Jump to content

Recommended Posts

Posted

Ever since the Georgia game a year ago the shine of Sark the offensive genius has slowly faded away and led to more questions than answers. It is time for Sark the CEO to fire Sark the OC, both of which are elite in their own right as history has shown, or he risks suffering the same fate of Tom Herman. There are plenty of examples of former great play callers that have allowed their Ego to undermine their ability to win at the highest level and ultimately led to their downfall.

Locally we saw Tom Herman on offense and Charlie Strong defense fail to property delegate their biggest strengths while focusing on building a program. Nationally we saw Jimbo fisher do the same and get fired at a&m after letting his ego ruin the entire program before the halfway point of his 10 year mega deal. We could spend hours finding examples of coaches failing to properly entrust their side of the ball with high level assistants. 

If Sark wants to be held in the same breath as other elite Saban acolytes he needs to follow the lead of the others. 

Saban- Identified Kirby Smart early and allowed him to become his DC in his late 20s leading to 4 national championships. After Smart he hired Pruitt who ultimately left to be the HC of Tennessee after a NC. 

Smart-  Since his first year in Athens he has relied on a DC to manage the defense starting with Mel Tucker before bringing in Lanning/Schumann to lead the defense. All of whom have been or will be a HC in their career. 

Kiffin- The parallels of Sark and Kiffin are eerily similar in both their job history and failures on the biggest stages.  In 2017 when hired at FAU he handed the play calling over to Kendall Briles and then Charlie Weiss Jr. After taking the Ole Miss job he has ran through a few OCs including Lebby who parlayed his success into HC gig and Weiss Jr who Ole MIss fans want gone. But the results show as a CEO Kiffin has been able to punch above his weight at a program that historically is foot note in the SEC. 

Day- For the first 5 years of his tenure Day has had the same issues we are seeing with Sark in the playoffs. Great regular seasons and losing by a score in the playoffs in games that were very winnable. In year 6 Day finally gave up the play calling duties to Chip Kelly before winning his first championship and now allows Brian Hartline to call plays without missing a beat. 


If Sark wants to make the leap the others have and keep his job at Texas long term here are a few names that make sense and should be capable of handling the job. 

Coaches with connections to Sark-

AJ Milwee- this is the most obvious choice but his development of QBs at Texas has left much to be desired. Also without any real play calling experience the job may be to much to ask. In the even a move is made I would like to see Milwee call plays at another school first. 

Charlie Weiss Jr- for the past few years he has called plays for Ole Miss with varying results. Sark and Weiss spent a year together with the Falcons and the job would be more enticing than a rebuild at Florida if Kiffin takes that job. 

Clay Helton- Laughing at this one on the surface is easy but look at the offenses he put up while calling plays for Sark at USC. In Sarks time there they averaged close to 35 a game before Helton took over as HC following Sarks dismissal. He is currently making $900k at Georgia Southern and fits the mold of HCs taking coordinator roles (Kelly at tOSU, Malzahn at FSU, Wommack at Alabama). Sitting at 3-4 after an 8 win high water mark last year Helton could look to get back to a blue blood at the highest level. 

Tee Martin- Same connections as above. His offenses have left a lot to be desired but after spending time in the NFL under Todd Monken now may be the time for him to re emerge at the college level. 


Coaches on the hot seat-

Jonathan Smith- This one may take another year to play out but early signs are not pleasant for Smith at Michigan State. The closest connection Texas has to Smith is the 4 years Smith spent at Washington with Kwiatkowski before taking the Oregon State job. 

Joe Moorhead- In year 4 as the HC of Akron things are not getting any better. Successful stints at Penn State and Oregon would make this a no brainer if it were to happen. 

Garrett Riley- The younger brother of Lincoln rose to fame with the 2023 TCU runner up finish and quickly parlayed that to a job at Clemson where he was entrusted with a complete overhaul of the offensive system. This is the final year of his original deal at Clemson and may make sense for all parties to move on to allow Dabo to save face heading into a do or die year next year. 

Bobby Petrino- I tried to justify this due to its abject hilarity but I can't, moving on. 

 

Pipe Dreams (I know these will not happen)-

Dan Mullen- Currently at UNLV and having early success but history shows the schools he wants would require three 10 win seasons before hiring him. Texas OC Dan Mullen would be able to parlay one or two seasons into whatever high end opening came up. Currently making $3 million a year.

