Last week, we shared our staff predictions for the 2017 Notre Dame football season and invited you to share your own thoughts. Here’s the follow-up, where we review our commentariat season predictions and compare them to our own. Next week, to close the circle, we’ll hold a death dodgeball match to decide whose prediction for each question is valid. FYI, you guys will need to practice hard, because we brought in Patches O’Houlihan to get us ready. Gird your loins. No, seriously, those wrenches hurt.
The 18Stripes Commentariat Season Predictions
Big Picture Stuff
What will Notre Dame’s 2017 regular season record be?
- 9-3 – 43%
- 10-2 – 19%
- 8-4 – 19%
- 7-5 – 11%
- 12-0/11-1 – 7%
- 6-6 or worse – 2%
A whopping 69% of you picked 9-3 or better, and 26% picked 10-2 or better. That is some serious Kool Aid consumption, and this comes from a guy who voted for 10-2 himself. 58% of our staff voters picked either 8-4 or 7-5, so you all are much more optimistic than we are apparently. We’d be quite happy to be wrong on this one.
Worth noting here that, unlike with the staff, the 6-6 option was not shut out. To all who may have sprung for that option, let us offer you one small consolation: If it really happens, we’ll have a new coach before the ball drops in Times Square.
What’s your biggest concern heading into the season?
- Defensive line depth chart – 37%
- Safety depth chart – 24%
- Defensive fundamentals – 11%
- Brian Kelly – 11%
- Too much change in one offseason – 6%
- 2016 hangover – 2%
- Health – 2%
- Offensive gamebreakers – 2%
- Secondary skill and playmakers – 2%
- Center depth chart – 2%
- Shenanigans – 2%
Interesting omissions from our commentariat: Nobody chose special teams or the first-time starter at quarterback. Heady stuff for a rookie and a unit that ranked in the bottom half in many categories last year.
The winner (?), just as it was for the staff, was the defensive line depth chart. For us the worry was more defensive tackle; we have little production but several bodies at end, while we have little production and few bodies on the interior. Defensive depth up the middle is a major concern: 60% of the staff chose the line, while 61% of you chose the line and the safeties.
It’s not a surprise to see defensive fundamentals and Brian Kelly relatively high on the list also. From there, we get a potpourri of main concerns; I like the former offensive line personnel (I assume) who voted for the center depth chart. Also, whoever voted for “shenanigans,” you are anonymously awarded 18S HOF status. Fantastic.
Superlatives
Who will be Notre Dame’s offensive MVP?
- Josh Adams – 42%
- Brandon Wimbush – 32%
- Equanimeous St. Brown – 11%
- Mike McGlinchey – 8%
- Quenton Nelson – 6%
- Tony Jones Jr. – 2%
The staff’s top three selections were Adams, St. Brown, and Wimbush, so pretty similar here. Many of you seem to be quite confident in Wimbush’s ability to make a big impact immediately; from your fingers to God’s ears. Or something like that. More offensive line love here, good work by the hogmolly groupies. Also, Tony Jones?? I like the kid, but I don’t know what kind of season would end with him as the offensive MVP. It would be interesting, no doubt.
Who will be Notre Dame’s defensive MVP?
- Nyles Morgan – 92%
- Daelin Hayes – 4%
- Drue Tranquill – 4%
Alpha. Dog. Nuff said.
Who will provide the play of the year?
- Brandon Wimbush – 32%
- Equanimeous St. Brown – 30%
- Josh Adams – 17%
- Daelin Hayes – 7%
- CJ Sanders (as a kick returner) – 6%
- Alize Mack – 4%
- Josh Adams – 8%
- Julian Love – 2%
- Shaun Crawford (pick six) – 2%
- Justin Yoon (game winner) – 2%
Once again the top of the table was pretty much the same, with one notable exception: 25% of the staff tabbed Alize Mack, while only 4% of you did. You also chose a few defenders, who got shut out of the staff responses. Kudos to the voter who was bold enough to predict not just Crawford, but what type of play it would be.
