Upon Further Review: Manny Diaz as DC

View as article
That's where we disagree and our interpretation of the data veers in different directions. A guy like Trob isn't going to be here long anyways. My fear is Manny beats up on the bad teams just enough to get an an extension and then we're right back in purgatory. Our schedule is always going to give a mediocre coach the chance to win just enough games to satiate our incompetent, apathetic administration.

My opinion on his hire is the same as the day his hiring was announced. I don't believe in criticizing decisions after the fact. You judge a decision by the set of data points available AT THE MOMENT of the decision since none of us have a crystal ball. I'm trying to be as fair as possible here but this is going to go down as ANOTHER University of Miami head coach who gets fired here, and can't get another head coaching job anywhere.
If Ed Orgeron can win a championship with the right combination of staff and players, then there's no reason Manny can't. The odds of Blake James making a home run hire to replace Manny is slim to none so the choice is to hope Manny hits the Orgeron luck or just give up.
 
Advertisement
If Ed Orgeron can win a championship with the right combination of staff and players, then there's no reason Manny can't. The odds of Blake James making a home run hire to replace Manny is slim to none so the choice is to hope Manny hits the Orgeron luck or just give up.

The University of Miami is NEVER going to hire coordinators the likes of which LSU gave Orgeron. You can put that dream to bed right now

LSU's administration cares about football, there is a BIG difference.
 
Because some of us see the state of the program from a different perspective doesn’t mean we’re walking around with blinders on or are mongoloids.

I’ve given credit where credit is due and criticism when warranted. I prefer to look at the state of the program from a macro point of view and not focus on one or two negatives that may or may not Impact play on the field.
At this time all we can do is wait to see what happens on the field but it’s not like we’re sitting with the same staff, had poor recruiting and/or whiffed in the portal. Likewise, I don’t like the aggressive Slurper chest beating either. Most of us don’t have a dog in the fight except what’s best for the team.
 
Last edited:
The University of Miami is NEVER going to hire coordinators the likes of which LSU gave Orgeron. You can put that dream to bed right now

LSU's administration cares about football, there is a BIG difference.
Maybe not as the actual Coordinators but we just brought in several position coaches and an analyst who are capable of being on any staff. We’re better than where we were for sure.
 
Maybe not as the actual Coordinators but we just brought in several position coaches and an analyst who are capable of being on any staff. We’re better than where we were for sure.
At the end of the day, you need someone on that staff that can play chess toe to toe with opponents that have a heartbeat.

I love TRob. He's great at what he does, same for Williams. The issue is neither of these guys are going to be gameday play callers. Like I've already stated ad nauseum in this thread, I think the data that paints Manny as a "good DC" is a gross misrepresentation of reality. Manny is, at best, a spotty DC. The cast of characters backing him up in this thread are doing so because of those two back to back wins over VT and ND during Richt's last season here.

Nevermind the fact neither of those two offenses had a quarterback or a competent passing game. That type of context doesn't show up in the meaningless out of context stats that buoy his overall numbers. Nobody wants to talk about him being DIRECTLY fired for a LACK OF PERFORMANCE from Texas. This isn't David Aranda being let go from Hawaii as a casualty because his head coach got fired, Manny was DIRECTLY AND INDIVIDUALLY fired.

I'm sorry, I didn't see it from day 1. I didn't see it on day 150. I see it even less now.
 
Advertisement
But they only care about football at the expense of everything else. Few are willing to do that, nor should they.

I'm not saying we should go to that extreme, but the fact of the matter is we sit firmly on the other extreme. It's been that way for 2 decades. The intersection of apathy and incompetence.

Trust me when I tell you a good majority of the board doesn't even know what a football looks like.
 
At the end of the day, you need someone on that staff that can play chess toe to toe with opponents that have a heartbeat.

I love TRob. He's great at what he does, same for Williams. The issue is neither of these guys are going to be gameday play callers. Like I've already stated ad nauseum in this thread, I think the data that paints Manny as a "good DC" is a gross misrepresentation of reality. Manny is, at best, a spotty DC. The cast of characters backing him up in this thread are doing so because of those two back to back wins over VT and ND during Richt's last season here.

Nevermind the fact neither of those two offenses had a quarterback or a competent passing game. That type of context doesn't show up in the meaningless out of context stats that buoy his overall numbers. Nobody wants to talk about him being DIRECTLY fired for a LACK OF PERFORMANCE from Texas. This isn't David Aranda being let go from Hawaii as a casualty because his head coach got fired, Manny was DIRECTLY AND INDIVIDUALLY fired.