Mike McDaniel- The future former Dolphins head coach has consistently gotten worse behind the QB play of the oft concussed Tua. His services will likely be sought after at the NFL level but a refresher in the college ranks should be entertained. Most likely returning to San Fran under Shanahan like Saleh just did. 

Todd Monken- Has been the OC of the Ravens since 2023 after a successful run at Georgia but in the fickle world of NFL coaching Harbaugh may be forced to make a move to save face after a down year. Little chance this happens but always worth a call if things change in Baltimore. 

 

The likelihood Sark makes a change to his play calling duties is thin barring a call from CDC that forces his hand. Hopefully for Texas this change is the result  of a personal decision made by Sark alone that allows him to remain at Texas for a long time to come. 

  • Hook 'Em 8
Posted (edited)
12 minutes ago, Sir Ulrich said:

 

 

Clay Helton- Laughing at this one on the surface is easy but look at the offenses he put up while calling plays for Sark at USC. In Sarks time there they averaged close to 35 a game before Helton took over as HC following Sarks dismissal. He is currently making $900k at Georgia Southern and fits the mold of HCs taking coordinator roles (Kelly at tOSU, Malzahn at FSU, Wommack at Alabama). Sitting at 3-4 after an 8 win high water mark last year Helton could look to get back to a blue blood at the highest level. 

-

Dan Mullen- Currently at UNLV and having early success but history shows the schools he wants would require three 10 win seasons before hiring him. Texas OC Dan Mullen would be able to parlay one or two seasons into whatever high end opening came up. Currently making $3 million a year.

 

Helton's wife is from Houston, so there are ties other than USC.  Her sister is an Aggie.

 

Mullen is in play for a Head Coaching job once all the dust settles on UF, ARK and PSU.  He'll land where one of the current coaches gets gobbled up.  Maybe Auburn if they let Freeze go.  Mullen is an excellent coach who got screwed by the Gators.

Edited by jdhorn92
Posted
1 minute ago, jdhorn92 said:

image.thumb.png.45faeda89b0d3754ec1808d23574c976.png

You blow him out after 1 bad season, seems like you screwed him.  

The bad season wasn't the reason he was fired. It's what led up to and caused the bad season.

The program was incredibly toxic with Mullen. People within the organization didn't like him. He was simply an asshole. No one wanted to work for him so it was a constant battle to get good assistants. Florida would make a good hire but they would leave as soon as something better came along. The ones who stuck around were the ones who were also assholes or just couldn't get jobs other places because they weren't very good like Todd Grantham.

Mullen wanted out. In 2020, he basically put in for every NFL job and stopped caring at Florida. He completely gave up on recruiting because he simply didn't like recruiting and figured it was the next guy's problem. After the implosion at the end of 2020 as well as getting no job offers, he just started waiting for his buyout.

I recall speaking to Miss St fans after we hired him and they predicted it would go down this way.

  • Hook 'Em 1
  • Like 1
Posted

Good summary and compelling case, I just don’t think Sark will listen. He’s done better as the head of the program than I thought he would, and I think he’d probably get even better at self scouting and quality control if he didn’t have to be coming up with game plans and play calling every week. I go back to the fact that Jimbo is the only play caller head coach for either side of the ball who won a national championship this century. Josh Heupel at Tennessee is facing many of these same criticisms in his year 5 and most Tennessee fans want him to give up play calling duties as well. 

  • Hook 'Em 1
Posted
43 minutes ago, Sir Ulrich said:

Locally we saw Tom Herman on offense and Charlie Strong defense fail to property delegate their biggest strengths while focusing on building a program. Nationally we saw Jimbo fisher do the same and get fired at a&m after letting his ego ruin the entire program before the halfway point of his 10 year mega deal. We could spend hours finding examples of coaches failing to properly entrust their side of the ball with high level assistants. 

What are you talking about? Tom gave his OC responsibilities to an incompetent Tim Beck and then took it over toward the end. Charlie gave his to a truly lacking Vance Bedford and also before getting fired took it over. All of us were begging that they take over play calling over their designated coordinators and it is not what led to their downfall. By the time they took it over they were done. 

Ban OP for a week and delete thread for him not properly remembering what happened.

