[msqueri]

You shouldn't be scared of a generic replacement. Generic replacement would have a fair shot of doing better than Shaw and, if not, we'd get another bite at the apple in a few years as we did after Teevens and then again after Harris, striking gold on the third try. But the more we wait the less initiative we have to respond to changes in college football and, eventually, as an institution we may lose spirit for it or it may become too late.

The obvious problem with you argument for a "generic" replacement is one you use all the time (correctly IMHO). Things have changed in college football. These changes are almost entirely to Stanford's disadvantage. The "numbers" from past history no longer apply. The numbers for the PAC-12 or college football in general never did because Stanford isn't a "generic" school. Neither is Cal, neither is Oregon etc. The differences are not small either. Picking a coach is not a random variable with known distribution. Even if it was, the apparent assumption that one gets a Harbaugh with 33% probability is demonstrably wrong. Maybe every 40 years you get somebody in that general vicinity, looking at history. Given the many changes that are to Stanford's disadvantage, it would undoubtedly be less frequent going forward.

I think there are plenty of reasonable arguments that have been made on this board that replacing Shaw is a good idea, but the idea that a "generic" random choice would "probably" be better isn't one of those, IMHO.

There's a brobdingnagian difference between a generic replacement and Harbaugh. We probably wouldn't hit the lottery like Harbaugh if we had a dozen cracks at a hire. But that's not the standard. The standard is the team getting better. Our current level - top 25 talent getting top 75 results - is easy to replace. Shaw has been so bad that judging by Sagarin 2002-2004 level Buddy Teevens would be preferable. You don't think we can hire something equal or greater to Buddy Teevens?

Look at Stanford's track record when moving on from a coach for cause (rather than because somebody got a better job elsewhere:

* Christiansen had a .573 winning percentage and was replaced by Walsh, who immediately uncorked a .708 winning percentage.

* Wiggin had a .364 winning percentage and was replaced by Elway, who had a .463 winning percentage.

* Elway had a .464 winning percentage and was replaced by Green, who had a .471 winning percentage.

* Walsh II (not exactly the same, but a terminal assignment so somewhat analogous) had a .500 winning percentage and was replaced by Willingham, who had a .549 winning percentage.

* Teevens had a .303 winning percentage and was replaced by Harris, who was our only example of being worse than they guy who got canned (though the first of Harris' two years was a .454 winning percentage (.261 over two years).

* Harris had a .261 winning percentage and was replaced by Harbaugh, who had a .580 winning percentage.

Not only is it not hard to replace somebody who is coaching at a failure level but we've actually done it every time except Harris. Personally, with Harris I think his personal drama/affair/divorce/whatever the hell was going on led to a dark place for him that produced the spiral and otherwise very well could have kept the pattern going. Regardless, the history is clear that it's super easy to replace somebody when they're winning at a rate like Shaw has.

To your point on times changing in ways disadvantageous for Stanford, it's a logical leap to go from there to say we can't compete at a median level. For one, you ignore the advantages Stanford has such as a national reputation and recruiting profile that allows us to stand apart from the Pac-12 (i.e., the Pac-12 becoming a worse conference should be good for us in a relative sense within the conference). Even more fundamentally, I think it is ahistorical and unnecessarily pessimistic to think that Stanford's place in the college football firmament is sub-median level. You're saying we can't be a top 35 football program (Power Five median, FBS median would be more like top 65)? That's too pessimistic for me.

In any case, we don't need the median, we just need better than Shaw's abject failure. Let's say we're in the bottom 25th percentile of Power Five football. The 25th percentile of most winning coaches 2019-2021 was Justin Wilcox (Cal) at .483. That's a damn sight better than Shaw. And Stanford is certainly a more winning/advantaged/competitive program in the historical college football firmament than Cal.

I stand by it and don't think it's even a close call: a generic replacement would be likely to do better than Shaw. The evidence is loud. The main reason for it is how bad Shaw has been. I am not saying it's easy to pick a great coach. I am saying it's hard not to pick a better coach than winning less than 38 percent of your games with top 25 talent.