I'm sorry, I didn't see it from day 1. I didn't see it on day 150. I see it even less now.
Manny had some good defenses here. If the 2020 Florida gaytors had one of those defenses, they’re in the CFB playoffs without a doubt. Those defenses were good enough.
 
Advertisement
The University of Miami is NEVER going to hire coordinators the likes of which LSU gave Orgeron. You can put that dream to bed right now

LSU's administration cares about football, there is a BIG difference.

To be fair...its not like Miami can't find their Joe Brady...guy was a coffee runner for the Saints and LSU was paying him a little over 400K. You just need to identify and get'em. Money isn't that serious.

Guys like Sean Gleeson when he was hired away from Princeton to Okie State was making 500K, There was a story of Manny being interested in him for Temple. Mike Yurcich when he was in his first year at Okie State was making 400K. You just got to identify these guys.

Miami also was in the running for Dave Aranda (instead of hiring Manny Diaz under Richt) but LSU went over the top...Miami was offering a significant salary for him and we were close to getting him, if you recall that story.

Its the position coaches that, IMO, Miami struggles to afford.

However...Justice, Likens, T-Rob, Travis Williams...thats a nice mix of "Identified" (Justice) and well regarded position coaches...so...maybe things are changing, idk. We'll see.
 
To be fair...its not like Miami can't find their Joe Brady...guy was a coffee runner for the Saints and LSU was paying him a little over 400K. You just need to identify and get'em. Money isn't that serious.

Guys like Sean Gleeson when he was hired away from Princeton to Okie State was making 500K, There was a story of Manny being interested in him for Temple. Mike Yurcich when he was in his first year at Okie State was making 400K. You just got to identify these guys.

Miami also was in the running for Dave Aranda (instead of hiring Manny Diaz under Richt) but LSU went over the top...Miami was offering a significant salary for him and we were close to getting him, if you recall that story.

Its the position coaches that, IMO, Miami struggles to afford.

However...Justice, Likens, T-Rob, Travis Williams...thats a nice mix of "Identified" (Justice) and well regarded position coaches...so...maybe things are changing, idk. We'll see.
Most important things going forward are putting an AD in place who is actually competent, and then letting him hire a good head coach. I agree that quality assistants can be found from time to time on the cheap, but that usually requires competent leadership in place to unearth those gems.

Like I mentioned in an earlier post, the ability to surround yourself with good people is one of the most important traits a head coach can have. Manny has now fired both coordinators in as many years.
 
Advertisement
Anyone else doubt that if the 2020 Florida gaytors had Manny’s defense with Willis, they’re in the CFB Playoffs this year?
 
Whoa whoa whoa big guy. I'm just pointing out a couple of things I find interesting about our lil community here.

But because it's you, i'll discuss. My eyes tell me we were a good D when Manny was a DC and the stats say the same thing.

The whole any team with a pulse demolishes us thing is nonsense, because the stats stated that most of the good teams on O we play those teams were held under their averages in most categories. My eyes tell me the same thing. Now a few QBs found success. However something else my eyes tell me that you won't find in stats is that EVERY team still gets up to play Miami. Benkurt was a S. FL kid who played the game of his life and still got smashed. Yes he had one **** of a first half, but we adjusted and shut them down. Hornibrook made some throws that night he's never made in his life, and never made again, under duress throwing dimes. Not all QBs we play we will shut down, this doesn't happen ever with any team in CFB, and won't.

My eyes tell me that from 2016-2018, on defense, there weren't that many better teams at adjustments on D. After the first couple of drives and after the half. The stats back that up as well

My eyes and the stats showed me that after each and every year Manny the DC took something that was a weakness the year before and turned it around. After our LBs kept getting exposed by Clemson we went to the striker. our 3rd down defense wasn't great in 17, led the nation the next year. Offensive staff after year 1, Lashlee. D staff after year two, turn it over. Lack of turnover in 16, TO chain and being second in the nation in takeaways the next year.

People want to hate manny for the BYU game, because of run fits, because blah blah blah blah. The stats are the industry tells us Manny has had a lot more success as a DC than failure.

As for the whole it's Manny's scheme thing. I get that people think just because of philosophical likeness things should be the same, but that's not how it works. @HighSeas i think did a break down of blitzing and man defense of Manny vs Blake. Not only have we played and blitzed a ton less under Baker we also play things differently. Play callers who excel have a great feel for the game. Baker didn't have the same feel Manny had. It makes a huge difference.

