Tennessee football: Five things Danny White must avoid in coaching search
2. Hiring based on a potential staff
Remember Lane Kiffin? That was Mike Hamilton’s biggest reason for hiring him. Kiffin sold Hamilton on the staff he would bring, and to be fair, he did bring an elite staff of assistants. His father, Monte Kiffin, was the most notable of them, as he was the hottest commodity at the time as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers longtime defensive coordinator.
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Beyond his father, though, Kiffin brought in Jim Chaney as offensive coordinator and, most notably, Ed Orgeron as defensive line coach. It all seemed great until most of them decided to leave for the USC Trojans after one year on the job.
Now, Derek Dooley and Butch Jones weren’t hired based on staff. However, Jones made a splash in his third and fourth years by bringing in more high-profile staff members and cutting bait with longtime, loyal assistants, most notably replacing Mike Bajakian with Mike DeBord as offensive coordinator and replacing John Jancek with Bob Shoop a defensive coordinator.
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It didn’t work. DeBord worked, to be fair, but Shoop turned out to be a disaster since he clashed with the rest of the staff. These things are irrelevant. Nick Saban replaces his staff every two years. A coach should be hired for his ability to scout elite staff members, and that’s what Tennessee football needs.