Mike Stoops fired at OU
- Thread starter MeowingCows
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Doubt that Parker would ever leave Iowa. Good pay, great job security, coaches in a league with generally marginal offenses.
Yeah, getting good pay to defense marginal offenses that run about 65% of the plays during a game also.
Yea that was the 1st thing i thought of. We will need to give Heacock a significant raise if his D cont to shine.
I think Heacock is probably one of the best Defensive coaches in college football. I don't know if he is a head coach type guy. I honestly don't know if that is what he is shooting for or not. However, if I am Lincoln Riley he is one of the first calls I make when the season is over. We have talent but I wonder what Heacock could do with Oklahoma talent.
He absolutely would. But I don’t know if OU would want a guy that has primarily BIG experience.
I actually think they've already got their guy in Ruffin McNeill. I don't think OU fans are happy with Diaco or Kish, though. I could see McNeill staying on and hiring a couple new position coaches after the season. This might be what gets them to the CCG and a shot at the playoff...
Yeah, Ruffin and the head coach are tight. Many thought, when it happened, that he was hired to replace Mike.
I've been seeing in a few places online that Stoops being fired might not have been entirely due to him being a terrible DC. It sounds like he was a general douche in the locker room to the point where during halftime he got into a fist fight with one of the players after the player snapped due to excessive berating.
Can't honestly say that this event would surprise me (particularly when paired up with horrible on-field performance).
I’ve also seen support from a lot of current and previous players he coached. Could be a love him or hate him kinda guy.
Got a source that knew someone in the program and basically the explosive demeanor that you see is pretty typical. Not sure how a player or other coaches can take that and add in the results and this shouldn't have been a very hard decision.
Pretty good interview. Here is most of it:
Mike Stoops met with The Athletic for more than an hour Thursday.
“There are a lot of circumstances that led to this,” Stoops said. “Some by my doing, some not by my doing. But ultimately it is my responsibility, and what was on the field Saturday was unacceptable. That’s the bottom line.
“It was extremely hard and extremely emotional. Lincoln gave me an opportunity to get this thing fixed. He wanted it fixed. It’s hard when you put so much into something and it doesn’t work, but I left him no choice.”
The following conversation has been edited for clarity.
Your early-2000s OU defenses included guys like Roy Williams, Rocky Calmus, Teddy Lehman and Derrick Strait. Do you think those defenses would struggle in today’s Big 12?
No, because the front was always dominant. That’s where it all starts. You have to be able to dominate the line of scrimmage. Those guys were very competitive, too. We had a great mix where every level of the defense was still very athletic, big, long. But it still would’ve been hard to cover field space. We wouldn’t have been able to dominate games like we did then. That’s just when spreads were starting to come to fruition.
You haven’t seen anybody dominate our offense in three years. No one’s going to stop us consistently. Not even Georgia (in the Rose Bowl). They’re lucky they got out of that game, trust me. And they know it. They don’t want to see that again, and I’m not sure anybody does. No defensive coordinator wants to see that, I’ll tell you right now.
The RPOs, I think, changed football for good. That won’t go away. You’re seeing it in the NFL. You see field space become problematic. Whether anyone wants to admit it or not, these college offenses are in the NFL now.
The rules are set up for the offense. You can’t do some things to a receiver but they can do everything to you. Linemen downfield. Substitutions. It’s hard, man. It’s much more difficult now than it’s ever been. And (the Big 12) is where all this is coming from.
Oklahoma was at the forefront of this offensive evolution when Mike Leach brought a version of the spread to Norman in 1999. Did you see all of this stuff coming?
I don’t think anyone saw it getting to this. I think you saw that spread offense, but not the tempo, the running game off it, the RPOs. Mike wasn’t like that. He was spread it out, throw it, dump it, and run it every now and then to keep you off-balance. Hal Mumme was the creator of it, and it’s really taken on a life of its own.
You mentioned how strong those defensive fronts were back in your first stint at OU. Those teams had Tommie Harris, Dusty Dvoracek and other dominant defensive tackles. Is that why you guys have struggled so much over the past few years?
That is a huge part of it. Everything starts on the offensive and defensive line. That’s the most important element to your team. Our D-lines haven’t been as dominating. But I do think they’re becoming that. Neville (Gallimore) is just starting to realize his potential. Amani (Bledsoe) is just coming into his own. Kenneth Mann. I think Ronnie Perkins is going to be one of those types of players. I think some of these younger guys have a chance. It’s a developmental group that I think is really moving in a positive direction.
