Charlie Fisher

LeatherCy
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About 10 minutes before I received the text about AJ I had a lengthy conversation with Coach P as he was driving back from Chicago to Iowa City. I had texted him about Charlie leaving being official. Coach P told me "Don't be surprised if AJ Blazek is a candidate." Coach P said AJ was at one of Iowa's last practices prior to leaving for their bowl trip. This was after signing day. Can't believe AJ would make the move but maybe life in NJ isn't worth the extra pay. We'll find out tomorrow at 10:00 AM
Leatherneck309
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Any rumors are reason for excitement right now. AJ would be a home run in my opinion. Also feel there is a great staff in place that could produce a good hire.
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ST_Lawson
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Unfortunately, this is how things work at the FCS level. Successful coaches will get interest from FBS schools. Unless you are somehow lucky enough to get a coach who is EXTREMELY dedicated to the school or you are one of the very few FCS schools who can pay nearly low-FBS money, your coach will move up. Outside of a couple of schools, FCS schools can't compete with FBS-level money. It just means you've been successful. I was hoping that we could keep Fisher around for a couple more years before he started getting higher-level job offers again, but an opportunity opened up and he took it.

So, moving forward from here...tomorrow's press conference. First off, you don't announce dropping football (or any sport), dropping a division, or any other bad news at a morning announcement where you invite the public. You do it late on a Friday afternoon with a press release and don't make a big deal out of it if you can. I'm about 85% sure that Tanney has already negotiated with the existing coaching staff to keep most, if not all of them here. Because Fisher is leaving for an assistant position, he will likely not be taking any (or maybe 1, tops) of the coaches with him. I'd bet that tomorrow morning, Tanney will announce one of our existing top-level assistants as the new HC and that the majority of the staff will be remaining here.

With regards to how this changeover compares to the one two years ago and why I feel better about this than back then:
This time around, Fisher is leaving for a substantial pay increase and a much nicer locale (I love Macomb, but it's hard to compete with the southwest). Nielson leaving was essentially a "lateral" move...HC at a MVFC school in a small town kinda in the middle of nowhere in IL to HC at a MVFC school in a small town kinda in the middle of nowhere in SD. There was a slight pay bump and a bit better situation with facilities currently, but in the grand scheme of things...not really a step up.
Overall, so far this whole situation has been handled WAY better this time around as opposed to last time. I realize that Tanney was out of the country two years ago when Nielson left, but still...the person who was supposed to be in charge at the time did a horrible job (and was essentially fired because of it).

Another comment about why I was kinda "meh" about hiring from within last time and I'm much better with it this time is because I think that the assistants that Fisher brought in are overall, much more experienced at the DI level and have a much better ability to recruit well, run a DI-level team, and do a good job. You also have to consider the situation with the recruits who have already signed with us. Two years ago, there was no early signing period. We didn't have recruits who had already signed with the school and coaching staff when Nielson left. We do now. We obviously can't keep Fisher around but if we keep most or all of the rest of the staff, that will be a much better situation for the current recruits and recent signees than if we wiped the slate clean and started again with a brand new staff.

Now, we don't really know for sure how most of Fisher's recruits will end up doing, but the ones that we have seen play and the transfers that we saw him bring in, I'd say have done pretty well. Recruits like Ratkovich and Viti have played and done well...Sam Crosa, Tony Harper, Tyrin Holloway...all fairly solid transfers. This is one thing I think Fisher does have in common with Nielson...both are good recruiters (I do think that Fisher was a much better playcaller than Nielson was, especially late in games).

Anyway, I'm not worried about the direction that we are headed. This is just how it goes for successful programs. Will Healy turned Austin Peay completely around in a couple of years and had STRONG interest from South Alabama. USA eventually hired former Central Arkansas HC Steve Campbell. Coaches and programs do well...coaches get "big time" job offers and in many cases, they'll take those offers. Just like it's "next man up" when a player gets injured...in this case it's "next man up" when our HC gets hired away. Do what we can to keep the current staff in place and keep this train rolling.
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meganeck
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LeatherCy wrote: Wed Jan 03, 2018 7:17 pm About 10 minutes before I received the text about AJ I had a lengthy conversation with Coach P as he was driving back from Chicago to Iowa City. I had texted him about Charlie leaving being official. Coach P told me "Don't be surprised if AJ Blazek is a candidate." Coach P said AJ was at one of Iowa's last practices prior to leaving for their bowl trip. This was after signing day. Can't believe AJ would make the move but maybe life in NJ isn't worth the extra pay. We'll find out tomorrow at 10:00 AM
AJ would be a home run hire in my opinion, be interesting to see what happens, but I just don't see how they can do an outside hire this quick, don't they have to post it and all that other legal stuff. Not sure about that and if it applies if you promote from within.

