Let’s first talk about the 7 million dollar salary. Pool, let’s use this tweet for reference:
I talked about the fact that Mickey was wanting 7 figures to stick around, and with us paying what we had to with Rhule to get him out of his Carolina Panthers buyout, the numbers get a little tricky. If Mickey who would more than likely get the Associate Head Coach title but not be a coordinator was going to get a million, you probably have to pay your offensive and defensive coordinators close to 1.5 a piece. That would take you to 4 million before we even talked about the other 7 assistants. I’ve said I think you need to pay Mickey, but let’s just assume for a second that it doesn’t work out… let’s talk about one of the things that pissed me off when Frost came here from UCF and his assistant salary pool.
I wasn’t as mad as others were when he brought his entire staff with him from Orlando. Turns out I was pretty wrong about that, but I understood it. Coaches rarely deviate from what works, and they just went 13-0. They just beat Auburn in the a bowl game. Why not bring everyone with you? While that proved to be a mistake despite me being somewhat ok with it, there was one thing that I always harped on on my previous message board.
I got so mad that when Frost brought his whole staff here he just instantly increased all of their salaries by sometimes more than double what they were getting. I get that a guy like Travis Fisher or Sean Beckton probably were hot commodities and needed a little incentive to come north. But a guy like Duval wasn’t being courted by anyone else, you didn’t need to take him from 185k to 400k just because you could. You didn’t need to take Ryan Held from 140k to 300k. Just because you have it doesn’t mean you have to spend it.
Circle it back to Rhule, I thought we would need to get to 7 million if we were paying an assistant who wasn’t a coordinator 7 figures. If Mickey chooses to go elsewhere, you may backfill him with a different WR coach, and one you can get for a more reasonable dollar amount (and get the same production). This is not to crap on Mickey, in my opinion i’m paying that dude. I’m just trying to level set on some expectations.
Here’s an example, Michigan and John Harbaugh don’t pay a single assistant (not even coordinators) over 1 million and they just won the east. Their entire assistant salary pool is 6.35 million, according to Trev, Rhule will get 7 million.
Again, i’m not saying to go cheap or that a guy like MJ doesn’t deserve it… but if we don’t get him to stay, it doesn’t mean we just have to go disperse it “because we have it”. Use it to upgrade some other positions where you may be able to get someone you thought wasn’t possible previously.
Rhule already using his philosophy handing out offers to speedsters
We talked about this article in many previous posts about Rhule, and how he found guys that could flat out fly that may be a bit unpolished as football players now, but have incredibly high ceilings.
And Rhule wasted no time going that route. His first offer was to a track All-American that runs a 10.8 100 that is currently committed to Virginia Tech
And he followed that up with a real surprising one to Jaylen Lloyd, who was at Omaha Central before transferring to Omaha Westside
Lloyd has a 10.4 100, 21.3 200, 50 foot triple jump, and the list goes on. Fits exactly what Rhule wants with guys that are fast as heck and have a ton of upside.
I would give one bit of caution on some of these…. doing this can really increase the chances of missing. I always look back at a guy like Kenzo Cotton or Ben Zajicek and they had all the numbers you wanted, but you have to really love football to be a contributor at a Power 5 school. Just offering based on track stats can be even more “boom or bust” than the normal recruiting process. But when you find some hidden guys no one is looking at, the ceiling is extremely high.
And this isn’t to say they will do it with every position and recruit, it’s just something to keep an eye on moving forward.
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Rhule’s teams at Baylor were full of stud speedster WRs and RBs. JaMycal Hasty, Trestan Ebner, Denzel Mims, Jalen Hurd (converted RB turned WR from UT), etc. He had a bunch of lightly recruited skill position guys with tons of speed and length. I can absolutely live with that if he has someone who can deliver to them at a clip like Charlie Brewer did. With Mickey in tow, we can absolutely recruit higher level players than they did at Baylor and, while he wasn’t pulling in top 20 classes at Baylor, that little boost should add a ton of talent to his roster in addition to his developmental abilities.
I think between their philosophy on speed and those assets with Mickey’s recruiting, that WR room could get dangerous in a hurry. I’m really curious what he does with the roster for 2023.
Pay Mickey! Find a big time DC and pay him. Find a big time OL coach and pay him. If you cant find the experience guys, pay them based on what they have done and let them prove themselves. Its simple, you have the money but you dont have to use it.
Mickey proved himself.
What do you think about the OC that he is bringing in?
I need to learn a bit more about him… had a South Carolina fan text me “good riddance” but all fans get a little emotional at times. I like what it kind of turned into, and i’m not a huge Spencer Rattler fan, I think he can make things look better or worse than they actually are. As always, if we just do what you said and get a great OL and DL coach, everything will look pretty good.
