First, he is a proven successful P5 OC and QB coach at multiple programs. I don’t know why people are saying this is a risky hire; I can’t imagine how it could be less risky.
Second, he knows what he’s getting himself into at Berkeley. No unexpected culture shock for him or his family.
Third, like DeRuyter, he is a failed head coach and is less likely to be lured away by the first hint of a head job.
I hope Wilcox gives him the authority to name the QB, and significant say in who we recruit.
Unbridled optimism based on how amazing Davis Webb was in his one and done season for Cal. Next Year top 50 offense coupled with top 25 defense leads to top 25 ranking at the end of the season. Year after that: Play Offs!!! Hooorayyyy!!!!
I'm certainly more positive than not. Very little in this world is guaranteed. The magic sauce of coaching is complicated. See Pete Carrol in the NFL before U$C and Hawks, or for that matter Dykes. So Spavital has enough experience and track record to hold hope. Wilcox knows defense. Together? We'd have gone to a bowl game this year, and would Cal fans be happy with a consistent bowl game that occasionally sees us be top 20?
IMHO, we need to expect more. We need to expect Michigan, Wisconsin, UCLA levels- every damned year. Otherwise the football-blase’ admin figures that’s adequate bread and circuses.
The Pac-12's issue was always that it "cannibalized" itself by: 1. having decent parity in the conference; and 2. requiring one extra conference game that other P5 conferences didn't have. But they've since rectified the extra game. 5 win bowl teams are quite infrequent, go to the crappiest of in-name-only bowls, and would hardly move the needle.
If it's the same SI writer that wrote today that Davis Webb "set several records at Cal", I wouldn't be surprised. Jared Goff holds most of the records and Webb didn't beat him in any of the major tracked stats. Point being: although I enjoy his content, fact-checking doesn't seem to be a strong suit.
Spavital is a good hire because he'll be returning to what he's best at. We may be generally pessimistic about our status as a transfer or recruiting destination but we're much better compared to Texas State. I think it's a solid B hire timed well.
By relying on transfers Spavital upset some powerful Texas high school coaches. But he also needed wins to recruit players. So it's a no-win situation there. I do think he'll be more in his element now.
Last year we'd have been at .500 or better with an average o-line and a marginally competent OC (the offense looked better after Musgrave was canned). It's reasonable to think these improvements are closer to Spavital's floor than his ceiling.
I think this may have been one of the best options available given the situation. I know not everyone thinks that Wilcox is on the hot seat, but my guess is that most quality OC candidates do. I would assume that candidates would be concerned that (a) Wilcox has no more than 1 season to turn things around, and (b) if he can't, it won't have been enough time for the new OC to establish himself as an heir apparent.
Thus even among the candidates who would even consider the conflagration that is Cal Athletics, they would probably wait a year.
I disagree that Wilcox's seat is all that warm. He came in here with a smart, long term plan. Defenses win championships, not offenses that throw 50+ times per game. You may have noticed that Sonny is down to running about 70 offensive plays per game at TCU vs the close to 90 he was running at Cal. He has learned and evolved. Wilcox brought in Baldwin (apparently his 2nd choice but was running the spread) and DeRuyter partially because of their head coaching experience which he had none of, and smartly realized they would be extremely beneficial in navigating his early years leading the Bears through the morass that is athletics at Cal.
They both left for what they saw as promotions, not for lack of performance. And as you may recall, Cal was on the upswing pre-covid (remember, we were all optimistic?) Some sniping aside, Musgrave was a solid if not exciting hire and possibly Cal's best option at the time (no well researched hire is guaranteed to be good or bad). It didn't turn out well, (he arrived the same time as covid, poor guy) but Cal's defense has been solid through Wilcox's tenure. It is not an excuse to say Cal was probably hit harder and set back further than any other P5 school with the harshest protocols in place, primarily by the City of Berkeley which no one else had to endure.
Those now calling for Wilcox's head would be singing a completely different tune if a total of 3 plays had gone Cal's way this season. 1) There's no phantom offsides call vs ND & there's a minimum 7 point and as much as 14 point swing, setting Cal up with a cushion & more likely win. 2) Longhetto goes 1 for 2 instead of 0 for 2 in the first half vs CU, gives Cal 3 more points and likely avoids overtime. 3) Cal recovers DTR's 4th quarter fumble swinging the odds way in Cal's favor for a win. 3 plays, Cal goes 7-5 instead of 4-8. One could argue that our margin for victory is often too thin, but competing in the P5 with one arm tied behind our back, a different outcome on a mere 3 plays and Cal finishes 6th in the conference & gets a nice bowl, looks pretty good.
