Written as/before Taylor was being fired and posting here for discussion per @Jamesy2 request:
I don’t know if Troy Taylor is in his last week at Stanford, his last nine months, or has us over such a barrel financially that the Taylor era could endure further still. But there is so little hope or enthusiasm around the program that my mind keeps coming back to wanting there to be a coaching search and turning the page. I’ll throw out some thoughts in the hope of eliciting reactions/seeing what others think/hopefully hearing a few inspiring names bandied about.
If we jettisoned Taylor before or during the 2025 season, the in-house options are sparse. The two most experienced leaders on the staff, Gregory and D’Onofrio, are now gone. April has a pedigree but is light on experience. He is probably the most stable option as it would maintain as much continuity as possible while elevating the part of the staff that evidently has not alienated the team.
No matter who an interim coach is, it’s hard not to shudder at the fate of the offense. Taylor has made himself literally indispensable to the offense. (A sad comment considering we have sucked on offense during his tenure) Absent a miracle a Taylor-less 2025 offense would potentially contend for one of the worst in power football history. I am having trouble even envisioning who could be in charge. I think we’d be so desperate that having a brilliant amateur like Andrew Luck or Todd Husak step in would have to be in the realm of discussion.
If we moved to fill the position more permanently, there are of course fewer options now than there would be in November or December. The first place one would think to look would be unemployed coaches. I started to post that Luck might be inclined to consider us a mutually beneficial option for his ally/mentor/confidant Pep Hamilton (not saying I’d recommend this) but then I remembered Hamilton just returned to coaching with the offensive coordinator job at Maryland. Nonetheless, I would not be surprised if that’s a call whenever the job comes open. Among the currently unemployed (at least as coaches), the mind first races to shock the world pipedreams like Nick Saban, Urban Meyer, and Chris Petersen. I’d make the calls if I were Luck but that’s almost surely day dreaming.
Something that strikes me as more realistic would be offering to be career reclamation/a path back to a power job for somebody like Jimbo Fisher, Gary Patterson, Pat Fitzgerald, Paul Chryst, or Justin Fuente. This might be one of the flashier things we could do. I realize there are baggage with some and likelihood of mediocrity with others (I’d bet Chryst or Fuente would be pretty mediocre at Stanford but I’d take it at this point) but I don’t think we should be dissuaded from considering one of the better combinations of safe/splashy potentially out there for us.
if we wait until the end of the season our options would presumably open up more. One route I can’t get out of my head is the possibility we could buy low when a better program gives up on their head coach. It is possible one or more of the following could get their walking papers or otherwise find themselves under too much pressure to be fun: Kalen DeBoer, Mike Norvell, Mike Gundy, Mark Stoops, Luke Fickell, Brian Kelly, Lincoln Riley, Billy Napier, Hugh Freeze. I realize some would be non-starters and most would probably not consider slumming to our level but this is a caliber of coach that if I were Luck I’d strain every ligament sprinting to the airport.
The other splashy route I can’t get out of my head is the former NFL head coach route. The combination of that route’s empirical success, connection to the zeitgeist/professionalization of college football, and Luck’s Rolodex makes that intriguing. The first name that pops to mind for me is Matt Eberflus. I would be intrigued by the Cowboys DC/former Bears head man. Luck also has close ties with Rob Chudzinski, though he was only an NFL head coach for a year. Luck’s network is of course broader than who he shared locker rooms with but there aren’t a ton of options that jump out to me (Brandon Staley maybe, and I have written in the past about Jerod Mayo’s unique and appealing fit).
Luck could also look to his network to elevate someone to a first time head coach role. At first blush Kentucky DC Brad White and Tavita Pritchard strike me as the rising stars. But again, nothing to say it has to be somebody who shared the same locker room.
Looking beyond Luck’s network, my ambition for us is always that we could strive for a proven baller college coach. We never do this and it would require money, plus a hell of a sales job to convince somebody to leave a better program. But I will just say for the record that poaching somebody like Matt Campbell, Lance Leipold, Chris Klieman, Sonny Dykes, Bret Bielema, Curt Cignetti, PJ Fleck, Dave Aranda, or Jamey Chadwell would be the fastest way to my heart.
I am cognizant that my ambition may exceed Stanford’s grasp. A pretty conventional path for a Power Four coach is a Group of Five coach who has succeeded. We should keep an eye this fall on how the following (and others) do: Bob Chesney, Jon Sumrall, Jeff Monken, GJ Kinne, Chuck Martin, Tim Albin, KC Keeler, Eric Morris, Mike Uremovich, Butch Jones, Clay Helton, Bronco Mendenhall.
A lot of those guys aren’t good geographic fits (which I hope we wouldn’t consider a deal breaker but they might). The same is true for rising star coordinators, which, given the success of blue blood coordinators moving up in recent years, we might want to kick some tires on. I have to think Glenn Schumann, for instance, has a big job in his future. I’d be shocked if he picked us, but you don’t make shots you don’t take.
One name arguably stands alone in how enticing it would be: Chip Kelly would be a fun way to turn the page on this era of Stanford football.
This is all just idle day dreaming and, ultimately, Stanford’s financial and institutional constraints will play a big role. There are issues related to fit that will loom large that I haven’t dwelled on here. But if we are moving on from Taylor now or at the end of the year I would love to know who folks would want. It doesn’t seem to me there is currently an obvious route.