Which freshman will make the biggest immediate impact?
- TE Cole Kmet – 30%
- S Isaiah Robertson – 20%
- DT Kurt Hinish – 15%
- WR Michael Young – 15%
- TE Brock Wright – 13%
- DT Darnell Ewell – 4%
- DT Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa – 2%
- QB Ian Book – 2%
You guys are extremely bullish on Kmet. He has more athleticism than Wright but isn’t as game-ready; will that still be the case by the mid-year break, though? Robertson is a solid choice; if the NCAA denies Navy transfer Alohi Gilman’s hardship waiver request, Robertson will be in the two-deep. Young has shown enough that he’ll likely see some time on offense and special teams. Hinish, Ewell, and MTA all have a shot to be in the rotation based on the aforementioned depth concerns. As for Ian Book, well… We’ll overlook the fact that he’s a sophomore and note only that some people just like to watch the world burn.
The staff’s clear top two were Brock Wright and Isaiah Robertson, with everyone else kind of in an undistinguishable group. And we didn’t have Book, so…
Over/Under Fun
Wins in first 6 games: 5
61% took the over, pretty much in line with the 58% of the staff who did so as well. Given the hand-wringing we’ve seen over the impending doom that Georgia’s juggernaut offense will visit unto us, I’m a bit surprised. I’ll point out once again that Vegas still has us as a favorite in this game.
Average team rushing yards in Brian Kelly’s tenure: 2,127
I was surprised when 92% of the staff took the over on this; I was just as surprised when 89% of you did the same. As noted earlier, if you’re all right, this will be the third time in Kelly’s eight years at Notre Dame that he’ll have topped that number. 2012 and 2015 both resoundingly beat it.
Average team passing yards in Brian Kelly’s tenure: 3,272
Here you differed from us quite a bit, as 59% took the under compared to 92% of the staff. You still think we’ll do better against Kelly’s rushing average than his passing average, but the divide is narrower. Only 2012 and 2016 have been under this number in Kelly’s tenure, and the most recent offenses that Chip Kelly was a part of have all been comfortably above it. Stay tuned.
Average team sacks in Brian Kelly’s tenure: 24
Average team tackles for loss in Brian Kelly’s tenure: 70
Average team interceptions in Brian Kelly’s tenure: 12.6
You upheld the motto established in the staff survey: In Elko We Trust.™ The staff voted for the over on each item, 58%/58%/67%. Meanwhile, 68% of you took the over on sacks, 72% (!) on tackles for loss, and 56% on interceptions. RAMMING SPEEEEED!!!
Josh Adams rushing yards: 1,100
54% of you took the over here, while the staff was split down the middle. Even though it would probably mean he would record the best individual rushing season under Kelly (Cierre Wood had 1,102 yards in 2011), I’m pretty confident Adams will get there if he’s healthy.
Equanimeous St. Brown receiving yards: 1,000
Here you broke again from the staff; 63% of you took the over, while only 50% of the staff did. This was an easy one for me given that ESB almost got there last year in a train wreck of a season; I can understand skepticism with a new quarterback and a new offensive coordinator, though. So many question marks in 2017.
Brandon Wimbush rushing yards: 400
67% of you took the under here, compared to 58% of the staff. The under seems like a fairly safe bet; only Deshone Kizer has beaten this number under Kelly, and nobody else has cracked 300 yards. Wimbush is probably a better runner than Everett Golson, who had a 298-yard season, but he’s not as rugged as Kizer and the staff will probably be more careful with him.
Nyles Morgan tackles: 110
There was a big gulf here between the commentariat and the staff: 65% of you took the over, while 75% of the staff took the under. It would be a big jump from Morgan’s career high of 90 tackles last season, but then again it would be below junior Jaylon Smith (114) and senior Manti Te’o (113). Then again, that’s Smith and Te’o. Is 2017 Morgan on their level?