Why has it been so hard for you guys to recruit those players? Is it because they don’t want to play in the Big 12 against these offenses?
It’s hard for a lot of reasons. It’s not just that. There aren’t a bunch of them in this geographic area. So just put a 200-mile circle around this area. What are you going to get? There aren’t a ton, so you have to go out, whether it’s to California, Florida, Canada, wherever you have to go. You go all over to try to get them.
And then, if you’re recruiting those high-profile guys, you’re usually going up against Ohio State, Alabama, Georgia, people like that. And then you get people recruiting against you with, ‘Well, why would you want to go there? It’s a finesse league.’ That works against you, too.
Geography and styles lend to losing out on some of those players, those difference-makers. But again, with the way the NFL is going, if you come to a place like this, you’re going to have opportunities to rush the passer, to get sacks. The game is going that way. Look, Alabama is a spread team now and they’ve never been a spread team.
We’ve heard a lot about how OU’s defensive backs are too small to hang with the big receivers you face. But I remember when Derrick Strait would shut down a guy like Texas’ Roy Williams. Is it all about size, or is there more to it?
It’s more than that. It always is. It’s going to be technique. You’ve got to have strength, too. If you’re not big, you’d better have strength. You’d better have excellent technique and strength to be able to counter these big receivers. If you don’t have, either, then you will be at a severe disadvantage. Their big bodies create space. The fundamentals become even more critical against bigger guys.
You have alluded to this before, but why do you think you have had such a difficult time connecting with players today?
I think kids nowadays take things more personal, maybe don’t have the ability to take criticism as well as maybe back 15 years ago. It’s coaching; it’s not criticism. But I think they take it personally. The lack of trust is part of that, too. They need to know you’re out for their best interest, always. I think that’s the most important thing that kids have to know.
That’s where some of the disconnect comes. It would never be personal. No coaches want to yell just to yell. They’re coaching to teach and trying to make you understand the point. If you’re not precise in this game, you’re going to get lit up. Some kids think they’re being picked on or that coach doesn’t like me; well, it has nothing to do with that. It’s just about trying to put them in the best possible position for their own success
You have to be a strong-minded person and you’d better have thick skin. Not everyone’s going to like you, but they’d better respect you and what your knowledge is and what you’re trying to teach.
I’m not out there running for prom king. That’s not what I’m there to do. I’m there to teach and get our players in the best position, and get them to understand why it has to be that way.
This is a very humbling game. You’ll get your ass humbled in a hurry in this game if you think you have all the answers. That’s why Nick Saban is the way he is. You can’t take your foot off the gas or you’re going to get run over. Kids have to understand that.
The thing I don’t understand about that is that your reputation is well-known. Everybody who has ever watched you on television knows how you coach. So why would players be surprised by that when they get to OU?
I don’t know that. That’s a good question. My intensity is well-known. I’m a perfectionist. I have always worked that way, and my players have always respected that. They see how I work. I have never taken a play off in 30 years. Maybe that gets overwhelming to them. But I think any great coach does that.
I think for some kids, it’s hard to understand until you get to a certain point and then maybe they start to understand it better. It takes time for young kids to get that. They’re used to coming out of high school and being able to do whatever they want. This is nothing like that. Maybe they’ve never really been yelled at, and now everybody’s critiquing everything I do, picking on everything I do, good bad or indifferent. It takes a strong person to get that.
They all say, “It’s OK, I’ve got this.” Well, no, you don’t have it. No, obviously you didn’t get it.
We were never good enough to not be perfect in a lot of ways, and understand exactly what we were doing, and to not beat ourselves. I think at times we beat ourselves, and that’s my responsibility. When you do that, it falls on coaching.
The amount of concentration and focus it takes to play a 60-minute game is enormous. You’ve got to prepare for that pretty much all year-round. You can’t simulate every play of everything. Kids have to have roles: “This is how we play this. This is why you align here.” You have to make those rules consistent because you can’t show them everything. Young teams, you have to show them a lot. Sometimes they don’t get it. You want them to be able to react, not think.
You seem very much at peace with what has happened. Why is that?
Because I tried. I did everything I could. I worked hard. I tried to put our players in the best possible positions to succeed. It’s been excruciating and very uncomfortable the last few years. No one likes to be criticized. It hurts. It hurt a lot for a long time, but I feel like they can’t hurt me no more. Let ’em hurt somebody else for a change. I felt like I was personally attacked.
