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January 3, 2011

The Peril of Pederson

Filed under: Athletic Department,Football — Chas @ 6:06 pm

Let’s start this off by first suggesting you go over to Cardiac Hill and read Anson’s observation on Pederson having to go to the assistant coaches and apologize for essentially ignoring and blowing them off for nearly a month. I read the same piece and it just never clicked to me that Pederson was that stupid.

Right now, the fans are crying for Pederson’s head as well over this debacle. Predictably, you have media people defending him. It is a bit of bull since the defense consists  primarily based on the work he did the first time as AD at Pitt. That’s nice, but that is like defending Johnny Majors in the 90s for the work he did at Pitt in the 70s.

When Nebraska fired Pederson, the rumors immediately started that Pitt — which was in need of a new AD — would take him back.  I was not in favor of it. There were the typical arguments in favor of it, but the real reason appeared to be that Chancellor Nordenberg was comfortable with Pederson.

Pederson is not a subtle AD. He works in broad big project situations. When he came to Pitt in the 90s he was needed. The athletic department was a mess. There was no direction. If you want to analogize it to a home renovation, the only thing that was still solid was the foundation. The whole house, though, was a wreck. The plumbing, the electric, roof, walls. However you feel about the man, he did a lot of hard work to get Pitt athletics away from the absolute suckitude of the 90s. Doing that required a lot of drive and aggressiveness to keep pushing to change — and yes a certain arrogance.

Then Nebraska, his alma mater, came calling. They came because they did know they needed change. Osbourne was retiring. It was no longer enough to be merely a football school. Especially with Texas and Oklahoma resurgent. Pederson was brought in to make changes.

The difference is, the Nebraska house was in need of an update. Not rebuilding. It wasn’t in need of anything radical. Some new furniture.  Update the cabinetry and swap out that black formica counter top for granite in the kitchen. Redo the bathrooms. Pull up the carpet and go with hardwood in the house. Maybe fix the landscaping and redo the driveway. Most of these things require working with the homeowner. Staying in their comfort zone and listening while trying to affect the changes needed.

Pederson didn’t do that. He charged aggressively and arrogantly at Nebraska. The firing of Solich — like the firing of Wannstedt — was seen by most of the fanbase as a needed and necessary thing. Even if it was uncomfortable because of the loyalties and ties; and debatable when viewed only on the basis of the previous season or two.

The hiring process was a debacle. The arrogance in dealing with people, alumni and boosters. Plus making abrupt changes to the Nebraska athletic department made enemies. It meant that he had no base of support, other than the results, i.e., winning. If they did that, then the moves were necessary to bring a stodgy outdated athletic department into the modern times.

That didn’t happen. Not just in football, but basketball. The questions became sharper in asking what the point of such radical changes to the culture of Nebraska athletics if teams didn’t improve. And in fact got worse.

His return to Pitt had been mostly low-key. He almost seemed to have learned something. That Pitt no longer needed to be overhauled. That he had to take a step back and not push for change so hard. He was working on the olympic sports. Essentially continuing the work Jeff Long had been doing. No need to mess with basketball (men or women) and football seemed stable. The only time he was in media was for extensions for the coaches or helping to promote the 2010 football season.

And 2010 Pitt football went to hell.

He had to act. There is only a small minority that disagrees there.

It’s just that in the big moment, he fell back to old patterns and habits. He was the search committee. He avoided people. he helped shut down information. He (according to plenty of rumors) ignored red flags and/or was not as diligent in his background checks. In short he went back to his arrogant ways of ignoring all information offered and any advice. It was all Pederson.

For whatever reason, he basically avoided the entire football staff the minute Wannstedt was fired. He avoided the players. He avoided the coaches. He closed himself off to them. I don’t know why. Guilt? Arrogance. General dickishness? I can’t say.

He did, however, burn and ignite bridges. He put himself out there alone. Maybe assuming he would get all the credit for making the hard choices. Now, he is alone out there to take all the blame. Either way. He’s earned it, and will pay the price.





XBlackMagicX, I get where you’re coming from, but they’re not the same guy! Those are good qualities that we like to have in a coach. It’s just like an athlete, two guys may similar abilities, but one performs better. Who knows? I just don’t like a lot of the other canidates and that makes me looks at the qualities that I think are important. Wanny had a lot of good qualities, but he didn’t perform to expectations.

