Grading every coaching hire of 2020 coaching carousel: Lane Kiffin, Mike Norvell earn high marks

The college football head coaching carousel has finally stopped spinning heading into 2020 but which hires earned top grades and which are flops?

Every college football offseason sees a ton of head coaching changes. With 130 FBS programs, that’s bound to be the case as programs try to find the right guys to get them to the level they believe they should be at. However, the carousel spinning for the 2020 college football season has seemed to be doing so at a more furious and curious pace than normal.

Whether it was Matt Rhule leaving a rebuilt Baylor Bears team for the NFL, Chris Petersen and Jeff Tedford resigning at Washington and Fresno State, respectively, Florida State finally deciding to euthanize the Willie Taggart experiment or even four SEC jobs opening up, it’s been a wild ride to start the offseason in college football.

But after all of the movement, the dust has finally settled as all of the FBS head coaching vacancies have now been filled. As is always the case, some will work out, some won’t and we might be able to see some of those successes or failures coming while others we could have never predicted.

Given what we know now, however, it’s time to assess the new FBS head coaches. Let’s hand out grades for every college football head coaching hire going into the 2020 season.

Replaced: Eli Drinkwitz – Hired by Missouri

While dominating in the Sun Belt over the past few seasons, the Appalachian State Mountaineers have kept a model of consistency that has worked well but as also seen a handful of departures. Scott Satterfield was hired by Louisville, which led to Eli Drinkwitz taking over after a promotion. Now, Drinkwitz is heading to a Power 5 program as well, they’ve hired from within again as Shawn Clark takes the reins.

To say Clark is familiar with Appalachian State would be to put it lightly. Not only did he serve on both Satterfield’s and Drinkwitz’s staff but he also played for the Mountaineers two decades ago. Thus, his familiarity with the goings-on in Boone is second to none, which should serve him well.

Drinkwitz undoubtedly benefitted from Satterfield’s prior recruiting and implementations, so the real task for Clark will be to acquit himself well when those things start to take shape. But in terms of sticking with a formula that’s proven incredibly fruitful for the Mountaineers, you can’t fault them for again promoting one of their own.

Replaced: Chad Morris – Fired

From all we know about Sam Pittman, he’s shown he can be a quality recruiter capable of bringing in good prospects into Power 5 schools. The issue is that’s just about all we know in terms of the job Pittman is going to be able to do with the Arkansas Razorbacks.

Pittman has plenty of experience at the FBS level dating back to the mid-1990s. He’s been an assistant head coach and offensive line coach at every stop, most recently at Arkansas from 2013-15 and at Georgia from 2016-19. He’s never been a college football head coach or coordinator, which is not the biggest boost of confidence for fans of the Hogs.

Considering other SEC vacancies were filled by big or hot names on the head coaching market, Pittman definitely doesn’t seem to strike a chord with fans. Maybe he proves everyone wrong but his lack of experience controlling either the offense or defense at this level sparks some concern.

Replaced: Matt Rhule – Hired by Carolina Panthers

Because of the quick turnaround Rhule instituted in Waco, former LSU defensive coordinator Dave Aranda inherits a Baylor program that’s not only on the mend but Rhule had in the College Football Playoff mix until late in the 2019 season.

Aranda has proven himself as a defensive mind and recruiter throughout his journey through the college ranks, which featured stops at Hawaii, Utah State and Wisconsin prior to heading to LSU. Both of those aspects are interesting fits with the Bears in the Big 12 as they were arguably one of the few teams at the top of the conference under Rhule, more or less, thrived on the defensive side of the ball.

While Aranda is not the prototypical fiery defensive coordinator we often see, especially in terms of getting head coaching gigs, this is a good hire for Baylor to get an experienced guy that should be able to continue what Rhule started in pulling the Bears out of the mire.

Replaced: Steve Addazio – Fired

Since 2006, Jeff Hafley has certainly been around the block and garnered quite a bit of experience as a defensive mind. He was an assistant at Pittsburgh before taking over as the secondary coach in 2008 until 2010. Hafley then filled the same role at Rutgers before leaving for the NFL where he worked as the secondary coach for the Buccaneers, Browns and 49ers.

This past season, however, Hafley returned to the college football ranks as he took the role of co-defensive coordinator on Ryan Day’s staff at Ohio State. While he certainly had the elite talent to work with in Columbus, he was able to capitalize on that talent and have the Buckeyes as one of the top defensive units in the country.

Hafley’s well-traveled career should serve him well as a recruiter and he’s more than paid his dues and briefly proven himself as a defensive mind. That should give Boston College a boost in the ACC as they move on from the stale Addazio.

