Why the UNT job is so attractive

Harry · October 29, 2015

I have grown tiresome of all of the negative ned's who want to say "UNT is a coaching graveyard", or "Why would anyone take this job." or "we won't be able to land (insert coaches name here) because he already has a good thing going and is looking for a better gig etc.."

That's all hogwash! BS! Let me tell you why.

1). Tell me how many jobs out there pay $1 million a year? How many? I would say not many. My sense is this job will pay in the 900- 1.5 million range. There will also be a significant bump to assistant pay as well. NOTE TO SELF: ANY JOB PAYING 1 MILLION BUCKS IS ATTRACTIVE...PERIOD!

2). A chance to coach at the D-I level is only available for 128 very lucky people every year. That 128 out of probably thousands of qualified and dedicated coaches who have made a career of this who will never get the opportunity.

3). UNT's attractiveness as a coaching destination really just started in 2011. That was when Apogee stadium was unveiled. That was when we started paying competitively for both head and assistant coaches. That was when we basically were moving into a respected conference (C-USA). So for all of you who want to reach back to Theron Fouts days of roaming the sidelines when compiling the win loss records, I call BS. The first time in my lifetime that we stepped up to really play ball here was 2011. JUST 4 YEARS AGO. We "pretended" to participate but the truth was we were doing just enough to "get by" and created a revolving door of our top recruiting assistants every year.

4). UNT is not a pressure cooker job. Sure we expect results but a coach will be able to come here and show a lot of progress in year one. Some of these p5 gigs will be looking for damn near immediate results or they are going to fire you. UNT is a place were you can build your dream staff, implement your system, build things from the ground up and really there is nowhere to go but up. Mac said things were hard at North Texas, actually I think things are EASIER at North Texas than many jobs paying even less money!

5). Location Part 1 - can you say access to the biggest number of quality D-I recruits within a cars drive? No more airplanes, in fact you can hit some of the top high schools within 4-5 minutes of each other!! The focus of this hire is RECRUITING and where is a better place in the country to do that? Even if you don't get the top guys, I would submit there are so many who can play here you should still be able to dominate C-USA.

Location Part 2 -- every coach out there has a pretty wife and kids who want good neighbors, good shopping, good schools and a great place to live. Denton and DFW offer that in a big way. There are airports and tons of restaurants, things to do... it is a great place to raise a family, Why do you think so many corporations (Toyota etc) choose to relocate here?

6). Numbers - UNT has 37,000 students who want so badly to have something to hang their hat on. It's a great school as we all know and yet it is often misunderstood and under appreciated. Despite our terrible performance on the field the student population keeps growing and keeps yearning for a good football team. The right guy could take this program to attendance heights yet to be seen. Dodge showed us a taste of that when he had 6500 fans for a spring game... it's there it just needs to be nourished. I would submit to you, hitting attendance numbers tied to incentives here would be a HELL of a lot easier than at SMU or other places. You just have to win... you just have to connect with the students and alumi. Mac tried God bless him, but it's not just rah rah, it's making a CONNECTION... and of course WINNING.

I think we all would be shocked if we knew how much interest there is from college coaches in this job, perhaps moreso than even some of the higher up the foodchain jobs that are out there. UNT has had 4 years of being an attractive job and this time it will be significantly more attractive than when Mac took it. GMG

Edited October 29, 2015 by Harry

Eagle-96 · October 29, 2015

It kind of falls under the store/restaurant in a failed location bit. If multiple business fail at a location then the location itself takes on a bad moniker. Another business goes in and, even though it may be a great business, people will tend to say "nothing ever makes it there"(we've all said it). The new business will likely fail as well based on location perception. This is the place we are currently stuck in for some poeple I think.

gangrene · October 29, 2015

Good post Harry. I'm tired of hearing all the excuses for why a good candidate wouldn't dare come here too. In fact, I started writing a similar list last week, but got sidetracked before I could finish it. I'll post my list in this thread later.

rws69 · October 29, 2015

Fully agree with your post Harry. I am reminded of the "sleeping giant" tag put on us a couple of years ago.

