What grades would you give Maturi for his two coaching hires??

Undoubtedly the two will be compared because they both started here at the same time. The two came here with high hopes and two years later, both have their respective teams on the rise.
Both are recruiting well and I think this is an exciting time to be a Gopher fan.

Tubby took over a team that won only 9 games and was one of the worst in the country and Brewster took over a team that had just gone to the Insight.com bowl and should have beaten Texas Tech which two years later has become one of the top teams in the country. On closer inspection though, the team was severely depleted in talent, particularly on defense. Tubby took a bunch of guys and blended his system with what they did best and the end result was players playing up to their maximum potential. Brewster took a bunch of guys and tried to force them into a system that did not fit what they did and the end result was players who were confused and playing worse than they did the year before. We STILL can't run the football which is absolutely amazing when you look at what we did two years ago.

First off, comparing Brewster to Smith is a very tough comparison. Hiring Tubby Smith who has won a national championship and comes from one of the top programs in the country is kind of like hiring Bobby Bowden from Florida St. The guy can coach and he knows how to get it done. I like his low key approach off the floor and his high intensity on it. When Brewster gets a new recruit, it is done with great fanfare, but Tubby will go out and get someone that I really haven't heard too much about.

I still do not know if Brewster is a good coach, but I KNOW Tubby Smith is. Tubby is well respected throughout the country and we pull out and win games due to extraordinary adjustments made during the game. I do not get that with Brewster, at least yet. I would not say we have won any football games yet because Brewster and his staff outcoached the other staff but I could be wrong. Brewster took an Insight.com bowl team, took a giant step backward his first year, then has the team back to right about where Mason had left it, with some very good underclassmen talent and a hope that it will be able to take the next step upward. Tubby meanwhile, took that 9 victory team and turned it into a 20 win season last year -- a very large step up right away and at #17 this year and 16-1. You honestly could not have asked for more improvement at such an early stage in his tenure -- that is fantastic.

Another difference is that Brewster has gone out of his way to sell the program and he talks a pretty great game. At times, I think I am listening to Jim Wacker when he talks about how great things are even after a poor result on the field. Eventually, he will need to back that up with victories and I think fans patience will be tested this year with a tougher schedule in year 3. Tubby on the other hand, quietly goes about his business of coaching and gets the job done. When he talks, people take him seriously and he has credibility because he has been there and done that before. I think Brewster should borrow a page from the Tubby Smith handbook and listen to Pat Reusse's advice and shut up and coach. Brewster doesn't have to sell tickets -- the new stadium will be sold out regardless what he does, at least for a few years. I think he needs to hire a top notch offensive coordinator as Cosgrove as DC looks like a very shaky pick and was met with a lot of criticism. In retrospect, the choice of both Withers and Dunbar were not good choices and did not work out .
Tubby's assistants seem to work just fine and you have to wonder if Tubby retires from here if he will set up his son to coach, much like Bobby Knight did at Texas Tech.

Finally, I think Tubby is at the top of his game and as long as he stays hungry, he will keep moving this team in the right direction. If he sticks around for a few more years things will be very fun to watch and Gopher basketball tickets will be the hottest tickets in town. Brewster still has a long ways to go to get up to a Tubby Smith level - he is still a second year coach who is nowhere close to being an elite college coach. I think he will get better and he has learned a lot over the last couple years but he will need to hire quality assistants and get good recruits that fit into his system, whatever that is.

You look at basketball vs. football and they are two different games and sometimes it's like comparing apples to oranges. I think it is easier to win right away in basketball - an exceptional recruiting class can get you into the Final Four in basketball in just a couple years, such as Michigan's "Fab 5" class, while in football, you simply do not win championships with freshmen so you have to cut Brewster some slack. Still, Brewster will need to show that the team is moving in the right direction and he needs to start showing that he can coach at this level. Tubby on the other hand, shows what a great coach can do for a program and is a tough act for a new coach like Brewster to follow - I don't know if it is fair, really but my early grades are:

Tubby Smith A+
Tim Brewster C+

My Grades

Tubby A, Brewster B.

The + comes from NCAA W's or bowl game W's.