Replaced: Mike Bobo – Resigned

Speaking of the stale Steve Addazio, his dismissal from Boston College didn’t stop the Colorado State Rams from swooping him up as Mike Bobo walked out the door. And if you’re looking for relative consistency, Addazio can be your guy. The issue, however, is he’s never veered in a positive trajectory from being just slightly better than mediocre when you look at his record.

Addazio was a fitting 44-44 during his time with Boston College. Put simply, there was always a defined ceiling with the Eagles when he was at the helm of the program, able to beat the teams they should but never truly competitive against the upper tier of the conference.

It would have been refreshing to see Colorado State be a little more imaginative and, frankly, risky in their head coaching hire — especially considering Addazio has no experienced coaching (and, by proxy, heavily recruiting) out west.

Replaced: Lane Kiffin – Hired by Ole Miss

If there’s one thing Willie Taggart has proven either at Oregon or at Florida State, it’s that he’s not the man to rebuild a program. In fact, he more than proved he’s going to fail quite spectacularly in that regard. Taggart is not going to be in that position as he takes over for Lane Kiffin at Florida Atlantic.

Kiffin did a phenomenal job of both building up the talent pool on the Owls roster and establishing some strong recruiting avenues. That should serve Taggart well as he’s coming into a good situation and one he can continue as he still has strong recruiting ties in the state of Florida.

Considering how monumentally he flamed out at Florida State, it’s reasonable if people are questioning the Taggart hire for FAU. Overall, however, he’s a nice guy to bring in for this program and a coach that should start to find more favor with the college football world at large as he inherits the work Kiffin did.

Replaced: Willie Taggart – Fired

It’s understandable if Florida State fans are a little scarred from the Willie Taggart debacle and a bit hesitant to believe in their latest head coaching hire. Sometimes you get hurt and it takes you a while to recover — that’s only human nature.

They should be ready to buy into Mike Norvell, however. Since taking over the Tigers program in 2016, Norvell compiled a 37-15 record and has Memphis as consistently one of the better Group of 5 teams in college football, including leading them to the Cotton Bowl this past season. Furthermore, Norvell was the common denominator of those teams as his staff was anything but consistent while bigger schools poached his coordinators and position coaches.

Norvell has the potential and track record of a guy who can come into a program that has no problem with recruiting things to their brand and completely revamping the culture around them. That’s desperately needed in Tallahassee and Norvell can be the right man to do what Taggart most definitely could not.

Replaced: Jeff Tedford – Resigned

Filling the shoes of Jeff Tedford, who produced a 10-4 season in 2017 with Fresno State and followed up with a 12-2 season the following year, is not going to be an easy task for Kalen DeBoer. And yet, this is one of the best hires made in all of college football when you look at what DeBoer has already accomplished.

Tedford and the Bulldogs went just 4-8 in the 2019 season and, though talent departures had something to do with that, so too did the departure of DeBoer. He was the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach with Fresno State in those prolific 2017 and 2018 campaigns, which speaks to his ability to succeed at the program. Furthermore, he led Indiana to one of their most productive offensive seasons in recent memory while serving as their offensive coordinator in 2019.

DeBoer indeed has to prove himself worthy as a first-time head coach. But with his track record of offensive success, this is 100 percent the right swing for Fresno State to take.

Replaced: Mike Norvell – Hired by Florida State

Among jobs in the Group of 5, coaching the Memphis Tigers has to be one of the more attractive jobs considering the immense success both Justin Fuente and then Mike Norvell were able to have there, then parlaying those triumphs into jobs in the ACC. Next up to try and do the same will be Ryan Silverfield, who was promoted from Norvell’s staff.

Silverfield served as interim coach for the Tigers in the Cotton Bowl matchup with Penn State and, though Memphis lost, it’s clear he’s a good fit in the locker room. Not only did the program have faith enough to give him the interim job and then remove that tag moving on to 2020 but he’s clearly someone the players on the roster love by all accounts.

The big concern with Silverfield following the success of Norvell is simply his limited experience. While that’s not the end-all of whether a coach will be successful, that Silverfield has no coordinator or head coaching experience in his career is cause for some trepidation.

Replaced: Joe Moorhead – Fired

In terms of name brand hires, there were few bigger than the Mississippi State Bulldogs landing Mike Leach. It became clear Joe Moorhead was not going to bring what was necessary to compete in the SEC to Starkville, so they cut bait and made a flashy hire to lure Leach away from Pullman.

Though never in the SEC, Leach’s Air Raid offense has proven to be one of the most prolific in college football throughout his time at both Washington State and Texas Tech. The question is about the jump in conferences though as the traditionally more talented defenses of the SEC — as opposed to the Pac-12 — could potentially cause Leach’s stylings to be rendered somewhat ineffective.