  • Hook 'Em 4
Posted
14 minutes ago, gatormarc said:

The bad season wasn't the reason he was fired. It's what led up to and caused the bad season.

The program was incredibly toxic with Mullen. People within the organization didn't like him. He was simply an asshole. No one wanted to work for him so it was a constant battle to get good assistants. Florida would make a good hire but they would leave as soon as something better came along. The ones who stuck around were the ones who were also assholes or just couldn't get jobs other places because they weren't very good like Todd Grantham.

Mullen wanted out. In 2020, he basically put in for every NFL job and stopped caring at Florida. He completely gave up on recruiting because he simply didn't like recruiting and figured it was the next guy's problem. After the implosion at the end of 2020 as well as getting no job offers, he just started waiting for his buyout.

I recall speaking to Miss St fans after we hired him and they predicted it would go down this way.

Gotcha.  Makes sense... if he's a dickhead like you said, UK or Ok St may be his ceiling. He was on XM84 last week with Childers and was a good interview, he only gave his side of things of course.  

Posted

 

1 minute ago, jdhorn92 said:

Gotcha.  Makes sense... if he's a dickhead like you said, UK or Ok St may be his ceiling. He was on XM84 last week with Childers and was a good interview, he only gave his side of things of course.  

That's one of the other asshole things he does. He's spent plenty of time trashing Florida while still cashing those checks knowing that no one at Florida is going to respond.

Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, gatormarc said:

Do you think they will strike out with Lashlee?

Now that SMU is ACC, going from a high ceiling semi-low expectation gig in the metroplex to a high expectation/low ceiling gig in Fayetteville doesn’t sound all that appealing. Arkansas hasn’t been a great program since their SWC days and just about all coaches, even some good coaches, fail in Fayetteville. It would take a double/triple salary increase if I were in Lashlee’s position to consider that move. 

Edited by perfectchaos007
Posted
1 minute ago, perfectchaos007 said:

Now that SMU is ACC, going from a high ceiling semi-low expectation gig in the metroplex to a high expectation/low ceiling gig in Fayetteville doesn’t sound all that appealing. Arkansas hasn’t been a great program since their SWC days and just about all coaches, even some good coaches, fail in Fayetteville. It would take a double/triple salary increase for to consider that move. 

He's only making $2.5M at SMU. I don't think double or triple is a problem for Arkansas.

Posted

He made the playoffs at SMU, can easily recruit DFW, and has a wealthy alumni base looking for reasons to throw money at the program.  Why the hell would be leave that for Arkansas, where the AD has publicly stated that their HC will need to work around their NIL limitations?

 

As for the thread topic, I do think Sark is a talented OC.  He has proven that early in his career and later in his career.  I do think the book is out on how to defend his current system.  He needs to make changes to his offense.  I do think he has the ability to do that and do it well once he realizes he needs to do that.  He stated as much in his press conference today about looking at himself in the mirror.  Most HC’s can’t even do that.  With that said, given everything on his plate, it is impossible for him to gameplan, think about adjustments, and carry on all the HC duties and do them all well.  I think it would benefit him to hire someone that is willing to run his offense, take his feedback and direction, but can also spend every minute of the day game planning while Sark is busy performing HC duties.  I think it would help him and this team if he was watching the game like the rest of us to allow him to make adjustments and coach his players vs thinking about which play to call next.  

  • Hook 'Em 5
Posted
2 hours ago, gatormarc said:

He's only making $2.5M at SMU. I don't think double or triple is a problem for Arkansas.

It isn't for SMU either if that is what it takes to keep him an SMU is a better job than Arkansas.

Posted
3 hours ago, victory88 said:

He made the playoffs at SMU, can easily recruit DFW, and has a wealthy alumni base looking for reasons to throw money at the program.  Why the hell would be leave that for Arkansas, where the AD has publicly stated that their HC will need to work around their NIL limitations?

 

As for the thread topic, I do think Sark is a talented OC.  He has proven that early in his career and later in his career.  I do think the book is out on how to defend his current system.  He needs to make changes to his offense.  I do think he has the ability to do that and do it well once he realizes he needs to do that.  He stated as much in his press conference today about looking at himself in the mirror.  Most HC’s can’t even do that.  With that said, given everything on his plate, it is impossible for him to gameplan, think about adjustments, and carry on all the HC duties and do them all well.  I think it would benefit him to hire someone that is willing to run his offense, take his feedback and direction, but can also spend every minute of the day game planning while Sark is busy performing HC duties.  I think it would help him and this team if he was watching the game like the rest of us to allow him to make adjustments and coach his players vs thinking about which play to call next.  