[msqueri]

You shouldn't be scared of a generic replacement. Generic replacement would have a fair shot of doing better than Shaw and, if not, we'd get another bite at the apple in a few years as we did after Teevens and then again after Harris, striking gold on the third try. But the more we wait the less initiative we have to respond to changes in college football and, eventually, as an institution we may lose spirit for it or it may become too late.

The obvious problem with you argument for a "generic" replacement is one you use all the time (correctly IMHO). Things have changed in college football. These changes are almost entirely to Stanford's disadvantage. The "numbers" from past history no longer apply. The numbers for the PAC-12 or college football in general never did because Stanford isn't a "generic" school. Neither is Cal, neither is Oregon etc. The differences are not small either. Picking a coach is not a random variable with known distribution. Even if it was, the apparent assumption that one gets a Harbaugh with 33% probability is demonstrably wrong. Maybe every 40 years you get somebody in that general vicinity, looking at history. Given the many changes that are to Stanford's disadvantage, it would undoubtedly be less frequent going forward.

I think there are plenty of reasonable arguments that have been made on this board that replacing Shaw is a good idea, but the idea that a "generic" random choice would "probably" be better isn't one of those, IMHO.

There's a brobdingnagian difference between a generic replacement and Harbaugh. We probably wouldn't hit the lottery like Harbaugh if we had a dozen cracks at a hire. But that's not the standard. The standard is the team getting better. Our current level - top 25 talent getting top 75 results - is easy to replace. Shaw has been so bad that judging by Sagarin 2002-2004 level Buddy Teevens would be preferable. You don't think we can hire something equal or greater to Buddy Teevens?

Look at Stanford's track record when moving on from a coach for cause (rather than because somebody got a better job elsewhere:

* Christiansen had a .573 winning percentage and was replaced by Walsh, who immediately uncorked a .708 winning percentage.

* Wiggin had a .364 winning percentage and was replaced by Elway, who had a .463 winning percentage.

* Elway had a .464 winning percentage and was replaced by Green, who had a .471 winning percentage.

* Walsh II (not exactly the same, but a terminal assignment so somewhat analogous) had a .500 winning percentage and was replaced by Willingham, who had a .549 winning percentage.

* Teevens had a .303 winning percentage and was replaced by Harris, who was our only example of being worse than they guy who got canned (though the first of Harris' two years was a .454 winning percentage (.261 over two years).

* Harris had a .261 winning percentage and was replaced by Harbaugh, who had a .580 winning percentage.

Not only is it not hard to replace somebody who is coaching at a failure level but we've actually done it every time except Harris. Personally, with Harris I think his personal drama/affair/divorce/whatever the hell was going on led to a dark place for him that produced the spiral and otherwise very well could have kept the pattern going. Regardless, the history is clear that it's super easy to replace somebody when they're winning at a rate like Shaw has.

To your point on times changing in ways disadvantageous for Stanford, it's a logical leap to go from there to say we can't compete at a median level. For one, you ignore the advantages Stanford has such as a national reputation and recruiting profile that allows us to stand apart from the Pac-12 (i.e., the Pac-12 becoming a worse conference should be good for us in a relative sense within the conference). Even more fundamentally, I think it is ahistorical and unnecessarily pessimistic to think that Stanford's place in the college football firmament is sub-median level. You're saying we can't be a top 35 football program (Power Five median, FBS median would be more like top 65)? That's too pessimistic for me.

In any case, we don't need the median, we just need better than Shaw's abject failure. Let's say we're in the bottom 25th percentile of Power Five football. The 25th percentile of most winning coaches 2019-2021 was Justin Wilcox (Cal) at .483. That's a damn sight better than Shaw. And Stanford is certainly a more winning/advantaged/competitive program in the historical college football firmament than Cal.

I stand by it and don't think it's even a close call: a generic replacement would be likely to do better than Shaw. The evidence is loud. The main reason for it is how bad Shaw has been. I am not saying it's easy to pick a great coach. I am saying it's hard not to pick a better coach than winning less than 38 percent of your games with top 25 talent.