I don’t know if Troy Taylor is in his last week at Stanford, his last nine months, or has us over such a barrel financially that the Taylor era could endure further still. But there is so little hope or enthusiasm around the program that my mind keeps coming back to wanting there to be a coaching search and turning the page. I’ll throw out some thoughts in the hope of eliciting reactions/seeing what others think/hopefully hearing a few inspiring names bandied about.
If we jettisoned Taylor before or during the 2025 season, the in-house options are sparse. The two most experienced leaders on the staff, Gregory and D’Onofrio, are now gone. April has a pedigree but is light on experience. He is probably the most stable option as it would maintain as much continuity as possible while elevating the part of the staff that evidently has not alienated the team.
No matter who an interim coach is, it’s hard not to shudder at the fate of the offense. Taylor has made himself literally indispensable to the offense. (A sad comment considering we have sucked on offense during his tenure) Absent a miracle a Taylor-less 2025 offense would potentially contend for one of the worst in power football history. I am having trouble even envisioning who could be in charge. I think we’d be so desperate that having a brilliant amateur like Andrew Luck or Todd Husak step in would have to be in the realm of discussion.
If we moved to fill the position more permanently, there are of course fewer options now than there would be in November or December. The first place one would think to look would be unemployed coaches. I started to post that Luck might be inclined to consider us a mutually beneficial option for his ally/mentor/confidant Pep Hamilton (not saying I’d recommend this) but then I remembered Hamilton just returned to coaching with the offensive coordinator job at Maryland. Nonetheless, I would not be surprised if that’s a call whenever the job comes open. Among the currently unemployed (at least as coaches), the mind first races to shock the world pipedreams like Nick Saban, Urban Meyer, and Chris Petersen. I’d make the calls if I were Luck but that’s almost surely day dreaming.
Something that strikes me as more realistic would be offering to be career reclamation/a path back to a power job for somebody like Jimbo Fisher, Gary Patterson, Pat Fitzgerald, Paul Chryst, or Justin Fuente. This might be one of the flashier things we could do. I realize there are baggage with some and likelihood of mediocrity with others (I’d bet Chryst or Fuente would be pretty mediocre at Stanford but I’d take it at this point) but I don’t think we should be dissuaded from considering one of the better combinations of safe/splashy potentially out there for us.
if we wait until the end of the season our options would presumably open up more. One route I can’t get out of my head is the possibility we could buy low when a better program gives up on their head coach. It is possible one or more of the following could get their walking papers or otherwise find themselves under too much pressure to be fun: Kalen DeBoer, Mike Norvell, Mike Gundy, Mark Stoops, Luke Fickell, Brian Kelly, Lincoln Riley, Billy Napier, Hugh Freeze. I realize some would be non-starters and most would probably not consider slumming to our level but this is a caliber of coach that if I were Luck I’d strain every ligament sprinting to the airport.
The other splashy route I can’t get out of my head is the former NFL head coach route. The combination of that route’s empirical success, connection to the zeitgeist/professionalization of college football, and Luck’s Rolodex makes that intriguing. The first name that pops to mind for me is Matt Eberflus. I would be intrigued by the Cowboys DC/former Bears head man. Luck also has close ties with Rob Chudzinski, though he was only an NFL head coach for a year. Luck’s network is of course broader than who he shared locker rooms with but there aren’t a ton of options that jump out to me (Brandon Staley maybe, and I have written in the past about Jerod Mayo’s unique and appealing fit).
Luck could also look to his network to elevate someone to a first time head coach role. At first blush Kentucky DC Brad White and Tavita Pritchard strike me as the rising stars. But again, nothing to say it has to be somebody who shared the same locker room.
Looking beyond Luck’s network, my ambition for us is always that we could strive for a proven baller college coach. We never do this and it would require money, plus a hell of a sales job to convince somebody to leave a better program. But I will just say for the record that poaching somebody like Matt Campbell, Lance Leipold, Chris Klieman, Sonny Dykes, Bret Bielema, Curt Cignetti, PJ Fleck, Dave Aranda, or Jamey Chadwell would be the fastest way to my heart.
I am cognizant that my ambition may exceed Stanford’s grasp. A pretty conventional path for a Power Four coach is a Group of Five coach who has succeeded. We should keep an eye this fall on how the following (and others) do: Bob Chesney, Jon Sumrall, Jeff Monken, GJ Kinne, Chuck Martin, Tim Albin, KC Keeler, Eric Morris, Mike Uremovich, Butch Jones, Clay Helton, Bronco Mendenhall.
A lot of those guys aren’t good geographic fits (which I hope we wouldn’t consider a deal breaker but they might). The same is true for rising star coordinators, which, given the success of blue blood coordinators moving up in recent years, we might want to kick some tires on. I have to think Glenn Schumann, for instance, has a big job in his future. I’d be shocked if he picked us, but you don’t make shots you don’t take.
One name arguably stands alone in how enticing it would be: Chip Kelly would be a fun way to turn the page on this era of Stanford football.
This is all just idle day dreaming and, ultimately, Stanford’s financial and institutional constraints will play a big role. There are issues related to fit that will loom large that I haven’t dwelled on here. But if we are moving on from Taylor now or at the end of the year I would love to know who folks would want. It doesn’t seem to me there is currently an obvious route.
