I keep hearing from just about everyone that Wilcox and co. are a .500 brand, whether it be 6-6, 7-5 or 5-7. I prefer to look at it a different way. He is 14-25 in conference, or just above a 35% winning percentage where it counts. His overall record is padded by some fairly easy non conference match-ups in his first few years. We thought Cal had a tough non-conference schedule this year, and sure enough Cal lost to Nevada and TCU. But we found out that Nevada, predicted in pre-season to win their division, failed to do so. And TCU was bad enough to fire their head coach of 20 or more seasons.
A head coach is expected to establish an identity in years 4 and 5 when he is fielding his own players, and yet Cal has gone backwards with a overall 4-9 record against FBS opponents. So I don't see at 500 coach that can be acceptable to a lot of folks at Cal. I see a guy on a bad downward arc who is going to get shown the door. It's just a matter of when.
I think one question is whether we continue to maintain the level of talent on our current trajectory. Winning is the number 1 recruiting tool - and we're not really doing that. So do we wait for years on the off chance that Wilcox and Co. turn things around? Or do you juice up the brand with a fresh hire? I'm generally in the pro-Wilcox sunshine-pumper camp, but it would be an easier sell if I thought the kids still believed. 4 decommits, including the best pieces of the recruiting class, in a matter of weeks suggests that the kids *aren't* alright.
Nothing is more helpful to a program than fanbase size. Recuits are more likely to be fans as kids, recruits are more excited to come to a school as attendance is higher, more money goes into the program in general, and coaches want to come to places with big fanbases.
I understand the ultimate goal is Rose Bowl, but what do we really expect from Cal? 9-10 win seasons every year? I don't know if that is possible anymore. There are multiple universities within even just the Pac-12 that can bankroll way harder than we can, and CFB is increasingly becoming more and more of a money-focused sport.
Even if we were to move on from Wilcox, which is what this post feels like, I don't imagine we'll do much better. Even if we find someone great, they'll just get poached within a year or two by a university that cares more. If we actually want to grow as a program, we're going to have to commit so someone -- whether or not it's Wilcox -- growing with us.
That said, Wilcox/Sirmon/Musgrave have shown flashes even if it's against weaker talent. And most of our losses this year were by one score. Blowing it all up now feels like a bad move even though losing to UCLA is shitty. Just need to remember that they have way more talent in their depth than we do, and it showed.
Really hoping Milner is able to step up next year and our fresh crew of offensive targets are worth the hype.
Mrjpark: You aren't kidding about the talent disparity. Charbonnet and Dulcich just flat out beat us last Saturday. Even DTR, with all of his inconsistency, showed what an elite athlete he is. What an arm! That hail Mary that he threw at the end of the first half was an absolute rocket and we were lucky that Scott broke it up. I think that this staff has done an excellent job of coaching up the talent that we are able to recruit but last Saturday was a painful exhibition of what four and five star talent is capable of doing on any given night. God help us if U$C gets their recruiting mojo back and we have to face that kind of top talent every time we play the LA schools.
No, not meaning to correct you. Sorry if I came off that way. Hopefully we can. I think Wilcox has shown some propensity for that, but on the opposite side of the ball. I can't think of any offensive players that have made any large strides. Can you?
Offensively I think that Sturdivant and Terry have the most potential to become the breakout receiving threats that we desperately need. Of course, that also means that we need a QB that can get the ball to them. With all of the impending graduations and expiring eligibilities this year, we will find out real soon who is going to step up on the offensive side of the ball.
I think if we want to take a next step, it's not really on the main guys (it falls up to them, but hear me out) but figuring out pass protection. We need someone better than Daltoso at tackle and just generally more development in our offensive line if we want a consistent passing game. What I've noticed is that it doesn't matter how good or bad an opposing defense is. What makes us successful vs. not is based on whether or not they decide to apply pressure.
Daltoso, he is a great kid and plays hard but it is frustrating they Wilcox and this staff haven’t been able to find a recruit and develop a recruit to replace him in the starting lineup.
Yup, it still is all about the OL and has been for Wilcox's entire tenure. For a coach who wants to model his team to Wisconsin he sure is taking his time with the OL. The DL appears to have arrived. Given how long it has taken for Cal to identify and coach up OL, we should have 20 on the roster at minimum. I feel if Cal can get their act in gear on the OL unit, we will be more competitive.