Travis · October 29, 2015

7. UNT job has nice C cups and a tight rear.

MeanGreenTexan · October 29, 2015

7. UNT job has nice C cups and a tight rear.

Major Applewhite's resume just came in. So did Bobby Petrino's!

DeepGreen · October 29, 2015

I first heard the term "sleeping giant" in 1994-95 from a Dallas newspaper article. They were talking about UNT moving up to D1a at the time.

im all for kicking the sleeping giant in the NUTS!

Eagle-96 · October 29, 2015

Major Applewhite's resume just came in. So did Bobby Petrino's!

I hear they will be Co-coaches as per RV.

MeanGreenD · October 29, 2015

Excellent post Harry. I wholeheartedly agree. I actually think this is an attractive job since despite the dismal season, next year has me feeling really good. All the pieces are there to go bowling next year and contend in CUSA West.

Florida is only OOC game we have a very little to no shot of winning. SMU, Army & Bethune are all winnable. We won't have to play the 3 top teams from CUSA East. We'll actually have a bye week mid-season.

DaMarcus is getting experience, he'll have the entire offseason to get familiar with a new system. The coach will also be able to recruit "his guy" as well and have him in here to compete after next year.

We're not losing much on the O-line, Thompson & Banogu are the only seniors in the group. Miles and Murray are young, they'll only get better. Murray is a monster of a man...

J-Will is something special, as has been pointed out numerous times.

Plenty of weapons that to throw to, will need TE's to step up.

Gray and McClain make for a solid safety duo. Corners are young, but getting experience this year. If new Coach brings in new D Coordinator, we won't line up 10 yards off WRs and may actually give em a chance to make some place.

We aren't losing much on the D-Line or at LB. There may be better replacements for Orr, Bean & Wallace. Harrison is 60 lbs heavier and McNair should be a beast.

Any candidate should be able to see this type of potential and recognize there is a strong chance here for early success. This makes the job even more attractive since taking this team to a bowl or CUSA Championship game next year would give this coach instant credibility among the fanbase, media, and most importantly, recruits. It would also help him build his resume for future offers as I do hope our next coach is hired away by a powerhouse P5 school that throws an insane amount of money at him and would reverse the "graveyard" trend.

Withers940 · October 29, 2015

nice animated GIF

Good God, that was an awesome Post. YOU THE MAN!!!! I couldnt agree with you more

MeanGreenTexan · October 29, 2015

Excellent post Harry. I wholeheartedly agree. I actually think this is an attractive job since despite the dismal season, next year has me feeling really good. All the pieces are there to go bowling next year and contend in CUSA West.
Florida is only OOC game we have a very little to no shot of winning. SMU, Army & Bethune are all winnable. We won't have to play the 3 top teams from CUSA East. We'll actually have a bye week mid-season.
DaMarcus is getting experience, he'll have the entire offseason to get familiar with a new system. The coach will also be able to recruit "his guy" as well and have him in here to compete after next year.
We're not losing much on the O-line, Thompson & Banogu are the only seniors in the group. Miles and Murray are young, they'll only get better. Murray is a monster of a man...
J-Will is something special, as has been pointed out numerous times.
Plenty of weapons that to throw to, will need TE's to step up.
Gray and McClain make for a solid safety duo. Corners are young, but getting experience this year. If new Coach brings in new D Coordinator, we won't line up 10 yards off WRs and may actually give em a chance to make some place.
We aren't losing much on the D-Line or at LB. There may be better replacements for Orr, Bean & Wallace. Harrison is 60 lbs heavier and McNair should be a beast.

Any candidate should be able to see this type of potential and recognize there is a strong chance here for early success. This makes the job even more attractive since taking this team to a bowl or CUSA Championship game next year would give this coach instant credibility among the fanbase, media, and most importantly, recruits. It would also help him build his resume for future offers as I do hope our next coach is hired away by a powerhouse P5 school that throws an insane amount of money at him and would reverse the "graveyard" trend.