So I’m starting to get worried with what I’m seeing from Rhule in terms of his staff. He absolutely should hire guys he knows from Temple/Baylor/Carolina. But he gets 10 assistants and at least 3 should be hires new to him who fill a gap in that old staff or simply represent an upgrade such as a coach you’ve gone against and think highly of. In our case, the big gap in his coaching tree is regional ties and Big 10 experience that are crucial to success here.
My understanding is Mickey is the only coach Rhule is considering retaining but this could get complicated by whatever happens at Tulane or possibly some other openings coming. The rest of the staff are all coming in blind to the local recruiting scene, with zero Big 10 experience and talking about recruiting ties in Texas. Its still early and he’s likely working on some things here but his press conference had 1 glaring issue for me. His recruiting emphasis is going to be Texas, New Jersey then Florida and oh yeah of course local kids too. He needs to abort that agenda, get someone to crush instate (Mickey can handle this) then hire someone with ties to KC/St Louis and another with ties into Chicago. Its been 12 years since we joined this conference so lets start acting like we’re in the Big 10 and not the Big 12.
Ya, i’ll be curious how he fills it out. I think Joseph is the only for sure one he wants to retain, and Busch he is vetting a bit. In my opinion, I think he’s trying to figure out who his DC is going to be. If it’s Snow, you basically lose the ability to keep Bill Busch around. If it’s the guy from A&M you can keep Busch for sure.
I’m not too worried about it yet, some of these guys that have been announced may be analysts if we get the right fit elsewhere. I’m not sure who is full time yet.
Just a heads up but Busch was informed he’s out this AM, not public yet (can’t say my source on a public forum, sorry). Beckton and Applewhite were also told they are out in case we were wondering if they were options. The DC position seems to be a bit of a mystery but I’d be weary on Snow who is turning 67 years old in 3 weeks. I think Rhule is actually searching for a DC who would be new to him but this one seems a mystery we have to wait and see. I was told he has had at least 1 rejection there.
I think those other hires are absolutely coaches. It’s pretty common for an NFL assistant OL or DL coach to drop to college and take over a room. Our last 2 OL coaches did just that so why wouldn’t Knighton? Cooper’s resume screams coach not analyst. Ditto Foley. We just don’t know the full details of whether Cooper has just CB’s or more, whether Knighton just has interior DL or full DL or what Rhule wants Foley to do given his diverse background.
Also I’d love it if someone would introduce Rhule to Garrison. He’s grown as an OL coach and can own KC for us.
I love Garrison as OL coach. He did a great job recruiting and developing our room. We had 3 walk-on starters when we played for a CCG under him.
Everyone is gone at this point except Joseph and Raiola. If we don’t hear about MJ in the next 24 hours i’ll be worried.
Interesting that the new DL coach Knighton is young guy a la the Riola hire last year. Does this mean Robinson from A&M is coming to be the DC? Seems like an underwhelming hire for that important of a position but it makes sense if they are trying to save some $ and bring in Robinson as DC and pay to keep MJ.
Any news on the MJ front? Would think they have to get that ironed out quick. I saw they just re-offered Cam Lenhardt who I believe was Mickey’s choice at EDGE before he got overruled in favor of Williams. Does that bode well for MJ staying on staff?
I think Rhule develops coaches just as much as he does teams. He really didn’t know him until he got to Carolina so I wonder if he saw something good there?
If this goes past another 24 hours I think Mickey is out unfortunately.
Sounds like everyone is gone except for possibly MJ.
I’m hearing Raiola and Mickey are being retained but Mickey will likely keep looking at other opportunities as they come
Mickey is poop or get off the pot in the next 24 hours. Better not be Raiola, that would make me unhappy.
Been a little while so thought I’d reengage this convo. I’d love to hear your thoughts on a few coaches we hired. I had some good intel before because my source was actually someone on staff but not anymore (hence I knew Raiola was retained early). I did get some good feedback on some of the new and old coaches (and they think Rhule was the right hire so not just bitter ex coach).
I have a couple real concerns for what I’m seeing/hearing. Purdue just hired a new HC and his 2 years at IL give him more years experience in the Big 10 than our entire staff combined. The old staff acknowledged the Big 10 is a “unique place” and said past exposure would have been helpful. This was an avoidable mistake IMO.
The other is confusing because I see 2 stories, polar opposite. The new staff is all over the place recruiting and appears highly organized. Yet Rhule had our support staff sitting in a room all day doing nothing for 2 weeks because he couldn’t bother to have a conversation with them or the ops team to direct on how to use these people temporarily. He let 2 people go last week in random conversations at the coffee machine where the support member saw Rhule and did a quick intro only to have him say btw we are moving on so feel free to pack up your things and take whatever you want. It’s a really bad look and unfortunate for all, especially the ones who had/have zero clarity on whether they have a job still.
