This Organization Will Not Tolerate Failure... Anymore

On Monday, November 24th, 2008, the Jeff Genyk experiment was ended by the powers that be at Eastern Michigan University. Genyk was 15-42 the day of his firing and finished off his time at Eastern in style (I would say style and class but that was clearly not the case) by beating those assholes from Mt. Pleasant to give him a grand total of 16 wins in 5 seasons as a head coach. That's 3.2 wins a season and it of course was beyond unacceptable.

Fast forward about a month to December 22nd, 2008, the day the EMU administration finally got what they wanted. Ron English was target number 1 from the start (if you read back you'll see he was also my first pick right off the bat...and then I said it was gonna be Fred Jackson...whoops) and the powers that be found a way to scrape together enough money ($350K almost double what Genyk was paid) to entice one of the hottest names in coaching to take control of a football team with no sense of direction and 16 wins in the past five seasons.

Why do I think Ron English will be successful at a place with no conference titles in over 20 years and one who's last winning season was when Bill Clinton was in office? I could answer it in one sentence but that would be boring. Here are ten reasons why Coach English will turn the perrennial MAC doormat into a championship contender.

In no particular order...

1. English is a FOOTBALL GUY. He has done nothing else in his life but play football and then coach football. Genyk played ball at Bowling Green (which should have raised eyebrows from the start) and then spent 15 or so years in the business world selling office furniture or something and then one day decided to coach football. English on the other hand played at Cal and when his playing days were over, he started coaching and has done nothing else with his life since.

2. English has actually called plays during a game. Genyk was never a coordinator at any level. This is a HUGE issue that I've harped on before in this blog. In my opinion, you cannot effectively run a football team unless you have actually been the guy in charge of calling the shots when the bullets start flying in a football game. Not only has English been a defensive coordinator, but he was voted as Rival's Defensive Coordinator of the Year in 2006 for his efforts at Michigan. Defense has been an issue for a couple of seasons at EMU and like the old addage goes, "Defense wins championships." Come next fall, you will see an entirely different defensive attitude in Ypsilanti.

3. He's spent his entire life on the defensive side of the ball. This is not a reiteration of my previous point. This is important and notable because his new offensive coordinator (it's not announced yet but it's Ken Karcher from Toledo) will most likely be left alone to call what he wants to call and run his offense as he sees fit, with little to no interference from the head coach, an issue that seemed to result in zany (and in the case of WMU '06 game losing) trick plays with the previous regime. I'm not saying you're never gonna see a flea flicker, I'm just saying that the new OC will most likely be allowed to run the plays he wants to run. This is a huge bonus and vastly different from past seasons.

4. Losing has never been an option for Ron English. It's happened rarely over his career coaching. Since 1996, teams he's coached with have suffered only 4 losing seasons and three of those seasons were one win from a winning season (well..a .500 season). He's not used to losing and he'll bring that mentality to Ypsilanti.

5. The Michigan Pedigree. Yeah, Northwestern is a Big 10 school too and yes, the Cats were pretty good in the mid to late 90s, but let's be honest with ourselves here...Northwestern is not Michigan. Being a coach or player at Michigan during the Carr era meant that you were getting an education as to how a football team should prepare for and win championships. As a coach, it taught you how to treat your players in order to get the most out of them in life and football. Being able to say you coached at Michigan will always raise some eyebrows when it comes up in conversation, in a good if not great way. This is something that will help with recruiting and fundraising. The guy knows how to win because he was taught how to win by winners.

6. Assistants. A head coach is only as good as his assistants (well, I'm not sure that idea really holds a hell of a lot of water because the previous head coach had some outstanding coaches but generally it's very true). Ron English is hiring some guys who can straight up coach football and have done nothing but coach football. As I've mentioned before, the assistants are not officially announced but some names are Tyrone Wheatley (yes, THAT Tyrone Wheatley), Antonio and Tim Carter, Kurt Anderson (the only holdover from the last staff, so far. Played and coached at Michigan as well), and Eric Lewis, son of long time NFL coach Sherman Lewis. I'll get into coaching responsibilities and the rest of the staff some other time. When you look at these coaches a few things pop out at you. 1. They're younger guys as far as football coaches go. 2. They're pure football guys. 3. They've all played and/or coached football at extremely high levels. 4. When you add those three things up, you get great recruiters and guys that the players will play for and trust. A very important thing in terms of success. (More on assistants when official announcement from the sports information department is released via the Eagle Nation website.)

7. The players are there for winning and winning quickly. Schmitt, Blevins, Fretz, LeDuc, Johnson, Buche, Davis, Gage, White, and other participating players return on the offense which, as most of you know, was one of the most prolific in the country for the last two weeks of the season. Defensively EMU returns Hatchett, Hicks, Downard, Downs, Long,Ohrman, a slew of more than capable defensive tackles, May, and Jenkins. Looking at it now you would have to think that with the breath of fresh air that comes with a new staff, this is a team that could win 5-7 games next season. Army, Arkansas, Michigan, and Northwestern are the non conference opponents next year which could make things tough but two of those games are truly winnable while the other two would require some sort of devine intervention from St. Jude (patron saint of the hopeless cause, seriously) to get a win. Either way, we've still got some good ballplayers left over in Ypsilanti.

8. Intensity. With a young coaching staff comes young coaching staff intensity. Practices will be highly competitive (especially with the Carter brothers coaching WRs and DBs against each other every day), well organized, and productive. The enthusiasm won't be the fake kind the players and fans are used to. There won't be any of the shenanigans from the game against the assholes from Mt. Pleasant, but you can bet your ass these players will be mentally and physically prepared to play as hard as they can for every play every week.

9. The Administration is finally 100% committed to winning. I don't mean committed like in Blue Chips where we're buying new John Deere's for kids from the sticks, I mean committed as in they are finally willing to open up the pursestrings and pump some money into a program that desperately needs it. You have to spend money to make money and to make money you need a winning football team. People out there constantly (The Eastern Echo, forum posters, etc.) talk shit about how nobody comes to the games, well, if you don't win games, you don't get people to come watch you. It's pretty simple. No wins, no fans, no money. All that is about to change.

10. It's time. The time to win is now at EMU. The University needs it. The Alumni need it. The Ypsilanti community needs it. A winning football team at EMU would finally instill a sense of pride in an area of the state that hasn't had a whole hell of a lot to be proud of in a while (I'm not counting Ann Arbor in the area because people from Ann Arbor typically walk around with an air of asshole entitlement and I don't like them). Ron English is the coach that will turn this football team into a championship contender and in turn, give those that need it, something they can hang their hat on.

Preview for tomorrow: A new feature! People I'd Like To Punch in the Face

*UPDATE*
Also staying on at EMU are Video Coordinator Matt Patterson, Director of Football Operations Jake Kirkendall, and Graduate Assistant Steve Otterbein.