Frank Commentary
I think the hardest hurdle a head coach faces is when they get things going well where everyone is moving in the right direction, finally, and then a few key pieces leave the fold. That has to be a soul-crushing moment for any new head coach experiencing their first real moments of big success.
It has taken a lot of blood, sweat and tears for Marcus Freeman to get his team to this situation, and his players and assistant coaches have had to suffer through it as well.
And then your defensive coordinator quits…
And then your GM leaves….
That has to be frustrating for Freeman, but that’s just the price of success. You have to constantly be on the lookout for talent as a successful head coach because you never know who is going to leave and when, and that’s not just from a player or coaching standpoint, that goes for personnel as well.
So much of a team’s success happens behind the scenes, and amongst the personnel. It’s a very underrated and critical part of the program that needs to be addressed every year. Not just replacing key people who leave, but also enhancing your personnel with other key pieces, people and things that can help you get closer to the goal.
And here is my one piece of advice for Marcus Freeman as he tries to navigate through this current situation, and in the future. Yes, I know he didn’t ask me. I know that ND Athletics Director, Pete Bevacqua, didn’t ask me, either, and they very likely won’t read this, nor take any of my advice even if they do…but they should.
Why? Because I’ve seen what doesn’t work. I’ve seen it happen over and over and over these past 25 years of covering Notre Dame football. I’ve seen a lot of things that didn’t work. I have witnessed a lot of things that did, but I’ve also been there to see a lot of things that didn’t work, and decisions made for the wrong reasons, but made to appease people or to make people look good. Sorry, that never works.
Sometimes you just need to do what you need to do, and only your heart and your gut is going to tell you that. The best people certainly lead with their head and make smart decisions, but, truly, the best talent just knows talent. They know that, while X hire might not be “sexy,” none of that matters. What matters is who is going to do the best job!
I’ve watched these past few days as Irish fans sift through name after name and resume after resume and debate who is worthy to replace Al Golden as defensive coordinator. I’ve seen the same thing start to happen for the GM position as well.
Guess what, Irish fans? You don’t know who would be the best fit, and I don’t know, either. We are truly the least qualified to make these decisions. We won’t be there for the investigation to create this list of candidates. We won’t be part of the vetting process. We won’t partake in the research about each person, their personal lives, their family situation, etc. We won’t be there for the interview where we hear their vision for the Notre Dame defense moving forward, nor how someone might take ND’s roster and team into this brave new world of NIL and portal in the GM role. We won’t be there, and we’re not qualified to judge any hire, nor criticize a decision not to hire someone. Certainly, at least not until some actual evidence comes in, which will be quite a bit down the road.
Nobody knows, not even Marcus Freeman or Pete Bevacqua, if any of these hires will be “great,” “good,” or might “suck.”
But I do know that Freeman and Bevacqua will have far more information on these hires than any of us will.
Having said all of that, here is my point in writing this piece. Freeman and Bevacqua are at a critical juncture in the Marcus Freeman head coaching tenure at ND. There will be a lot of outside noise from fans, from personnel and staff, from mentors and respected confidants, from everyone. They all mean well, and some of their thoughts should be valuable, but certainly not all or even a lot, as they also won’t know as much about the situation as Freeman and Bevacqua will.
Some hires will be celebrated more than others, but that doesn’t mean they’re the “right” hire. The only thing that matters, and you will be judged by, is if you make the right hire. Nobody will be around to praise you if your hire stinks, and people will conveniently forget you were right if your hire was panned and turned out to be fantastic. All that matters is finding the right person.
For instance, let’s take the GM job. I think a lot of ND fans think the GM role is mostly about recruiting. That is just false. There is so much more involved in the GM job than just recruiting. ND had a recruiting guy in that role before, but I’m not sure a “recruiting guy” is the best person for that role. Why?
That role encompasses far more than just recruiting. Roster retention, evaluations, portal evaluations, NIL expertise, experience working with the countless agents out there now, a background of running a team of people and managing a team that can work well with your coaching staff. The role also involves having involvement working with big donors of the University, and also working with big companies you’re hoping will want to use your players for NIL opportunities. And, yes, overseeing the recruiting team as well. There are certainly other hats this person will have to wear as well. It’s a monster job, and involves far more than who Johnny Football likes or doesn’t like.
This person should have a lot of experience in all of those fields, and the few fields where I think it’s vital moving forward is those relationships built with large companies, ND’s donors, and personnel people who you can attract. This person should have a very large rolodex of people, and folks who like them, who will pick up their phone call and offer to help. This person needs to know a lot of people because they will be constantly trying to fill roles under them. That will be NIL people, evaluators, great recruiting talent, people who deal with the NFL, and agents, but also the smaller but very important research roles like getting transcripts, talking with high school coaches, arranging travel, etc.
The GM role is a much larger role than just recruiting. I think the ideal candidate would be someone who has worked at ND under their situation. A person who knows what it’s like working with the ND admission process. Someone who has been in at least one of these roles I’ve outlined. Someone who has good connections. A person who knows a lot of people. Ideally someone who knows people in the big business world and some important donors as well.
This person doesn’t need to have all of those things, but the more they have, the more likely it would be they succeed.
As for the defensive coordinator position, it’s really a situation where Irish fans need to understand that the home run hire likely isn’t going to happen—at least the “home run” everyone thinks would be a home run. Just because some think it might be a bad hire…that does not mean it will be a bad hire.
What they need to do is fine the best Xs and Os guy they can. Someone who has experiencing calling a defense in real time. Someone who can make adjustments. Someone who has done it at this level of play. Someone who is respected and comes with great recommendations from people you respect.
That person may not be the person everyone wants, or thinks they want, but that is the person they need to appoint.
It is very importing that the person they pick can get along and work with the rest of the staff and support staff. This is true, but it shouldn’t be the main thing. The important thing is to get a qualified, experienced coach, and trust your gut you’re making an informed decision and not a decision because others want a splash hire or the home run hire.
Make the smart hire. Make the right hire. The whole future of the program rests upon this decision. It shouldn’t matter if it’s popular. What matters most is to get it right.