A couple quick hits on things I also heard. Whipple was hired by Trev and was far worse behind the scenes than any of the things people are saying about Frost (I was even told others thought he was intentionally sabotaging the QB room fwiw). He only took the job because he needed the insurance for his wife who has stage 4 cancer and had no interest in his job. The OL room hated Raiola and he clashed with the other coaches. So in this regard he was the easiest to keep around. His style aligns more with Rhule’s staff than the old staff also. I am not remotely surprised to see Banks and Williams in the portal as I noticed they were pretty checked out at the game in Ireland (along with Miller they stood at the end away from everyone with their helmets off to the side and unengaged the whole time). I was also told we need a complete culture reset and a lot of the roster just needs to leave to enable it but also because they just don’t have the talent or if they do there are other issues. Recruiting under Frost was a total disaster and part of that is the recruiting support staff we have is terrible. I’ll be curious to see if Rhule cleans house once the dead period hits and he has time to flip that room. This is a complete tear down and rebuild. Frost left things much worse than he inherited.
It was a bad situation. I will go into it a bit more tomorrow but i’m pretty surprised Raiola was retained. But I also know he had no allegiance to Frost so it somewhat makes sense there.
From what I was told Rhule hit the ground with support staff as soon as it was announced he was coach, but I always wonder what these new hires do when it’s almost a done deal and they have to wait for the season to be over. The hardest part is going to be Rhule seeing with his own eyes what they are lacking and what they have, he has to basically wait til spring practice to see that. But he at least had the benefit of watching the games to see things on the field.
As far as people leaving, staff or players, I think Rhule is taking the approach of everyone pretty much needs to go administratively, and if a player wants to go to the portal so be it because if he has to coach your “want to” to be here it’s a losing battle anyway.
The Whipple thing I tried telling people wasn’t going to go well. He retired then came back out of it and there was no way he was going to be on the same page as Frost, they were just too different.
Raiola still a possibility and I don’t understand it at all.
The only coaches that should be consider to be retained are Raiola, MJ, Applewhite. Maybe Busch. Reason is those three are not tied to Frost and only here one year. The results are not really there fault. Busch is just a great coach but is tied to Frost being on the support staff before being an on the field coach last year. You point about Frost keeping his UCF coaches and just given them a raise is what is happening again. Yes we have 7 million to pay but just because you make that much money does not mean you are that good at what you do. So if you keep Raiola, does he get a raise just because of the head coach is new? Makes no sense. MJ deserves a raise, but what has the other coaches done to be paid at the top of the market of there respected position?
Hopefully they are holding some back for some top notch coordinators.
I have no idea wth is going on with Raiola but I heard he got a 2nd meeting today and is expected to be kept. I will say he’s worked under some really good OL coaches and walked into a nightmare. I also heard some things about Whipple that make me think he may have been the biggest issue on offense. Fixing S&C, better install and broader management of the offense can help a lot here but we need a talent infusion and I’m not sure Raiola is the guy there. The new OC and Rhule have backgrounds coaching OL so I’m thinking he’s about to get a lot more help. This is 1 position we shouldn’t worry about players going in the portal if they so choose.
Whipple ended up being a complete disaster. I have no idea why Raiola may stay, but that’s where things look like they are heading. At least we made a change at S&C but I need to research that guy a bit more.
Its hard to judge Raiola. I saw better run blocking, but worse pass blocking. And I saw miss assignments on blitz pickup. Oline has been the only group that new faces have not come in. I think it is more talent and development issue. The miss assignments is all coaching tho
OL was just our worst position group, so I have a hard time being ok with retaining the coach of the worst group on our team. Just tough optics for me.
So the O line was the worst performing group by far on the entire team…and yet Raiola is the only one that might be retained?? What are we missing here? Was it Whipple that wanted things done a certain way and that’s why we were bad? I dont know enough of Raiola except what I saw on the field this year and quite frankly, it was the worst O line I can recall playing for the Huskers in many, many years.
I think we just had some people running with the fact a recruit tagged Raiola when he was really just tagging the OL coach. He didn’t know anything other than that’s what it said on Twitter who our OL coach was.
Well it ain’t going to be Mickey staying. This program never fails to disappoint. One step forward. Two steps back. I’m actually starting to wonder if there really is a curse. Hopefully Coach Rhule has what it takes to reverse course for this giant crap show that is Husker football..SMH.
I would’ve liked Joseph to be on board as a recruiter and WR coach, thought he would’ve added a lot of value.
But personally not too worried about about it in the grand scheme of things(football-wise, not talking about the human side of this).
He would’ve been a nice piece, but whether Rhule is successful or not here I don’t think was going to hinge on Joseph staying.
If he was causing even a little bit of divide then he shouldn’t have been retained anyway. Everyone pulling in the same direction is necessary.
Well, things have certainly changed here recently:( Cannot see MJ being kept around now (even if innocent…thats a pretty big PR issue out there..and if guilty..well…..). I wonder if the DC they are looking for is still coaching?
Ya, it’s done for MJ now. We will hire a WR coach in the next 24 hours more than likely.