This thread is a joke. Now Davis is being crowned as one of the great Miami football coaches? People use to kill him for being be a terrible game day coach.
It is unbelievable how quickly everyone has turned on Golden in a matter of a month.
There are very distinct differences between what Golden came into versus every other HC at Miami.
We were on probation when Butch came but we were just at the tail end of 10 year dynasty. Our brand was as high as it had ever been. Butch certainly deserves a ton of credit for the teams he built from 2000-2002 but he came to Miami in 1995, a year after finishing #6 in the AP polls. He ******* inherited a team with Ray Lewis, Yatil Green, Kenny Holmes, Kenard Lang, Danyell Ferguson, KC Jones, etc. Could you imagine the uproar on this message board when Marvin Minnis, Derrick Gibson, Sedrick Irvin, Markeith Cooper, Stockar McDougle, Broderick Nelson, Martavious Houson, Bryce Bishop, Anquan Boldin all signed elsewhere...mostly with FSU. Does anyone remeber when we got blown out by East Carolina? Blown....out. Meanwhile, we were recruiting Ed reed and Dan morgan...a goofy white kid from Coral Springs.
Yet, Golden comes in after a 5 year period of winning a collective 30 games and only one final ranking in the top 25. The successor to greatest mockery of running a traditional power called the Shannon regime. Stockpiled with defensive talent from Shannon's last 2 recruiting classes. Of course, Olivier Vernon only played 5 games since he was suspended for the first 6 games of 2010 and the brilliant Ray Ray Armstrong played 7 games which leaves you with the all-time worst defensive recruiting classes ever!!
Ray Ray Armstrong ATH
A.J. Highsmith ATH
Prince Kent ATH
Jamal Reid ATH
Brandon McGee DB
Devont'a Davis DB
Keion Payne DB
Kacy Rodgers DB
Dyron Dye DE
Shayon Green DE
Olivier Vernon DE
David Perry DE
Andrew Tallman DE
Curtis Porter DT
Luther Robinson DT
Jeffery Brown DT
Tavadis Glenn DT
Delmar Taylor DT
Kelvin Cain LB
Tyrone Cornelius LB
James Gaines LB
Kevin Nelson LB
Travis Williams LB
But it gets better. 2 weeks before Goldens first game we are destroyed by an NCAA scandal that suspends almost every impact player on the team for the first game followed by a mass exodus of the most entitled and dumbest recruiting class ever of whom for the most part, have never made it above practice squad level in the NFL....our beloved class of 1998. Oh yeah, Shannon had 2 commits (Dorsett and Chickillo) when Golden took over heading into december...and we weren't even recruiting 95% of the top players in Dade/Broward/Palm Beach. Does anyone but me remember AG flipping Thomas Finnie in weeks, pulling Eddie Johnson, Rawshawn Scott, and Olsen Pierre out his ***.
But don't bother to remembering reality....its all about 2 gap vs 1 gap, 3-4 vs 4-3.
Having to go to the waiver wire to find kickers, back-up QBs and just about anyone with a pulse to fill all the gaping holes in our depth chart was just all make believe.
In the meantime, after all of the bull**** we have been through, Golden and his staff (ALL who could have easily jumped ship) stuck it out and managed to not only pull in
the #9 ranked recruiting class in 2011 which included flipping Tracey Howard but beat out everybody and their mother for Stacey Coley, AQM, Artie Burns, Jamal Carter, Gus Edwards, Corn Elder, Derrick Griffin, Deon Bush, Jermaine Grace, Kevin Olsen, Tyriq McCord, Malcolm Lewis, and Jelani Hamilton, finding diamonds in the rough like Rayshawn Jenkins, Antonio Crawford, LaDarius Gunter, Gabe Terry, Herb Waters..
All of these kids could have played anywhere for the most part but Golden AND HIS STAFF keep these programs head above water and convinced these kids to come play in front of 25k fans with the potential to not play in a bowl game for half of their career and potentially get hit with USC sanctions that would have certainly diminished their ability to ever play for something meaningful.
Yes, there have been some mistakes along the way, but it wasn't for a lack of trying and yes, in recruiting, trying means something. There is nothing more AG could have done to get Matt Thomas, Amari Cooper, Teddy Bridgewater, Jaynard Bostwick, Alex Collins. This staff recruited the **** out of those guys.
And the cookie is Golden did win the Coastal last year. So don't give that Duke gets to go the ACC championship before us. Golden did it in year 2, under the worst circumstances.
Meanwhile, we go 9-3 in year 3 of his regime and everyone is all **** and vinegar because we lost to Duke. But let's completely overlook the FACT that we lost Rawshawn Scott in the 1st game, Dorsett for 2/3 of the season, Duke Johnson for half the season, Deon Bush wasn't healthy until the last few games, and your QB was playing with a peg leg for majority of the season. And YES, the offense effects the defense. In a 100 series, our offense sustained drives longer than 2 minutes less than 25% of the time. But overcoming 4 turnovers at UNC on a Thursday night, Playing the best team in the country on the road and losing your best player, and then trying again to overcome 3 turnovers in the 1st half against VT in the rain with VT winning the Time of possesion battle 40min to 20min. But that is no reason for anyone to potentially be worn out for a game against a team that ended the season 10-2 and losing.
Nick Saban lost to Alabama-Birmingham at LSU and Louisiana-Monroe at Bama....both at HOME.
So best coach in history has lost to worse teams than Duke under better circumstances yet this entire message board is melting. ......WHILE WE ARE PULLING IN A TOP 5 RECRUITING CLASS! But it is #fail is we don't get cook or michel! Just like Marvin Jones, Lamonst Green and every other player from South florida who has left town.
Am i thrilled with the defensive play? No. Do I think changing coaches or scheme will make things better next year? No. This is same **** we heard with Coker's offense....we need to go to the spread...then under Shannon we were to vanilla and should go to a 3-4, now we play some odd fronts but we are playing 2 gap, not 1 gap so lets ***** some more....
Everyone needs to settle the **** down. If you know anything about the Temple football program and the fact that what Golden accomplished there was nothing short of Miraculous on top of what he has accomplished here under the worst climate imaginable....
It pains me to hear the consistent bull****!!!
Wow. After rereading...i got progressively angrier throughout this love note. lol.
I love the football talk and the X's and O's but it is ridiculous to hear the same retread parrots grind on the same BS day in and day out.
