Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by AZGrizFan »

89Hen wrote:
Pwns wrote:Also they have made the playoffs more consistently than UD has in recent history.
There are Hen fans that think that's more important. Me, I'd rather have three trips to the NC than three more playoff "appearances". :coffee:

Put it this way, would you rather be the Bills or Cowboys of the 1990's? One won three Super Bowls, but one was in four of them. ;)
I can confirm for you that from a fan's perspective, NOT being in the playoffs sucks. :coffee:
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 93henfan »

Blue Hen Fanatic wrote:
89Hen wrote: There are Hen fans that think that's more important. Me, I'd rather have three trips to the NC than three more playoff "appearances". :coffee:
;)
I agree, 89Hen. Hen Fans had to go two decades without going back to National Championship, and then KC was able to not only get the Hens back to an N.C., but win it. And yes, KC was able to do what his Predecessor never could with his own players, win a DIAA National Championship game. And yet, his predecessor was able to lead the Hens into the playoffs time and again, to no avail, and KC was able to lead the Hens to 3 National Championship Games in 7 years. Many old time Hen Fans can appreciate that, but some of the younger Hen fans do not have that bigger perspective, and so want to repeat history again, by finding a coach who will win consistently and make the playoffs more often, but fail to do what KC has always been well known for - leading his team to National Championship games 8-)

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Tubby won triple the number of titles that Keeler did.

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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by Cujo »

Aren't the Griz basically the Buffalo Bills of FCS? Besides the fact we actually won a championship. :ohno:
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by AZGrizFan »

Cujo wrote:Aren't the Griz basically the Buffalo Bills of FCS? Besides the fact we actually won a championship. :ohno:
Hell no. We're more the Denver Broncos (they're 2-4). :lol: :lol:
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 93henfan »

AZGrizFan wrote:
Cujo wrote:Aren't the Griz basically the Buffalo Bills of FCS? Besides the fact we actually won a championship. :ohno:
Hell no. We're more the Denver Broncos (they're 2-4). :lol: :lol:
Same timezone too.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by bluehenbillk »

93henfan wrote: Tubby won triple the number of titles that Keeler did.

Just keepin' it real, as they say in downtown Wilmington.
Well, to be fair Tubby won one title with a playoff system which was D-2 in 1979. He never won one in 1-AA, in fact only made it to one title game in 20 years....
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 93henfan »

bluehenbillk wrote:
93henfan wrote: Tubby won triple the number of titles that Keeler did.

Just keepin' it real, as they say in downtown Wilmington.
Well, to be fair Tubby won one title with a playoff system which was D-2 in 1979. He never won one in 1-AA, in fact only made it to one title game in 20 years....
Well, to be fair KC won his title with three classes of Tubby's recruits.

This debate has played out ad nauseum on GoHens. The bottom line is one coach is in the College Football Hall of Fame and has his name painted on the field and the other is collecting unemployment. Comparing the two is sort of silly.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by kalm »

AZGrizFan wrote:
Cujo wrote:Aren't the Griz basically the Buffalo Bills of FCS? Besides the fact we actually won a championship. :ohno:
Hell no. We're more the Denver Broncos (they're 2-4). :lol: :lol:
And it's been almost as long too.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 89Hen »

93henfan wrote:Tubby won triple the number of titles that Keeler did.

Just keepin' it real, as they say in downtown Wilmington.
:rofl: That's not keeping it real in any way.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 89Hen »

93henfan wrote:Well, to be fair KC won his title with three classes of Tubby's recruits.

This debate has played out ad nauseum on GoHens. The bottom line is one coach is in the College Football Hall of Fame and has his name painted on the field and the other is collecting unemployment. Comparing the two is sort of silly.
Tubby deserves to be in the hall of fame, but he never won a I-AA title and went to ONE NC game in 20 years (all of which were with four years of his recruits). Tubby overstayed his welcome by a decade IMO.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by Rob Iola »

89Hen wrote:
93henfan wrote:Well, to be fair KC won his title with three classes of Tubby's recruits.

This debate has played out ad nauseum on GoHens. The bottom line is one coach is in the College Football Hall of Fame and has his name painted on the field and the other is collecting unemployment. Comparing the two is sort of silly.
Tubby deserves to be in the hall of fame, but he never won a I-AA title and went to ONE NC game in 20 years (all of which were with four years of his recruits). Tubby overstayed his welcome by a decade IMO.
It took a coaching change for daHenz to finally jettison their high school offense - could you imagine what Gannon would've accomplished working the spread?

Or conversely Flacco in the Wing-T?
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by Gil Dobie »

So, who's going to be the new coach?
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 89Hen »

Gil Dobie wrote:So, who's going to be the new coach?
Somebody who will not be there long. Keeler was probably the last coach that will stay at UD for more than 5 years.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by bluehenbillk »

You'd imagine that they have to have a head coach in place either this week or next, otherwise their recruiting class could be in tatters.