You really did become an easy target for a lot of people.
Right. And that’s the hardest part, feeling like I let a lot of people down. But the players from the past … that criticism probably hurts more than anything else, from past players or people who have been in the arena and know really how hard it is.
Look, I didn’t just become dumb. (Oklahoma State defensive coordinator) Jim Knowles is not a dumb coach. He’s a damn good football coach. I’ve seen his work. And he’s played (three) Big 12 games and look at what they gave up (117 points and 1,454 yards). That guy is smart. Sometimes, you just get overmatched. There’s only so much you can do on defense. There are only so many great calls. Defensive coordinators in this league are challenged every single week.
Mike Stoops met with The Athletic for more than an hour Thursday.
“There are a lot of circumstances that led to this,” Stoops said. “Some by my doing, some not by my doing. But ultimately it is my responsibility, and what was on the field Saturday was unacceptable. That’s the bottom line.
“It was extremely hard and extremely emotional. Lincoln gave me an opportunity to get this thing fixed. He wanted it fixed. It’s hard when you put so much into something and it doesn’t work, but I left him no choice.”
The following conversation has been edited for clarity.
Your early-2000s OU defenses included guys like Roy Williams, Rocky Calmus, Teddy Lehman and Derrick Strait. Do you think those defenses would struggle in today’s Big 12?
No, because the front was always dominant. That’s where it all starts. You have to be able to dominate the line of scrimmage. Those guys were very competitive, too. We had a great mix where every level of the defense was still very athletic, big, long. But it still would’ve been hard to cover field space. We wouldn’t have been able to dominate games like we did then. That’s just when spreads were starting to come to fruition.
You haven’t seen anybody dominate our offense in three years. No one’s going to stop us consistently. Not even Georgia (in the Rose Bowl). They’re lucky they got out of that game, trust me. And they know it. They don’t want to see that again, and I’m not sure anybody does. No defensive coordinator wants to see that, I’ll tell you right now.
The RPOs, I think, changed football for good. That won’t go away. You’re seeing it in the NFL. You see field space become problematic. Whether anyone wants to admit it or not, these college offenses are in the NFL now.
The rules are set up for the offense. You can’t do some things to a receiver but they can do everything to you. Linemen downfield. Substitutions. It’s hard, man. It’s much more difficult now than it’s ever been. And (the Big 12) is where all this is coming from.
Oklahoma was at the forefront of this offensive evolution when Mike Leach brought a version of the spread to Norman in 1999. Did you see all of this stuff coming?
I don’t think anyone saw it getting to this. I think you saw that spread offense, but not the tempo, the running game off it, the RPOs. Mike wasn’t like that. He was spread it out, throw it, dump it, and run it every now and then to keep you off-balance. Hal Mumme was the creator of it, and it’s really taken on a life of its own.
You mentioned how strong those defensive fronts were back in your first stint at OU. Those teams had Tommie Harris, Dusty Dvoracek and other dominant defensive tackles. Is that why you guys have struggled so much over the past few years?
That is a huge part of it. Everything starts on the offensive and defensive line. That’s the most important element to your team. Our D-lines haven’t been as dominating. But I do think they’re becoming that. Neville (Gallimore) is just starting to realize his potential. Amani (Bledsoe) is just coming into his own. Kenneth Mann. I think Ronnie Perkins is going to be one of those types of players. I think some of these younger guys have a chance. It’s a developmental group that I think is really moving in a positive direction.
Why has it been so hard for you guys to recruit those players? Is it because they don’t want to play in the Big 12 against these offenses?
It’s hard for a lot of reasons. It’s not just that. There aren’t a bunch of them in this geographic area. So just put a 200-mile circle around this area. What are you going to get? There aren’t a ton, so you have to go out, whether it’s to California, Florida, Canada, wherever you have to go. You go all over to try to get them.
And then, if you’re recruiting those high-profile guys, you’re usually going up against Ohio State, Alabama, Georgia, people like that. And then you get people recruiting against you with, ‘Well, why would you want to go there? It’s a finesse league.’ That works against you, too.
Geography and styles lend to losing out on some of those players, those difference-makers. But again, with the way the NFL is going, if you come to a place like this, you’re going to have opportunities to rush the passer, to get sacks. The game is going that way. Look, Alabama is a spread team now and they’ve never been a spread team.
