CWB
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By John Mark Hancock
May 15, 2006
What more evidence than the recent NFL draft do we need that the NFL scouts really do believe what they've been telling the media and others in private every time they come to take a look at Tennessee's football players? The book on UT is that they recruit outstanding athletes, but have few top coaches to coach them up to their fullest potential to the point that they are stars who are ready to shine in the NFL.
Only three UT players total have been taken in the first three rounds of the NFL for the past three years. Yes, you read that right.
When Johnny Majors was on The Hill, he had topflight coaches who knew how to coach up the talent. Of course, Phillip Fulmer was recruiting as well then as he does now. The difference was that Majors had the coaches to take that outstanding raw talent to the next level. It showed in the fact that the Vols had first round draft choices flying out of Big Orange Country to bigger and better things. It also showed in the fact that a number of Majors' assistants went on to become coordinators and head coaches in the NFL, as well as at other bigtime schools in which they won championships and revitalized other programs and teams.
The NFL scouts know that much of the talent that Fulmer still recruits, while it is great, many times is regressing under the less than stellar coaching they're receiving. Tennessee had coaches on its staff for several years recently that are now holding forth at Kentucky, Kansas State, and MTSU, some of whom probably will be out of coaching soon altogether, since they can't cut the mustard. Do you think for one minute that NFL head coaches and general managers want players who were coached by those guys? No player on the offensive side of the ball was drafted from UT into the NFL this year for the first time in memory.
The NFL is a very sophisticated, smart organization. They know where the talent is and they know where the great coaches are. UT got several players drafted on Day 2 in the lower rounds this year and several more signed free agent contracts. However, the days of UT consistently having tons of players drafted in the first 3 rounds of the NFL draft are obviously over until they can prove that they have coaches on their staff that can coach up the talent.
The reason the Vols still get a lot of Tennessee players drafted, albeit in the lower rounds and as free agents, is that the scouts know that UT has an abundance of playing talent, but that their coaches on their own NFL staffs are going to have to get them to unlearn some of the things they were taught at UT and coach them up to the level that they should have been by a topflight college coach. The NFL teams aren't willing to spend big money on top draft choices that they have to bring along themselves. That money goes to the top talents who have had top coaches for 4 or 5 years in college that can thus immediately step in and play and make a difference on an NFL roster.
Until Fulmer realizes that his failures in hiring and retaining poor coaches is the bottom line reason for not only UT's dismal showings on NFL Draft Day the past 3 years but also for the lack of championships since 1998, the Vols will never progress beyond where they are now. The rehiring of David Cutcliffe was a step in the right direction, but there is other deadwood on the coaching staff that should have been replaced and some of the hires that were made in the off-season may be dubious at best. Steve Spurrier and Tommy Tuberville, on the other hand, hire the very best they can find.
Until Fulmer adopts the same attitude about hiring coaches that he does in recruiting players and goes after the very best in America, the Vols won't ever be winning any more championships at UT. His moves this past off-season were long overdue and may very well be far too little too late to right a sinking ship.
Just to clarify, no one liked Majors very much personally. He tried to intimidate everyone he met. He also drank to excess far too many times, but so did his own coach, Bowden Wyatt, which is what led to the downfall of what could have been a promising career. Even General Neyland hit the bottle too much and died of cirrhosis of the liver at the Oschner Clinic in New Orleans. We all have our faults, shortcomings, and mistakes we make in life.
However, one mistake that Majors didn't make was in the hiring of topflight coaches. He knew that he might not be the sharpest knife in the drawer when it came to coaching, X's and O's, recruiting, etc., and he surrounded himself with those who were brighter and who challenged his thinking, just as Coach Bruce Pearl does now in his careful hiring of assistants in mens basketball. The fact that so many of them went on to greater things as coaches proves that, or else they wouldn't have been in demand.
Contrast that to Fulmer, who is a good man who says all the right things, doesn't embarrass himself personally, but simply won't hire the best coaches to coach the best players. Perhaps Fulmer is insecure and doesn't want to see what happened to Majors happen to him by having an assistant take over his job. For whatever reason, though, the contrast is stark and great in that particular element. Fulmer's hires simply have not been the stellar ones that Majors' were.
Majors had several of his hires go on to be head coaches in the NFL, such as Dom Capers, Lovie Smith, Jon Gruden, etc. He had several more become top assistants in the NFL, such as Bobby Jackson, Joe Avezzano, Larry Marmie, etc. Several others have become top head coaches and coordinators at major colleges, such as Jackie Sherrill, Walt Harris, and others. When Fulmer's coaches ever do leave, they are mostly, by and large, either to get out of coaching, to make lateral moves, or to take lesser jobs. Rarely, if ever, do any of them move up to the heights that Majors' assistants did.
