Question for johnson fans

Y

yellowbritchies

Flats Noob
Joined
Nov 17, 2006
Messages
710
I'm not starting this thread to bash Paul Johnson.Although I am not a Paul Johnson lover, there are quite a few posters who are.It seems that when someone on this board, or other boards for that matter advances the idea to fire/replace/get rid of Paul Johnson they seem to think that he's the best coach to come around Tech since Bobby Dodd! Some of you Johnson backers say that we/Tech can't do any better for a coach and that we should keep him, and that 7/5 or 8/4 is about the best we can do under the circumstances. You promote the idea that really no other successful young coach or assistant would be attracted to Tech and don't want to coach here for some strange reason.You believe that Tech has a better chance of competing with his offense than with any other offense that's out there. Frankly gentlemen I believe that we can do much better, and would like to give it a try when Johnson's contract is up.Serious,give me a reason that Tech can't do better!
 
yellowbritchies said:
I'm not starting this thread to bash Paul Johnson.Although I am not a Paul Johnson lover, there are quite a few posters who are.It seems that when someone on this board, or other boards for that matter advances the idea to fire/replace/get rid of Paul Johnson they seem to think that he's the best coach to come around Tech since Bobby Dodd! Some of you Johnson backers say that we/Tech can't do any better for a coach and that we should keep him, and that 7/5 or 8/4 is about the best we can do under the circumstances. You promote the idea that really no other successful young coach or assistant would be attracted to Tech and don't want to coach here for some strange reason.You believe that Tech has a better chance of competing with his offense than with any other offense that's out there. Frankly gentlemen I believe that we can do much better, and would like to give it a try when Johnson's contract is up.Serious,give me a reason that Tech can't do better!
Click to expand...

  1. Too few hot wimmen.
  2. No budget for paying players' families.
  3. Calculus.
  4. No easy majors.
  5. Very few academic exceptions allowed.

Until the top brass in the school make a commitment to field top football teams, we won't do better regardless of who the coach is.
 
I think there are significant cultural changes ocurring surrounding college football that are making it more difficult than ever to attract top talent to Georgia Tech.

I think Paul Johnson is one of if not the best option for us to have at this school and I think stability would help our recruiting situation more than anything else.

Paul Johnson has proven that he takes his students' academic lives seriously as he has graduated all but 1 of his recruited players. I love that fact. I love it more than his ACC Championship that was vacated. I think college football is ruining several lives, and I think it's great that we have a coach that takes every player's actual life very seriously.

I think the advent of twitter, social media, the recruiting services websites and TV Shows, and attention-grabbing mechanisms have all made college football much more about supserstar spoiled brats being given what they want, GT does not do that, and CPJ's offense certainly does not do that.

We attract players that I think are respectful of the game, their teammates, and lead good lives off the field as far as I know.

I think we as fans need to be willing to accept that GT is not a football factory. We will not be a perennial top-25 power, we simply do not have the tools in place to recruit at a pace to allow that. We should expect to be in the top-25 at the end of the year once every four years or so, as a good recruiting class becomes upper classmen. Sometimes it will happen, and sometimes it won't. This time it didn't happen. I think our next chance is 2015/2016 if CPJ is still around.

I really just don't understand why you want to fire him. He has brought us our first ACC Championship in many years and competed in the Championship game twice in 6 years. He has beaten UGA and been extremely competetive in two of the other years, and this year's game I think could be a battle as well. He is building relationships and bringing in better and better talent in the state of Georgia. This class is getting pretty good, and has shown the initiative to make moves when necessary to improve the staff and program.

The last two years have been disappointing, a lot of bad luck has happened against us. I just don't think you're going to bring in a coach at the collegiate level who would either not use as a stepping stone, or have the success CPJ has had. Literally the only complaint against him is the team's apparent inability to beat the more talented teams on the schedule in recent history. We are still 6-4 this season with UGA still left on the schedule and a bowl game. We have 4 losses to teams that are ranked pretty highly by most arbitrary systems.
 