This year's team will average about 21 points a game. We need to up that average to 30 - 33. Find 10 + points more per game and we will compete w/ the top tier teams. All about the OL for the next 9 months and it will likely dictate Wilcox's future.
If I were trying to figure out what issues Cal would have to address if they wanted to take a step up in 2022, my top two answers would be to somehow find one Pac-12 average or better tackle and then to find a different Pac-12 average or better tackle. With Daltoso graduating and Craig a health question, they desperately need to find two tackles, whether as transfers or by quickly developing the guys on the roster.
Cal has what 5 - 7 schollies left for this cycle (not sure, perhaps Trace knows)? Areas of need should come from the portal given Wilcox is in desperate / immediate need of a stop gap. Agreed on the LT & RT fix. 5 years and no one on the current roster can beat out Daltoso, scary.
Another post mortem is to address the sophistication of Musgrave's offense. Perhaps to run a pro style you need pro style OL, which Cal clearly does not have to compete with the upper echelon in the conference. Mentally they can handle it but athletically / physically the consistency just isn't there. Angus gets one more year although I wouldn't mind if he were replaced this year.
I just expect growth in a program. Somebody mentioned Bruce Snyder, and I will again. Snyder had three losing seasons to start his tenure, but go back and look at those losses. Snyder's teams balled out, and when they lost, it was usually to a better team with superior talent. In years four and five, he had his own players and stamped his identify on the program. His 1991 team was one of the best in Cal history.
Wilcox is 4-9 against FBS teams in years four and five and suffered beat-downs this year against equally matched teams like Washington State and UCLA. (Yes, I think Cal was equally matched against UCLA and simply got out schemed and out coached.) It is not blowing it all up to realize you made a bad hiring decision and go another direction. That's why there are 10 to 20 head coaching changes every year in the FBS.
Those are outstanding points but if we do let Wilcox go, his model of stout defense and good offenses that protect the ball is a good one to emulate, especially since we aren't going to attract that many elite four and five star players. If our offense had been even marginally better this year we would probably be at least a seven win team and bowling. This is the model that we need to keep building to be successful in football.
I have always felt that it's best to hire an offensive mind as a head coach at a place like Cal. Two perfect successful examples of that that are Jeff Teford, who was the OC at Oregon, and Bruce Snyder, who was the OC for the LA Rams. Okay, Sonny Dykes was an offense guy and an overall fail because he did not seem to care about defense at that point in his career.
But overall, I think you must have a good to great offense first in this conference and then try and find a competent DC to shore up the other side. Jonathan Smith at OSU is a good example here. The guy is a brilliant offensive mind, but had to fire his DC mid-season. He did that, and the OSU D played better the rest of the way and continues on an upward track. Maybe even a better example is what Mike Leach did at WSU a few years ago. He brought in Alex Grinch as his DC and took the Cougars to an 11-win season, all the while playing his usual creative and free wheeling brand of offense. Grinch moved on to Oklahoma and apparently is following Lincoln Riley to USC....yikes.
Bob, Troy is not your son or son in law, is he! :) Sorry, just had to ask since you are such a promoter of his. While I still like Troy and agree he should be a candidate, I agree with Paws on the overall philosophy. Get the best coach you can at any given time. I don't think you can or should try to hire a lifer...instead, as Paws says, we should fix up the program and support so that whomever is hired will want to stay.
I think looking for a coach to stick around forever is a losing game. That would be a short list and not a very compelling one. You're just as likely to end up with a guy you may not want around forever (Kapp). Your best strategy is always to get the best candidate you can for the position and adjust as the program evolves. Generally if a guy jumps elsewhere, it's because the program is doing good things. Figure out a way institutionally to build on that momentum by making that coach happy or prioritizing some sort of continuity between tenures. The big takeway with losing Snyder was not only that they didn't show him the love they very well could have to keep him, but that they had an opportunity to keep some of that continuity by hiring Mariuchi then (and as a consequence not given Perry Klein the QB who was being groomed as my namesake's successor the starting qb position under Gilby). But they blew it all up instead. I'd very happily take one year of what Cincy is having and lose my coach if that's what it took to experience some greatness.