Indeed.

drex · October 29, 2015

Nice reflections on the situation, Harry.

wardly · October 29, 2015

Guys,with all due respect, I can't think of but a very few players on our roster that play anywhere in CUSA except UTSA. We are the worst of the worst in D1 football. Two of the last three coaches we fired both stated that UNT is a school where it is hard to recruit. If it is hard to recruit players, it just might be hard to recruit coaches. I have asked for names of coaches who we think might be interested in our head coaching position as opposed to those who we might want and have gotten no response. Just because I think it might be harder to hire at UNT doesn't mean I am not a loyal longtime fan. I just happen to see more warts on the frog than others.

Graddean · October 29, 2015

I think there will be plenty of applicants. Coaches are like lawyers. They all think they can win if given time to implement their system. The leash for the HC at UNT will be longer than say for someone like Strong at Texas.

greenit · October 30, 2015

It kind of falls under the store/restaurant in a failed location bit. If multiple business fail at a location then the location itself takes on a bad moniker. Another business goes in and, even though it may be a great business, people will tend to say "nothing ever makes it there"(we've all said it). The new business will likely fail as well based on location perception. This is the place we are currently stuck in for some poeple I think.

I thought that was why we moved across the street?

MeanGreenZen · October 30, 2015

It kind of falls under the store/restaurant in a failed location bit. If multiple business fail at a location then the location itself takes on a bad moniker. Another business goes in and, even though it may be a great business, people will tend to say "nothing ever makes it there"(we've all said it). The new business will likely fail as well based on location perception. This is the place we are currently stuck in for some poeple I think.

If you want to go with the "failed restaurant location" bit then I think Harry is saying that the previous restaurant may have failed, but they just opened a Target and a Home Depot across the street and suddenly WAY more potential customers are in the area every day. The next restaurant at that location may be so busy they have a 30-minute wait on weeknights and refuse to advertise on Groupon because that is beneath them.

TheWestie · October 30, 2015

7. Bet the House BBQ

Bet_burnt%2BendsW.jpg

UNTpolitico · October 30, 2015

I have grown tiresome of all of the negative ned's who want to say "UNT is a coaching graveyard", or "Why would anyone take this job." or "we won't be able to land (insert coaches name here) because he already has a good thing going and is looking for a better gig etc.."
That's all hogwash! BS! Let me tell you why.
1). Tell me how many jobs out there pay $1 million a year? How many? I would say not many. My sense is this job will pay in the 900- 1.5 million range. There will also be a significant bump to assistant pay as well. NOTE TO SELF: ANY JOB PAYING 1 MILLION BUCKS IS ATTRACTIVE...PERIOD!
2). A chance to coach at the D-I level is only available for 128 very lucky people every year. That 128 out of probably thousands of qualified and dedicated coaches who have made a career of this who will never get the opportunity.
3). UNT's attractiveness as a coaching destination really just started in 2011. That was when Apogee stadium was unveiled. That was when we started paying competitively for both head and assistant coaches. That was when we basically were moving into a respected conference (C-USA). So for all of you who want to reach back to Theron Fouts days of roaming the sidelines when compiling the win loss records, I call BS. The first time in my lifetime that we stepped up to really play ball here was 2011. JUST 4 YEARS AGO. We "pretended" to participate but the truth was we were doing just enough to "get by" and created a revolving door of our top recruiting assistants every year.
4). UNT is not a pressure cooker job. Sure we expect results but a coach will be able to come here and show a lot of progress in year one. Some of these p5 gigs will be looking for damn near immediate results or they are going to fire you. UNT is a place were you can build your dream staff, implement your system, build things from the ground up and really there is nowhere to go but up. Mac said things were hard at North Texas, actually I think things are EASIER at North Texas than many jobs paying even less money!
5). Location Part 1 - can you say access to the biggest number of quality D-I recruits within a cars drive? No more airplanes, in fact you can hit some of the top high schools within 4-5 minutes of each other!! The focus of this hire is RECRUITING and where is a better place in the country to do that? Even if you don't get the top guys, I would submit there are so many who can play here you should still be able to dominate C-USA.
Location Part 2 -- every coach out there has a pretty wife and kids who want good neighbors, good shopping, good schools and a great place to live. Denton and DFW offer that in a big way. There are airports and tons of restaurants, things to do... it is a great place to raise a family, Why do you think so many corporations (Toyota etc) choose to relocate here?
6). Numbers - UNT has 37,000 students who want so badly to have something to hang their hat on. It's a great school as we all know and yet it is often misunderstood and under appreciated. Despite our terrible performance on the field the student population keeps growing and keeps yearning for a good football team. The right guy could take this program to attendance heights yet to be seen. Dodge showed us a taste of that when he had 6500 fans for a spring game... it's there it just needs to be nourished. I would submit to you, hitting attendance numbers tied to incentives here would be a HELL of a lot easier than at SMU or other places. You just have to win... you just have to connect with the students and alumi. Mac tried God bless him, but it's not just rah rah, it's making a CONNECTION... and of course WINNING.
I think we all would be shocked if we knew how much interest there is from college coaches in this job, perhaps moreso than even some of the higher up the foodchain jobs that are out there. UNT has had 4 years of being an attractive job and this time it will be significantly more attractive than when Mac took it. GMG