These are the facts that are absolutely true and straight. Here are the numbers of how many UT players were taken in the first 3 rounds (Day One) of the NFL Draft in the past 3 years:
2004 - Zero
2005 - Two
2006 - One
It is startling and shameful that UT won't hire coaches to get our abundant talent coached up to get it drafted high anymore, like it regularly did under Majors. Once Majors got the talent restocked at UT, there were multiple selections in the NFL Draft on Day One from UT annually until he was fired. That is a serious indictment on the current coaching staff, not on the players themselves. If anything, the talent level being recruited has gone up, not down, since Fulmer became head coach, and yet the NFL realizes its not being coached up to top NFL standards once it gets here. Many NFL general managers, coaches, scouts, etc., will tell you that in private. Most don't want their comments made public in the media. However, the draft results speak for themselves. The numbers don't lie.
While the Vols still get a lot of lower-round picks and free agents taken, the difference in money is enormous. UT is simply doing these kids an injustice and costing them millions of dollars by not providing them with top coaching. That's also beginning to have an effect in recruiting, as it makes Fulmer's job so much harder to attract top talent when he has nothing to show them on what his last several classes have done in the draft. He has less to sell because he refuses to hire top coaches. That's the bottom line. It showed glaringly in this year's drop-off in recruiting and it's very difficult to get it turned around.
Remember that Fulmer took over a program that was laden with talent. He didn't have to rebuild and retool a program. He has yet to prove he has those capabilities. So far, he hasn't. UT still doesn't have the top talent in coaching on either side of the ball that they could have, considering their ability to pay as much as anyone nationally.
Those players that are taken from small schools are the exceptions, rather than the rule. The NFL mainly drafts players from schools that recruit a lot of raw talent and then has coaches that coach them into NFL material BEFORE the draft. Those that have to be coached up to that status AFTER the draft still get drafted, but in the lower rounds or as free agents.
If Fulmer stays around for another 2 or 3 seasons, we will see for sure whether he is or was a better coach overall than Majors. Right now, the jury is still out on that for sure. Remember, Majors took over a program that had virtually no talent and brought in top coaches to bring it back to respectability and won several SEC championships with it. He left it in top shape with enough talent to win national championships, just like he had done at Pittsburgh.
So far, Fulmer hasn't won any more national championships than Majors, nor has he won any more SEC championships. Remember, too, that Fulmer has never had to rebuild from the depths that Majors found the program in when he returned in 1976 and never will have to rebuild from those depths, since he continues to recruit well. If he had, it is questionable whether he would have any better record now than Majors had when he was fired. The way things are going, Fulmer's record is on a steady decline.
Fulmer MAY be a better coach overall than Majors, but we just don't know that yet. Fulmer is coming up on the same number of years that Majors was at UT and he hasn't accomplished any more yet in his overall coaching career than Majors did. He hasn't put Tennessee in any more major bowls than Majors did. He hasn't won more topflight bowl games than Majors did. He hasn't beaten his top rivals consistently, either. He still has a losing record against Tuberville, Mark Richt, Nick Saban, Spurrier, etc. He may be overtaken even by Mike Shula.
If they thought they could use UT as a stepping stone to a major college head coaching job or an NFL job, assistant coaches would come in droves, just like they did under Majors. Majors was a bear to work for but his assistants endured his demanding demeanor because they knew they would be able to move up by being on The Hill and getting their players coached up into the NFL.
They came in droves in the 1980s and 1990s because they knew that the head coach at the time would give them the opportunity to coach and that they wouldn't be micromanaged. The atmosphere for assistant coaches under Majors was far different than it is now. Fulmer couldn't hire topflight ones in the off-season for several reasons, including the fact that some believe he won't be around much longer and that his ship is sinking. That was never the aura that was created around Majors. Even though he had bad years, there were no thoughts he would be terminated until the very end.
Majors had a track record of hiring top coaches. Fulmer doesn't. Good coaches gravitate to those who have the reputation Majors had in getting them better jobs. Fulmer never has enjoyed that reputation in the coaching profession, simply because he hasn't earned it and hasn't proven it.
Fulmer's record vs. Urban Meyer, Steve Spurrier, and Mark Richt, his primary competition in the rough and tumble SEC Eastern Division, is a combined 3-13, for only 18%. His record against Tommy Tuberville since he went to Auburn isnt any better, nor was it against Nick Saban when he was at LSU What will be his record vs. Mike Shula after this season?