The smartest thing I heard from Spavital in Avi's article is him asking if the talent at WVU would still be there if he took the job. He wouldn't be coming to Cal if he didn't think the talent was here.
- Baldwin was shown the door. I believe I read something like we were ranked 11th, 12th, and 12th in the Pac-12 in yards per play and points per game in Baldwin's three years respectively.
- DeRuyter appeared to be pushed out for Justin's buddy Sirmon. First he was demoted to "co-" defensive coordinator..
TDR was never here to stay for long. You don't get head coaches to come be a coordinator at a non-elite team forever like Bama can. Don't really think Oregon getting him to come over for a raise in addition to higher level of talent says anything about him being shown the door.
Same with Baldwin, although I do believe he was allowed to find his next job rather than getting fired which speaks volumes on Wilcox's character as a person (although you could also argue said character doesn't really have a place in the world of P5 CFB, where wins are everything).
Yes, I had forgotten about the co-defensive coord thing, but then got picked up by Oregon for a nice raise, so not the worst demotion. And Baldwin got a HC job, albeit at Cal Poly, probably a step down. And I had forgotten how feeble our O was due to it being even more so under Musgrave. Sounds like Baldwin is headed to ASU today to be their offensive coord.
Probably a step down? It is a definite step down. His pay was essentially halved. You ever take half your pay at your next job and wonder if it's a step down or not?
So If Wilcox has a smart long term plan, then why has it hurt so much watching Cal games over the last three seasons? Blaming losses on refs and bad bounces gets you nowhere, IMO. Most AD's around the country would have told Wilcox his plan was taking too long and sent him packing along with his 17-32 conference record.
Unless you're someone like Lincoln Riley that can bring a team with you, turnarounds don't happen in a year. Wilcox showed progress every year until Musgrave. IMHO he deserves one last chance and if he fails he fails.
We aren't a university that's easy to win at, so any plan for success is going to need to take longer than the 3-4 years that most coaches get at other places with lower academic standards. The days of Tedford tanking our APRs for wins is over and we should get used to that.
I hear you, but another poster said on this very thread that Baldwin was shown the door after producing bottom feeding stats in the conference in his three years under Wilcox. Can't blame that on Musgrave. I think the early successes were more a case of Wilcox having very good defenses in a conference that was historically bad.
Fast forward to this year when Cal's defense had trouble stopping anything in great stretches against new look offenses from the likes of Arizona, WSU, Washington and USC. That's going to continue, and I just don't think Spav and Wilcox will team up to produce the horsepower needed to produce wins to satisfy us fans. Hope I'm wrong.
The difference between the early teams and the current team is honestly our front seven. Weaver was the heart and soul of that defense, and that's not something you can just replicate. In addition to that, our offense has gotten progressively worse. You can't expect our defense to hold up against improving P12 offenses when OUR main offensive strategy is 3-and-out. Lastly, Sirmon is definitely a step down from TDR. I think his defenses are good enough that if we have an offense and they're not forced to play 80% of the minutes, they're good enough to get us ranked. But there's a general sloppiness and lack of attention to detail that's a huge contrast from TDR's defenses. Plus we don't have Gerald Alexander anymore, who literally coached up an entire secondary of NFL players.
I think we need to remember that Spavital's one-year stint at Cal was working with one of the great offensive minds in the game and with a quarterback in Davis Webb who was good enough to get an extended stay in the NFL. Wilcox is the exact opposite of a great offensive mind whose natural instinct is to turtle in close games and let his defense try and win it. How much meddling Wilcox will try to inflict on Spav's offensive plan remains to be seen. I maintain that things are not going to get better for Cal football until Wilcox is shown the door.
Dykes learned and adapted too at TCU - his teams run the ball more so the defenses aren't as gassed late in the game. Also, Dykes has had a lot more luck with his defense at TCU with a lot less injuries (his first two seasons at Cal, just about every defensive back ended up injured).
He also inherited a really really good defense. Gary Patterson was a HC known for his defenses. I'll give Dykes three years to completely fuck up his defense. But TCU is a great example of what happens to a team with a really good defense (that barely beat us in 2021) when a great offensive mind joins them. Dykes does have a great offensive mind.
