[washingtonismoney]

ESPN, in two separate articles, is speculating about the idea:

In an article asking why the Bruins seem to* underachieve all the time:

"I would keep a close watch on that one," a coaching agent told ESPN.com "It would be expensive for them to terminate him, but I think he's worn out his welcome to be honest with you. His temperament, tantrums, behavior, all of it -- people are kind of done with him. He's had some good years there, no question about that, and the guy can coach, so it may be a good time for him to get out now."

ESPN's coaching hot seat rankings put Mora at #9 in their top-ten rankings. (Also has Helfrich at #2, Helton at #5, and Kelly at #7).

* (I think Mora's a victim of the wider football world's intolerance of nuance regarding quarterbacks and coaches. Flacco is either ELITE or NOT ELITE by the week. Mora -- who's exceeded Vegas expectations most years he's been on the job -- is apparently awful. Our own David Shaw often gets little benefit of the doubt from his less reasonable critics, who to be fair don't post on the Cardboard)

http://insider.espn.com/college-football...ating-wins
http://insider.espn.com/college-football...all-week-8

[washingtonismoney]

ESPN, in two separate articles, is speculating about the idea:

In an article asking why the Bruins seem to* underachieve all the time:

"I would keep a close watch on that one," a coaching agent told ESPN.com "It would be expensive for them to terminate him, but I think he's worn out his welcome to be honest with you. His temperament, tantrums, behavior, all of it -- people are kind of done with him. He's had some good years there, no question about that, and the guy can coach, so it may be a good time for him to get out now."

ESPN's coaching hot seat rankings put Mora at #9 in their top-ten rankings. (Also has Helfrich at #2, Helton at #5, and Kelly at #7).

* (I think Mora's a victim of the wider football world's intolerance of nuance regarding quarterbacks and coaches. Flacco is either ELITE or NOT ELITE by the week. Mora -- who's exceeded Vegas expectations most years he's been on the job -- is apparently awful. Our own David Shaw often gets little benefit of the doubt from his less reasonable critics, who to be fair don't post on the Cardboard)

http://insider.espn.com/college-football...ating-wins
http://insider.espn.com/college-football...all-week-8

[BostonCard]

Mora is a fascinating case.  On the one hand, his record is substantially better than the coaches who have preceded him:

1974–1975	Dick Vermeil	15–5–3
1976–1995	Terry Donahue	151–74–8
1996–2002	Bob Toledo	49–32
2003–2007	Karl Dorrell	35–27
2008–2011	Rick Neuheisel	21–29
2012–present	Jim L. Mora	40–18

He is certainly much better than Neuheisel, Dorrell, or Toledo; you have to go back to Terry Donahue to get a coach with a similar overall record, and Donahue was given two decades at UCLA.  Mora can recruit about as well as anyone, and over his tenure, I think only USC can match UCLA in recruiting within the Pac-12.  So, Mora can recruit well and can win games... BUT, it sure seems that when you go through the roster, you might have expected UCLA to have performed better given the players they have on the team.  Now, to be sure, our opinion of him might be colored by the fact that he has never beaten Stanford, but still this is a program that always seems to underachieve just enough that you are left wondering if there is a bit of a failure to translate talent into championships.

BC

[BostonCard]

Mora is a fascinating case.  On the one hand, his record is substantially better than the coaches who have preceded him:

1974–1975	Dick Vermeil	15–5–3
1976–1995	Terry Donahue	151–74–8
1996–2002	Bob Toledo	49–32
2003–2007	Karl Dorrell	35–27
2008–2011	Rick Neuheisel	21–29
2012–present	Jim L. Mora	40–18

He is certainly much better than Neuheisel, Dorrell, or Toledo; you have to go back to Terry Donahue to get a coach with a similar overall record, and Donahue was given two decades at UCLA.  Mora can recruit about as well as anyone, and over his tenure, I think only USC can match UCLA in recruiting within the Pac-12.  So, Mora can recruit well and can win games... BUT, it sure seems that when you go through the roster, you might have expected UCLA to have performed better given the players they have on the team.  Now, to be sure, our opinion of him might be colored by the fact that he has never beaten Stanford, but still this is a program that always seems to underachieve just enough that you are left wondering if there is a bit of a failure to translate talent into championships.

BC

[washingtonismoney]

...but still this is a program that always seems to underachieve just enough that you are left wondering if there is a bit of a failure to translate talent into championships.

I'll concede that Mora isn't a no-brainer retention guy. But he seems to fall in a class of coaches -- your Mark Richts, your Glen Masons -- who are reasonably good but not disastrous. The history of firing such coaches and seeking the coach who will better such an obvious nincompoop (in fans' perception) isn't a great one, IMO.

