Kentucky Wildcat Football: Swing for the fences with coaching choices

Oct 27 2012; Miami, FL, USA; Western Kentucky Hilltoppers head coach Willie Taggart in a game against the Florida International Golden Panthers in the second quarter at FIU Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Robert Mayer-US PRESSWIRE

The Double

Neal Brown, Willie Taggart, Gary Andersen

The coaches in this category would likely be considered disappointments to many fans, but solid hires to others. These guys have had success, but probably have another couple of years to really prove themselves.

– Kentucky fans love a Kentucky-boy, and Neal Brown fits that bill. He’s from Danville and played at Kentucky for part of his college career. He’s become a protege of former UK coach Tony Franklin and in effect Mike Leach, and is essentially a way for the program to get a Leach/Franklin offense without actually hiring the lightning rod that they both are. The only issue is that Brown is young (32 years old) and has only been a FBS offensive coordinator since 2002. His lack if experience is certainly concerning, but there’s enough to like about Brown for fans to get behind him.

– It seemed inevitable that Kentucky fans would bring up Willie Taggart after the Hilltoppers dealt the Wildcats the loss that essentially ended things for Joker. His Western Kentucky team played well beyond their talent level for the overtime win this season. He has brought excitement and enthusiasm to Bowling Green and brought his team into relevance in only his third season. He has also proven to be an ace recruiter. With all that said, he is still only 15- 20 in his years as a head coach and sports a very unimpressive 12-11 record in the Sunbelt Conference. Taggart has a bright future in coaching, but he’s far from earned a BCS job at this point. If Kentucky were to target him, it would be a relatively high risk/high reward hire. A little too risky to be any higher than this.

– Gary Andersen is a name that has just recently come onto UK fans’ radars. He’s the head coach of Utah State and has lead his Aggies to a 9-2 record with his only losses being at BYU and at Wisconsin, by a combined 5 points. His 8 losses over the past two season have come by an average of less than four points as well. Andersen’s 24-24 overall record isn’t impressive, but considering the state of the Aggies when he took over, that’s quite an accomplishment. Still, winning in the WAC and winning in the SEC are different animals altogether. Andersen doesn’t have a big name, has no history east of the mountain time zone, and has accomplished everything at a non-BCS school.

– The three coaches that would qualify as “doubles” are guys that, while qualified, wouldn’t be nearly as exciting for most of the Kentucky fans. They have solid resumes to fall back on but still really need more to be considered a higher caliber candidate. Still, all would likely be viewed as improvements over the current staff.

The Single

Mark Hudspeth, Sonny Dykes, Mike MacIntyre

The single coaches are guys that have a lot to prove if hired into a BCS-conference school as all three have big question marks.

– Mark Hudspeth is a pretty popular name among teams looking for coaches right now. He’s currently the head coach at Louisiana Lafayette and has guided the Ragin’ Cajuns to a 6-4 record this season. While he has extensive connections throughout the south and the type of personality that could make him a star one day, the majority of his experience comes from the division II level and he’s only been at a non-FBS school for two seasons. Hudspeth isn’t ready this year and isn’t an option that excites most fans.

– As soon as the announcement came down that Joker wouldn’t be returning, the speculation about Sonny Dykes started. I’ll admit, the gaudy offensive numbers are hard to ignore, but then again, so are the numbers that the Dykes’ Louisiana Tech defense allows. As a matter of fact, Dykes’ team has allowed FEWER than 24 points in only one game this season. His pedigree and production on the offensive side of the ball are impressive, but Dykes would need a top notch defensive coordinator to have a prayer in the SEC.

– The name Mike MacIntyre is another name that has randomly popped up in the last two weeks. He’s currently the head coach of the San Jose Spartans of the WAC. MacIntyre is developing a reputation as a coach that builds his programs from nothing, and does it with haste. Since taking over at SJSU three seasons ago, he’s gone 1-12, then 5-7, and is sitting at 9-2 this year. The downside, MacIntyre has been a position coach for his entire career except for a two year stretch as Duke’s defensive coordinator. It could be argued that his success has largely come from poor competition. MacIntyre has an impressive résumé, but he’ll really need to accomplish more.

– While the coaches that qualify as singles don’t excite as many people, they would all be capable of winning at Kentucky under the right circumstances.

The Strike Out

Phil Fulmer, Mike Leach, David Cutcliffe

– These three coaches are just bad news all around. Phil Fulmer is 62 years old, has been out of coaching completely for four seasons, and coached nearly his entire career at Tennessee. No one else has made the call at this point, so Kentucky doing so would seem desperate. Mike Leach is a lightning rod for controversy and any hopes he had of returning to Lexington were probably dashed with new accusations of misconduct this season. David Cutcliffe is a very good coach and he has actually made Duke relevant, but he’s about as exciting as getting a prostate exam. The program needs juice right now.

As long as the Kentucky administration swings for the fences, I’m okay with the results.