College football hot seat watch: Are Lincoln Riley and Sherrone Moore totally cooked?

Death, taxes and blaming your head coach for all of your team's problems. It is a tale as old as time. One thing that has stood out to me through the first six weeks of the 2024 college football season is that coaching matters. When it is good, a team can compete with anyone. When it is bad, supposedly good teams can lose games they have no business falling in. It is why wholesale changes are made.

Since I woke up feeling dangerous, I feel compelled to give you the hot seat watch your souls crave. Buns will be toasted, as it is gettin' hot in herre for a handful of coaches. Usually when I have done this exercise in the past, I have limited it to about three-to-five Power Four/Five candidates. Over the last week or so, I have come to the conclusion that may be closer to a dozen probably need to go soon.

So what I am going to do today is rattle off a baker's dozen of Power Four head-coaching situations where I think an upgrade could be beneficial in the long-term. The strange part is head coaches like P.J. Fleck at Minnesota or Tony Elliott at Virginia are nowhere to be found. They either have their teams playing well or have shown an ability to play a tough brand of football to win some tight games.

I broken down the coaches into three tiers: He's heating up!, he's on fire!, and it's getting hot in herre!

He's heating up!

TCU Horned Frogs head coach Sonny Dykes

Something is up in Fort Worth, and I think it is the TCU Horned Frogs head coach. Sonny Dykes may get a little longer runway after playing for a national title two years ago, but TCU missed a bowl game a season ago, and just lost at home to Houston. The Cougars might be the worst team in the Big 12, and possibly the Power Four. It is looking more and more like the 2022 season was the anomaly here.

Michigan Wolverines head coach Sherrone Moore

No, I don't think Michigan is going to fire Sherrone Moore after one year. However, anointing him to head coach seems to have been a foolish maneuver. He is supposedly a gifted offensive mind. That may be true, but his team is getting atrocious quarterback play week after week. This team went undefeated a year ago. With the way the Wolverines play on offense, they might go 7-5 this season.

Mississippi State Bulldogs head coach Jeff Lebby

Mississippi State couldn't possibly fire Jeff Lebby after one season, right? Well, the Bulldogs are riding a four-game losing streak and have to go to No. 5 Georgia this week for Bulldog, Bulldog. He is a proven offensive mind as a coordinator, but this was always going to take time to rebuild in the wake of Mike Leach's untimely death. Zac Selmon won't give Lebby the Zach Arnett treatment, will he?

Florida State Seminoles head coach Mike Norvell

At some point, heads will need to roll in Tallahassee. After winning the ACC a year ago, Florida State has lost six of its last seven games. Its lone win since the ACC Championship Game was home vs. Cal, a team that loves losing to winless teams in conference play under Justin Wilcox. While I would argue for Mike Norvell to get one more season, he must get rid of Adam Fuller and find a new quarterback.

North Carolina State Wolfpack head coach Dave Doeren

North Carolina State has a tough schedule, but the Wolfpack have looked like paper tigers under Dave Doeren this season. He has been in this job in Raleigh for about a decade now. Doeren's team has made a killing flying under the radar, but when the spotlight is shined on them, they shrink. Despite an experienced offensive line, the offense isn't any good because Grayson McCall is shot.

He's on fire!

USC Trojans head coach Lincoln Riley

I don't care that Lincoln Riley is in the midst of a 10-year contract, I know a snake oil salesman when I see one. It has not been the defense that has been the problem for USC. It has been his gimmicky, pop-gun Air Raid offense that was never going to work in the Big Ten in the first place. Jennifer Cohen did not hire him. Mike Bohn did. Money aside, go get USC a head coach who can win in the Midwest.

Iowa Hawkeyes head coach Kirk Ferentz

We are delaying the inevitable at this point. Kirk Ferentz is going to keep doing him until he is dead. For as long as he remains the head coach of the Iowa Hawkeyes, nothing is going to change. The offense will be abysmal. Even more damning, the defense isn't as good as it was a year ago. It isn't loyalty at this point. It is Stockholm Syndrome. If Beth Goetz can fire his son, she can fire Ferentz.

Auburn Tigers head coach Hugh Freeze

Hell ain't a bad place to be, but it might be a place if Auburn is your hell. I almost feel bad for Hugh Freeze. He may be a terrible person, but he has been tasked with an impossible situation of turning Auburn around. Hubris, and YellaWood money, may have brought him there, but I don't think he gets four years here. Auburn played about as well as Auburn could at Georgia and still lost by three scores.

Florida Gators head coach Billy Napier

Give Billy Napier a lot of credit. He is not going down without a fight. Florida is 3-2 with wins over Samford, Mississippi State and UCF. The only problem is they have more teams on their schedule coming up the caliber of Miami and Texas A&M. If Florida goes 6-6, Napier should get a raise. Unfortunately, I don't think the fan base or the boosters will see it that way. I feel so very bad for him...

It's gettin' hot in herre! So fire your bad coach!

Purdue Boilermakers head coach Ryan Walters

We have crossed into the level of where it may be too far gone. Purdue may give Ryan Walters a third year, but he is going to be facing a ton of pressure both from the fanbase and from athletic director Mike Bobinski. The Boilermakers played for a national title in men's hoops. Walters' team may win three games this year. They have already fired Graham Harrell as offensive coordinator. It is over...

North Carolina Tar Heels head coach Mack Brown

If any team in the ACC is on quit watch, it is my boy Cody Williams' North Carolina Tar Heels. After a 3-0 start, UNC has lost three games in a row to James Madison, Duke and Pittsburgh. While all three of those teams might be quite good, North Carolina is most certainly not. I am struggling to see a way for this team to get to bowl eligibility. UNC needs to be identifying Mack Brown's replacement already.

Baylor Bears head coach Dave Aranda

For months now, it has been undeniably clear that Dave Aranda won with Matt Rhule's players. While I will say that Baylor played Iowa State quite well on the road in Ames, that was always going to be a trap game for the Cyclones. What that game showed us is you can win convincingly with a defensive-minded head coach like Matt Campbell, but you need a quarterback and you must be an alpha male.

UCLA Bruins head coach DeShaun Foster

This reeks of Zach Arnett. No, I don't think Zac Selmon is going to rip the rug out from the guy he hired away from Oklahoma in Jeff Lebby at Mississippi State, but UCLA needs to hire an actual head coach this offseason. I applaud the idea behind hiring DeShaun Foster on a whim after Chip Kelly bailed on y'all, but UCLA deserves better. Let's have Troy Aikman pick the next coach. Can he coach?