We’ve heard a lot about how OU’s defensive backs are too small to hang with the big receivers you face. But I remember when Derrick Strait would shut down a guy like Texas’ Roy Williams. Is it all about size, or is there more to it?
It’s more than that. It always is. It’s going to be technique. You’ve got to have strength, too. If you’re not big, you’d better have strength. You’d better have excellent technique and strength to be able to counter these big receivers. If you don’t have, either, then you will be at a severe disadvantage. Their big bodies create space. The fundamentals become even more critical against bigger guys.
You have alluded to this before, but why do you think you have had such a difficult time connecting with players today?
I think kids nowadays take things more personal, maybe don’t have the ability to take criticism as well as maybe back 15 years ago. It’s coaching; it’s not criticism. But I think they take it personally. The lack of trust is part of that, too. They need to know you’re out for their best interest, always. I think that’s the most important thing that kids have to know.
That’s where some of the disconnect comes. It would never be personal. No coaches want to yell just to yell. They’re coaching to teach and trying to make you understand the point. If you’re not precise in this game, you’re going to get lit up. Some kids think they’re being picked on or that coach doesn’t like me; well, it has nothing to do with that. It’s just about trying to put them in the best possible position for their own success
You have to be a strong-minded person and you’d better have thick skin. Not everyone’s going to like you, but they’d better respect you and what your knowledge is and what you’re trying to teach.
I’m not out there running for prom king. That’s not what I’m there to do. I’m there to teach and get our players in the best position, and get them to understand why it has to be that way.
This is a very humbling game. You’ll get your ass humbled in a hurry in this game if you think you have all the answers. That’s why Nick Saban is the way he is. You can’t take your foot off the gas or you’re going to get run over. Kids have to understand that.
The thing I don’t understand about that is that your reputation is well-known. Everybody who has ever watched you on television knows how you coach. So why would players be surprised by that when they get to OU?
I don’t know that. That’s a good question. My intensity is well-known. I’m a perfectionist. I have always worked that way, and my players have always respected that. They see how I work. I have never taken a play off in 30 years. Maybe that gets overwhelming to them. But I think any great coach does that.
I think for some kids, it’s hard to understand until you get to a certain point and then maybe they start to understand it better. It takes time for young kids to get that. They’re used to coming out of high school and being able to do whatever they want. This is nothing like that. Maybe they’ve never really been yelled at, and now everybody’s critiquing everything I do, picking on everything I do, good bad or indifferent. It takes a strong person to get that.
They all say, “It’s OK, I’ve got this.” Well, no, you don’t have it. No, obviously you didn’t get it.
We were never good enough to not be perfect in a lot of ways, and understand exactly what we were doing, and to not beat ourselves. I think at times we beat ourselves, and that’s my responsibility. When you do that, it falls on coaching.
The amount of concentration and focus it takes to play a 60-minute game is enormous. You’ve got to prepare for that pretty much all year-round. You can’t simulate every play of everything. Kids have to have roles: “This is how we play this. This is why you align here.” You have to make those rules consistent because you can’t show them everything. Young teams, you have to show them a lot. Sometimes they don’t get it. You want them to be able to react, not think.
You seem very much at peace with what has happened. Why is that?
Because I tried. I did everything I could. I worked hard. I tried to put our players in the best possible positions to succeed. It’s been excruciating and very uncomfortable the last few years. No one likes to be criticized. It hurts. It hurt a lot for a long time, but I feel like they can’t hurt me no more. Let ’em hurt somebody else for a change. I felt like I was personally attacked.
You really did become an easy target for a lot of people.
Right. And that’s the hardest part, feeling like I let a lot of people down. But the players from the past … that criticism probably hurts more than anything else, from past players or people who have been in the arena and know really how hard it is.
Look, I didn’t just become dumb. (Oklahoma State defensive coordinator) Jim Knowles is not a dumb coach. He’s a damn good football coach. I’ve seen his work. And he’s played (three) Big 12 games and look at what they gave up (117 points and 1,454 yards). That guy is smart. Sometimes, you just get overmatched. There’s only so much you can do on defense. There are only so many great calls. Defensive coordinators in this league are challenged every single week.
Mike Stoops with some solid answers to how ****** up the narrative about B12 football is. The conference should be lauded for its revolutionary offense rather than focusing on per game defensive stats that may not matchup to conferences that try to jab their way to victory.
