Sportsfrog.com

So Florida State is ready to name their heir to Bobby Bowden? It seems so, as they’ve planned a press conference on Monday to apparently do such an act.

Great.

Bowden is 78. And unfortunately, he should have retired years ago. But the school has been loyal to his service and I can’t fault them too much for that. After all, this is academia, not a business.

But Bowden just has not been able to adjust to the huge change college football has undergone over the past decade. And the recent, self-proclaimed reinvention of his style of football has been nothing but the equivalent of polishing of a turd.

So entered Jimbo Fisher, apparently now, for a while.

To me, this move is entirely reactionary. I think FSU saw what they lost when they lost Mark Richt and are compensating now to avoid the same mistake. And that’s a mistake.

Richt, now head coach at Georgia, was the offensive coordinator at FSU from 1990-2000. He is a former college quarterback (UM) who with the Seminoles helped coached two national championship teams and two Heisman trophy quarterbacks.

From 1990 to 2000, with Richt around running the offense, FSU’s combined record was 120-15-1 (88.9%). After Richt left for Georgia, FSU’s record has been 58-31 (65.2%). Georgia’s record under Richt is 71-19 (78.9%).

So, back to Jimbo Fisher, this whole annointing thing just seems to me like the boy who has a girlfriend because he’s afraid to not have a girlfriend. And through his first year of dating, Fisher hasn’t really been a miracle worker. Granted, he inherited a mess, but that just means he should be given more time, not the keys to the school.

John Romano, columnist for the St. Pete Times, seems to agree.

Here are some cherry-picked lines from Romano’s column that echo my own sentiments:

“I’m not saying it’s a mistake to hire Jimbo Fisher. I’m saying it’s a mistake to limit yourself to Jimbo Fisher.

A year ago, Jeff Bowden was supposedly so wretched as an offensive coordinator that the university and boosters were willing to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to get rid of him. Fisher is supposedly so valuable as an offensive coordinator that the university is committing more than $1-million to keep him.

So how come the Seminoles scored more points when the other guy was in charge? How come FSU had 36 offensive touchdowns with Jeff Bowden, and is on pace to score 26 with Fisher?

A few years ago, LSU was looking for a head coach to replace Nick Saban. Fisher had been in Baton Rouge for five seasons, including the 2003 national championship season. And, yet, the Tigers hired Les Miles.

Last season, Fisher was a candidate to be the head coach at the University of Alabama-Birmingham but supposedly priced himself out of the job. The point is, how does he go from being a candidate at UAB to the head-coach-in-waiting at FSU after one season as offensive coordinator? ”

So cheers to Florida State. For continuing to live in the past with how they operate.