SC coaches rather than interim ones.

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - OutsiderFan - 11-30-2015

This was the only thing that made any sense, IMO.  And I don't really see it as that big of a deal, honestly.

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - winflop - 11-30-2015

Good for Helton, good for Haden.  We'll find out Saturday to what extent it's not so good for Stanford, although the argument can be made that when U$C is good, the conference gets much high visibility as a whole.

As long as we keep beating them twice a year it's all good :)

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - needle - 11-30-2015

If SC had gone another way, would Clay Helton have been a strong candidate for any other open Power 5 HC vacancy?

Honest question. But the uncertainty inherent in me asking it makes me OK with the hire. It also makes me a little curious what SC fans think of it.


Re: SC hires Clay Helton - ChicagoCard - 11-30-2015

[tweet]671360641647534081[/tweet]

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - terry - 11-30-2015

(11-30-2015, 09:20 AM)ChicagoVisitor link Wrote:[tweet]671360641647534081[/tweet]


What does that mean?

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - washingtonismoney - 11-30-2015

(11-30-2015, 09:30 AM)terry link Wrote:What does that mean?

Ellison has been very, very critical of Haden's tenure. Here's one article: http://espn.go.com/ncf/story/_/id/13937182/pete-how-usc-hopes-recapturing-glory-failed-trojans

He wrote a spittle-filled, punctuation-optional Facebook post blasting Haden right around when Sark was fired.


Also:
https://twitter.com/BruceFeldmanCFB/status/671365986679988224

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - ChicagoCard - 11-30-2015

(11-30-2015, 09:39 AM)washingtonismoney link Wrote:[quote author=terry link=topic=13826.msg144782#msg144782 date=1448901030]
What does that mean?

Ellison has been very, very critical of Haden's tenure. Here's one article: http://espn.go.com/ncf/story/_/id/13937182/pete-how-Under Stanford Control-hopes-recapturing-glory-failed-Literature's Most Famous Losers

He wrote a spittle-filled, punctuation-optional Facebook post blasting Haden right around when Sark was fired.

Also:
https://twitter.com/BruceFeldmanCFB/status/671365986679988224
[/quote]

Thanks, sorry I didn't elaborate. I've been a little tuned into LA-based sources of info on S,C, this season and it's been entertaining.

Riki Ellison btw was a linebacker for S,C, in the 1st John Robinson era and then played for the 49ers.

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - washingtonismoney - 11-30-2015

This is ... not exactly a vote of confidence: https://twitter.com/McMurphyESPN/status/671375384915628033

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - washingtonismoney - 11-30-2015

It makes me happy to see so much dumbness:

https://twitter.com/TheMaxMeyer/status/671367802465345536

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - Treebound - 11-30-2015

I'm guessing that Haden would have preferred to wait and see the outcome of the P12 Championship game, whereas Helton and his agent were likely pushing for a decision.    I heard from a few sc alums that their team was going to really bring the game this weekend so that Helton would get the job.  Interesting timing and we will see how they play.   

Oregon is clearly the second best team in the p12, by record (7-2) and by eye test.  I would have rather played them again for the title, but oh well.  They also have a higher ranking. 

Go Stanford and go UNC!

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - washingtonismoney - 11-30-2015

(11-30-2015, 10:39 AM)Treebound link Wrote:... whereas Helton and his agent were likely pushing for a decision.  ...

AGENT: Hey, could we have a decision?
PAT HADEN: No.
AGENT: OK, cool.



Re: SC hires Clay Helton - CompSci87 - 11-30-2015

(11-30-2015, 10:39 AM)Treebound link Wrote:I heard from a few sc alums that their team was going to really bring the game this weekend so that Helton would get the job.

Lucky for us he has the job sewn up now, so the team can slack off this coming weekend.  :P

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - thunder_chik - 11-30-2015

(11-30-2015, 11:26 AM)CompSci87 link Wrote:[quote author=Treebound link=topic=13826.msg144801#msg144801 date=1448905194]
I heard from a few sc alums that their team was going to really bring the game this weekend so that Helton would get the job.

Lucky for us he has the job sewn up now, so the team can slack off this coming weekend.  :P
[/quote]

Yeah, did Haden inadvertently remove a motivating factor by announcing this BEFORE the game?  And how will SC fans feel about the hire if we absolutely cream those guys on Saturday?

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - jacketree - 11-30-2015

Because the championship and Rose Bowl aren't motivating enough.....OK


It does change the game narrative, but whatever.

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - BostonCard - 11-30-2015

https://twitter.com/BruceFeldmanCFB/status/671353189569060864

Yeah, but he wouldn't have been hired had they not beaten the Bruins, and that would have had nothing to do with the loss either.

BC

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - amartinsu13 - 11-30-2015

Their team is fired up about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLCziB4aOpY&feature=youtu.be

Interesting to make this decision now...

I can hear it already:
If they lose - all the haters will be out in full force
If they win - what a great hire!

Re: SC hires Clay Helton - stupac2 - 11-30-2015

I was reading over the reddit thread on this hire, and I saw a few optimistic takes (mainly this one) and got curious about the relative performances before and after Sark was fired. He was fired after the loss to Washington, so I assigned every game until that point to Sark, and every game after that to Helton. I then looked at USC's offensive YPP in that game, and compared that to the opponents average ypp on the season on defense.

The result? Sark's team was better. They averaged 1.58 ypp more on offense than the opponent typically gives up, Helton averages 0.07. Yes, Helton's team is barely better than an average opponent against their defenses. Interestingly his only loss, against ND, was his best game, averaging more than 2 ypp above ND's typical game. I did the same for defense, and Sark's team held opponents 0.83 ypp below their regular season average, and Helton's held them 0.02 yards below. So on both offense and defense Helton's team appears to be performing worse than Sark's.

I thought another way of looking at this would be to use FPI, since that's the only advanced metric I'm aware of that's readily available week-by-week. In week 6 (after the Washington game) USC was ranked #5 with an FPI of 22.8, currently they're #8 with an FPI 20.0. It could be that the week 6 FPI was held up by the high preseason expectations (it's not clear what kind of preseason voodoo ESPN does and how long the metric holds onto it), but you'd still expect better than just treading water if Helton was such an improvement.

So I don't see it. I think this USC team is worse than the one we played and beat in their own house. The only difference I see is turnover margin, USC was +4 with Sark (all of that coming against Arkansas St), and is +9 under Helton. Their big wins under Helton were all multi-turnover games, Utah with 4 turnovers and UCLA with 3. Turnovers matter, obviously, but it looks to me like Helton took Sark's team, made them a bit worse, and then got lucky with turnovers where Sark didn't. Not a good sign if you're a USC fan.