Harry I'm not sure whether to salute or just choke back a tear and say an amen. I completely agree, we are ready for a winning program a slow development of a program of well we are ready for someone who doesn't accept losing.. If we could get 3/4 of what we want I think myself and most of those here would be the biggest sellers of the mgc and season tickets.

croatan · October 30, 2015

Harry, good post and spot on imo. As an outsider I see North Texas as a true gem that has yet to be cultivated properly.

This could really be an up and coming program with the right person in place. The key as in everything is to find t h e right leadership for the job.

Priority number 1 has to be recruiting. You need a good evaluator of talent and a coach who understands he has to sell NOrth Texas as a place to come in and shape the program right away. More than anything else the new guy and his staff will have to b e willing to spend a crazy amount of time in local high schools and find kids that can be developed into good football players. Imo,the new coach needs to love recruiting and hire a staff that does as well.

Priority 2 has to be shifting to an offense that has the potential to score points in a hurry. No more pro style sets for NT. I think your new coach has to sell the program to recruits and fans alike as a fast and entertaining brand of football.

Priority 3, sell,sell and sell some more the UNT program as one that is worth playing for and one worth supporting. Sell the UNT brand as one that will fight to the last whistle, player and fan to win. The best college football coaches imo are great recruiters,hire good people and can sell the brand and narrative of the school to all constituents.

Wish you guys well in your search.