Tubby A-
Brewster C-

Tubby=A- The magic eight ball says this ranking will only go up with the incoming recruiting class and a strong finish to this exceptional start.
Coach Brew= The jury is still out, I would love to see what he can do with 4-5 of his own recruiting classes. Goldrush nailed it saying Brewster didn't have the personnel to do what he wanted when he first took over. Also, it would be great to see the new stadium give us the home field advantage we never had at the Metrodump.

Football is a lot different than basketball in that football teams and players take longer to develop than basketball players. I'd say two years as a basketball coach is equal to three years (or maybe even four) as a head football coach. Tubby's big year is this year and so far the results have been amazing. He gets an A. Brewster's big year will be next year. If he can some how pull off 7 or 8 wins against what will be a much more difficult schedule than this year's, it will show that the program is definitely on it's way to being better than the mediocre, which is what Mason conditioned Minnesota fans to accept. At this point, I agree with GSL. The jury is still out on Brewster. The next two years will say a lot.

tubby: a
brewster: d...and that's being generous - look past the recruiting, and you will agree.

that's what happens when you bundle your coaching hires. you get what you pay for.

Well, recruiting IS part of it when you think about it -- that is one of the things that brought Mason down because if he could have recruited better defensive players, he probably would still be here and we probably would have gone to a Rose Bowl. When Brewster had the team 7-1 he was the toast of the town and everyone probably would have been giving him much higher grades.

I am a little concerned with the coordinators leaving (that's 3 in just 2 years and 2 of those did not work out too well here.) We really need a guy who can come in and revamp our offense and I think that can be done -- we should be at least a TD better per game average with the right guy because we have a lot more firepower/playmakers coming in. Hopefully Cosgrove gets a short leash and a quick hook if he does not work out because he is coming in with some serious red flags.

Your rating of a D is not out of line, but I do think Brewster has the team on the rise and the outlook is still good so I will give him a C+. I think everyone agrees though that Maturi hit a home run out of the park though with the Tubby Smith hire. I do not know how he got him here but Tubby has really made me excited to watch Gopher basketball again! I think any grade less than an A for what he has done so far doesn't do the man justice!!

Obviously: Tubby is an A

I'm getting so annoyed by the Brewster/Tubby comparisons because the sports are so different.

-85 scholarship to 13 scholarships
-Staff of 8 full time coaches (OC/QB Coach, WR Coach, OL Coach, DC, LB Coach/Special teams, DL Coach, Secondary Coach, strength & conditioning + 2 GA's & 2 Quality Control + we likely have 1-2 interns) vs. 3 full time coaches
-Sport dominated by upper classmen with strength vs. sport where talented freshman can have an impact
-Meaningfully different expectations, in basketball an NCAA tournament berth is considered success and that can be achieved with a top 5-7 Big Ten finish depending on the year whereas in Football a New Year's Day Bowl is what people consider success and that achieved with top 4 Big Ten finish.

And most importantly, I'm tired of hearing the misleading fact that Brewster took a bowl team to a 1-11 record. The 2007 was not the 2006 team. The 2006 team barely scraped by on the back of a 3 year starter at QB to make a bowl game and their final record was 6-7 which was not great. In 2007 we returned 4 starters on offense (Wheelwright, Shidell, Brinkhaus, and Pinnix (played injured)) and 7 starters from a very weak defense (Van De Steeg (played injured), Allen, Davis (moved positions), Sherels, Hightower, Harris, and Barber). Returning 11 starters (2 of which played injured throughout the year) is not the same team as the year before. There were definite personnel deficiencies on the 2006 team got worse in 2007. For instance, we finished 117th out of 119 teams against the pass and then we lost 2 of our top 3 cornerbacks (Jones & Massey) due to an off field incident. Was 1-11 a failure of a season, yes, but is it misleading to say that Brewster took a bowl team to 1-11, most definitely yes, because we didn't have the talent of a bowl team.

The direction of the team is upward but most opponents this season still had much more talent than Minnesota did. That is not something you can fix with one recruiting class and we are in the process of upgrading the talent. The key is going to be what Brewster can do with the 2008 recruiting class as they grow from freshman to seniors and actually have the size to compete against Big Ten opponents.

