Re-Examining Butch's First Four Years on Rocky Top

If you’ve read me at all this football season, I think I’ve made it pretty clear that I’m not exactly a fan of Butch Jones. He hasn’t done anything to indicate to me that he’s a top 20 college head coach, and I think that’s been reflected by Tennessee’s play on the field during his tenure, particularly during the last two years.

My position since mid-season has been that it’s time for the Vols to move on from Butch and hire a more competent coach who won’t blow three 13 point leads in one season, or preside over a team whose only good first half performance all year came against Tennessee Tech. Despite all the baggage, Louisville’s Bobby Petrino has been my pipe dream pick to take the reins on Rocky Top. He's a smart guy who’d score more on the field than he did with mistresses, while also winning a ton of games in Knoxville.  He’d also instantly become the best coach in the SEC East, and command a decently talented roster at a school that will pretty much do anything to win. Petrino's been wildly successful at Louisville and Arkansas, two schools that probably aren’t even Top 25 jobs; imagine what he’d do at Tennessee, a Top 15 job with a much larger recruiting budget, better facilities, better tradition, more money, etc.

Unfortunately, Butch will get a fifth year because Tennessee’s athletic director Dave Hart is retiring this summer, and he has no reason to get rid of a high profile staff member and start a coaching search while he's on his way out the door. And if Butch is as incompetent as I think he is, the new athletic director would want the opportunity to fire him and hire his own guy. He wouldn’t want to show up in Knoxville, stuck with a new coach hired by the previous AD who he’d now have to be committed to for the next three years. So unless a Butch-Horse sex tape gets leaked to the media, I think we’re probably stuck with him in 2017.

I’ve had a lot of discussions with my friends about Butch and Tennessee, and read entirely too many ill-informed message board diatribes posted by guys with names like 69VOLS69, in the hopes of figuring out how the fan base felt about the last four years and where we should go from here. The most common excuse I’ve heard (and it’s the same one they used for Dooley) is, “The program was in shambles when he took over! He just needs more time!”.

Interesting…. If that was the case, then why did it take Jim Harbaugh like 6 games to turn around Michigan? Why has Jim McElwain been able to win the SEC East in both of his first two seasons? Why did both Urban Meyer and Bob Stoops win national titles in their second years at Ohio State and Oklahoma?

BUT MATT! DEREK F*****G DOOLEY WAS IN KNOXVILLE!!!!!! HE’S THE HEAD COACHING EQUIVALENT OF A POST-THANKSGIVING DUMP!!!

Yeah, because Tennessee was the first program to hire a horribly inept and in over his head coach. He’s the first guy to ever leave a program in shambles. No one has ever done that before…. Wait a second, most of time when a football coach is fired, particularly after three seasons, isn’t it because the program sucked? Because it was “in shambles”? Yes, of course!

Here’s my uncontroversial thesis: if you’re a good college head coach at a big time job (which Tennessee is), you win a lot of games relatively quickly, regardless of what came before you. This has been spelled out time and time again at schools all over the country. But rather than just say it, why not show you?

Butch Jones- Tennessee

Previous Coach: Derek Dooley

Dooley’s Record: 15-21 overall, 4-19 in conference

2010: 6-7

2011: 5-7

2012: 4-7

Dooley was a crap show, there’s no doubt, but he did have back-to-back Top 10 recruiting classes his first two years. The notion that the cupboard was balder than a baby’s bottom when he left is absurd, though he did make a monumental, unforgivable screw up by not signing a single offensive lineman in his last class.

Butch’s Record: 29-20, 14-18 in conference

2013: 5-7

2014: 7-6

2015: 9-4 (blew three 13 point leads)

2016: 8-3 (one good first half performance all year)

1-3 against Florida (though they could’ve easily been 4-0), 0-4 against Alabama, never beaten a top 10 team, vastly underperformed for the level of talent they had on the roster the last two years. Also, it’s hard to blame the previous administration when this entire roster is guys you’ve coached and recruited for the last four years. From a personnel standpoint, the stink of Dooley isn’t present at all with the current Vols. Oh yeah, and there's this; since 1992, every coach that has won the SEC Championship had nine victories in either their first or second year at the school they eventually captured the conference title at. It took Butch three seasons before he won nine games. Not a good sign. 

Jim Harbaugh- Michigan

Previous Coach: Brady Hoke

Hoke’s Record: 31-20, 18-14 in conference

2011: 11-2

2012: 8-5

2013: 7-6

2014: 5-7

After an impressive first year in which he went 11-2, Hoke went 20-18 during his last three seasons while looking like a sweaty middle school gym teacher going through his third divorce.

Harbaugh’s Record: 20-4, 13-3 in conference

2015: 10-3

2016: 10-1

If Michigan beats Ohio State tomorrow they win the Big Ten East and will play in their conference championship game, with a chance to make the college football playoff in Harbaugh’s second year.

Bob Stoops- Oklahoma

Previous Coach: John Blake

Blake’s Record: 12-22, 7-17 in conference

1996: 3-8

1997: 4-8

1998: 5-6

Blake took over a program that was struggling prior to him arriving and couldn’t do much better.