This hate for Dykes is absurd. He actually did us no wrong. He came here, he fixed our culture issues, fixed our academics, and actually put together a pretty competitive roster. He sucked at evaluating defensive coaching staffs and that burned us, but there's really no reason for the amount of vitriol I see towards him from Cal fans. I imagine it's simply because he's so Texan, which absolutely hurts my soul we can't be more tolerant.
Cautiously optimistic that this hire can get the Bears to turn the corner on the offensive side of the ball. Hoping that he and Wilcox can ham ‘n egg it to being at least conference relevant, if not nationally. An aside, Angus McClure was (re)hired by UNR recently, FYI.
Sort of a dice roll hire, IMO. Like Justin and Jake sat down, looked at each other and said "man our situations would have been better if we had paired up earlier...dude let's do this." So if you like the idea of two talented O and D wonder twins with a chip on their shoulder, who yearn to prove the world wrong....then this might be a good match.
Honestly, when I first saw his named mentioned I was less than enthusiastic, but some of my fears have been assuaged by my fellow WFCns, who seem unusually positive. Please excuse me, it takes a special kind of Cal filter to understand having the best offense in the Pac-12 (for a year) but still going 5-7. Never felt that special at the time.
There are several things to like about this hire:
First, he is a proven successful P5 OC and QB coach at multiple programs. I don’t know why people are saying this is a risky hire; I can’t imagine how it could be less risky.
Second, he knows what he’s getting himself into at Berkeley. No unexpected culture shock for him or his family.
Third, like DeRuyter, he is a failed head coach and is less likely to be lured away by the first hint of a head job.
I hope Wilcox gives him the authority to name the QB, and significant say in who we recruit.
Unbridled optimism based on how amazing Davis Webb was in his one and done season for Cal. Next Year top 50 offense coupled with top 25 defense leads to top 25 ranking at the end of the season. Year after that: Play Offs!!! Hooorayyyy!!!!
A man after my own heart.
I'm not on board with this hire unless I can get a clip of Spav also sensually moistening his lips.
I'm certainly more positive than not. Very little in this world is guaranteed. The magic sauce of coaching is complicated. See Pete Carrol in the NFL before U$C and Hawks, or for that matter Dykes. So Spavital has enough experience and track record to hold hope. Wilcox knows defense. Together? We'd have gone to a bowl game this year, and would Cal fans be happy with a consistent bowl game that occasionally sees us be top 20?
All I ask for is a bowl game every year. It shouldn’t be this hard to consistently make a bowl game.
IMHO, we need to expect more. We need to expect Michigan, Wisconsin, UCLA levels- every damned year. Otherwise the football-blase’ admin figures that’s adequate bread and circuses.
If you schedule non conf right there should be two winnable games there and then you just need to go 4-5 I’m conference. Not a huge ask
The Pac-12's issue was always that it "cannibalized" itself by: 1. having decent parity in the conference; and 2. requiring one extra conference game that other P5 conferences didn't have. But they've since rectified the extra game. 5 win bowl teams are quite infrequent, go to the crappiest of in-name-only bowls, and would hardly move the needle.
Yeah, the Pac-12 made the rule in 2018 so the writer would just be wrong.
If it's the same SI writer that wrote today that Davis Webb "set several records at Cal", I wouldn't be surprised. Jared Goff holds most of the records and Webb didn't beat him in any of the major tracked stats. Point being: although I enjoy his content, fact-checking doesn't seem to be a strong suit.
I have never cooked with fish grease.
Spavital is a good hire because he'll be returning to what he's best at. We may be generally pessimistic about our status as a transfer or recruiting destination but we're much better compared to Texas State. I think it's a solid B hire timed well.
By relying on transfers Spavital upset some powerful Texas high school coaches. But he also needed wins to recruit players. So it's a no-win situation there. I do think he'll be more in his element now.
Last year we'd have been at .500 or better with an average o-line and a marginally competent OC (the offense looked better after Musgrave was canned). It's reasonable to think these improvements are closer to Spavital's floor than his ceiling.
Well I guess I’m ready for Spav’s chocolate and JW’s peanut butter. Let’s hope it’s two great tastes that go great together.
Oski’s Pieces? 🍬
I think this may have been one of the best options available given the situation. I know not everyone thinks that Wilcox is on the hot seat, but my guess is that most quality OC candidates do. I would assume that candidates would be concerned that (a) Wilcox has no more than 1 season to turn things around, and (b) if he can't, it won't have been enough time for the new OC to establish himself as an heir apparent.
Thus even among the candidates who would even consider the conflagration that is Cal Athletics, they would probably wait a year.