For what Brewster has done so far: B

I think you have to judge a new coach based on recruiting & improvement than wins and losses. Wins and losses in year 3-5 take precedence over recruiting at that time.

Tubby- A
Brewster- Incomplete

That was easy

I don't like comparing coaches usually (especially in different sports), but in keeping with the spirit of this thread,

Tubby gets an "A"

Brewster gets an "incomplete"

Tubby A
Brewster D+

Comparing coaches is part of being a sport fan. I'm all for it. Their being in different sports just adds another layer to it. And, of course they will be compared. As a matter of fact they should be compared. They came in at the same time and both to difficult situations - of somewhat different levels of trauma I concede. But both were hired to do some real rehab. We should get to congratulate and if appropriate condemn based on their performance. The regents too should take note of how they are doing, and compare one to the other.

Tubby's got an "A" as of today. He can clearly up that grade - though not by much. I suppose it could go down as well, but you've got to like his trajectory. It looks like he should be able to hang on to his mid-term sophomore grade. What has he not done that has been asked of him? And he's done it w/o embarrassing himself, the team, the U or the state. An MSU win would have gotten him the "+" as of today. He still may get it by then end of the year.

Brewster . . . . .What to say, what to say? There is no way not to give him an "F" for his sophomore year following up on the "F" that he earned as a freshman. You can't get an incomplete at the end of the year! There is no more work to hand in. I'm still hoping that he can turn it around and become a "C" student at some point. I really am. But I am also very very skeptical that he will be able to pull this off.

First an irrelevant, but honest point; he inherited the lesser of the two challenges.

There is no way that last year could not have been an obvious "F". And, I do not want to hear about recruiting. Recruiting is something you do to prepare for the test. It is not the test though! The record and the character of the team are the test.

This year he had a total of one sort-of-interesting win at Illinois. Other than that, with much sound and fury, his team generally struggled to beat up on a bunch of nobodys. All the while coach Brewster was able to do this in a way that mostly embarrassed himself, his team the UofM and the state in that order. As the season progressed and he and his team should have been showing their true colors, they collapsed into hopeless confusion, panic and ineptitude.

If his recruiting is so great, maybe it will show up in his grade next year. And if recruiting is something he should be graded on then he should have said so when he inherited the team; "Guy's - we're going to rebuild this thing from the ground up and it will take years". Instead, he squawked like a turkey about the team's Rose Bowl destiny. If he wanted to be judged on that, let's oblige him. I really do hope he can turn it around, but I don't have much faith.

minimax said:

Brewster . . . . .What to say, what to say? There is no way not to give him an "F" for his sophomore year following up on the "F" that he earned as a freshman. You can't get an incomplete at the end of the year! There is no more work to hand in. I'm still hoping that he can turn it around and become a "C" student at some point. I really am. But I am also very very skeptical that he will be able to pull this off.

First an irrelevant, but honest point; he inherited the lesser of the two challenges.

There is no way that last year could not have been an obvious "F". And, I do not want to hear about recruiting. Recruiting is something you do to prepare for the test. It is not the test though! The record and the character of the team are the test.

This year he had a total of one sort-of-interesting win at Illinois. Other than that, with much sound and fury, his team generally struggled to beat up on a bunch of nobodys. All the while coach Brewster was able to do this in a way that mostly embarrassed himself, his team the UofM and the state in that order. As the season progressed and he and his team should have been showing their true colors, they collapsed into hopeless confusion, panic and ineptitude.

If his recruiting is so great, maybe it will show up in his grade next year. And if recruiting is something he should be graded on then he should have said so when he inherited the team; "Guy's - we're going to rebuild this thing from the ground up and it will take years". Instead, he squawked like a turkey about the team's Rose Bowl destiny. If he wanted to be judged on that, let's oblige him. I really do hope he can turn it around, but I don't have much faith.

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It is clear to me that you know absolutely nothing about the difficulty of turning around a football program vs. a basketball program. And like most Gopher fans you have no idea how bad the football team really was in 2006 and how much worse we were when most of those players left. Cupito deserves a medal of honor for willing that 2006 team to 6 wins and if not for 2 missed field goals by NDSU from within the red zone we would have been 0-2 against them.

grunkiejr said:

It is clear to me that you know absolutely nothing about the difficulty of turning around a football program vs. a basketball program. And like most Gopher fans you have no idea how bad the football team really was in 2006 and how much worse we were when most of those players left. Cupito deserves a medal of honor for willing that 2006 team to 6 wins and if not for 2 missed field goals by NDSU from within the red zone we would have been 0-2 against them.