Gentlemen, actually I think PawlOski's example is quite good, though I will point out that though many of us thought Perry Klein would become the starting QB in '92 following Pawlaski's graduation, Dave Barr was Gilbertson's choice.
Yes, I was looking forward to Klein taking over. Snyder made sure to give him game reps during my namesake’s senior season. And he looked good and was fairly touted. Never sat right with me that Gilby passed him over for Barr. Barr was ok (and a really nice kid), but it felt like Gilby kind of wanted to remake the program. Also, apropos of nothing, Klein used to dribble a football between his legs on the sideline, which I hadn’t seen before or since.
Sorry, not saying Taylor is not a good candidate. He should absolutely be considered if the job becomes available. I'm only taking exception to the idea that the priority should be someone who will stick around forever. Tedford was our best coach in decades before and since, and yet we didn't even want him staying around forever even though he probably wanted to.
I watched the game a few times again on the 23 minute Youtube highlight reel. Unfortunately a lot of the plays that came up for CAL started with down and distance situations like 3rd and 7, so I did not get to see much of the 1st and 2nd downs. Our first half was pretty good. We were in the game. In the second half it came down to a number of plays where we just did not execute. We ran the ball successfully between the tackles in the first half, but we went away from that strategy in the 2nd half and our passing game let us down. I could not see many of the routes developing but it seemed that Chase did not do a good job of checking down quickly. He had open receivers but just could not get the ball to them. Part of this is because he was under pressure. Part of this is some of our receivers dropped critical catches. Our schemes were not very good in this game. UCLA's defense always seemed to control the edges, and in the second half on critical downs we would load our players to the boundary side of the field where both our runners and receivers were crowded. I think we could have effectively run traps on the edges. In the end, we just didn't execute well enough to stay with a well coached UCLA team that had great schemes on both sides of the ball. That's on our coaches. (Again).
I think you have the game summarized pretty well. You could see how tenuous the line play was from the start, protection for the pass game just couldn't hold long enough. I still don't understand this tendency to give up on the run so quickly and go to the pass when it hasn't been working too well to begin with.
Nice write-up. It's unfortunate the way things turned out - Cal definitely could have adjusted the offense to account for the incessant blitzing, maybe relying more on the run game. Also, Garbers rarely had even two seconds to survey the field and find a receiver. UCLA seemed to always be in the backfield.
Ultimately the assistant coaches are Wilcox's responsibility though.
I have little doubt that Musgrave is a capable offensive mind, and the offense has looked really good at times this season. But what about next season? Musgrave has had 2 years to coach up the next starting QB, and neither of the 2 waiting in the wings was considered good enough to put up the 11/29 for 92 yds and a QBR of 5 that Glover did against Arizona? I think Nick's premise - that a few weeks of good results against moribund defenses doesn't suggest that we've turned a corner - is pretty valid.
Ultimately it's a relative quibble - these decisions are small potatoes when compared to preparing the team to be competitive on a down to down basis. But even if Cal could score two touchdowns, it's flawed to assume that UCLA wouldn't keep right on scoring, which they very much did.
We should have just run the ball on every single play using different O-line formations and pulling guards to defeat the blitz. If we ran on 1st through fourth down that's four carries needing 10 yards for Brooks, Moore, Dancy, Street or whomever. Would also have kept our defense off the field and kept UCLA possessions to a minimum. Why not try this as opposed to getting our as--- kicked every time we tried to throw a pass?
I keep hearing from just about everyone that Wilcox and co. are a .500 brand, whether it be 6-6, 7-5 or 5-7. I prefer to look at it a different way. He is 14-25 in conference, or just above a 35% winning percentage where it counts. His overall record is padded by some fairly easy non conference match-ups in his first few years. We thought Cal had a tough non-conference schedule this year, and sure enough Cal lost to Nevada and TCU. But we found out that Nevada, predicted in pre-season to win their division, failed to do so. And TCU was bad enough to fire their head coach of 20 or more seasons.
A head coach is expected to establish an identity in years 4 and 5 when he is fielding his own players, and yet Cal has gone backwards with a overall 4-9 record against FBS opponents. So I don't see at 500 coach that can be acceptable to a lot of folks at Cal. I see a guy on a bad downward arc who is going to get shown the door. It's just a matter of when.