For every coach that Majors either supposedly ran off or left on their own, he always replaced them with topflight talent. There was rarely any second-guessing of any of Majors' hires. That's because most everyone recognized them as outstanding coaches when they were hired. That hasn't been the case with Fulmer.
Let's compare. Each won a national championship, though Majors' was at Pittsburgh.
Majors won three SEC championships. Fulmer has won two so far. Majors also won other championships as a head coach prior to coming to UT. Edge to Majors.
Wins and losses aren't comparable because Majors took over a program that was at rock bottom and had to rebuild it from scratch, practically. Fulmer took over a program laden with talent that should have won several championships in a row. When Spurrier went to the NFL, several more should have been won. Even if you compare wins and losses, Fulmer's record against top teams and top coaches is abysmal, as has been pointed out elsewhere.
Here are the First Round NFL draft choices that Majors produced:
Robert Shaw
Roland James
Anthony Hancock
Willie Gault
Reggie White
Clyde Duncan
Alvin Toles
Tim McGee
Terry McDaniel
Anthony Miller
Keith DeLong
Charles McRae
Antone Davis
Alvin Harper
Dale Carter
Chris Mims
Todd Kelly
It's arguable as to whether Heath Shuler or James Stewart should be credited to Majors or Fulmer, as both were recruited and mostly developed under Majors and the coaches that Majors hired. Thus, both of them could most likely be considered both Majors' & Fulmer's.
Here are the first round draft choices Fulmer has produced:
Peyton Manning
Terry Fair
Marcus Nash
Al Wilson
Jamal Lewis
Shaun Ellis
John Henderson
Donte Stallworth
Albert Haynesworth
Jason Allen
It's worth noting that there were no first-round draft choices from UT in the 2003, 2004, or 2005 drafts, despite having had Top 10 recruiting classes in the years those classes came in, as those were the recruiting classes immediately following the national championship.
It's also worth noting that instead of having the first round draft choices drop off precipitously, as they have under Fulmer, they continued to steadily increase under Majors. Out of the 15 years that majors was the coach, there were 1st round draft choices in 12 of them, showing remarkable consistency. Out of the 14 years that Fulmer has been at the helm so far, there have only been 1st round draft choices in 4 of them, if you don't count Shuler and Stewart in Fulmer's total.
In terms of All-American players, Majors produced these:
Roland James
Willie Gault
Jimmy Colquitt
Reggie White (also in the College Football Hall of Fame)
Jimmy Colquitt
Bill Mayo
Tim McGee
Chris White
Harry Galbreath
Keith DeLong
Eric Still
Antone Davis
Dale Carter
Carl Pickens
John Becksvoort
Fulmer has produced these All-Americans:
Leonard Little
Peyton Manning
Al Wilson
Cosey Coleman
Deon Grant
Raynoch Thompson
John Henderson
Travis Stephens
Dustin Colquitt
Keving Burnett
Jesse Mahelona
Michael Munoz
Jason Allen
As you can see, Majors and his staffs had longer lists in both cases than Fulmer and his staffs. Remember also that many of the people that Fulmer had on his staff for a long time were Majors hires. The list of All-SEC selections is also similarly weighted in favor of Majors & his staff. Since both coaches were head coaches for approximately the same length of time now at UT, and since Fulmer was credited with some wins in Majors' last year, it is fair now to compare and assess both of them on these bases. In light of this, how do we review these metrics of measurement? For sure, it can't be said that Fulmer is far and away a better coach than Majors when you consider all of them collectively or even one of them individually, can you?
I personally liked Bill Battle better than I liked Johnny Majors, and I also liked Buzz Peterson a lot. The most likeable guys, a players coach like Fulmer, aren't always the ones that do the best jobs. Most players who played for General Neyland and Bear Bryant will tell you that they either feared or hated them. I doubt many players will tell you that about Fulmer. Do we want someone who is well-liked or someone that wins championships consistently?
As UT mens basketball head coach Pearl has said, he wants to be feared and hated by everyone except Vol fans. Tennessee needs a coach of its football team who has that same mentality. South Carolina has one now. If UT had hired him when he left the NFL, perhaps they might be on the upswing now, as the Gamecocks are. Of course, he would have a lot more to sell at Tennessee than at South Carolina, too.
Not only was Majors a better coach and better judge of talent, he also had the guts to get rid of coaches who were not doing their job. He also inherited a program that was in the toilet, not one that was on top. UTs facilities were awful when he arrived and he got them built back to the point that when Fulmer took over both the talent and the facilities were topflight.