[washingtonismoney]

...but still this is a program that always seems to underachieve just enough that you are left wondering if there is a bit of a failure to translate talent into championships.

I'll concede that Mora isn't a no-brainer retention guy. But he seems to fall in a class of coaches -- your Mark Richts, your Glen Masons -- who are reasonably good but not disastrous. The history of firing such coaches and seeking the coach who will better such an obvious nincompoop (in fans' perception) isn't a great one, IMO.

[BostonCard]

Hey WIM, a belated congratulations on your 10,000th post!

I agree with your general take.  I think the parallels with Richt are very strong.  They were both excellent recruiters who were generally successful, and who were excellent recruiters, but who always seemed to fall short of very high expectations.

It is a fair supposition that if Mora were to be fired, his replacement would be a step down.

BC

[BostonCard]

Hey WIM, a belated congratulations on your 10,000th post!

I agree with your general take.  I think the parallels with Richt are very strong.  They were both excellent recruiters who were generally successful, and who were excellent recruiters, but who always seemed to fall short of very high expectations.

It is a fair supposition that if Mora were to be fired, his replacement would be a step down.

BC

[CTcard]

Mora is a fascinating case.  On the one hand, his record is substantially better than the coaches who have preceded him:
... Mora can recruit about as well as anyone,
... BUT, it sure seems that when you go through the roster, you might have expected UCLA to have performed better given the players they have on the team.

I think Mora is more a classic case study.

He came in and won a lot more than the previous coaches.

He has a set of annoying public-personality traits that opponents hate and home fans either love or don't care about as long as in a given season he's winning more than the year before, but everyone jumps on when the losses appear.

Eventually, he has a season substantially worse than the previous one (or few) and much of the fan base starts grumbling that he cannot win championships, cannot get his team to the next level, has terrible personality flaws, so let's fire the guy and take a roll on someone else.

I certainly won't grieve for him if he gets fired - he's made a boatload of money, his douchebag tactics are first annoying and this year injured a bunch of our team, and anyway he coaches a team I don't care about other than as an opponent. But, I would expect there is a pretty high likelihood that if they do fire the guy, the next guy will on balance be worse.

There is an interesting caveat to that. Most teams tend to hire a guy who approximates the opposite of the guys they fired. [Stanford hired the ebullient Buddy after the stoic Willingham (and we didn't even fire Willingham), the disciplinarian and longtime offensive-planner Wlat after the loosey-goosey and tactically challenged Buddy, the enthusiasm unknown to mankind Harbaugh after the somnolent Wlat.]
So, if we take as a given that Mora's strength is recruiting and he lacks in some aspect of molding that talent and if the next guy has the opposite traits, he might be able to get a lot out of Mora's top recruits before the talent level drops.

----------------
A very interesting case is Helfrich at Oregon.

Oregon hasn't fired a coach or hired from outside the program since 1977 when they fired Don Read and hired Rich Brooks (from UCLA).

After that they went Brooks to NFL - hire OC Bellotti, Bellotti to AD - hire OC Kelly, Kelly to NFL - hire OC Helfrich.

I don't know the local views on Oregon's staff to know if they have a logical successor there right now. Their Asst Head Coach has been the OL coach for about 30 years. Their OC is new and I don't think very high profile. Their DC is Hoke who of course has been a major program head coach but teams don't promote coordinators of atrocious units. I'd guess their most likely candidate is Scott Frost - who as a first year head coach at UCF at least has them playing competitively against their schedule.

[CTcard]

Mora is a fascinating case.  On the one hand, his record is substantially better than the coaches who have preceded him:
... Mora can recruit about as well as anyone,
... BUT, it sure seems that when you go through the roster, you might have expected UCLA to have performed better given the players they have on the team.

I think Mora is more a classic case study.

He came in and won a lot more than the previous coaches.

He has a set of annoying public-personality traits that opponents hate and home fans either love or don't care about as long as in a given season he's winning more than the year before, but everyone jumps on when the losses appear.

Eventually, he has a season substantially worse than the previous one (or few) and much of the fan base starts grumbling that he cannot win championships, cannot get his team to the next level, has terrible personality flaws, so let's fire the guy and take a roll on someone else.

I certainly won't grieve for him if he gets fired - he's made a boatload of money, his douchebag tactics are first annoying and this year injured a bunch of our team, and anyway he coaches a team I don't care about other than as an opponent. But, I would expect there is a pretty high likelihood that if they do fire the guy, the next guy will on balance be worse.