keith · October 30, 2015

I have grown tiresome of all of the negative ned's who want to say "UNT is a coaching graveyard", or "Why would anyone take this job." or "we won't be able to land (insert coaches name here) because he already has a good thing going and is looking for a better gig etc.."
That's all hogwash! BS! Let me tell you why.
1). Tell me how many jobs out there pay $1 million a year? How many? I would say not many. My sense is this job will pay in the 900- 1.5 million range. There will also be a significant bump to assistant pay as well. NOTE TO SELF: ANY JOB PAYING 1 MILLION BUCKS IS ATTRACTIVE...PERIOD!
2). A chance to coach at the D-I level is only available for 128 very lucky people every year. That 128 out of probably thousands of qualified and dedicated coaches who have made a career of this who will never get the opportunity.
3). UNT's attractiveness as a coaching destination really just started in 2011. That was when Apogee stadium was unveiled. That was when we started paying competitively for both head and assistant coaches. That was when we basically were moving into a respected conference (C-USA). So for all of you who want to reach back to Theron Fouts days of roaming the sidelines when compiling the win loss records, I call BS. The first time in my lifetime that we stepped up to really play ball here was 2011. JUST 4 YEARS AGO. We "pretended" to participate but the truth was we were doing just enough to "get by" and created a revolving door of our top recruiting assistants every year.
4). UNT is not a pressure cooker job. Sure we expect results but a coach will be able to come here and show a lot of progress in year one. Some of these p5 gigs will be looking for damn near immediate results or they are going to fire you. UNT is a place were you can build your dream staff, implement your system, build things from the ground up and really there is nowhere to go but up. Mac said things were hard at North Texas, actually I think things are EASIER at North Texas than many jobs paying even less money!
5). Location Part 1 - can you say access to the biggest number of quality D-I recruits within a cars drive? No more airplanes, in fact you can hit some of the top high schools within 4-5 minutes of each other!! The focus of this hire is RECRUITING and where is a better place in the country to do that? Even if you don't get the top guys, I would submit there are so many who can play here you should still be able to dominate C-USA.
Location Part 2 -- every coach out there has a pretty wife and kids who want good neighbors, good shopping, good schools and a great place to live. Denton and DFW offer that in a big way. There are airports and tons of restaurants, things to do... it is a great place to raise a family, Why do you think so many corporations (Toyota etc) choose to relocate here?
6). Numbers - UNT has 37,000 students who want so badly to have something to hang their hat on. It's a great school as we all know and yet it is often misunderstood and under appreciated. Despite our terrible performance on the field the student population keeps growing and keeps yearning for a good football team. The right guy could take this program to attendance heights yet to be seen. Dodge showed us a taste of that when he had 6500 fans for a spring game... it's there it just needs to be nourished. I would submit to you, hitting attendance numbers tied to incentives here would be a HELL of a lot easier than at SMU or other places. You just have to win... you just have to connect with the students and alumi. Mac tried God bless him, but it's not just rah rah, it's making a CONNECTION... and of course WINNING.
I think we all would be shocked if we knew how much interest there is from college coaches in this job, perhaps moreso than even some of the higher up the foodchain jobs that are out there. UNT has had 4 years of being an attractive job and this time it will be significantly more attractive than when Mac took it. GMG

See, now this is what happens every year. However, it's normally leading up to the start of the season when we're still wide-eyed, bushy-tailed and with a 0 in the loss column. Harry gets us all fired up about the great things we're about to experience as Mean Green fans. The future's bright (there's an annual run on green-colored eye glasses), we have playmakers at every position, we're faster, stronger and bigger than we've ever been, the two-deep is solid, the coaching staff is prepared...how could we not win a conference championship and go bowling. Sure, it *could* happen, but this is our year. We will prove all the naysayers wrong and finally give this sleeping giant a kick in the rear. Then, and unfortunately a lot more often than not, reality sets in and everything comes crashing down. It turns out all those pre-season polls were right after all. What began with so much promise ends in utter disappointment. The good thing is we all seem to have short memories and after a few months of despair all is forgotten. Fall approaches and the cycle starts all over again.

Keeping my fingers crossed Harry that everything you say comes true and we finally break the cycle.

akriesman · October 30, 2015

Terrific post Harry. We needed that here.