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Well, it's clear to me that you've been smoking a lot of cheap weed in the bathroom while your mom's at the store . I'm kidding - I'm sure that you're a fine and thoughtful fellow, but honestly what part of 0 - 55 against Iowa at home don't you get!

And, who had any real sense optimism going into the game against Kansas? Nobody. There's a reason for that. Look, I know more about football programs than some and less than others - maybe even you. But, that shoulda, coulda, if not for two missed field goals stuff is for F students! Coach Brewster is the guy who's supposed to know more about it than ANYBODY at the the UofM and there is no realistic evidence that he does. To the contrary!

I agree with you about Cupito! Even given the level of the opposition. I hope the alumni swells are treating him well. The thread had nothing to do with him however.

minimax said:

Well it's clear to me that you've been smoking a lot of cheap weed in the bathroom while your mom's at the store . I'm kidding - I'm sure that your a fine and thoughtful fellow, but honestly what part of 55 - 0 against Iowa at home don't you get!

And, who had any real sense optimism going into the game against Kansas? Nobody. There's a reason for that. Look, I know more football programs than some and less than others - maybe even you. But, that shoulda, coulda, if not for two missed field goals stuff is for F students! Coach Brewster is the guy who's supposed to know more about it than ANYBODY at the the UofM and there is no realistic evidence that he does. To the contrary!

I agree with you about Cupito! Even given the level of the opposition. I hope the alumni swells are treating him well. The thread had nothing to do with him however.

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I'm just saying that the football program was in a lot worse shape than most people realize. Mason had done a good job recruiting his first 5-6 years here which is why we kept getting better until the Michigan disaster in 2003. After that point each class was progressively worse but we were still living off of the 2003 and earlier classes so the record hid the underlying erosion of the program. I think 2006 might have been Mason's best job of coaching considering that team was able to make a bowl. However, we needed Cupito to go out and sling the ball around and throw for 300 yards a few times because the line & running game were not what it had been in prior years. In 2003-2005 we had two running backs go for more than 1000 yards each season. In 2006 our top 2 rushers had 1500 yards rushing which was about a 33% decline from the prior year. The fall off in production was not simply we lost Maroney & Russell but rather that the OL lost key personnel. The fall off in production was bound to get worse in 2007 because we only returned two starters on OL from 2006. Add in breaking in a new QB, a new offensive system, and a miserable defense that is decimated by losing 3 starters on an already thin group and 2007 was bound to be a failure. Should we have lost to FAU, Bowling Green, and NDSU? We probably should have beat at least one of those three if not two of them but our personnel wasn't any better than what they had. I just don't think 2007 was deserving of an F for that season because we were a lot worse than people realize and we did manage a win and to be competive in a lot of games we were overmatched. The Wisconsin and Iowa at the end of the year are great examples because they were way more talented than the Gophers but we were in both of those games.

In 2008, I remember 55-0 all to well. Iowa was much better than us but considering how well we had played OSU earlier in the year I have no idea what happened there. If I could give a grade lower than an F for that game I would. It was inexecusable. However, going in to Wisconsin the week before and putting up that kind of a fight deserves a B. You really can't blame a coach for 3 fumbles inside the 10 yard line by freshman, especially when two of them were unforced (botched hand off by Eskridge, dropped pitch by Salamon). The play calling was actually good that game and the defense played fairly well, although they did give up a long pass or two that they shoudn't have. You can blame Brewster for the loss to NU because he made a bad call about getting aggressive but that was a very competitive game that we should have won against a very good opponent--make a field goal from the red zone and we kneel on the ball at the end of the game. I didn't understand the struggles on offense against Michigan but the defense played very well to hold them to field goals most of the game despite being on the field for about 45 minutes.

The biggest reason that 2008 was better than 2007 was because we had better talent on the field (recruiting) and the change in turnover margin. Part of that is the focus of the coaches on preaching creating opponents turnovers and limiting our own turnovers and part of it is just having a sophomore QB instead of a freshman QB.