Stoops’s Record (first four seasons): 43-9, 25-7 in conference

1999: 7-5

2000: 13-0 (won national title)

2001: 11-2

2002: 12-2 (won conference title)

Stoops showed up to a program that hadn’t had a winning season since 1993 and won a national title in his second year. Couldn’t I argue Stoops inherited a much worse situation than Butch? OU went five years without finishing above .500 before Stoops arrived; Tennessee had gone just three.

Nick Saban- Alabama

Previous Coach: Mike Shula

Shula’s Record: 26-23, 13-19 in conference

2003: 4-9

2004: 6-6

2005: 10-2

2006: 6-6

Besides an impressive third year, Shula’s tenure is viewed as a universal failure by most Tide fans. Here’s something interesting though; look at Shula’s records again, compared to Butch’s, who has ironically coached as many games in Knoxville as Mike did in Tuscaloosa. Butch is three games better overall and one game better in conference, but isn’t Shula just basically Jones with a slightly higher peak and lower valley?

Saban’s Record (first four seasons): 43-11, 25-7 in conference

2007: 7-6

2008: 12-2 (won SEC West)

2009: 14-0 (won national title)

2010: 10-3

Since this time, Saban has won three more national titles and is the favorite to do it again this year.

Urban Meyer- Florida

Previous Coach: Ron Zook

Zook’s Record: 23-14, 16-8 in conference

2002: 8-5

2003: 8-5

2004: 7-4

The Zooker wasn’t a disaster, but compared to Spurrier, the talent and level of play had clearly slipped.

Meyer’s Record (first four seasons): 48-9, 24-8 in conference

2005: 9-3

2006: 13-1 (won national title)

2007: 9-4

2008: 13-1 (won national title)

Meyer reversed Zook’s downward trend basically overnight and won two national titles in his first four seasons. Did Zook leave UF better off than Dooley left UT? Sure, that’s inarguable. But Meyer’s first year in The Swamp was about as good as any campaign Butch has been able to put forth in four seasons. Again, every single player on the roster is recruited and coached up by Jones and his staff! You can’t keep blaming Dooley when all the players are Butch guys now.

Jim McElwain- Florida

Previous Coach: Will Muschamp

Muschamp’s Record: 28-21, 17-15 in conference

2011: 7-6

2012: 11-2

2013: 4-8

2014: 6-5

Muschamp, like Shula, is viewed as an abject failure by most Florida fans. The offenses his last two years might’ve been the worst in conference the last 25 years outside of some of the most porous ones at Vanderbilt (the Gators finished 13^th in the conference in yards in 2014, and dead last in 2013). Interesting to look at the comparison of records between Muschamp and Jones. Butch is one game better overall, but is three games worse in conference play. Couldn’t I argue, just like with Shula, that Muschamp is basically Butch with a slightly higher peak and a lower valley? Not-so-fun fact: Muschamp is 3-0 against Butch.

McElwain’s Record: 18-6, 13-3 in conference

2015: 10-4 (won SEC East)

2016: 8-2 (won SEC East)

So McElwain takes over a program that couldn’t score and went a combined 10-13 in the two years before he got there, and proceeds to guide them to back-to-back division titles. What am I missing here? What’s Butch’s problem?

Pete Carroll- USC

Previous Coach: Paul Hackett

Hackett’s Record: 19-18, 10-14 in conference

1998: 8-5

1999: 6-6

2000: 5-7

Hackett took over a program that had started slumping under the previous coach, John Robinson, and couldn’t do enough to make the Trojans anything but mediocre.

Carroll’s Record (first four seasons): 42-9, 27-5 in conference

2001: 6-6

2002: 11-2 (won conference title)

2003: 12-1 (won national title)

2004: 13-0 (won national title)

Carroll, like everyone else on this list, took over and won big almost instantly, setting up a dynasty in Los Angeles during the first part of 2000s.

James Franklin- Penn State

Previous Coach: Bill O’Brien

O’Brien’s Record: 15-9, 10-6 in conference

2012: 8-4

2013: 7-5

Franklin’s Record: 23-14, 13-11

2014: 7-6

2015: 7-6

2016: 9-2

If Ohio State beats Michigan tomorrow, and Penn State knocks off Michigan State, then the Nittany Lions win the Big Ten East and will travel to Indianapolis for the conference championship game. If they win that game, they’d not only have a conference title, but also an excellent shot to make the college football playoff.  And if that were to happen, what a hell of job by Franklin, considering everything that school has gone through this decade. Sandusky’s crimes and Paterno’s knowledge of it rocked the program, and the NCAA, for no real reason, decided they needed to destroy the future of the football team by slashing the number of available scholarships AND banning them from postseason play for four years. The sanctions were eventually lifted, but not before the depth of the program was already shot. O’Brien came in and did a good job considering everything, but Franklin still faced an uphill battle when he took the job three years ago. Now, he potentially has them two wins away from a conference title and possible playoff berth. Uh Butch…. What’s the deal buddy?

Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot, Butch and Tennessee already won the most important title, the Championship of Life! How could I be so stupid! Sorry Coach Jones, everything I just wrote is now null and void! You can now go back to underachieving every year!