Daelin Hayes sacks: 8.5
Here your bearishness and ours were roughly equal, as 70% of you took the under compared to 67% of the staff. It seems like a relatively modest number, but if Hayes hits it he’ll have at least the second best individual season in Kelly’s tenure: 2012 Stephon Tuitt had 11 sacks and 2015 Romeo Okwara had 9.
Defensive and special teams touchdowns: 4.5
57% of you took the over, while 67% of the staff did the same. The line is right on Kelly’s average of 4.3. All Elko, all the time.
Possessions vs. Navy: 10.5
Under Kelly, when we’ve had 11 or more possessions against Navy, we’re 4-0 with an average margin of +27.3. When we’ve had 10 or fewer possessions, we’re 1-2 with an average margin of -5. Apparently everyone thinks we’re going to smoke them this year; 80% of you and 83% of the staff took the over. As Charlie Brown once said, gee, that’d be neat.
Occurrences of “grit” in press conference comments: 50
57% of you took the over here, compared to 58% of the staff. After the first couple of press conferences, I’m wondering if I should’ve time-bounded this one to the first half of the season.
Dreaded Votes of Confidence handed out by Jack Swarbrick: 1.5
67% of you and 67% of the staff took the under. If he issues multiple votes of confidences, that probably means we’ll have a new coach in 2018.
Observer ads taken out by disgruntled alumni: 0.5
Someone’s copying our answers… Just like in the staff voting, this is a 50/50 split. EYES ON YOUR OWN PAPER! Please, we don’t need to vacate anything else.
Prop Bets
Which coordinator will have the biggest impact in 2017?
Mike Elko was the unanimous choice in both surveys. The defense was certainly the most broken unit on the team, and Elko came in with the strongest resume of all the new assistants. Even so, I was a little surprised that literally nobody took Chip Long. In Elko We Trust.™
Who will start at free safety against Temple?
91% said Nick Coleman, compared to 93% of the staff. In Sunday’s “New and Gold” scrimmage, Coleman looked like a different player than the one last seen wondering which way was up. How much of his apparent transformation is real, and how much is of the Junior Jabbie variety?
Who will start at free safety against Stanford?
Man, this is a tough room… 33% of staff thought Coleman would lose his job by the end of the season, while 46% of you thought the same. Coleman has you all right where he wants you…
Who will lead the team in touchdowns?
You were less convinced of Josh Adams’s supremacy here – 54% of you chose him, compared to 75% of the staff. If RB1 doesn’t lead the team in scores, we’ll either spread it around really well or somebody will have a breakout performance for the ages.
Who will lead the team in sacks?
59% of you chose Daelin Hayes, in line with the 58% of the staff who did the same. As we noted before, for at least seven straight seasons a defensive lineman has led Mike Elko’s defense in sacks. Going out on a limb here to pick Hayes.
Who will lead the team in interceptions?
You’re slightly more bullish on Julian Love than the staff was here, with 82% of you choosing the field compared to 92% of the staff. Love seemed like a natural choice before camp, but others have made big strides at corner – especially Nick Watkins, Shaun Crawford, and Donte Vaughn. That in turn has allowed the staff to consider using Love as something of a Swiss Army knife, which could muddle his chances to be a ball hawk.
Wrapping Up
Some optimism, some pessimism, and some uncertainty. Sounds like another year of football is here! Are you ready for Temple yet? We sure as hell are, man. The last nine months have felt like 40 years in the desert. Time to get back out there and crack some heads engage in physical play in a responsible and safe manner.
Good question, Clarence… If our livers survive the season, we’ll revisit this in January and have a good laugh about how we were all more pessimistic than we should’ve been, as we call in our orders for national championship merchandise. The power of positive thinking, folks.
A big thank you to our great community for your help in this exercise, and Go Irish!
But where was the subtle Princess Bride reference?
I’ll add a post script…
ND fans: “He wasn’t fired? INCONCEIVABLE!”
Swarbrick: “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
Not subtle by any means, but I’ll at least meet you halfway.