Wins. Yes, some seasons consisted of 10 games, or 11, 12, 13 ...but here are wins per head coach...

Johnson: 9, 10, 6, 8, 7, 6*
Gailey: 7, 7, 7, 7, 9, 7
O'Leary: 6, 5, 7, 10, 8, 9, 8
L****: 5, 5, 1
Ross: 2, 3, 7, 11, 8
Curry: 1, 1, 6, 3, 6, 9, 5
Rogers: 6, 7, 4, 6, 7, 4
Fulcher: 7, 5
Carson: 4, 4, 4, 9, 6
Dodd (after 1956): 4, 5, 6, 5, 7, 7, 7, 7, 7, 9


I'm not ready to get rid of CPJ, but last night it was very obvious that there was an immense talent difference on the field. Which quite frankly, more years than not, is the case when you're recruiting and playing 2 and 3 star-quality athletes and competing, in some instances (such as last night) against 3 and 4 star-quality athletes.

It's not lost on me that Clemson is as strong as they've been in years --certainly a top 10 team. And we're just not in their league.
 
So I guess the question is:

"You believe that Tech has a better chance of competing with his offense than with any other offense that's out there?"

As for the answer, yes I do and I think that offense is one that's spread option passing, as opposed to spread option running (think Kliff Kingsburry, Mike Gundy, Art Briles, Chip Kelly, Mike Leach) beacuse:

- It is much more appealing to elite HS talent since it's much more aesthetically pleasing to watch and has fewer cut blocks, so the "cut block" and "boring offense" arguments can't be used to negative recruit against us

- It opens up a lot more running lanes for read option plays as the opposing defense is playing nickel all game and only has 2 lb's in so we can fest on more secondary players which are the worst tacklers in every team

- It's equipped to come from behind and is capable of better executing a 2 minute offense

The only worry for me is that our WR talent pool is so weak that it will take us 2-3 years to get the perimeter athletes to properly execute it.

I think CPJ gets another year, his buyout is less after next year plus if the ACC has two BCS teams this year (FSU in the MNCG and Clemson in an at-large BCS bowl) each member school will get an extra $3 million. Those two factors will combine to make next year the ideal time to fire CPJ is the results don't pan out, specially since our biggest rivals (VPI, Clemson, UM and Ugag) will all be breaking new QB's and will be at their most vulnerable.

In my book the change gets made next year but only if we don't deliver results, meaning keep performing like we have against top tier ACC teams and Ugag.
 
GEETEELEE said:
  1. Too few hot wimmen.
  2. No budget for paying players' families.
  3. Calculus.
  4. No easy majors.
  5. Very few academic exceptions allowed.

Until the top brass in the school make a commitment to field top football teams, we won't do better regardless of who the coach is.
Click to expand...

#2 has to come from unrelated boosters, not from the school itself, and they have to be very well connected politically and legally, and have to follow the Cam Newton road map exactly.

#4 has to get by the Board of Regents, who are UGA dominated, so that gets stonewalled.

#5 is something the school could actually do something about.

GTYellowJacket12 said:
So I guess the question is:

"You believe that Tech has a better chance of competing with his offense than with any other offense that's out there?"
Click to expand...

I think the Clemson High School Offense could work okay here, but we would lose some of the benefits of unfamiliarity that we reap now. I do not think the Oregon High School Offense would work here, because we don't have the track stars they do. A pro offense, which is predicated entirely on matchups instead of intelligent trickery, would fail miserably here because we don't have the positive matchups, due to talent gap.

The best offense that could possibly be run here would be the CPJ offense where the QB knows how to pass and the receivers knew how to catch. It would be brutal. But we don't have that. This far into his employment, I question whether it's possible to have that *and* have the option work right, since both pieces of the puzzle are very complicated. I question whether there's enough time in the day to practice both.
 