If you are considering the job that Brewster has done you get a much better read by look at 2007 versus 2008 than 2007 vs. 2006. Go ahead and say we should have won more than 1 game in 2007 so move it up to 3-4 wins. Looking at 2008 we won 7 games and maybe we should have won 9 games (2 of 3 from NU, Wisc, Mich). I would say Wisconsin was the fault of players not executing routine plays, Northwestern was a combo failure to execute (FG in the red zone, Weber misreading an option read that would have scored a TD) and coaching error (not taking it to OT), and Michigan was a failure to prepare players so that falls on the coaches.

I just don't think that equates to anywhere near an F.

If you compare where we are today versus when Mason was fired in 2006, we're probably at the same spot we were in 2006. However, 2006 was a peak--2007 was going to be worse than 2006 because we only returned 11 starters--and 2009 looks like we should be better than 2008 because we return 19 starters. To achieve the same thing with young players that are going to be back for at least one if not more years says a lot about the direction of the program.

Tubby - D
Brewster - F

gold04 said:

Tubby - D
Brewster - F

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LOL. Every fanbase has a few like you.

jury is definitely out on brewster. get back to me in two years.

Tubby -- A
Brewster -- D

I think Tubby has done what a head coach should do and that is provide stability and direction to a program. I question this with Brewster and his staff turnover. People have said that Brewster should be applauded for getting rid of Dunbar when his philosophy wasn't matching with Brewster's. As long as Brewster was an assistant he should have developed a plan for the type of offense and defense he would want to run if he became a head coach and then go and find the guys who believe the same as him. If he wanted to have a power running game he should not have brought in Dunbar in the first place, it isn't as if Dunbar switched his philosophy and schemes when he got here, he is running the same scheme he has run for years prior. In regards to Maturi on his hiring, he pulled the trigger way to quick on the football hire and didn't even interview some very qualified candidates who were interested. If he had looked at these candidates first and then hired Brewster, I would have felt better about it and atleast felt like he did his due diligence.

grunkiejr,

In deference to the sheer volume of your words, that this is a bb board, and the fact that I'm leaving for dinner, I'm willing to be nudged up to a D- for his sophomore grade. But don't even get me started on his selection, management and development of assistant coaches! I leave the last word to you should you want it. Just curious though, don't you notice the panicked look in his eyes most second halves? Peace out!

minimax said:

grunkiejr,

In deference to the sheer volume of your words, that this is a bb board, and the fact that I'm leaving for dinner, I'm willing to be nudged up to a D- for his sophomore grade. But don't even get me started on his selection, management and development of assistant coaches! I leave the last word to you should you want it. Just curious though, don't you notice the panicked look in his eyes most second halves? Peace out!

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Sorry about the first post. I was kind of harsh. I'll try a different approach that is more focused.

Fact 1: we were 6-7 in 2006 with 11 starters returning in 2007.
Fact 2: we were 7-6 in 2008 with 18 starters returning in 2009.

Do you agree with the following?

1. The talent level from 2006 to 2007 was deteriorating (best players graduated or didn't return to team).

2. The cupboard was bare when Brewster arrived (he had to recruit Jucos in 2008 to fill holes that were present when he arrived).

3. It is rare for True Freshman to make an impact on college football teams and therefore it takes a while for recruiting to translate in to wins.

4. The 2008 team was better because Brewster recruited Juco's that had a positive impact on the season (BPT, Lawrence, Brock, McKinley).

5. Achieving a 7-6 record in 2008 with only 3 seniors starting is better than a 6-7 record in 2006 with 11 seniors starting.

6. The trajectory of the program is upward (19 returning starters--9 of which will still be here in 2010) versus downward when Brewster took over.


You can say what you will about 2007 (we underperformed) and 2008 (we collapsed as the team wore down and the line was exposed) or turnover on his coaching staff (every hire has not been the right hire) but if you agree with points 1-6 we are in a better position today than when Brewster arrived which would imply that he should receive at minimum a C.

Tubby: F
Brewster: F-


ok. just kidding.
Tubby: A+
Brewster: C+

But if Brewster pulled that win out of wisconsin, he would have an A in my book.