Comment by Justinian 01.04.11 @ 11:37 am

“I guess my main problem with Bradley is that he is basically Wanny”

Black Magic, do you think that Bradley can win 10 games and get us ranked 15th in the country like Wanny did in ’09? Any problem with that?

Comment by BigGuy 01.04.11 @ 11:42 am

I think that saying that a guy has the good qualities that Wannstedt had doesnt mean he also has the bad ones that Wannstedt had…

The three biggest flaws of Wanny:

1.) Gameday coaching and preparation including his “play not to lose” attitude.

2.) Too much of a friend to the players and not a leader.

3.) Was never able to coach up his players, get more out of them than their talent level.

I too would love to see Malzahn but is that realistic?

Comment by Coach Ditka 01.04.11 @ 11:44 am

If Malzahn turned down $3 mil to take the Vandy job and stay in the SEC — albeit with a conference bottom-feeder — what makes anyone think he would take the Pitt job?

Comment by Scott 01.04.11 @ 11:51 am

Smizik feeling lazy today and re-posted CBS article on Richrod. He also endorsed him! What a fitting ending THAT would be to this very bad dream. Scary part is I’m almost liking the idea. I’m so ashamed of myself. I need to shower now.

Comment by FG 01.04.11 @ 11:57 am

BigGuy, or should i say somebody in the wannstedt family

every time you pull out that stupid 10 win stat ill remind you that Pitt beat zero top 25 teams that year and was favored to win every game they played… possibly the easiest schedule in BCS competition history

Comment by DeVanzo 01.04.11 @ 12:06 pm

“Pitt…was favored to win every game they played”

DeVanzo, I think that I’ve got it. Ohio State is a crappy program and they should change coaches because they were favored to win in every (or nearly every) game that they played.

Comment by BigGuy 01.04.11 @ 12:24 pm

Wannstedt family member…

are you attempting to suggest there is anything remotely similar with the schedule Ohio State played in 2009 with the creampuff fest pitt played in 2009? HAHAHAAH…

also, they were NOT favored against USC and lost

oh, and then theres that part where they won the big games necessary to go the BCS game (rose bowl)
link to en.wikipedia.org

just cant fight that wannstedt intellect…

Comment by DeVanzo 01.04.11 @ 12:31 pm

HAHAHA and then theres the part where you omitted the “Pitt beat zero top 25 teams that year ” in your quote

because OSU beat 4 ranked teams

Comment by DeVanzo 01.04.11 @ 12:32 pm

We truly have become a national joke. This quote from rivals.com national recruiting analyst Mike Farrell:

“Everything they did to bungle this, if there was a ‘Screw Up Your Program For Dummies’ book, they would follow this step by step.”

Comment by Scott 01.04.11 @ 12:40 pm

Ever hear of KC Keeler. Coach at I-AA Delaware. Look for him to be named as a coach at a I-A school. Not saying I want him at Pitt but he will surface somewhere. Just an example of how many good coaches are out there. Pitt needs to look every where.
link to delawareonline.com

Comment by notrocketscience 01.04.11 @ 12:42 pm

Welcome to the party Notrocketscience. Next time you may want to scroll up and read the other posts.

🙂

Comment by Tony in Harrisburg 01.04.11 @ 12:57 pm

DeVanzo, you might be right. In each of the three past years, Pitt finished in a tie for 2nd in the BE. This was after all the talent that DW recruited. What an embarrassment! I’ll bet every team in the BE had better records than Pitt over the past three years and recruited better than DW. No wonder you wanted him gone. Of the seven other coaches in the BE, I know that most (or all) are more talented than BW. Whom in the league should we replace him with? Well, too bad it can’t be Edsall. He knows how did get his kick-off return man to run back a kick-off 95 yards for a TD, and he knew how to get Ray Graham to fumble to beat Pitt. (OK. Edsall did have a little problem with Rutgers.) Gee, but for one fumble, Pitt would have been in a BSC game and DW may not have been fired.