GEETEELEE said:
  1. Too few hot wimmen.
  2. No budget for paying players' families.
  3. Calculus.
  4. No easy majors.
  5. Very few academic exceptions allowed.

Until the top brass in the school make a commitment to field top football teams, we won't do better regardless of who the coach is.
Click to expand...

This!!!
 
GEETEELEE said:
  1. Too few hot wimmen.
  2. No budget for paying players' families.
  3. Calculus.
  4. No easy majors.
  5. Very few academic exceptions allowed.
Click to expand...

I'll give you 3, but seriously why is 4 so consistently repeated? Has everyone forgotten about the m-train and the entire college of liberal arts? Do the people who repeat this not attend tech and hear the jokes about those majors?
 
  1. Limited curriculum
  2. Small and borderline nonchalant fanbase/student body
  3. Academic focus > Athletic focus of administration, faculty, students, and alumni with regards to effort and most importantly money
  4. School work load is hard as balls


...and Tech's within a stone's throw away from at least 8 schools who offer the exact opposite. And not to mention, Tech's now living in a landscape where the antithesis of the above list is cherished more than ever.
 
OP, you know we don't have that many ladies here on the board, but I guess we do have a few gay guys.
 
This is too easy:

Taking the 2011-2012 data.

We are ELEVENTH in the ACC, and outside the top FORTY nationally in athletic department total revenue ($60,253,966).

We are NINTH in the ACC in athletic department total profit ($133,377).

Depending on the year, we go from about 42k to 48k in average attendance. Even if we managed to sell out our stadium for every game, which we don't do even for "big" games, we still wouldn't be in the top 30 in average attendance.

Our "rivals" have more resources than we do, bigger fanbases, and lower academic standards for both entrance and maintaining eligibility.

Our "fans" don't seem to understand the previous point, demand that we compete with said "rivals," and don't regularly show up to games, especially when their lofty expectations aren't met.
 
GT's all-time winning percentage = 59.4%

Johnson: 60.5%
Gailey: 57.1%
O'Leary: 63.9%
L****: 33.3%
Ross: 54.4%
Curry: 42.7%
Rogers: 52.3%
Fulcher: 54.5%
Carson: 50.0%
Dodd (post '56): 64.4%
 
We have some pretty awful fans. I blame it on the fact that our school is in Atlanta which is one of the worst sports towns in the country. We have awful awful awful fans. Real awful. We're rude to other teams. We're rude to sidewalk fans. We're rude to each other. We're rude to the team. We never show up on time if at all. We don't go to games. We don't make Yellow Jacket Alley something cool. We have a terrible band. We just are one of the worst fanbases for how storied our program is. The players, stadium, and program deserve better than us.

I don't know what kind of culture change would need to happen, but something needs to change.

I think some of it is the fact that a lot of alumni didn't particularly enjoy their time at Georgia Tech, and so there isn't the love for the school that other teams with rabid fanbases have.
 
I will preface this with the comment that I hate losing and 6-6 records as much as anyone, but...
I am a Johnson fan because he can win if things fall right. We would need to run something stylized regardless of who comes here in order to overcome talent gaps with "big-boy" programs. Why not stick with THIS stylized version? We've been competitive in the only thing that we have direct control over (The Coastal Division) most every year he's been here.

To paraphrase another thread, Clemson wins with a stylized high school offense and 4-5* talent we CAN'T recruit. What makes anyone think we would be better running a pro-style offense with less talent or taking a couple down years to install a spread passing offense? Either way, we have to pay Johnson a ton of money to leave, then likely another coach an even larger amount of money to come. I don't think the AA has that capacity any more.

Edit: If we can change the stance of the Hill to assist the AA, my opinion might change, but with everything else being equal, I don't see a significant enough reason to change.
 
QuadF said:
I'll give you 3, but seriously why is 4 so consistently repeated? Has everyone forgotten about the m-train and the entire college of liberal arts? Do the people who repeat this not attend tech and hear the jokes about those majors?
Click to expand...