I think one question is whether we continue to maintain the level of talent on our current trajectory. Winning is the number 1 recruiting tool - and we're not really doing that. So do we wait for years on the off chance that Wilcox and Co. turn things around? Or do you juice up the brand with a fresh hire? I'm generally in the pro-Wilcox sunshine-pumper camp, but it would be an easier sell if I thought the kids still believed. 4 decommits, including the best pieces of the recruiting class, in a matter of weeks suggests that the kids *aren't* alright.
When you are getting paid millions of dollars to coach football, “impatience from fans” comes with the job description.
What are the stages of grief again? I think we are at acceptance.
Thank you, Nick...great article. Totally agree, esp. w/ the Big Picture.
My goal is to go bowling regularly. We don’t necessarily need to go to the rose bowl, but we should be in the discussion for it every once in a while.
6-6 every year should be attainable with the talent we have.
We should never be finishing below 3rd in the North. We have a much bigger fanbase than Stanford OSU or WSU. 4 win seasons are unacceptable.
"We have a much bigger fanbase than...", how is that germane to winning or losing? Much less our placing in the North? Asking for a friend.
Nothing is more helpful to a program than fanbase size. Recuits are more likely to be fans as kids, recruits are more excited to come to a school as attendance is higher, more money goes into the program in general, and coaches want to come to places with big fanbases.
I understand the ultimate goal is Rose Bowl, but what do we really expect from Cal? 9-10 win seasons every year? I don't know if that is possible anymore. There are multiple universities within even just the Pac-12 that can bankroll way harder than we can, and CFB is increasingly becoming more and more of a money-focused sport.
Even if we were to move on from Wilcox, which is what this post feels like, I don't imagine we'll do much better. Even if we find someone great, they'll just get poached within a year or two by a university that cares more. If we actually want to grow as a program, we're going to have to commit so someone -- whether or not it's Wilcox -- growing with us.
That said, Wilcox/Sirmon/Musgrave have shown flashes even if it's against weaker talent. And most of our losses this year were by one score. Blowing it all up now feels like a bad move even though losing to UCLA is shitty. Just need to remember that they have way more talent in their depth than we do, and it showed.
Really hoping Milner is able to step up next year and our fresh crew of offensive targets are worth the hype.
Mrjpark: You aren't kidding about the talent disparity. Charbonnet and Dulcich just flat out beat us last Saturday. Even DTR, with all of his inconsistency, showed what an elite athlete he is. What an arm! That hail Mary that he threw at the end of the first half was an absolute rocket and we were lucky that Scott broke it up. I think that this staff has done an excellent job of coaching up the talent that we are able to recruit but last Saturday was a painful exhibition of what four and five star talent is capable of doing on any given night. God help us if U$C gets their recruiting mojo back and we have to face that kind of top talent every time we play the LA schools.
Dulcich was a non-scholarship walk on as a receiver. Kelly reinvented him basically.
Pawloski: You are right and thanks for setting me straight. I guess that means that we can do the same thing if given the chance.
No, not meaning to correct you. Sorry if I came off that way. Hopefully we can. I think Wilcox has shown some propensity for that, but on the opposite side of the ball. I can't think of any offensive players that have made any large strides. Can you?
Offensively I think that Sturdivant and Terry have the most potential to become the breakout receiving threats that we desperately need. Of course, that also means that we need a QB that can get the ball to them. With all of the impending graduations and expiring eligibilities this year, we will find out real soon who is going to step up on the offensive side of the ball.
Polk has looked great….. at Mississippi State.
I think if we want to take a next step, it's not really on the main guys (it falls up to them, but hear me out) but figuring out pass protection. We need someone better than Daltoso at tackle and just generally more development in our offensive line if we want a consistent passing game. What I've noticed is that it doesn't matter how good or bad an opposing defense is. What makes us successful vs. not is based on whether or not they decide to apply pressure.
Daltoso, he is a great kid and plays hard but it is frustrating they Wilcox and this staff haven’t been able to find a recruit and develop a recruit to replace him in the starting lineup.