LMFTFY: “Wimbush is probably a better runner than Everett Golson”
“Zaire is the better runner and Kizer is the better passer”
Ha… Brief note on “probably” – I *think* he’s a substantially better runner than Golson, but I don’t *know* it yet because we haven’t seen enough of him in live action. I’m even more confident that he places more priority on ball security than Everett did, if for no other reason than that it’s literally impossible to place less priority on it. I almost broke my TV the second time he fumbled against ASU because he propped himself up with the ball during a spin move… Kelly said early in 2012 that Everett had the art of QB play naturally down and needed to work on the science. He was indeed an artist. In every way.
Pretty much what I expected, but ouch.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/which-college-football-teams-are-always-overrated-in-august/
I don’t think there’s much to that analysis. Most teams on that list do “worse” than their preseason rankings. More damning of the preseason poll than of ND, FSU, UF, PSU & Texas. Also, 538 is still on my shit-list for their election bumblings.
I largely agree, but I do think they hit on a good point later in the article – from your reaction I’m guessing you might not have made it that far… The preseason rankings of most of those teams, like FSU, Florida, Texas, etc., have typically been pretty high, so it’s much easier to underachieve than overachieve. On the flip side, we have an average preseason ranking of 25 in the time they examined, which theoretically would make it much easier for us to overachieve.
So I think there’s some fairness to them calling us out a bit, but overall, yeah, I agree that it’s hardly surprising that the big-name programs lead the over-ranked charge. Duh.
How dare you assume I didn’t read the article! (Which I didn’t) I have a right to my opinion! (And only look at pretty graphics and then chide an author for making the same conclusion that I also made)
I think the most impressive stat from that article is Clemson at 40%. Granted they have the benefit of not being as highly ranked in the earlier years of the time-frame they sampled, but its still pretty impressive. Dabo Swinney has outperformed his pre-season ranking for the past 5 years. Pretty tough to do considering they were ranked #2 at the start of last season.
I’ve gone on record with my skepticism about Saban being a truly elite coach, as opposed to a perfect match for Alabama, but I’ll set that aside for a moment and just note that both Saban and Meyer clearly have the resumes to be in their own tier, with multiple titles and titles at two different schools (I think Pop Warner and Howard Jones, both contemporaries of Rockne, are the only other coaches to pull that off).
The third of the holy triumvirate that ND fans like to talk about is Harbaugh, but there’s really no defensible reason for him to be there over Swinney. In ten seasons at San Diego, Stanford, and Michigan, Harbaugh is 78-33 (0.703) with no P5 conference championships, no national title appearances, three top 15 finishes, and a 2-2 record in bowl games. Meanwhile, in nine years at Clemson, Swinney is 89-28 (0.761) with three ACC titles, a national title earned by beating Meyer and Saban, another title game appearance, 5 *straight* top 15 finishes (and counting), 7 straight years with 10+ wins (and counting), a 7-4 record in bowl games and a 4-2 record in NYD/playoff games.
That’s what we call a “landslide victory.” So unless your preference for MANBALL outweighs just about every metric you could possibly pick, you have to put Swinney on top of the next group after Saban and Meyer. I think his “aw, shucks” routine makes people discount him, but they shouldn’t. He’s a damn good coach, and he’s far more likable than Meyer, Saban, or Harbaugh on top of it.
I love Dabo. He would easily be my top pick to coach at ND, over Meyer, Saban, et alia. I don’t love his accent, but I could get over it.
What is it about alabama and saban being such a great fit? It’s not like the previous regime at Alabama was that great right? So it’s not simply alabama making saban (I know that’s not your position either).
I don’t think Saban is a bad coach, or even that he’s not a very good coach. I’m just not sold that he’s at the level of Meyer as a football coach. I think that ceteris paribus he’s better at running a program than Meyer – he’s never had to fake a heart issue or experienced massive player discipline problems – and that coupled with above average ability as a coach and the unlimited resources and nonexistent restrictions at Alabama have turned his program into an elite machine.
