This thread is ridiculous. It’s blindingly obvious what the OP is doing: setting up a no-win scenario for a coach he clearly thinks was wrongly hired. His premise: any good coach could win 10 games with this roster and this easy schedule... but he also states later that if Mullen does win 10, it doesn’t mean he’s good because the roster is talented and the schedule is easy. Dumb.
First, OL is atrocious. If you look at recruit rankings of projected starters, they are in the bottom third of the conference... AND they’ve had terrible coaches developing them. How can you expect them to be competent after one offseason with POTENTIALLY good coaching?
Second, LB is a dumpster fire.... at one of the most important positions in a 3-4 scheme. Safety isn’t much better.
Third, you say don’t discuss QBs but that’s insane - it’s the most important position and will likely undermine any chance of winning 10 games. You can’t just dismiss that part of the argument because it’s inconvenient for your narrative.
Finally, you might have a valid point about this roster and this schedule if these guys had good coaching and development for the last 3 or 4 years but they haven’t. They are installing completely different schemes on both sides of the ball AND revamping the S&C program. Winning 8 games this year with those VERY REAL constraints would be very impressive. Give Mullen a chance - don’t set impossibly stupid standards that you will still undermine if they are met.
1. I do not think Mullen was wrongly hired. He was not my choice for the job, but he was hired by Foley/Strickland and they are the people with the authority to make such a hire.
2. Thus I did not set up Mullen in a no win situation. If anyone did, Mullen/Strickland/Foley did. I merely looked at the schedule and ticked off the wins I thought UF should get with good not great coaching.
3. You mention OL and LB. That is the type of discussion I was trying to get going. My purpose for this thread was to get people to give their views on the roster. The reason I started it was when I say that a good coach should win 10 games against this schedule, lots of people say not with this roster not with standing the 4 and 5 year recruiting rankings that say UF has recruited better than many of its opponents on this years schedule.
4. I said I did not want to hear about QB because that topic had been discussed ad nauseam here and I was not looking for repeats of the easy answer.
5. You raise an interesting point about strength and conditioning, but that in fact can be changed a great deal in one off season, if it was even a problem.
6. We have seen new schemes installed prior to this in one off season. UF went from scoring 23.6 points per game in 1989 to 33.7 points per game in 1990 while switching from an Emmitt Smith running offense to a Spurrier offence. So it can be done.
7. Let's try a counter factual here, what if UF had hired Spurrier this year. Would you be saying the talent was not there to win 9 games against this schedule?
8. I don't set the standards at UF. I am just one fan with one fan's opinion. As you can tell from above, I remember Spurrier being hired. I know that going 9-2 his first year did not make us all assume he would have the career at UF that he had. I know even two and three years there was uncertainty if Spurrier would do what he was doing every year for a long period of time. Mullen as any coach would be is of course in the same boat. I think any good coach should win 10 games against this schedule. The most I could accomplish by stating this opinion is to help some people buying into fool's gold if Mullen wins 10 games this year but turns out not to be the right guy. I probably will not even impact that. Heck right now there is a guy on another thread who bought into the idea that Muschamp had a good season one year at UF when it took a miracle blocked punt to beat U-La-La and UF scraped by againt several other bad teams. So I do not think my opinion affect fans much at all.