Yup, it still is all about the OL and has been for Wilcox's entire tenure. For a coach who wants to model his team to Wisconsin he sure is taking his time with the OL. The DL appears to have arrived. Given how long it has taken for Cal to identify and coach up OL, we should have 20 on the roster at minimum. I feel if Cal can get their act in gear on the OL unit, we will be more competitive.
This year's team will average about 21 points a game. We need to up that average to 30 - 33. Find 10 + points more per game and we will compete w/ the top tier teams. All about the OL for the next 9 months and it will likely dictate Wilcox's future.
If I were trying to figure out what issues Cal would have to address if they wanted to take a step up in 2022, my top two answers would be to somehow find one Pac-12 average or better tackle and then to find a different Pac-12 average or better tackle. With Daltoso graduating and Craig a health question, they desperately need to find two tackles, whether as transfers or by quickly developing the guys on the roster.
Cal has what 5 - 7 schollies left for this cycle (not sure, perhaps Trace knows)? Areas of need should come from the portal given Wilcox is in desperate / immediate need of a stop gap. Agreed on the LT & RT fix. 5 years and no one on the current roster can beat out Daltoso, scary.
Another post mortem is to address the sophistication of Musgrave's offense. Perhaps to run a pro style you need pro style OL, which Cal clearly does not have to compete with the upper echelon in the conference. Mentally they can handle it but athletically / physically the consistency just isn't there. Angus gets one more year although I wouldn't mind if he were replaced this year.
I just expect growth in a program. Somebody mentioned Bruce Snyder, and I will again. Snyder had three losing seasons to start his tenure, but go back and look at those losses. Snyder's teams balled out, and when they lost, it was usually to a better team with superior talent. In years four and five, he had his own players and stamped his identify on the program. His 1991 team was one of the best in Cal history.
Wilcox is 4-9 against FBS teams in years four and five and suffered beat-downs this year against equally matched teams like Washington State and UCLA. (Yes, I think Cal was equally matched against UCLA and simply got out schemed and out coached.) It is not blowing it all up to realize you made a bad hiring decision and go another direction. That's why there are 10 to 20 head coaching changes every year in the FBS.
Those are outstanding points but if we do let Wilcox go, his model of stout defense and good offenses that protect the ball is a good one to emulate, especially since we aren't going to attract that many elite four and five star players. If our offense had been even marginally better this year we would probably be at least a seven win team and bowling. This is the model that we need to keep building to be successful in football.
I have always felt that it's best to hire an offensive mind as a head coach at a place like Cal. Two perfect successful examples of that that are Jeff Teford, who was the OC at Oregon, and Bruce Snyder, who was the OC for the LA Rams. Okay, Sonny Dykes was an offense guy and an overall fail because he did not seem to care about defense at that point in his career.
But overall, I think you must have a good to great offense first in this conference and then try and find a competent DC to shore up the other side. Jonathan Smith at OSU is a good example here. The guy is a brilliant offensive mind, but had to fire his DC mid-season. He did that, and the OSU D played better the rest of the way and continues on an upward track. Maybe even a better example is what Mike Leach did at WSU a few years ago. He brought in Alex Grinch as his DC and took the Cougars to an 11-win season, all the while playing his usual creative and free wheeling brand of offense. Grinch moved on to Oklahoma and apparently is following Lincoln Riley to USC....yikes.
Bob, Troy is not your son or son in law, is he! :) Sorry, just had to ask since you are such a promoter of his. While I still like Troy and agree he should be a candidate, I agree with Paws on the overall philosophy. Get the best coach you can at any given time. I don't think you can or should try to hire a lifer...instead, as Paws says, we should fix up the program and support so that whomever is hired will want to stay.
I think looking for a coach to stick around forever is a losing game. That would be a short list and not a very compelling one. You're just as likely to end up with a guy you may not want around forever (Kapp). Your best strategy is always to get the best candidate you can for the position and adjust as the program evolves. Generally if a guy jumps elsewhere, it's because the program is doing good things. Figure out a way institutionally to build on that momentum by making that coach happy or prioritizing some sort of continuity between tenures. The big takeway with losing Snyder was not only that they didn't show him the love they very well could have to keep him, but that they had an opportunity to keep some of that continuity by hiring Mariuchi then (and as a consequence not given Perry Klein the QB who was being groomed as my namesake's successor the starting qb position under Gilby). But they blew it all up instead. I'd very happily take one year of what Cincy is having and lose my coach if that's what it took to experience some greatness.