Also I hope Charlie knows what he is doing because I just don't see Herm Edwards being successful at ASU. The AD wanted to keep the OC & DC and they both left. i thought their previous coach did a decent job and was a good coach. i guess we shall see.
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meganeck wrote: Wed Jan 03, 2018 7:52 pm
LeatherCy wrote: Wed Jan 03, 2018 7:17 pm About 10 minutes before I received the text about AJ I had a lengthy conversation with Coach P as he was driving back from Chicago to Iowa City. I had texted him about Charlie leaving being official. Coach P told me "Don't be surprised if AJ Blazek is a candidate." Coach P said AJ was at one of Iowa's last practices prior to leaving for their bowl trip. This was after signing day. Can't believe AJ would make the move but maybe life in NJ isn't worth the extra pay. We'll find out tomorrow at 10:00 AM
AJ would be a home run hire in my opinion, be interesting to see what happens, but I just don't see how they can do an outside hire this quick, don't they have to post it and all that other legal stuff. Not sure about that and if it applies if you promote from within.

Also I hope Charlie knows what he is doing because I just don't see Herm Edwards being successful at ASU. The AD wanted to keep the OC & DC and they both left. i thought their previous coach did a decent job and was a good coach. i guess we shall see.
I think that with a position like football coach, they have the leeway that they can kinda hire whomever they want to. They can do a national search...they can hire from within...they can straight up offer someone they have their eye on, etc. It's more like an A&P position where they can hire and fire at will. There are some limitations, but if they want Blazek, then they can bring him in.

I agree with the situation at ASU. I feel like Edwards is the "big name" hire, but likely won't end up doing all that well. Fisher has a lot of connections in college football though, so I think he can probably find a decent job somewhere, no matter what happens. It is a pretty decent pay increase and a fairly nice place to live (definitely isn't as cold down there as it is here right now), and there's going to be a lot more people in the stands there than we ever have had at Western. Still...could be another stepping stone for him...idk.

EDIT - here's an article with some info about AJ Blazek's situation as of last March before this last season and what he's making pay-wise: http://www.nj.com/rutgersfootball/index ... stant.html
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LeatherCy
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Didn't realize Ash had promoted AJ to Asst Head Coach. Funny in this article that is NOT AJ pictured! :D I agree with a previous post. I don't think they could hire someone from outside this quickly. Or can they even name one of the current asst coaches without posting the job??
vatusay
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The rumors came out couple weeks ago, right?

I would assume tanney has been working on the situation the whole “break”.
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ST_Lawson
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vatusay wrote: Wed Jan 03, 2018 8:42 pm The rumors came out couple weeks ago, right?

I would assume tanney has been working on the situation the whole “break”.
This would be my guess too. Maybe nothing "official" early on, but he could definitely be talking to people, negotiating, discussing salary and stuff. Then when it's official that Fisher was leaving, could sign the contracts and make the hiring official at that point. I'm sure he's spent most of the last few weeks making calls and working on the situation.
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leatherneckcountry
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Certainly aren't getting anything from the staff through twitter
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sealhall74
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ST_Lawson wrote: Wed Jan 03, 2018 9:01 pm
vatusay wrote: Wed Jan 03, 2018 8:42 pm The rumors came out couple weeks ago, right?

I would assume tanney has been working on the situation the whole “break”.
This would be my guess too. Maybe nothing "official" early on, but he could definitely be talking to people, negotiating, discussing salary and stuff. Then when it's official that Fisher was leaving, could sign the contracts and make the hiring official at that point. I'm sure he's spent most of the last few weeks making calls and working on the situation.
If he was smart, he would have started when Charlie put his house on the market.
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