It's not so much no easy majors as not a whole lot of variety in the programs offered. Not everybody wants to major in management. The "college of liberal arts" has about 1/10th the majors of most liberal arts places.

You simply aren't going to attract top talent with a small stadium, small fanbase, and (at best) middle tier conference. Nobody has consistently recruited well at GT since Bobby Dodd in the 50s. Things are a lot different now.

I love GT. I was raised a GT fan. I've always been and always will be a GT fan. But I'm constantly surprised by the number of people on here who think we should be landing top 10 or top 25 recruiting classes every year. There is just about nothing going for us in terms of recruiting. We can pitch Atlanta, decent facilities, and a somewhat decent football history that for all practical purposes ended nearly 60 years ago. I don't know why people thinks that means we should be able to keep up with the Auburns, Bamas, ugas, climpsons, FSUs, etc. of the world.
 
GTCrew4b said:
We have some pretty awful fans. I blame it on the fact that our school is in Atlanta which is one of the worst sports towns in the country. We have awful awful awful fans. Real awful. We're rude to other teams. We're rude to sidewalk fans. We're rude to each other. We're rude to the team. We never show up on time if at all. We don't go to games. We don't make Yellow Jacket Alley something cool. We have a terrible band. We just are one of the worst fanbases for how storied our program is. The players, stadium, and program deserve better than us.
Click to expand...

To me its this. Just about all our fans do is emphasize their inferiority complex day in and day out. I rarely see people I consider true fans who support the team no matter what and support the coach during the season. I've seen so many instances of "fans" screaming obscenities at our players during games to the point where our players were turning around embarrassed.

Until we can sell out the stadium every game, we really have no right to call for the coach's head or to criticize recruiting, player performance, etc., because we aren't doing our part. We can't even sell out Virginia Tech on the 100th anniversary of our stadium.
 
GTCrew4b said:
We have some pretty awful fans. I blame it on the fact that our school is in Atlanta which is one of the worst sports towns in the country. We have awful awful awful fans. Real awful. We're rude to other teams. We're rude to sidewalk fans. We're rude to each other. We're rude to the team. We never show up on time if at all. We don't go to games. We don't make Yellow Jacket Alley something cool. We have a terrible band. We just are one of the worst fanbases for how storied our program is. The players, stadium, and program deserve better than us.

I don't know what kind of culture change would need to happen, but something needs to change.

I think some of it is the fact that a lot of alumni didn't particularly enjoy their time at Georgia Tech, and so there isn't the love for the school that other teams with rabid fanbases have.
Click to expand...

I think our band is pretty cool, and I like our mascot. Agree on most other counts.
 
I'm a Paul Johnson fan but the amount of negative publicity he's brought to Georgia Tech is wearing so ööööing thin. I can't take it much longer.
 
I like CPJ and I think that in long term he can make football success at GT. He has been proactive in addressing problems and contrary to belief, he does adapt. He's obviously trying to make changes in recruiting, but that has a long lead time to pay off and the collective patience of the fan base is short.

At the end of the day, I know success and failure in sports are ultimately measured by the win-loss record and there's no denying that GT has been a .500 program since the conclusion of the 2009 season. I suspect that if CPJ does not beat uga this year or win 10 games next year, then he's probably gone. His contract expires Dec 2016, which means he basically only has three years left as of now and it's generally considered a negative in recruiting to have less than 4 years left.

Could another coach do better? Of course. Who is that coach? No one knows. You have to pick one, try him out, and then release him if he doesn't meet expectations. I know there are a lot of reasons beyond the coaches control that limit the ability to bring in highly ranked players, but there's always someone out there that will say they can work around those issues. More dangerous perhaps, is the coach who says that but secretly and naively believes he can get those restriction removed.

Let me ask this, CPJ makes a bout $2.7M/yr. Supposing he was feeling the heat and didn't think he get a comparable job somewhere else and thus was willing to take a pay cut to stay the head coach, would you let him stay and what would his new compensation have to be?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top