Gentlemen, actually I think PawlOski's example is quite good, though I will point out that though many of us thought Perry Klein would become the starting QB in '92 following Pawlaski's graduation, Dave Barr was Gilbertson's choice.
Yes, I was looking forward to Klein taking over. Snyder made sure to give him game reps during my namesake’s senior season. And he looked good and was fairly touted. Never sat right with me that Gilby passed him over for Barr. Barr was ok (and a really nice kid), but it felt like Gilby kind of wanted to remake the program. Also, apropos of nothing, Klein used to dribble a football between his legs on the sideline, which I hadn’t seen before or since.
And Klein ended up in the NFL briefly, whereas Barr did not.
Sorry, not saying Taylor is not a good candidate. He should absolutely be considered if the job becomes available. I'm only taking exception to the idea that the priority should be someone who will stick around forever. Tedford was our best coach in decades before and since, and yet we didn't even want him staying around forever even though he probably wanted to.
I watched the game a few times again on the 23 minute Youtube highlight reel. Unfortunately a lot of the plays that came up for CAL started with down and distance situations like 3rd and 7, so I did not get to see much of the 1st and 2nd downs. Our first half was pretty good. We were in the game. In the second half it came down to a number of plays where we just did not execute. We ran the ball successfully between the tackles in the first half, but we went away from that strategy in the 2nd half and our passing game let us down. I could not see many of the routes developing but it seemed that Chase did not do a good job of checking down quickly. He had open receivers but just could not get the ball to them. Part of this is because he was under pressure. Part of this is some of our receivers dropped critical catches. Our schemes were not very good in this game. UCLA's defense always seemed to control the edges, and in the second half on critical downs we would load our players to the boundary side of the field where both our runners and receivers were crowded. I think we could have effectively run traps on the edges. In the end, we just didn't execute well enough to stay with a well coached UCLA team that had great schemes on both sides of the ball. That's on our coaches. (Again).
I think you have the game summarized pretty well. You could see how tenuous the line play was from the start, protection for the pass game just couldn't hold long enough. I still don't understand this tendency to give up on the run so quickly and go to the pass when it hasn't been working too well to begin with.
Playing catch up when we don't have the time we need for a run dominant game.
Playing catch up... yeah, but the team showed no sign of urgency at all.
Great discussions guys! My half a cent, Average coaches = Average team. My vote for head coach is Hardy Nickerson, I would coach for this guy!
Nice write-up. It's unfortunate the way things turned out - Cal definitely could have adjusted the offense to account for the incessant blitzing, maybe relying more on the run game. Also, Garbers rarely had even two seconds to survey the field and find a receiver. UCLA seemed to always be in the backfield.
Sure the O-line fell apart in the 2nd half but I feel like Garbers got decent protection in the 1st half and he still wasn’t any good.
Ultimately the assistant coaches are Wilcox's responsibility though.
I have little doubt that Musgrave is a capable offensive mind, and the offense has looked really good at times this season. But what about next season? Musgrave has had 2 years to coach up the next starting QB, and neither of the 2 waiting in the wings was considered good enough to put up the 11/29 for 92 yds and a QBR of 5 that Glover did against Arizona? I think Nick's premise - that a few weeks of good results against moribund defenses doesn't suggest that we've turned a corner - is pretty valid.
Ultimately it's a relative quibble - these decisions are small potatoes when compared to preparing the team to be competitive on a down to down basis. But even if Cal could score two touchdowns, it's flawed to assume that UCLA wouldn't keep right on scoring, which they very much did.
Prof. Romer disagrees :)
https://eml.berkeley.edu/~dromer/papers/PAPER_NFL_JULY05_FORWEB_CORRECTED.pdf
We should have just run the ball on every single play using different O-line formations and pulling guards to defeat the blitz. If we ran on 1st through fourth down that's four carries needing 10 yards for Brooks, Moore, Dancy, Street or whomever. Would also have kept our defense off the field and kept UCLA possessions to a minimum. Why not try this as opposed to getting our as--- kicked every time we tried to throw a pass?