Nobody has been overly impressed with the leaked names to date.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by andy7171 »

93henfan wrote:
bluehenbillk wrote:
Well, to be fair Tubby won one title with a playoff system which was D-2 in 1979. He never won one in 1-AA, in fact only made it to one title game in 20 years....
Well, to be fair KC won his title with three classes of Tubby's recruits.

This debate has played out ad nauseum on GoHens. The bottom line is one coach is in the College Football Hall of Fame and has his name painted on the field and the other is collecting unemployment. Comparing the two is sort of silly.
He's also collecting a shitload of money from UD for the next 5 years!
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 93henfan »

andy7171 wrote:
93henfan wrote:
Well, to be fair KC won his title with three classes of Tubby's recruits.

This debate has played out ad nauseum on GoHens. The bottom line is one coach is in the College Football Hall of Fame and has his name painted on the field and the other is collecting unemployment. Comparing the two is sort of silly.
He's also collecting a shitload of money from UD for the next 5 years!
I'm guessing it's a lump sum buyout. Doing some quick math, his reported salary is ~$350K/yr, so he stood to make ~$1.75M if he coached. You gotta figure UD wrote the buyout clause for some amount less than that, but he certainly won't be in the bread line.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by bluehenbillk »

Word is Delaware is announcing the hiring of Dave Brock today, former OC at a slew of schools, most recently at Rutgers.

While a majority of fans seem to be willing to see what Brock will bring to the table the reaction to his hiring certainly seems to be meeting an underwhelming response. Not the rejuvenation of the fanbase the new AD commented on with the Keeler firing.

I hope I'm wrong but I can't get the Buddy Ryan-Rich Kotite sequence out of my head here. I understand why Ryan, like Keeler was fired and didn't really disagree with either, however it seems like both the hirings of Kotite & Brock were done with not a lot of thought (Brock & AD Ziady worked together at BC). The Kotite hire ended up in disaster, praying that's not the case here.....
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by SunCoastBlueHen »

bluehenbillk wrote:While a majority of fans seem to be willing to see what Brock will bring to the table the reaction to his hiring certainly seems to be meeting an underwhelming response. Not the rejuvenation of the fanbase the new AD commented on with the Keeler firing.
It's not an overwhelming resume.

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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by Franks Tanks »

Rutgers had one of the worst and most boring offenses in FBS this past year. Watching one of their games was torture.

Being the OC at a FBS school sounds good, but not sure this is really an upgrade.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by State Line Liquors »

Yeah, I'm not jumping through hoops if all the Brock talk is accurate. But I will wait to reserve full judgement until I hear him speak today and see what he can produce on the football field. His assistants will help fill in the full picture substantially.

While I see some things that I like in his resume, I'm not quite sure this is a strategic upgrade from an X's and O's perspective, and I really don't see how this hire does much of anything to 'reinvigorate' the fan base. He hasn't been anywhere that was able to produce much in the way of wins.

This was a hire that the UD could not afford to make a mistake on. I really hope we haven't...
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by GannonFan »

The coaching hire, good or bad, will have little to do with the declining enthusiasm in the fanbase. In the quarters back in 2010, when UD had a stellar team, only 9k showed up for that playoff game. Performance on the field is only a small, very small part of what ails the Blue Hen program right now. So even if this guy is a dud (and at least from an initial hiring standpoint he is a dud - hopefully he can produce on the field) the bigger issues are still unresolved. Heck, if anything, this may alienate the small part of the Blue Hen fanbase that was rabidly pro-KC - so you piss them off while doing nothing to excite the other part of the fanbase that didn't care one way or the other about the coach. Thankfully I have my own kids playing sports in the Fall to tide me over while UD stumbles through figuring out how to fix something that's been in decline for a good 5 years now.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 93henfan »

Brock is a terrible hire. Will not be renewing my season tickets.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 89Hen »

FWIW, I don't recall being blown away by the hiring of Keeler. Do you?
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by GannonFan »

89Hen wrote:FWIW, I don't recall being blown away by the hiring of Keeler. Do you?
Huh? The Keeler hire was exciting - former Hen, brash, cocky, had been to a slew of national title games while at Rowan (admittedly, not winning any of them) and a guy who just won year in and year out. There was a lot of excitement about Keeler taking over and it paid off two seasons later with the lifting of the trophy in Chatty. Heck, I remember the Spring game that first year had something like 6k people there and it was a happening. That ain't gonna happen this time.

Brock may end up being a very successful coach, but like I said, what ails the Blue Hen football program has little to do with the product on the field.
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Re: Stunner!! UD fires KC Keeler!!

Post by 93henfan »

89Hen wrote:FWIW, I don't recall being blown away by the hiring of Keeler. Do you?
No, I wasn't. Most folks were just happy to be rid of Tubby. While I'm happy to be rid of KC, I do not believe that Brock will rejuvenate the fanbase, as our AD proclaimed was his aim a couple of weeks ago.
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