The Oklahoma blog Blatant Homerism looks at the Sooners’ new secondary coach. Let’s just say optimism abounds.
… When defensive ends coach Chris Wilson accepted an offer to join Dan Mullen’s staff in Starkville this offseason, few OU aficionados would’ve pegged deposed Georgia defensive coordinator Willie Martinez as the likely candidate to fill the rare opening in Norman. A guy who just shepherded the ‘Dawgs defense through two truly awful seasons? Um, sure.
Personally, I think it’s just what the Sooner D needs.
It certainly won’t bother me if he’s right about that, but I can’t help but wince a little when I read: “In Willie Stoops trusts.”
Don’t forget that Stoops hired Jon Fabris away from Georgia once – at least for a few days. Maybe he’s the kind of head coach who likes a challenge.
Get The Picture 
Willie is not there to teach technique, at least not the Willie “Thud” technique. Stoops likes Willie the recruiter, IMO.
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I, for one, think WillieMart is just what Oklahoma needs as well.
/sinister laugh
//Willie destroys hope
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Willie was okay until he was put in charge of the whole shabang. He’ll probably do fine out there but no matter how well he does I’ll never be sorry he’s gone.
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+1. I wish him well, also, but I’m glad he’s not on our sidelines as the DC.
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Agreed.. I think he was good as a position coach, and many of his peers and former players agreed… but, not so good as coordinator.
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Agreed. Willie is the perfect example of the “Peter Principle”. He rose to his level of incompetence (DC), but now he’s back at the level where he impressed Richt enough to get the DC job.
I suspect with a little less on Willie’s plate, he’ll do fine. I certainly hope he enjoys success, but not at our expense, of course.
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i’ve always been a little unconvinced by the contention that wm excelled as a position coach. that’s not to say he doesn’t deserve a share of the credit for the successes of the uga d in the bvg years. but his secondarys weren’t exactly known for their cover guys. sean jones, thomas davis, and greg blue (and guys like that) made their bones as jawbreakers, especially in run support. and by the time you get to the end of the wm era, rashad jones, who should have been one of those guys, never really rose to their level.
i think bvg as linebacker coach (less so as dc) really made wm look better than he was as a position coach, and that became pretty obvious after the free-fall of production from the linebacker unit.
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If you didn’t notice the great improvement of Tim Wansley, Bruce Thornton, Decory Bryant and Demario Minter under Martinez, then you were not watching UGA football.
The guy just wasn’t capable of handling the duties of defensive coordinator, and not only was a poor game manager, but seemed to lose his focus on teaching during the work week.
If he gets back to doing the things he did in his 1st 4 years at UGA, he will be a very good hire for Oklahoma.
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I think he was just fine as a position coach. Where he struggled as a DC was certainly personnel decisions. I think the Senator described it best last year with his “Crisis of Faith” post. WM would play a severely underperforming Bryan Evans over a severely overperforming Bacarri Rambo because he didn’t trust the young guy over the older guy. That to me was his ultimate downfall. I wish him the best at Oklahoma, but I’d be lying if I said I’d shed any tears over his departure.
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You could tell he CWM didn’t know how to fix the secondary two years ago. His whole answer to that question was to “get pressure on the QB.” Sure that is good too, but how about teaching guys how to cover? How to read hips on the breaks. How to turn your head when the ball is in the air and go for the ball (and not get a penalty). Maybe get a pick once in a while. The guys aren’t lacking for speed and talent. I think as a secondary coach, he started relying too much on pressure and got lazy.
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Hammer met nail. Willie’s Db technique was to Face mask the heck out of them as a last resort, then tackle them hard after they made the catch. The problem with Willie was that DC was his Peter Principal, he could not multi-task, the DB’s slipped. Still I think he could have survived had it not been for Jancek(sp). The worst LB coach in a lot of years for UGA. Rennie overcame poor coaching with shear want to. The rest of the crew had about as much organization as a Chinese Fire Drill. They could not cover anyone. Rennie’s greatest weakness was his inability to cover anybody.
I don’t know if CTG is the answer but we do know that his two new assistants are teachers and it will be refreshing to see good techniques.
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