A career path to watch

I mentioned before that (aside from Mike Bobo, of course), there were three offseason head coaching hires I found particularly intriguing.  One of those is Buffalo’s Lance Leipold, who amassed a ridiculous 106-6 record as the head coach at Division III Wisconsin-Whitewater.

Matt Melton posts that Leipold’s career suggests that the move will be a success, and not just because of that gaudy win-loss mark.

How does he measure up based on the three variables? Well, he spent eight years at Wisconsin Whitewater which is a solid run and makes him about average experience wise when compared to the lower-division hires examined in the study. His winning percentage of nearly 95% is tops by a healthy margin (Paul Johnson won 86% of his games in five seasons at Georgia Southern) and his games above .500 is twenty more than Brian Kelly accumulated in 13 seasons at Grand Valley State. If you are hiring a lower-division coach to lead your program, they don’t come much better than Lance Leipold. Add in the fact that Buffalo was probably a little better than their record indicated last year, and it’s easy to foresee a return to the postseason for the Bulls. As always, nothing guaranteed, but Buffalo appears to have made a great hire, even if he is likely at worst to double his number of career losses by the time he leaves upstate New York.

If he clicks, that will likely be a short time.

Thursday morning buffet

Perhaps you’ll find something nourishing here.

• SOD taught personal hygiene; Butch has his “Fourth-and-1″.  At Tennessee, they’re always learnin’.
• Vanderbilt is experimenting with GPS in players’ shoulder pads.  (No, it’s not to find them if they get lost on the playing field.)
• Mark Weiszer has a list of the new faces on Georgia’s support staff.
• Todd Gurley’s 2014 season:  In 2014, 61.9 percent of his rushing yards came after contact. He fumbled just three times in 510 carries.
• Don Leebern, friend to the beer drinker.
• “The Gators haven’t had a receiver sniff first- or second-team All-SEC honors from the coaches since Percy Harvin in 2008.”  When people tell you Florida’s offensive personnel don’t live up to the program’s recruiting reputation, this is the kind of stuff they’re talking about.
• Great line from Thomas Brown:  “He still looks good, so he still got it,” Holyfield said. “He says he’s got two more quarters in him.”
• Here’s a look at offensive efficiency trends in the SEC.
• The conclusion to the Silas Nacita affair:  “The bottom line is that I broke the rules.”

Wednesday morning buffet

Let me light the chafing dishes… ah, there.

• Hell is other people, Corch.
• Looks like we’ve got another Year of the SEC Running Back coming up.
• You think Georgia underachieved?  Check out what Bruce Feldman had to say about Miami.
• Eight new defensive coordinators in the SEC this season.  I guess I lost count.
• Mark Richt isn’t digging the prospect of an early signing period.
• Hey, it turns out the WWL can take steps when a broadcaster shows his ass in public.
• Part of me thinks Jim Harbaugh’s a little over the top with this.  But there’s another part of me that kinda knows how he feels.
• How much did losing a head coach or offense/defense coordinator effect a team’s recruiting ranking and class this year?

Tuesday morning buffet

A little snow, a little buffet…

• You’d think the one place where they wouldn’t have to dumb down the defense would be Vanderbilt.
• Bill Connelly does all the heavy lifting on Georgia Southern, a Dawg opponent this season, so that you don’t (okay, so I don’t) have to.
• Michigan’s policy for student football tickets now includes need-based discounts.
• “That was an incredible testament to Bobby Petrino.”  Oy.
• What’s in a name:  dual-threat quarterback vs. pocket passer.
• Thomas Brown likes Brian Schottenheimer’s open-mindedness with his assistant coaches.
• Hey, Snapchat and recruiting.  What could go wrong?
• Auburn’s explanation of the two players and the service dog incident?  They may have been dumbasses, but there was no malicious intent.  Hey, it’s Auburn; I can buy that.

Luck

No, not Oliver Luck.  Turnover luck.

I spent a morning pulling TOM data on the last five years to see if there was a pattern or edge I could find that I could use for predicting future team win behavior. Here are the bullets I found that I will post on and feature in the 2015 digital preview magazines coming out soon.

1. The greater the turnover margin, positive and negative, the more likely and greater the regular season win change in the forthcoming season

2. Turnover margin is very random.  Few teams can sustain a high or lower level of annual TOM.

3. Each team is ranked and patterned into predictive pools of trends.  Teams with high and low TOMs the previous season have very high likelihoods of regular season win total changes.

As for his second point, check out the chart in this post from Bartoo:

… It always makes me laugh when someone calling a game ‘predicts’ anything about the winner and the turnover battle.  We all know winning the turnover battle wins a lot of football games.  Each coaching staff emphasizes it and coaches the hell out of the turnover battle.  Offense and defense.

However, it is not so easy to predict.  The results over the last 5 years are all over the board.  There are a lot of teams with top coaching staffs at the top of the five year rankings, but it is difficult to have great results every year.

The teams in light green are the eight FBS teams that have had a positive TO margin each of the last five seasons.  The teams in light red, those are the eight that have had a negative TO margin each of the last five years.  The other 107 teams have had a mix of results.

The Oregon Ducks, the no. 1 ranked team in five year TO margin is the only team to have a double digit TO margin in four of the last five years.  Northern Illinois and Georgia are the only other teams to hit positive double digits three of the last five seasons.  [Emphasis added.]

You’ve only got eight teams out of 120 that have managed positive turnover margin in each of the last five seasons and eight that have done the same on the negative side.  That strikes me as evidence that there’s some degree of randomness in the system.

And Georgia would have joined that first group, but for the disaster that was 2013, with its green defense and Aaron Murray having to carry the offense on his shoulders much of the season.  Given what we’ve had to say about the coaching brain trust over the last five years, how much of that would you attribute to coaching and how much to statistical noise?

Friday morning buffet

Cold day, warm buffet.

• Here’s a look at what Trent Thompson might bring to the table.  (By the way, can we stop with the “Ray Drew was a bust” crap?)
• Bill Connelly drops his big ass spread sheet of 2014 receiving stats on us.  And, no, you won’t find any of Georgia’s guys lurking near the top of the list.
• Regardless of where you think the truth may lie between Jameis Winston and the woman who claims he raped her, the idea of students gathering on FSU’s campus to celebrate Winston by calling her names ought to be a head shaker.
• The Big Ten supports an early signing period, but with a caveat from a number of its head coaches that it should be accompanied by the implementation of early official visits.
• Another tax front to open with collegiate athletic departments? (h/t Hogbody)
• Turnover at South Carolina:  “… at least 36 percent of the Gamecocks scholarship roster will be first-year players. Including players who redshirted last season, 39 of the 85 players on the team will have never played a snap for South Carolina.”
• The spread spreads – from high school.
• “It’s a big deal to be the first to offer.”

Wednesday morning buffet

A warm buffet for a cold morning.

• I’d say stay classy, Auburn, about this, but what’s the point?  (UPDATED: Spencer Hall has some advice about dogs for Auburn players.)
• More from the annals of stay classy.
• Want a pretty good tell that a kid isn’t going to commit to your program?  This is one.
• Here’s a look at Georgia’s 2015 signees on the offensive side of the ball.
• Year2 checks out luck in the SEC, 2014 edition.
• Kansas is going to experiment with the use of impact-sensing mouthguards to monitor concussion risks.
• Phil Steele projects Georgia to crack the preseason AP Top 10.  (And you can click here if you want to listen to Steele and Schlabach discuss preseason Top 10 lists.)
• Will the pop pass survive the new downfield blocking rules?  Ian Boyd says yes, somewhat.