Comment by BigGuy 01.04.11 @ 12:58 pm

Comment by Tony in Harrisburg 01.04.11 @ 1:01 pm

Maybe we should be thankful for the fumble, BigGuy. 🙂

Comment by Scott 01.04.11 @ 1:03 pm

BigGuy Wannstedt… or just BGW from now on…

now that your last argument was wasted typing… let me explain how this one, which youve made 50 times before is as well…

despite asking what if about all of the big games buffoon blew… why dont you accept that they DID happen and we DID lose and we DIDNT play in one major bowl in his 6 long years here… i have to wonder, what thoughts were going through your head after Cincy at Heinz Field in 09??

GEE WILLY! what a great coach! how well he handled his job as special teams coach kicking right at mardy gilyard! geeeeee! soo smart! way to blitz all first half then sit back and watch Tony Pike tear your conservative defense to shreds! Geeeeeeee weve got the ball deep in the red zone in a tie game with less than a minute left and our opponent lacking time outs… should we run the clock out??? NOOOOOO lets go right for the end zone and kick to gilyard and watch Cincy go to the BCS…

cause thats what i was thinking… what a year! how lucky we were to have buffoon!! hes the best coach in the big east! we rule!

no more talk of years past… please!
i mean, at least drag Virgil or some of the other wanny apologists out with you so you have some allies!

by the way… i do like this talk of Keeler AT LEAST as OC… he has done a FANTASTIC job with qb’s

and do his comments on his alma mater… see: Rodriguez, Rich – 2007 section

Comment by DeVanzo 01.04.11 @ 1:11 pm

Tony

My bad. I guess I skipped too many posts.

Comment by notrocketscience 01.04.11 @ 1:12 pm

If what Scott says is true about Austin having the inside track, does Bradley want to be out of State College bad enough to be our DC? Would rather see Bradley as HC and Austin as DC though. With a non vanilla defense we at least beat UConn and maybe ND and Utah. Oh and better special teams would have helped in those games as well!

Wish Cigs had stayed around long enough to see what happens. Dont blame him for not wanting to wait though IMO he will do well at RU. He wanted so badly to have his family back in the burgh; at least NJ is closer than Cal. Life of a coach…

Comment by AZPANTHER 01.04.11 @ 1:24 pm

Just messing with you. Keeler is the ONLY guy that has Championship winning background, a clean program, TWO of his last 3 QB’s in the NFL and runs a exciting offense.

Plus he making 300K now so Pitt could still triple that and be where they want to be on the pay scale.

Comment by Tony in Harrisburg 01.04.11 @ 1:29 pm

I loved Wanny as a coach and defended him for a while, but his blunders in big games just piled up way too much for me. But regardless of if you loved Wanny or hated Wanny, it doesn’t matter. He’s gone as coach. Time to press on.

Has anyone seen a legit list of possible candidates?

Comment by XBlackMagicX 01.04.11 @ 1:36 pm

DeVanzo, six coaches in the 30 years since Sherrill left. Each of those coaches won National Championships. Whoops. I just reviewed the stat book. None of them did, and they were all let go because their records were less than desirable. Ah, but this time it is going to be different. Now I see how it works.

Comment by BigGuy 01.04.11 @ 1:39 pm

I agree. I knew nothing about Keeler before reading that article…oh, and the many posts about him above 🙂
I just want a proven winner…one winning year in the MAC does not count.

Comment by notrocketscience 01.04.11 @ 1:42 pm

Magic,

No one has and no one will based on what happened last time.

Haywood was never really a serious candidate until he showed up on campus. With Nordy running the show it’s safe to expect more of the same.

The only way we may find out is if someone sees a candidate and Nordy in public somewhere….like maybe a Denny’s in Monroeville both wearing hats, dark glasses and trench coats.

Comment by Tony in Harrisburg 01.04.11 @ 1:43 pm

I have been watching Keeler since Flacco transferred. He looks like a hell of a coach that is loved by the community.

Guess I should email his resume over to Nordy since the SEARCH firm in Atlanta is clueless.

Comment by Tony in Harrisburg 01.04.11 @ 1:50 pm

Black magic, please tell me we aren’t as pathetic, and hopeless, as Vandy? We might be in a pathetic patch right now, but we aren’t hopeless, ar we?

All- I still can’t get excited about Bradley, but I am not horrified, either. (rich rod, now that is horrifying) but I am excited by the idea of Joe exiting PSU and JayPa trying to run things, as soon as Bradley leaves. Can you say silver lining?