There is an interesting caveat to that. Most teams tend to hire a guy who approximates the opposite of the guys they fired. [Stanford hired the ebullient Buddy after the stoic Willingham (and we didn't even fire Willingham), the disciplinarian and longtime offensive-planner Wlat after the loosey-goosey and tactically challenged Buddy, the enthusiasm unknown to mankind Harbaugh after the somnolent Wlat.]
So, if we take as a given that Mora's strength is recruiting and he lacks in some aspect of molding that talent and if the next guy has the opposite traits, he might be able to get a lot out of Mora's top recruits before the talent level drops.

----------------
A very interesting case is Helfrich at Oregon.

Oregon hasn't fired a coach or hired from outside the program since 1977 when they fired Don Read and hired Rich Brooks (from UCLA).

After that they went Brooks to NFL - hire OC Bellotti, Bellotti to AD - hire OC Kelly, Kelly to NFL - hire OC Helfrich.

I don't know the local views on Oregon's staff to know if they have a logical successor there right now. Their Asst Head Coach has been the OL coach for about 30 years. Their OC is new and I don't think very high profile. Their DC is Hoke who of course has been a major program head coach but teams don't promote coordinators of atrocious units. I'd guess their most likely candidate is Scott Frost - who as a first year head coach at UCF at least has them playing competitively against their schedule.

[OutsiderFan]

Apparently, Mora's buyout is $15MM.  He isn't going anywhere for a while, because it's doubtful he's going to get any other offers about now.

[OutsiderFan]

Apparently, Mora's buyout is $15MM.  He isn't going anywhere for a while, because it's doubtful he's going to get any other offers about now.

[Hank 91]

Mora's tenure at UCLA would be viewed completely differently were it not for the Cardinal. We beat him in a close Pac-12 Championship game a few years ago, dealt him a crushing blow two years ago when his Bruins needed only to be our unranked squad to clinch a berth in the P12CG and a possible opportunity (had they won that game) to get into the playoffs, we crushed him on a nationally televised Thursday night game last year, and we stole that game this season. I know we all know this, but I think it's important not just that we've beaten them nine straight but that we've ripped their hearts out over and over.

That being said, prior to the headhunting that he seems to have encouraged recently, I've always respected Mora. He's always come across to me as a good guy, and I've always thought that if I were a UCLA alum, I'd be proud to call him my coach. I've changed my mind on that, but I still think he deserves more time at UCLA.

[Hank 91]

Mora's tenure at UCLA would be viewed completely differently were it not for the Cardinal. We beat him in a close Pac-12 Championship game a few years ago, dealt him a crushing blow two years ago when his Bruins needed only to be our unranked squad to clinch a berth in the P12CG and a possible opportunity (had they won that game) to get into the playoffs, we crushed him on a nationally televised Thursday night game last year, and we stole that game this season. I know we all know this, but I think it's important not just that we've beaten them nine straight but that we've ripped their hearts out over and over.

That being said, prior to the headhunting that he seems to have encouraged recently, I've always respected Mora. He's always come across to me as a good guy, and I've always thought that if I were a UCLA alum, I'd be proud to call him my coach. I've changed my mind on that, but I still think he deserves more time at UCLA.

[BostonCard]

A very interesting case is Helfrich at Oregon.

Oregon hasn't fired a coach or hired from outside the program since 1977 when they fired Don Read and hired Rich Brooks (from UCLA).

After that they went Brooks to NFL - hire OC Bellotti, Bellotti to AD - hire OC Kelly, Kelly to NFL - hire OC Helfrich.

I don't know the local views on Oregon's staff to know if they have a logical successor there right now. Their Asst Head Coach has been the OL coach for about 30 years. Their OC is new and I don't think very high profile. Their DC is Hoke who of course has been a major program head coach but teams don't promote coordinators of atrocious units. I'd guess their most likely candidate is Scott Frost - who as a first year head coach at UCF at least has them playing competitively against their schedule.

The way things are going with the 49ers, Chip Kelly may be back on the market soon.

BC

[BostonCard]

A very interesting case is Helfrich at Oregon.

Oregon hasn't fired a coach or hired from outside the program since 1977 when they fired Don Read and hired Rich Brooks (from UCLA).

After that they went Brooks to NFL - hire OC Bellotti, Bellotti to AD - hire OC Kelly, Kelly to NFL - hire OC Helfrich.

I don't know the local views on Oregon's staff to know if they have a logical successor there right now. Their Asst Head Coach has been the OL coach for about 30 years. Their OC is new and I don't think very high profile. Their DC is Hoke who of course has been a major program head coach but teams don't promote coordinators of atrocious units. I'd guess their most likely candidate is Scott Frost - who as a first year head coach at UCF at least has them playing competitively against their schedule.

The way things are going with the 49ers, Chip Kelly may be back on the market soon.

BC