Video: 1-on-1 with Gophers Coach P.J. Fleck: National Signing Day will be Monumental

Since Fleck was hired I've been trying to figure out who exactly he reminds me of, and I think I just did.

 

How dare Mark Coyle mention that he was concerned about Tracey Claeys' ability to recruit when at the time our recruiting class was ranked 70th nationally and dead last 14th in the Big Ten. If any Gopher fan wasn't concerned about recruiting under Tracey Claeys then they simply weren't following very closely. Let me say that again. Ranked 70th at the time we fired Claeys, 25 days later and we have jumped 20 spots. Your argument is a joke.

To all the Claeys backers regarding his recruiting, please quit pointing to the 2016 class. First of all, Kill did most of the work. Second, with the unusually high amount of highly rated MN kids, that class was basically gift wrapped for Kill/Claeys.

When Coyle was talking about poor recruiting under Claeys he was obviously referring to how things were looking for 2017 a month before signing day. Anyone who doesn't see the point he is making is a moron.

For crying out loud...seriously?

Until the last week or so on Rivals, GTech and Iowa sat below the Gophs with commits in the low teens. Both added commits and went by Gophs pretty quickly, just like the Gophs jumped a month ago when Fleck flipped a bunch of his WMU recruits.

Right now on Rivals Utah, TCU, ASU, Miss, and Cal all still sit below the Gophs, who are 49th, with commits in the low to mid teens.

Many, many programs had classes in the low teens in the past month. Having a "full" class early is no indication of how well the recruiting is going if the school is not a top 10-15 program.
 

So you are saying his recruiting class wasn't really as good as it looked - just like winning 9 games wasn't really as good as that looked.


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Those 9 wins are as misleading as could possibly be. Best wins against NW and WSU, that really says it all. We lost every big game on our schedule, every damn one of them. We lost the two most important games we play every year to Iowa and Wisconsin. No Gopher football season is truly successful if that season includes losses to both Iowa and Wisconsin.

The 8 wins in 2014, which included wins in Ann Arbor and Lincoln, and a blowout win over Iowa, was far more impressive than the 9 wins in 2016. In fact it's not even close.

It's amazing to me how the bowl win seemed to change everyone's mind about this past season. Yes, it was a nice win. But it does not erase what an incredibly disappointing regular season it was, which included zero signature wins. Claeys did nothing to earn this job, 8-4 regular season was the absolute worst this team could have done.
 

You and I have agreed in the past that the football future at Minnesota looks very good. Time to move on, don't you think? A thousand mile journey starts with the first step.........

Again, I'm in the boat rowing. I didn't want TC fired, but that is in the rear view mirror. I think PJF seems like a good hire. I love his tireless recruiting. In fact, I seem to expect greater things from him in the near-term then most the PJ-bobos who seem to lower expectations at every turn.

What I don't understand tho is why many believe that supporting PJ means belittling everything TC did accomplish?


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But at the same time, he has said before that he isn't wiling to compromise the process and the culture for immediate success. That was the case at WMU, and I'm guessing it will be the same here.

If immediate success comes along with it, great. But you won't be seeing him cut corners for an extra win or two in his first year.

The good news is he inherited a ton of talent that knows how to work hard because the previous staff expected it. The attended class and were successful because the previous staff demanded it. As he has said on a number of occasions, he has walked into a pretty good situation and should be successful from day one. Every coach, every leader of any organization, has to establish their expectations and culture. Sometimes you are having to do so from a bad situation such as Kill inherited, other times you step into a pretty good situation, such as Fleck is doing here.


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Why are many so hard on Fleck because Claeys got fired? It was not his decision. I'm starting to think many of you are pizza restaurant owners and your business got cut in half. (Joke there, easy on the responses.....)

Many aren't being hard on Fleck, such as me. Many are frustrated, just as I am, with the need some have to disparage the previous staff. Fleck is stepping into a really good situation because of the work of the previous staff, and he should be able to see some pretty significant success.

He wants to establish his culture, but that doesn't make the previous one bad. Every new leader, new coach, needs to establish their expectations, ways of working - their culture. The best leaders do not feel a need to talk negatively about those they are following. I am glad Fleck hasn't really done that, but Coyle and others have.

I hope Fleck is overwhelmingly successful, and if he is truly a great leader, he will recognize the work those before him did to help him along.


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Again, I'm in the boat rowing. I didn't want TC fired, but that is in the rear view mirror. I think PJF seems like a good hire. I love his tireless recruiting. In fact, I seem to expect greater things from him in the near-term then most the PJ-bobos who seem to lower expectations at every turn.

What I don't understand tho is why many believe that supporting PJ means belittling everything TC did accomplish?


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What am I missing? 0-6 record in trophy games, 0-7 if you include the Broken Chair Trophy with Nebraska. 0-2 vs Iowa, 0-2 vs Wisconsin, 0-1 vs Nebraska, 0-1 vs Michigan (and that loss is 100% on Claeys and no one else), 0-1 vs Penn State. He had an 11-6 overall record. Where did those 11 wins come from? It's a pretty impressive list. Central Michigan, Indiana State, Colorado State, Maryland, Rutgers, Illinois (twice), Purdue (twice), Northwestern, and Washington State.

Tracey Claeys accomplished nothing at Minnesota. The idea that he did is laughable.
 





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