Comment by Pwmcdupitt 01.04.11 @ 2:14 pm

I actually think Pitt is a better program than Vandy. It is nearly impossible to win at Vandy because the SEC is so loaded. And Vandy has no tradition. Seems like a no win situation. I just said the 3 million thing to show that Malzhan would be pretty expensive.

Comment by XBlackMagicX 01.04.11 @ 2:24 pm

Vandy is an academic powerhouse in a conference with much lower standards. Vandy, Duke, Northwestern, Rice and Stanford are the academic schools playing major college football.
Pitt is a solid school, however, it is not too difficult to get in to the school if you are a good athlete (we have much lower standards than Vandy, etc.)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I am not a big Bradley fan because I have the suspicion that he is an “old warhorse” and will not bring new and innovative ideas to our tired offense and defense. Bradley will be able to recruit, however, the play calling might be more of the same….VANILLA! Under Bradley I can see Pitt going 8-4, maybe 9-3. In other words your basic 17th-25th ranked team.
My choices based on what I know of young head coaches who are in Pitt’s limited price range are:
Keeler and Ken Niamatulolo (Navy). Two coaches on the way up who have proven records of getting the most out of the talent they have. Navy has been nothing short of amazing given all the restrictions that must be dealt with at a Service Academy. Delaware is a great program that shines brightly almost every year!!

Comment by isnore 01.04.11 @ 3:02 pm

Might not be different this time, but, staying at mediocrity is not the answer.

Comment by Dan 01.04.11 @ 3:42 pm

I LOVE the idea of Navy’s coach, but I would bet he has had great offers before. It is out of thin air, but I have the impression that he is one of those long term guys, who really enjoys being at a place where football practice is the EASIEST part of his players day. A lot of his players would never have gotten into Navy except for their talent, and athletes at the academy do get a lot of breaks, compared to the rest of the students, but their out of practice expectations are worlds away from any other football player, at any level. Except Army.

Comment by Pwmcdupitt 01.04.11 @ 4:51 pm

I’m really liking what I hear about Keeler.I’m curious why his name hasn’t popped up before. And it might appeal to SP. I get the impression that he likes to see himself as someone who can discover small college coaches who will succeed in the big time. He was right on with Howland, and I think he was trying for the same thing with Haywood.
The thing that bothers me about Bradley is that, while there are no strong reasons to think he would be not be successful here, his lack of head-coaching experience makes his hire a real crapshoot. Proving to have the administrative skills to run an overall program is the most important factor in a new head coach. A lot of outstanding coordinators just do not have that skill, as has been discussed in this forum. We have a lot of speculation that he performs a lot of JoPa’s duties, but that’s not much to go on. I’m sure he is a good recruiter, but the guy who recruited W.Pa before Bradley probably did a good job too. PSU has not exactly been a hard sell.

Comment by auggie from latrobe 01.04.11 @ 5:06 pm

I would be more interested in firing Pederson and keep Bennett as the interim through next season. That gives us the ability to find a new AD, stabilize any mess he may have created (beyond what we can see), install the AD and begin a proper search for a new coach. Hell, let Wannstadt act as interim AD as well.

Comment by Pitt it IS 01.04.11 @ 5:41 pm

Can’t we all see through this and realize it is not Pederson’s fault..
It is the Pitt Alum. and Donors, and even some fans fault! Wannstedt was forced out, causing this situation. He breathes Pitt football and was forced out after a tie for the Big East champions.
Also, Pederson made a GOOD hire. Yes, the guy got arrested. But can you tell me any way that Pederson could have seen this coming??? NO. Going through people and players I know that he is a very disciplined coach, and took no sh!t at Miami OH. He whipped those boys in line. The matter of fact here is that he made one mistake, and it should not call for the whole athletic department at Pitt to collapse because of it.
People make mistakes…. Rick Pitino at UofL- he was convicted of those charges, and then had 2 or so players go to jail, all within a very short amount of time. Now, until last week they were top 25 in the country and have one of the best recruiting classes next year.
AMEN

Comment by MattyIce 01.04.11 @ 6:02 pm

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Comment by soccer store 01.12.11 @ 1:35 pm

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