State of “The U”: Recovering from the Coker Era

In order to understand where the Miami Hurricanes football program is at this current time, it is helpful to look at the events that led up to the current regime taking over. 

Many will look at Miami’s recruiting classes and scoff at the number of five-, four- and three-star players compared to schools like Florida and Texas.  But remember, when the Hurricanes came off of their last national title, they were reeling in four-and five-star recruits seemingly on a daily basis. All of that successful recruiting didn’t lead to national titles. It led to a lot of losing, busts, transfers, and Larry Coker being jettisoned as the program crumbled under his watch.

Recruiting is only a piece of the puzzle, and if you get the wrong players in your program regardless of their star rating, it can have a dramatic effect on the program.

Randy Shannon made a tough decision early in his tenure. He did not like the attitude or work ethic of the Coker-Era players and benched many of them in favor of younger, hungrier recruits. That was a bold decision. He knew it would more than likely lead to sub-par seasons by Miami standards and put him directly in the doghouse with many fans.

Let’s look at the recruiting information from the Coker Era (2001–2006). One hunderd fourty total recruits were signed, and here are the ones who turned out to be decent or great players:

Kellen Winslow II
Antrel Rolle
Vince Wilfork
Kelly Jennings
Roscoe Parrish
Rocky McIntosh
Frank Gore
Quadtrine Hill

Devin Hester
Brandon Merriweather
Sinorice Moss
Jon Peattie
Baraka Atkins

Greg Olsen
Jonathan Beason
Eric Moncur [Reach]
Kevin Everett [Reach]

Calais Campbell
Joe Joseph
Anthony Reddick

Kenneth Phillips
Randy Phillips [Reach]
Bruce Johnson [Reach]
A.J. Trump
Daryl Sharpton

Javarris James
Dedrick Epps
Jason Fox
Orlando Franklin
Sam Shields [Reach]
Graig Cooper
Colin McCarthy
Chavez Grant [Reach]
Matt Bosher

Total:  34 successful recruits

I may have left some off who should be on there, but overall, this is a fairly accurate list.  Out of 140 recruits in the Coker Era, only 34 can be said to have made a fairly significant impact. As I was looking through the list, a lot of the players were not with the program more than a year or two.

The names I put [Reach] next to means it’s hard to say if they were all that great when they were at Miami, but they did play/start a lot of games. This is what Shannon was handed, and let’s not forget many of the players I didn’t list who were busts like Ryan Moore, Ryan Hill, Akieem Jolla, Kyle Wright, Lance Leggett, and Willie Williams. Plus, a few recruits ending up transferring to New Mexico State!

At elite programs, if you miss on that many recruits, you are going to suffer. All of the elite coaches are only as good as their assistant coaches and the recruits that they bring in. Think about Florida State and how good they were until Mark Richt and Chuck Amato left the program; they have not been the same since.

Bob Stoops has had assistants leave and Oklahoma has suffered a bit, and I am quite sure Florida is going to go through the same thing, especially with Charlie Strong taking over at Louisville and Dan Mullen already at Mississippi State. 

Shannon hasn’t been a head coach long enough to develop a long list of coordinator candidates that he has previous experience with. So he has to base his hires off of interviewing, best fit for the program and track record. Patrick Nix didn’t work out in two seasons and was fired. Mark Whipple replaced him and improved this offense significantly.

We are on our third defensive coordinator after firing Tim Walton, and Bill Young left to go back to his alma mater. Young's transfer and Dirk Koetter taking a job with the Jacksonville Jaguars rather than being Miami’s offensive coordinator are out of Shannon’s control. He made an effort to bring in good people, but they took other offers. 

Everyone can call for Shannon’s head and just may get it in a year or two if things don’t get better, but it won’t matter as long as the administration does not want to spend money on experienced coaching talent. If they get rid of Shannon, we aren’t hiring Nick Saban, Bob Stoops, Urban Meyer or any other big-name coaches. So get those thoughts out of your head.

All the fans complaining are living in the “We are the U” days and don’t want to take a realistic view at what’s going on in the program. Shannon is not perfect. No one ever said that he was. I don’t make excuses for his poor clock management at times, and I am still bewildered at why our linebackers just haven’t cut the mustard the past few years. 

But I see the program going in a positive direction. It may not be as fast as some want it to, but I don’t see anyone offering any sort of alternative solution that makes sense.  When Miami fired Coker, it was apparent that a rebuilding project needed to be undertaken for the program. We will see if Randy Shannon has what it takes to complete this task.