Between Michigan State, LSU, and Miami, Saban has a 0.628 winning percentage. That’s not bad, but for some perspective, among active coaches it would put him right around Jim Mora (0.631), Frank Solich (0.629), James Franklin (0.628), Jim McElwain (0.625), and Lane Kiffin (0.625). I think he’s a better coach than all those guys, but again, we’re talking about putting a guy on a level with Meyer, a guy with a career winning percentage that puts him in Rockne/Leahy territory.
Breaking it down further, Meyer had a 0.739 win percentage in two years at Bowling Green, 0.917 in three years at Utah (compared to Saban’s 0.585 in five years at MSU), 0.813 with two titles in six years at Florida (compared to Saban’s 0.750 with a half title in five years at LSU), and a truly absurd 0.910 with a national title in five years at Ohio State (compared to Saban’s 0.857 with four titles in 10 years at Alabama).
Remember, this isn’t a discussion of whether Saban is a good or bad coach. It’s whether he belongs in a tier with just him and Meyer. I don’t think he does, I think Meyer is a cut above. I think if you put Saban at USC, or Texas, or wherever, there’s a decent chance he wouldn’t do as well. Do well, yes, but win at an 0.850 clip, no. I think Saban’s style and Alabama’s resources and unmatched willingness to put football first – Meyer asked for admissions concessions from Ohio State, believe it or not, which I’m sure Saban has never had to do at Bama – are a perfect marriage.
That makes sense so it is more Bama making a very very good coach look like a generational type coach.
Does Bama have the best/most unlimited resources of any program?
I think they have the “best” combination of university resources, (ahem) external resources, and institutional willingness to subjugate academic and administrative concerns to football success. Even Ohio State or Florida wouldn’t completely throw standards out the door – the academic side wouldn’t allow it. Meanwhile, Alabama alums influenced the state to shut down the UAB program to reduce competition. That tells you everything you need to know.
They don’t care what they have to spend on the program, and as long as it’s not illegal and they can maintain plausible deniability with the NCAA, they’re not going to have a problem with it. For a guy who wants to be left alone to obsess over the nuts and bolts of running a program, it’s the perfect place to be.
He does, routinely, convince 4 and five star kids to gray shirt for him though. I’m not saying that’s all there is to it, but when you can do that, you are doing some serious recruiting. I mean that is a convincing dude.
I like him better than Meyer too. He doesn’t seem as slimy to me.
Eh… He’s not as weasely as Meyer, but that’s an extremely high bar. He does run kids off with highly questionable medical hardships, and I don’t think he’s overly concerned about setting them up for a successful future after they’re done playing. They graduate around 75% of their players, I think, which is probably above Alabama’s non-student average. I’ll give him credit for that, although as a cynic I’ll always believe he’s gaming that a bit.
I don’t think he’s ever grey shirted a five star, but he did get Jarez Parks, #91 overall last cycle (and with offers from Clemson, Florida, FSU, Georgia, LSU, Michigan, ND, OSU, Oklahoma, Stanford, and USC, among many others), to grey shirt. *After* pulling his scholarship offer on signing day, when Parks released a commitment video he had made in Paris. That’s one of the most impressive recruiting jobs I’ve ever seen.
That goes into the “running a program” point. But if you switch Meyer and Saban, do you think Meyer would be at least as successful as Saban has been at Alabama? I do, although I think he might have less longevity. For sure he would be more successful at, say, Florida or LSU than Saban would be. Which again isn’t saying that Saban is bad, I just think Meyer is in a level all by himself.
Saban has had perhaps the most successful coaching run in college football history in his time at Alabama. I think it’s an absolute long shot to think Meyer would have been as good at Bama as Saban has been.
And yet Meyer has had a higher win percentage at every comparable stop in his career – Utah vs. MSU, Florida vs. LSU, and OSU vs. Alabama.
This is not a hill I want to die on, but I don’t think it’s crazy at all to say that.