It was raised as a possibility on a couple of the $995 post-game posts that current offensive assistants are either yes men telling Sark the roster can run what he wants, or are ignored, meaning they tell him they can't and he doesn't listen.  

For whatever reason, it seems he has had higher expectations of his offensive personnel than what they can deliver.  One of those explanatory scenarios is bad, the other is fatal.

The OU game plan may be evidence that Sark is listening or someone is getting through to him, UK is another matter.

Posted
19 hours ago, Sir Ulrich said:

Ever since the Georgia game a year ago the shine of Sark the offensive genius has slowly faded away and led to more questions than answers. It is time for Sark the CEO to fire Sark the OC, both of which are elite in their own right as history has shown, or he risks suffering the same fate of Tom Herman. There are plenty of examples of former great play callers that have allowed their Ego to undermine their ability to win at the highest level and ultimately led to their downfall.

Locally we saw Tom Herman on offense and Charlie Strong defense fail to property delegate their biggest strengths while focusing on building a program. Nationally we saw Jimbo fisher do the same and get fired at a&m after letting his ego ruin the entire program before the halfway point of his 10 year mega deal. We could spend hours finding examples of coaches failing to properly entrust their side of the ball with high level assistants. 

If Sark wants to be held in the same breath as other elite Saban acolytes he needs to follow the lead of the others. 

Saban- Identified Kirby Smart early and allowed him to become his DC in his late 20s leading to 4 national championships. After Smart he hired Pruitt who ultimately left to be the HC of Tennessee after a NC. 

Smart-  Since his first year in Athens he has relied on a DC to manage the defense starting with Mel Tucker before bringing in Lanning/Schumann to lead the defense. All of whom have been or will be a HC in their career. 

Kiffin- The parallels of Sark and Kiffin are eerily similar in both their job history and failures on the biggest stages.  In 2017 when hired at FAU he handed the play calling over to Kendall Briles and then Charlie Weiss Jr. After taking the Ole Miss job he has ran through a few OCs including Lebby who parlayed his success into HC gig and Weiss Jr who Ole MIss fans want gone. But the results show as a CEO Kiffin has been able to punch above his weight at a program that historically is foot note in the SEC. 

Day- For the first 5 years of his tenure Day has had the same issues we are seeing with Sark in the playoffs. Great regular seasons and losing by a score in the playoffs in games that were very winnable. In year 6 Day finally gave up the play calling duties to Chip Kelly before winning his first championship and now allows Brian Hartline to call plays without missing a beat. 


If Sark wants to make the leap the others have and keep his job at Texas long term here are a few names that make sense and should be capable of handling the job. 

Coaches with connections to Sark-

AJ Milwee- this is the most obvious choice but his development of QBs at Texas has left much to be desired. Also without any real play calling experience the job may be to much to ask. In the even a move is made I would like to see Milwee call plays at another school first. 

Charlie Weiss Jr- for the past few years he has called plays for Ole Miss with varying results. Sark and Weiss spent a year together with the Falcons and the job would be more enticing than a rebuild at Florida if Kiffin takes that job. 

Clay Helton- Laughing at this one on the surface is easy but look at the offenses he put up while calling plays for Sark at USC. In Sarks time there they averaged close to 35 a game before Helton took over as HC following Sarks dismissal. He is currently making $900k at Georgia Southern and fits the mold of HCs taking coordinator roles (Kelly at tOSU, Malzahn at FSU, Wommack at Alabama). Sitting at 3-4 after an 8 win high water mark last year Helton could look to get back to a blue blood at the highest level. 

Tee Martin- Same connections as above. His offenses have left a lot to be desired but after spending time in the NFL under Todd Monken now may be the time for him to re emerge at the college level. 


Coaches on the hot seat-

Jonathan Smith- This one may take another year to play out but early signs are not pleasant for Smith at Michigan State. The closest connection Texas has to Smith is the 4 years Smith spent at Washington with Kwiatkowski before taking the Oregon State job. 

