College football 2018 preview: Predicting the first loss for every Top 25 team

Willie Taggart was hired as Oregon’s head coach in 2016 and signed to a 5-year, $16 million contract. He led the Ducks to a 7-5 season including several blowout losses and in December, he left Oregon after a year to take the head coaching job at Florida State vacated by Jimbo Fisher. Taggart agreed to a 6-year, $30 million contract at FSU.

Taggart is represented by Jimmy Sexton, who also represents 11 of the 14 head coaches in the SEC, including Jimbo Fisher. Sexton wields quite a bit of power in college football, especially in the South and he knew about Florida State’s head coaching vacancy before the school’s athletic director. Sexton did his job and 2018 season will kick off with Taggart making $5 million at FSU and Fisher at $7.5 at Texas A&M ($2 million raises for both).

Is this good for Florida State though?

The roster has plenty of talent and Taggart has generated plenty of hype but his only track record as a coach is building bottom feeders into good teams. He’s only won more than eight games once and his record against better than average coaches is less than stellar. Taggart is 4-10 against coaches with .550 or higher win percentages in the last three seasons and five of those losses were by 20 points or more.

With a schedule that includes Justin Fuente (Virginia Tech), Bobby Petrino (Louisville), Mark Richt (Miami), Dabo Swinney (Clemson), Dave Doeren (NC State), Brian Kelly (Notre Dame) and Dan Mullen (Florida), it’s going to be a bumpy season in Tallahassee.

Virginia Tech’s Labor Day evening visit will start the 2018 Noles’ season and the Willie Taggart era at 0-1