FanPost

Coaching search statistics

There's been much talk about about coaching searches on this fine website recently. There have been lots of numbers pulled from people's asses about the likelihood of being able to successfully replace Ferentz. So, I decided to go ahead and see what the statistics are. I put together a spreadsheet with every coaching hire in FBS from 2001-2011. I stopped at 2011, because I think that's the last year I can reliably say whether a coaching hire was successful or not.

My methodology was pretty simple. Looked at if the guy was good enough to get hired to a better job, lasted long enough to build a legacy (7ish seasons), won a MNC, etc. On the other side, if he was fired within 5 years, that's almost certainly a failed coach. There were a few guys that were hired multiple places on this list. Just because they were successful one place, doesn't mean they were at another (RichRod being the most glaring example).

I broke the results down a little:

Overall success rate: 51.4%

Power 5 success rate: 45.5%

Successful programs* success rate: 52.9%

Bad P5 programs success rate: 44.8%

Successful P5 success rate: 46.5%

Successful G5 success rate: 87.5%

Some conclusions.

1. There aren't many successful G5 programs (Boise St., Cincy, BYU, now NIU), but they (mostly) have a good way to keep things going. Hire from within, keep the same train rolling. This is very clear with Boise St (which dovetails right into #2).

2. The Boise St. Rule: Just because a coach can win when he has infrastructure set up to be successful at a successful G5 program, does not mean he'll be able to turn around a moribund P5 school (see: Nutt, Houston; Koetter, Dirk; Hawkins, Dan). I think that Petersen might be an exception here, only because Washington, I think, has the infrastructure in place for him to be (at least) a modest success.

3. The counter to this is Cincy, who hires outside of the program, and still seems to keep going (Dantonio, Kelly, Davis, now Tuberville). However, hiring a guy from Cincy seems to be a good idea.

4. Historic P5 powers are really dragging down the average for both successful programs and P5 programs. They dispose of coaches quickly if they don't show results very quickly (Bama, ND, MI).

Thoughts of your own? Any other conclusions you see? Critiques? Let me hear it.

*To determine successful programs I determined whether the program has the history and infrastructure to be successful. Feel free to argue I should include or take out a team.

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