Again those are just my opinions based on stats and eye
When Diaz was DC there was one game where his scheme and gameplan was a huge letdown. 2017 ACCCG I posted a preview breakdown in advance of the game and I legitimately thought the defense would have a lot of success. Clemson offense had a journeyman OLine, Kelly Bryant at QB, Fr Etienne and a JAG upperclassman splitting the backfield, and at WR they had all gadget and slot types. Clemson had a very predictable, limited offense with short passing and the same 2-3 QB run schemes on short yardage and red zone. Diaz called a very passive, soft spot drop zone kind of game, Clemson had some early success, got some lucky breaks and snowballed.

Since Baker arrived as DC pretty much every game has followed that blueprint (passive, soft, tons of zone).
 
Advertisement
Anyone else doubt that if the 2020 Florida gaytors had Manny’s defense with Willis, they’re in the CFB Playoffs this year?
Manny's defenses were good enough for Richt's teams to play in 3 straight NY6 games if those offenses were even above average. An elite offense like the Gators definitely makes the CFP.
 
Last edited:
Stats say the 2014 Hurricanes defense was the #14 defense in the nation in Total Defense. 🤔
Total defense is about the most meaningless way you can evaluate a defense statistically.

There’s obvious critiques of the fundamentals of Manny’s defense, which have been discussed time and time again. Even as people are talking about SOS or level of competition, Bill C’s metric takes that into account. Lance’s own evaluation took specifically into account how teams performed against their average numbers against Manny’s defense. There’s still clearly room for improving the defense, and hopefully bringing in experienced new comers with different perspectives can help get these things fixed. But just a down right dismissal over numbers versus “eye test” is equally as wrong in evaluating.
 
You realize you could also reverse that statement and it's also true right?

Information is just gross data . Context is king. I know for many people on this board that's like trying to explain advanced trigonometry to an impaired chimp....but it doesn't make it any less true.

Stats lie more than a politician. It's also ironic politicians always carry non contextual stats around in their back pocket which they spew on demand when faced with certain questions. Don't be that guy.

If I tell you a coordinator's defense was ranked in the top 10 but you don't take into account the schedule he played included St Brendan's, Lourdes, and Archbishop Carrol.....well that would make you just as guilty as the impaired chimp.

How many of you guys were around for the Coker days? Do you have ANY idea how many ******* morons on the site most of us migrated from kept spewing out Coker's WINNING PERCENTAGE AND NATIONAL TITLE as an argument for why he shouldn't be fired? It's a stat, it was real. It also wasn't put into CONTEXT.

And this is where the nail meets the hammer.

So I was told what 2018 showed was that Manny’s defense made bad offenses ever worst b/c when facing us, they were even below their season avg. lol.

OK, so let’s put it like this;
LBJ has a pick up basketball game against me. Sure, I’m decent in basketball, but I’m no where near his height, athleticism, or professional skill set. If he went on Twitter & bragged about holding me to 1 point, what purpose does that serve? Clearly he’s a superior athlete than I am. (Although I think I could get at least 4 points, lol)

The point? If Miami is trotting out 5 & 4 star players against teams featuring 3 star & UR filled teams, then what’s the point of bragging or pumping out ur chest? What we need to see is how does Diaz’s defense do against competent teams. In 2018, we played a whole slew of incompetent teams, which is why at the end of the season, we had a bottom third S.O.S out of all P5 teams.

Stats can be skewed anyway u want. Ppl say LBJ is the greatest of all time b/c of what he’s accomplished, while others say well let’s look at context, the era he’s playing in, the rule changes, how many games it took him to accomplish this vs. player X, etc. etc.

It leaves it open for interpretation & debate, but using one metrics & saying this is y Diaz is borderline elite is b.s, imo. Again, per “stats”, We were a top 15 defense in the nation, but anyone w/ eyes could see we weren’t, and when u peel back the layers of that ‘14 season, and look at other metrics where we performed poor in, it was clear our eyes were right.

I like to take a gander at both. Again, I think Diaz is a good DC; in no way shape or form and I’m saying he’s trash, but his philosophy, once caught on to, dips in efficiency. The reason why we can only use UT as a gage is b/c he bounces around after a yr at every stop (which, if imma be honest, is suspect af).
 
Advertisement
Back
Top