More than any of that, however, Leach’s recruiting has never been that aggressive as it’s really not his strong suit. And while he’s going to be endlessly entertaining with a bigger spotlight in the SEC, there is cause for concern Mississippi State might fall further behind in the conference if Leach isn’t able to compete heavily on the recruiting trail.

Replaced: Barry Odom – Fired

It’s hard to argue with buying in on Eli Drinkwitz. For starters, he’s coming off his lone season as the head coach at Appalachian State in which he won the Sun Belt quite convincingly with the Mountaineers. Prior, he was always a buzzword in the coaching ranks after he was “discovered” by Gus Malzahn and joined his staff several years ago.

Thus, Missouri giving him his first show as a Power 5 head coach makes sense and there’s a reason for optimism regarding the job he can potentially do with the Tigers. While that may be true, there is also some cause to worry about just how ready Drinkwitz is for this opportunity.

The simple truth of the job that Drinkwitz did at Appalachian State was he inherited Scott Satterfield’s roster and continued what his predecessor had been doing for one year. When it comes to his recruiting, own institution of culture and so on, he remains unproven. Again, I’m optimistic, but cautiously so.

Replaced: Bob Davie – Resigned

While many programs have kept with the trend of looking for creative offensive minds, the New Mexico Lobos zigged whenever everyone else was zagging by hiring Danny Gonzales, who has acquitted himself very well as a defensive coordinator at several stops throughout the 43-year old’s career.

At San Diego State, Gonzales was quite effective at building up his side of the ball to be one of the top units in the Mountain West. He then further proved his merit at Arizona State this past season as the Sun Devils were one of the better defensive groups in the Pac-12 for the 2019 campaign.

Since Gonzales played for New Mexico, his familiarity with the program also works in his favor. The reason the Lobos get a tepid grade for the hire, however, is simply because Gonzales doesn’t have the longest track record and, frankly, defensive hires are often a bit of a crapshoot. Even still, there’s no reason to not enter his tenure with at least some optimism.

Replaced: Bobby Wilder – Resigned

There are already critics about Ricky Rahne heading to Old Dominion after two years as Penn State’s offensive coordinator. The main point of criticism people will point to is the Nittany Lions offense took a step back in terms of productivity with Rahne at the helm instead of Joe Moorhead in 2017. The stats are undeniable as the points per game dropped 7.3 points per game but Penn State also lost Saquon Barkley from 2017 to 2018, which played a huge factor.

Despite the negativity centered around his perceived failures with the Nittany Lions, the Monarchs are bringing him in because they believe in him. The fact Rahne was able to find even some success with some limited weapons and unique players like a Trace McSorley speaks to his capabilities as an offensive mind and, seemingly, his promise as someone who can make the most out of the talent at Old Dominion.

Replaced: Matt Luke – Fired

There is no question Lane Kiffin’s return to the SEC goes down as the most polarizing hire, which makes sense as the former FAU, Tennessee and USC head coach has done nothing but garner headlines time and again throughout his career. And frankly, what could happen at Ole Miss could go one of two ways.

At Tennessee and USC, his two previous stops at Power 5 schools, Kiffin was an abject disaster. It was never a question of his gifts as an offensive mind or ability to build up talent within a program but rather his apparent immaturity that then led to mass dysfunction. At Florida Atlantic, however, he took a program that was in the doldrums of college football and gave them an adrenaline shot as he won two conference championships in three years with the Owls.

Has Kiffin matured and become, essentially, ready to be an SEC head coach and revamp Ole Miss? There’s absolutely no way you can know for sure if that’s the case or if it’s going to be another disaster left in Kiffin’s wake. Coming off of his job at FAU though, I air on the side of optimism.

Replaced: Chris Ash – Fired

A familiar face comes to a familiar place. Greg Schiano was the head coach of Rutgers from 2001-11 and had the most successful run with the Scarlet Knights than any coach in program history. After going 3-20 in his first two seasons and 9-14 over the next two years, Schiano won at least seven games in six of the next seven years, at least eight games in five of those seasons and nine wins three times.

Granted, all of that success under Schiano came prior to Rutgers joining the Big Ten and the Big East simply didn’t offer the same level of competition. Rutgers has gone a combined 9-39 over the last four seasons with Chris Ash at the helm, there’s nowhere to go but up from here.

Schiano might not be the long-term answer for the Scarlet Knights to possibly compete at the top of the Big Ten. However, he’s proven his ability to succeed in the program and, at the very least, should be able to pull them out of the cellar and make them respectable competition as a Power 5 school.

Replaced: Rocky Long – Retired

Make no mistake, the surprise retirement of Rocky Long from the head coaching ranks put the San Diego State Aztecs put the program in a bit of a bind in terms of finding a new head coach. Ultimately, they landed on a familiar face in Brady Hoke, who coached the Aztecs for two seasons before leaving for Michigan.