I disagree that Wilcox's seat is all that warm. He came in here with a smart, long term plan. Defenses win championships, not offenses that throw 50+ times per game. You may have noticed that Sonny is down to running about 70 offensive plays per game at TCU vs the close to 90 he was running at Cal. He has learned and evolved. Wilcox brought in Baldwin (apparently his 2nd choice but was running the spread) and DeRuyter partially because of their head coaching experience which he had none of, and smartly realized they would be extremely beneficial in navigating his early years leading the Bears through the morass that is athletics at Cal.
They both left for what they saw as promotions, not for lack of performance. And as you may recall, Cal was on the upswing pre-covid (remember, we were all optimistic?) Some sniping aside, Musgrave was a solid if not exciting hire and possibly Cal's best option at the time (no well researched hire is guaranteed to be good or bad). It didn't turn out well, (he arrived the same time as covid, poor guy) but Cal's defense has been solid through Wilcox's tenure. It is not an excuse to say Cal was probably hit harder and set back further than any other P5 school with the harshest protocols in place, primarily by the City of Berkeley which no one else had to endure.
Those now calling for Wilcox's head would be singing a completely different tune if a total of 3 plays had gone Cal's way this season. 1) There's no phantom offsides call vs ND & there's a minimum 7 point and as much as 14 point swing, setting Cal up with a cushion & more likely win. 2) Longhetto goes 1 for 2 instead of 0 for 2 in the first half vs CU, gives Cal 3 more points and likely avoids overtime. 3) Cal recovers DTR's 4th quarter fumble swinging the odds way in Cal's favor for a win. 3 plays, Cal goes 7-5 instead of 4-8. One could argue that our margin for victory is often too thin, but competing in the P5 with one arm tied behind our back, a different outcome on a mere 3 plays and Cal finishes 6th in the conference & gets a nice bowl, looks pretty good.
The smartest thing I heard from Spavital in Avi's article is him asking if the talent at WVU would still be there if he took the job. He wouldn't be coming to Cal if he didn't think the talent was here.
"They both left for what they saw as promotions"
Ahem..
- Baldwin was shown the door. I believe I read something like we were ranked 11th, 12th, and 12th in the Pac-12 in yards per play and points per game in Baldwin's three years respectively.
- DeRuyter appeared to be pushed out for Justin's buddy Sirmon. First he was demoted to "co-" defensive coordinator..
TDR was never here to stay for long. You don't get head coaches to come be a coordinator at a non-elite team forever like Bama can. Don't really think Oregon getting him to come over for a raise in addition to higher level of talent says anything about him being shown the door.
Same with Baldwin, although I do believe he was allowed to find his next job rather than getting fired which speaks volumes on Wilcox's character as a person (although you could also argue said character doesn't really have a place in the world of P5 CFB, where wins are everything).
Yes, I had forgotten about the co-defensive coord thing, but then got picked up by Oregon for a nice raise, so not the worst demotion. And Baldwin got a HC job, albeit at Cal Poly, probably a step down. And I had forgotten how feeble our O was due to it being even more so under Musgrave. Sounds like Baldwin is headed to ASU today to be their offensive coord.
Probably a step down? It is a definite step down. His pay was essentially halved. You ever take half your pay at your next job and wonder if it's a step down or not?
I honestly did just that several years ago & the work was a lot more interesting and the pay eventually took care of itself. But I get your point.
If you're three plays away from losing 2/3 of your games, it's bad no matter how you slice it.
"...a different outcome on a mere 3 plays and Cal finishes 6th in the conference & gets a nice bowl, looks pretty good."
Looks pretty good, kinda like the sandwich from yesterday that I forgot on the counter? Not great but I'm pretty sure it probably won't make me sick?
So If Wilcox has a smart long term plan, then why has it hurt so much watching Cal games over the last three seasons? Blaming losses on refs and bad bounces gets you nowhere, IMO. Most AD's around the country would have told Wilcox his plan was taking too long and sent him packing along with his 17-32 conference record.
Unless you're someone like Lincoln Riley that can bring a team with you, turnarounds don't happen in a year. Wilcox showed progress every year until Musgrave. IMHO he deserves one last chance and if he fails he fails.
We aren't a university that's easy to win at, so any plan for success is going to need to take longer than the 3-4 years that most coaches get at other places with lower academic standards. The days of Tedford tanking our APRs for wins is over and we should get used to that.
I hear you, but another poster said on this very thread that Baldwin was shown the door after producing bottom feeding stats in the conference in his three years under Wilcox. Can't blame that on Musgrave. I think the early successes were more a case of Wilcox having very good defenses in a conference that was historically bad.