I also thought that analysis was pointless. I’m not sure why they didn’t measure average discrepancy or something.
If defense of 538’s election coverage, they did give Trump a 30% chance. I don’t really call that a bumbling.
I give them a lot of credit for their coverage during the election. They lost me after the election when they were peddling divisive narratives and ignoring the data they spent months claiming to represent because they disliked the result.
I thought it was at like 89/11% day before election. And fairly confident on D’s taking Senate or House (I don’t remember which one now)
They had multiple models. Here is a link to their final prediction. 30% for Trump and the Senate was a 50/50 split.
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2016-election-forecast/?ex_cid=2016-senate-forecast
I’m by no means a 538 apologist. I just think statistics is very difficult to do well and they are one of the few who often put out strong articles.
However they put out weaker articles as well. I was not impressed with the overrated analysis.
The problem with statistics is that they are only particularly useful in large sample sizes. In a single occurrence stats can only be flat out wrong if they gave something a hard, non-rounded, 0 percent chance.
Everyone criticized those analytical sites for poorly predicting the election, when they didn’t seem to get the same criticism for saying the Pats had a wayyyy lower % chance of winning the super bowl. I think this is because even though that game was only 1 game, we see comebacks often, so it is easier for us to process that model as a %, not a guarantee of winning, despite being at practically guaranteed levels.
For elections it seems pretty pointless. Since the outcome is either 0 or 1, there is no way to ever reach 30% to prove your numbers work (assuming you need a sample size of about 20 to get a decent validation, I highly doubt many analytic publications will be around long enough to show they are accurate over the course of 20 elections).
This isn’t quite true. For example, they showed that their primary predictions (more than 20 elections) were basically in line with what you’d expect statistically (e.g., even an outlier like Michigan on the Dem side is something you’d expect about once per primary cycle given the probability they assigned). I don’t love some of their coverage, but I think they and someone like Nate Cohn at the Times are doing the best work when it comes to thinking about likely election outcomes in a rigorous way.
It’s also not quite fair to think of the outcomes as dichotomous. At least with their elections coverage, you can evaluate the expected margins against the actual margin. Because obviously their predictions aren’t win/lose, they’re generating a distribution of likely outcomes.
In terms of proving “30 percent,” that’s pretty straightforward to do. You have a lot of elections each cycle–House, Senate, governorships, sometimes President, etc. Saying “x has a 30 percent chance of winning” is roughly equivalent to saying, “given this set of data, we’d expect someone in candidate x’s position to win about 30 percent of the time.” Then you can go back and check all the expected values against the actual outcomes and see how they line up. I suppose you can make a claim that the same framework doesn’t lend itself as readily to presidential elections due to their infrequency or something, though.
To seize on the 6-6 comment: asking less to troll than genuine curiosity, what is the reasonable 7-5 scenario where Kelly is kept? I’m not sure I see it: either involves (a) going 4-2 out of the first 6, which would lead to “are they firing him over fall break????” discussion given the one L they should not have (the answer to that question will of course be no, but it will be A Thing), followed by going 3-3 over the last six or (b) losing 4 of the last 6 games. Scenario (b) will 100% get Kelly fired at 7-5 and maybe even at 8-4. Even under scenario (a), it’s hard to string together the permutation that will look good enough to keep him.
From the vantage point of today, I’ll say the best 7-5 for job security is probably close losses to UGA, @UNC, NC State, @Miami, @Stanford, and beating USC to give them their only loss (or, perhaps better, a second loss that keeps them out of the CFP). I can’t imagine that would be sufficient.
I don’t see a scenario where ND goes 7-5 and BK is kept.
Excessive injuries, crazy turnover from academic discipline and turnover among the coaching staff has been shown to give Kelly the benefit of the doubt despite a poor record on the field. A tornado hits the Gug or a swim team level bus accident for the football team, and he’s staying around with 7-5.