Joe Moorhead- In year 4 as the HC of Akron things are not getting any better. Successful stints at Penn State and Oregon would make this a no brainer if it were to happen. 

Garrett Riley- The younger brother of Lincoln rose to fame with the 2023 TCU runner up finish and quickly parlayed that to a job at Clemson where he was entrusted with a complete overhaul of the offensive system. This is the final year of his original deal at Clemson and may make sense for all parties to move on to allow Dabo to save face heading into a do or die year next year. 

Bobby Petrino- I tried to justify this due to its abject hilarity but I can't, moving on. 

 

Pipe Dreams (I know these will not happen)-

Dan Mullen- Currently at UNLV and having early success but history shows the schools he wants would require three 10 win seasons before hiring him. Texas OC Dan Mullen would be able to parlay one or two seasons into whatever high end opening came up. Currently making $3 million a year.

Mike McDaniel- The future former Dolphins head coach has consistently gotten worse behind the QB play of the oft concussed Tua. His services will likely be sought after at the NFL level but a refresher in the college ranks should be entertained. Most likely returning to San Fran under Shanahan like Saleh just did. 

Todd Monken- Has been the OC of the Ravens since 2023 after a successful run at Georgia but in the fickle world of NFL coaching Harbaugh may be forced to make a move to save face after a down year. Little chance this happens but always worth a call if things change in Baltimore. 

 

The likelihood Sark makes a change to his play calling duties is thin barring a call from CDC that forces his hand. Hopefully for Texas this change is the result  of a personal decision made by Sark alone that allows him to remain at Texas for a long time to come. 

Read All That GIF by Dead Meat James

Posted

Sark will never let go of the play calling unless an ultimatum comes from the big boys in Bellmont and the big cigars.

He keeps saying that he was hired to be the OC as well as head coach. He will have to be forced to let that go.

Posted

Sark's problem as a coach is that he has multiple offensive players failing to execute their jobs competently. He calls and sets up plays that would work with simple baseline competency of the players of the offense. 

The execution problem can be caused by different reasons for different players:

  • Youth: We're starting a new OL
  • Poor development: Anybody who has been an OL for two or three years here should be competent. Same at QB.
  • Poor talent evaluation: Might apply to OL; seems to apply to QB

To my ignorant eyes, those appear to be the points of attack regarding coaching. If analysis shows that being OC limits Sark's ability to impact those areas, then you have a point.

We were overrated due to Arch-mania (not Arch's fault). We're rebuilding an offense. It sucks, but it could improve over the off-season. With a good QB, we should be ready next year for what was predicted for us this year.

There is a tendency in the humans to see a successful organization and believe all policies of that organization must be excellent. Never true. Conversely, when things go poorly, everything about the organization is shit.

I'm not near ready to close the book on Sark.

Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, RomaVicta said:

I'm not near ready to close the book on Sark.

None of us are, and we recognize he built a good program. But his next step is to identify and adjust what’s holding them, and him, back. He has not.

Edited by Mdhorn
Posted (edited)
8 minutes ago, Mdhorn said:

None of us are, and we recognize he built a good program. But his next step is to identify and adjust what’s holding them and him back. He has not.

To be fair, although the problems that have exploded this year have been present to varying degrees in the past, the problems have not become acute until now.

That is, it was at least somewhat justifiable for Sark to ignore the critics given the program state the past two years, and the progress made over the preceding two.

It would have been ideal for him to self-diagnose the problem with the match between play calling and personnel and execution capability as well as potential problems with the pipeline and coaching there of.

Edited by TwiceHorn
Posted
1 hour ago, Mdhorn said:

None of us are, and we recognize he built a good program. But his next step is to identify and adjust what’s holding them, and him, back. He has not.

Fair position. It's a complicated equation this year.

Posted
On 10/20/2025 at 12:28 PM, jdhorn92 said:

Helton's wife is from Houston, so there are ties other than USC.  Her sister is an Aggie.

 

Mullen is in play for a Head Coaching job once all the dust settles on UF, ARK and PSU.  He'll land where one of the current coaches gets gobbled up.  Maybe Auburn if they let Freeze go.  Mullen is an excellent coach who got screwed by the Gators.

What about his brother? More dynamic historically but I can't comment on their run game or physicality.

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.



×
×
  • Create New...