I’m not saying at all that the mistake was not getting Oats to leave Alabama. Let me try again to restate the point. My point was that Alabama, a school similar to Texas (not a top destination job and more of a football school), managed to find a great coach and keep him. They found him in obscure Buffalo. That was very impressive coach scouting.
Meanwhile, Texas took a guy who on paper has some real questions. If Miller kicks ass, then great. All this worrying will have been for nothing. And when Alabama took Oats I’m sure there were tons of questions about his hire. But it turned out to be a very good hire. And he was a pretty unknown entity.
Miller is a pretty well known entity, and if history holds he won’t be as successful as Texas or its fans would expect or want. That’s what I find frustrating.
It’s a little bit like OU finding Stoops from the DC ranks and Riley from the OC ranks and then beating Texas fairly regularly. Those guys weren’t the big names when they were hired but the OU powers knew enough about football to make sure they got the true up and coming coaches. Of course Riley has plateaued and may flame out, but at OU he caused a lot of issues for Texas.