That said, I wouldn’t be surprised to see an advertisement in the newspaper from disgruntled alumni (if he is kept after a tornado) comparing wind related injuries during Kelly’s tenure vs. during Ara’s and Holtz’s. People ARE stupid.
Yes, I guess I’m assuming it’s not a world in which Wimbush and Josh Adams and Daelin Hayes and Niles Morgan are all injured, in which case they can probably get some buy-in that 7-5 was a pretty good season, all things considered. I don’t think anyone will buy it if it’s just one or two of those guys, though, even Wimbush.
Given this team’s history, I don’t know how safe an assumption that is to make. But yeah, you’re right if it’s only one or two of those guys.
I mean, I agree with your personally. I believe there *might* be convincing arguments to keep Kelly after a 7-5 season. But he’s already used all of those excuses – so at some point, it’s on him to make sure those problems don’t keep occurring (save for non-contact injuries).
It’s a good question. I definitely think 8-4 will be enough for him to stave off execution for another year (with a likely 10+ win bar for 2018), and I definitely think 6-6 will be enough to bring the executioner to his door before November is out. I never thought of it in terms of specific 7-5 scenarios, more that that was just a number that sat between my two certainties.
Let’s say the 7-5 includes wins over Temple, Boston College, Michigan State, Miami (OH), North Carolina, Wake Forest, and Navy, losses to Miami (FL) and NC State, and resounding losses to Georgia, USC, and Stanford. I think that would probably be enough to get him the axe, and at the very least he would be on extremely thin ice with his continued employment likely resting on the bowl game performance.
If, on the other hand, 7-5 includes wins over Temple, Georgia, Michigan State, Miami (OH), Wake Forest, Navy, and Stanford, and losses to Boston College, USC, North Carolina, NC State, and Miami (FL), I think the marquee wins *might* be enough to say progress has been made.
I still don’t see 7-5 as a terribly likely outcome, although I certainly didn’t see 4-8 as a remote possibility last year either. If it does come to pass and regardless of how specifically it might come to pass, I wouldn’t have any confidence in any particular outcome with Kelly. It really is the nightmare scenario.
What scenario do you think would have to play out for an in-season firing? Would a 1-3 start with 2 blowouts make Swarbrick make a move? I could see a realistic scenario where the season starts 3-5 with 3 blowouts (that would likely require an injury to Wimbush or him absolutely crumbling under the spotlight though). Do you think Swarbrick would make an in-season move in any scenario?
Hmm… I think it would have to be truly catastrophic. I don’t think 1-3 would do it because it would still be pretty early in the season and you could argue there was still time to right the ship, but maybe at 2-4? 2-5? I don’t know. It’s a drastic move and a highly unusual one for Notre Dame – I can’t speak categorically, but off the top of my head even when it was quite obvious that the coach was a dead man walking he has always worked out the string. Weis, Willingham, Davie, Faust, Brennan, Kuharich… All worked through the end of their final season.
If there was some cavalcade of injuries that led to a 3-5 start, you already have your answer on why it probably wouldn’t lead to an in-season firing.
I think it would take being 1-5 at the break, as 2-4 at least theoretically leaves open the possibility of 8-4. It’s not like ND needs the opportunity to give some assistant a shot at winning the job; even with Elko, there’s nobody on staff that realistically could be ND’s head coach in 2018, unlike, say, LSU last year. A hypothetical firing after starting 0-3 or 1-5 would just be trying to give the 2017 team a spark.
But I would put almost no chance of mid-season firing (unless you count a “everyone knows its coming” the week of the Stanford game) if they start 3-3 or better, and only like 10-15% at 2-4.
Fire him in week 5 and hire Stoops!!!!!!1!!!!!1!!!!!11
Speaking of “vacating”, any words on NCAA’s decision that 2012 didn’t exist?
Still under appeal. Our odds are probably slim, but for now the wins are still on the record until the appeal concludes.
And, just to make you feel a bit better, the decision actually vacated all wins from 2012 *and* 2013. Yay, NCAA!