On the one hand, there’s at least some reason for optimism with Hoke as he was able to succeed relatively quickly at San Diego State previously. After going just 4-8 in his first season with the Aztecs, he orchestrated at 9-4 campaign, which he then parlayed into the job in Ann Arbor. That has to stand for something.

The hire for SDSU is overall uninspiring. Hoke was less than stellar (to put it kindly) with the Wolverines and, following in the footsteps of Long after he was highly successful with the program, it’s hard to feel confident he’ll match that as he reclaims the job.

Replaced: Charlie Strong – Fired

Considering what happened in his time at Texas, it was hard not to feel less than enthused when the South Florida Bulls initially hired Charlie Strong. And as it turns out, that lack of excitement was proven to be the proper reaction as Strong was quite the letdown with a program that has enjoyed plenty of success in recent memory.

So after an uninspiring hire with Strong, USF has gone in the other direction in hiring Jeff Scott away from his role as Clemson’s co-offensive coordinator. While blessed with elite talent at Clemson to work with, the success of the Tigers offense with Scott helping to run the show has been obvious as they’ve run through the ACC with ease while putting big numbers on the scoreboard.

Not only should Scott help to ignite the Bulls offense moving forward but he should be able to dip into the deep pool of Florida recruiting and get some trophy fish. No, he’s not going to compete with Power 5 teams, but Scott was terrific on the recruiting trail for Dabo Swinney and that will serve USF well in the long run.

Replaced: Tony Sanchez – Fired

We know well the Oregon Ducks offense over the past few years has not been at the level it was in the heyday of Chip Kelly. However, it’s also hard to discredit the development and success of a player like Justin Herbert with the Ducks, which is a credit to Marcus Arroyo and his time spent working with Herbert and the rest of the Oregon offense in a system far different from the one Kelly ran.

Arroyo getting the UNLV job in the first place should speak to his qualifications as, despite what you may think, this was a gig connected to some big names, including Baylor’s new head coach and former LSU defensive coordinator Dave Aranda.

While you might not be buying what Arroyo did with the Oregon offense ver the last three seasons, what you can’t deny is he was one of the most gifted and productive recruiters in Eugene throughout his time there. For a program like the Rebels’, that can be huge if he can lure young prospects to Las Vegas.

Replaced: Frank Wilson – Fired

It’s possible I’m putting a little bit too much stock into experience as that’s not the only way a head coach can come in and succeed. However, it’s normally a good sign if a guy has gotten a shot to head up at least an offense or a defense previously in his coaching career, but that’s not the case when it comes to UTSA’s new head coach, Jeff Traylor.

Replacing Frank Wilson — who also had no head coaching or coordinator jobs prior to taking over the Roadrunners — Traylor has been at some big programs since 2015, working with the special teams and tight ends at Texas, as well as the running backs at both SMU and Arkansas. Prior to that, he was the head coach at Gilmer High School from 2000-14.

Traylor’s experience as a high school head coach in Texas may serve him and, thus, UTSA well in the recruiting race. Even so, that’s the only glaringly positive thing you can say about this hire given his complete lack of a track record to go off of.

Replaced: Chris Petersen – Resigned

Chris Petersen’s decision to step down at Washington was a move that sent shockwaves throughout the college football world. Finding a replacement for Petersen was not a long, arduous task for the university as defensive coordinator Jimmy Lake was essentially hand-picked by the previous head coach to be his successor in Seattle.

Having spent time in the NFL as a defensive backs coach from 2006-11, Lake has been mentored by Petersen at both Boise State and Washington, starting as a defensive backs coach and working his way up to becoming the defensive coordinator for the past two seasons with the Huskies.

The vote of confidence from Petersen on his way out should inspire confidence in itself. On top of that, however, Lake is clearly beloved by the players on Washington’s roster and should have next to no issues getting his team to buy into what he’s selling. And though he’s never been a head coach, he’s clearly been groomed for this moment.

Replaced: Mike Leach – Hired by Mississippi State

From one high-octane offensive system to another, the Washington State Cougars go from losing Mike Leach and the Air Raid to bringing in Nick Rolovich and the run-and-shoot he employed throughout his time at Hawaii. Much like with Leach, there will always be a baseline level of success when Wazzu has the ball simply because of the system that has proven effective.

One reason you have to like the Rolovich hire is he might actually be an upgrade over Leach on the recruiting trail. While Leach is somewhat notorious for his laid-back approach to recruiting and relying more on his constructs with X’s and O’s to allow players to succeed, Rolovich has a proven track record of identifying elite talent early and also developing players who are somewhat under-recruited. With a Power 5 program now, we could see Rolo thrive in that area.

For more NCAA football news, analysis, opinion and unique coverage by FanSided, including Heisman Trophy and College Football Playoff rankings, be sure to bookmark these pages.