meangreenbob · October 30, 2015

I have grown tiresome of all of the negative ned's who want to say "UNT is a coaching graveyard", or "Why would anyone take this job." or "we won't be able to land (insert coaches name here) because he already has a good thing going and is looking for a better gig etc.."
That's all hogwash! BS! Let me tell you why.
1). Tell me how many jobs out there pay $1 million a year? How many? I would say not many. My sense is this job will pay in the 900- 1.5 million range. There will also be a significant bump to assistant pay as well. NOTE TO SELF: ANY JOB PAYING 1 MILLION BUCKS IS ATTRACTIVE...PERIOD!
2). A chance to coach at the D-I level is only available for 128 very lucky people every year. That 128 out of probably thousands of qualified and dedicated coaches who have made a career of this who will never get the opportunity.
3). UNT's attractiveness as a coaching destination really just started in 2011. That was when Apogee stadium was unveiled. That was when we started paying competitively for both head and assistant coaches. That was when we basically were moving into a respected conference (C-USA). So for all of you who want to reach back to Theron Fouts days of roaming the sidelines when compiling the win loss records, I call BS. The first time in my lifetime that we stepped up to really play ball here was 2011. JUST 4 YEARS AGO. We "pretended" to participate but the truth was we were doing just enough to "get by" and created a revolving door of our top recruiting assistants every year.
4). UNT is not a pressure cooker job. Sure we expect results but a coach will be able to come here and show a lot of progress in year one. Some of these p5 gigs will be looking for damn near immediate results or they are going to fire you. UNT is a place were you can build your dream staff, implement your system, build things from the ground up and really there is nowhere to go but up. Mac said things were hard at North Texas, actually I think things are EASIER at North Texas than many jobs paying even less money!
5). Location Part 1 - can you say access to the biggest number of quality D-I recruits within a cars drive? No more airplanes, in fact you can hit some of the top high schools within 4-5 minutes of each other!! The focus of this hire is RECRUITING and where is a better place in the country to do that? Even if you don't get the top guys, I would submit there are so many who can play here you should still be able to dominate C-USA.
Location Part 2 -- every coach out there has a pretty wife and kids who want good neighbors, good shopping, good schools and a great place to live. Denton and DFW offer that in a big way. There are airports and tons of restaurants, things to do... it is a great place to raise a family, Why do you think so many corporations (Toyota etc) choose to relocate here?
6). Numbers - UNT has 37,000 students who want so badly to have something to hang their hat on. It's a great school as we all know and yet it is often misunderstood and under appreciated. Despite our terrible performance on the field the student population keeps growing and keeps yearning for a good football team. The right guy could take this program to attendance heights yet to be seen. Dodge showed us a taste of that when he had 6500 fans for a spring game... it's there it just needs to be nourished. I would submit to you, hitting attendance numbers tied to incentives here would be a HELL of a lot easier than at SMU or other places. You just have to win... you just have to connect with the students and alumi. Mac tried God bless him, but it's not just rah rah, it's making a CONNECTION... and of course WINNING.
I think we all would be shocked if we knew how much interest there is from college coaches in this job, perhaps moreso than even some of the higher up the foodchain jobs that are out there. UNT has had 4 years of being an attractive job and this time it will be significantly more attractive than when Mac took it. GMG

Great post!

Matt from A700 · October 30, 2015

If I was an aspiring head coach, I would love to be the guy that turned a program around. It may take a few years, but the result would be so rewarding. And then sustaining that success, which Mac couldn't do.

It is a hotbed for football in the 4th largest metro area in the nation with all sorts of outlets for entertainment, etc. "North Texas is a hard place to recruit to" is such bullshit.

Mike Jackson · October 30, 2015

Great post Harry and I hope all the things you listed overcome the deplorable leadership that has been on display for the majority of the past 10 years. I get what you are saying about "really trying" since 2011 but I still think that is a fairly weak excuse. If Darrell Dickey had success here with the resources he had at UNT the time, there is no way UNT should have had the horrible records since his departure. The Dodge hire wasn't so bad because of the results it was terrible because they could have brought him in as Offensive Coordinator and paid hime 25k more a year than what he maded as head coach and pay a head coach at least 5 years experience at the college 50k more than Dodge. That would not have broken the bank and I put that lack of foresight on RV. They could have even made Dickey's defensive coordinator as head coach and brought Dodge. That could have been an awesome combination.

Edited October 30, 2015 by Mike Jackson

southsideguy · October 30, 2015

let face you could make a pretty good living and live in Denton. You win 9 games a season her you are a football good, at the big schools you get fired. No pressure here.