Fast forward to this year when Cal's defense had trouble stopping anything in great stretches against new look offenses from the likes of Arizona, WSU, Washington and USC. That's going to continue, and I just don't think Spav and Wilcox will team up to produce the horsepower needed to produce wins to satisfy us fans. Hope I'm wrong.
The difference between the early teams and the current team is honestly our front seven. Weaver was the heart and soul of that defense, and that's not something you can just replicate. In addition to that, our offense has gotten progressively worse. You can't expect our defense to hold up against improving P12 offenses when OUR main offensive strategy is 3-and-out. Lastly, Sirmon is definitely a step down from TDR. I think his defenses are good enough that if we have an offense and they're not forced to play 80% of the minutes, they're good enough to get us ranked. But there's a general sloppiness and lack of attention to detail that's a huge contrast from TDR's defenses. Plus we don't have Gerald Alexander anymore, who literally coached up an entire secondary of NFL players.
GO JACK!! AVOID PREDICTABLE OFFENSES!!
Cautious optimism.
optimistic caution
I think we need to remember that Spavital's one-year stint at Cal was working with one of the great offensive minds in the game and with a quarterback in Davis Webb who was good enough to get an extended stay in the NFL. Wilcox is the exact opposite of a great offensive mind whose natural instinct is to turtle in close games and let his defense try and win it. How much meddling Wilcox will try to inflict on Spav's offensive plan remains to be seen. I maintain that things are not going to get better for Cal football until Wilcox is shown the door.
For my sanity, I need to believe JW will pass the offensive playcalling reins over to Spav.
Maybe Spav is what it takes to stop Wilcox from pumping the breaks the moment we have a 2 point lead in the 2nd half.
Million dollar question. But I’d like to think this shows Wilcox is learning? And is willing to adapt?
I mean look at Dykes at TCU now.
Dykes learned and adapted too at TCU - his teams run the ball more so the defenses aren't as gassed late in the game. Also, Dykes has had a lot more luck with his defense at TCU with a lot less injuries (his first two seasons at Cal, just about every defensive back ended up injured).
He also inherited a really really good defense. Gary Patterson was a HC known for his defenses. I'll give Dykes three years to completely fuck up his defense. But TCU is a great example of what happens to a team with a really good defense (that barely beat us in 2021) when a great offensive mind joins them. Dykes does have a great offensive mind.
Yes I also find Dykes' mind very offensive.
This hate for Dykes is absurd. He actually did us no wrong. He came here, he fixed our culture issues, fixed our academics, and actually put together a pretty competitive roster. He sucked at evaluating defensive coaching staffs and that burned us, but there's really no reason for the amount of vitriol I see towards him from Cal fans. I imagine it's simply because he's so Texan, which absolutely hurts my soul we can't be more tolerant.
Hell, he even swept Texas which felt really good.
I don't hate Dykes at all, I'm a fan! Agree with everything you said. I was just being a wordplay dork.
Happy he finally found a DC with whom he could waltz into the promised land. Wish it could have been here!
I'm taking a wait and see approach on this one-as a Cal fan, I'm trying to develop this as my m.o.
Cautiously optimistic that this hire can get the Bears to turn the corner on the offensive side of the ball. Hoping that he and Wilcox can ham ‘n egg it to being at least conference relevant, if not nationally. An aside, Angus McClure was (re)hired by UNR recently, FYI.
Sort of a dice roll hire, IMO. Like Justin and Jake sat down, looked at each other and said "man our situations would have been better if we had paired up earlier...dude let's do this." So if you like the idea of two talented O and D wonder twins with a chip on their shoulder, who yearn to prove the world wrong....then this might be a good match.
Honestly, when I first saw his named mentioned I was less than enthusiastic, but some of my fears have been assuaged by my fellow WFCns, who seem unusually positive. Please excuse me, it takes a special kind of Cal filter to understand having the best offense in the Pac-12 (for a year) but still going 5-7. Never felt that special at the time.
Yup.
Justin: "Well, my ball control offenses are trash, wanna run a spread for me?"
Jake: "Only if you help me break my addiction to bubble screens."
Who else interviewed? Did Spavital call us or did we call him?
Rumor is it took so long because they kept calling each other at the same time and getting busy signals.
Should have sent a text message
LOL!
Heh
So when do we get a press conference and hear the coach speak? When an OL coach announcement? Now I'm onto the next things.