Majors built the program back up to national power, winning 3 conference championships his last 5 years, with a lot of local players. He didn't have to have top recruiting classes every year to win like Fulmer does. There's no question that Fulmer is a better recruiter, but Majors was the better coach, better judge of talent, better at hiring topflight coaches, and better at keeping discipline within the program, both on and off the field. You knew that if you didn't perform up to your potential, there would be consequences, including being fired as a coach or benched as a player. Ask anyone who played for him and they'll tell you that they may not have liked him, but they respected him. I'm not sure Fulmer has that kind of respect now. Whether he can regain it or not is questionable.
Unless Fulmer gets it turned around this year, he may end his career with 1998 being the last year he won a championship of any kind whatsoever. If UT can't at least win the SEC championship once a decade, we need a new head coach, and we're approaching a decade now of being without such a championship.
The facts speak for themselves and can't be argued with. Fulmer has built himself a record, as did Majors. Both their records are about the same length now as far as the time they were head coach at UT, so it's interesting to compare the numbers. From what i can tell, despite all of the hype and publicity about Fulmer being the winningest coach, etc., the stats clearly show that Majors was the better coach over time, especially under their respective circumstances.
Would Fulmer have ever been able to rebuild the program from rock-bottom? We'll never know. However, once Majors got things rocking and rolling, he didn't let it slide like Fulmer has.
One thing that was pointed out to me recently was that fact that when the NCAA announced the impending deletion of Proposition 24 players from Division 1 rosters, UT imposed the rule some two to three years before it actually went into effect at other schools that we played. The UT administration decided UT would get a head-start and went ahead and implemented it some two years before the rest of the SEC had to do so. Thus, Majors could not recruit players like Tracy Rocker. Auburn came to Knoxville ranked #1 in the country in 1985 & and had some 13 starters who were Prop 24 students. They would not have been admitted to UT, but were hellacious athletes that Majors would have loved to have recruited had he been allowed to do so.
The Vols still beat Auburn that year, 38-20, and went on to spank Miami, who also had a ton of Prop 24 players, 35-7. Miami was saying if they won that game, they would prove they were national champs. Arguably, UT was the best team in the nation that year. Had the Vols had Prop 24 players on their team that year, they would have had the most outstanding group in UT history and would have easily won the national championship. With that sort of momentum, with Majors having had won 2 national championships within a decade of each other, including his at Pitt, who knows how many more he might have won? For some reason, that just flies right over the heads of so many who analyze Majors career.
By the way....just an afterthought: Fulmer doesn't seem to be able to recruit good tight ends, but two Middle Tennesseans that other Southern schools got signed NFL contracts this month. Wallace Cooper, the TE at Auburn, wore the Vols out in the 2 games he and Tuberville beat them 2 years ago, and Crenshaw, who played quarterback in the Nashville area, played TE at Florida State and is now an NFL draftee.
Majors made the changes to stay modern and stay abreast of the times. He wasn't afraid to change offensive or defensive schemes or go after certain different players from what he had recruited previously. The good coaches change and adapt to any time. Fulmer is just inflexible and refuses to do it. His hand was forced when Randy Sanders quit.
There is no question Fulmer is still a great recruiter. However, the entire point being made by this is that he still refuses to hire the very best coaches available to coach the talent he recruits. Majors never was afraid to do that. Of course, things have changed. However, Fulmer hasn't. Majors proved he could change with the times.
Coaches who can push the talent to the next level are just as abundant today as they were during Majors' era. He simply would hire them and Fulmer won't. The proof is in the fact that 1st round draft picks are fewer and farther between now for UT, even though their recruiting is still as good or better than ever. There is no inconsistency involved in that argument whatsoever. In fact, both facts point up the weakness in Fulmer as a coach compared to Majors.
The point is that Fulmer is getting more than his fair share of talent. He has no doubt had much better and talented material to work with than Majors ever did and has done less with it, as you can see from the fact that fewer are now being drafted in high rounds. The argument that there is more parity now just doesn't wash. Those that UT competes against are subject to that same parity. Tennessee still out-recruits them but they aren't out-coaching them in the big games that matter. Majors took less and made more with it. Fulmer is taking more and makes less with it. There is no other way to look at it. The only difference is that Fulmer is pulling down a much higher salary and isn't producing at the level commensurate with what he's being paid.
May 15, 2006
What more evidence than the recent NFL draft do we need that the NFL scouts really do believe what they've been telling the media and others in private every time they come to take a look at Tennessee's football players? The book on UT is that they recruit outstanding athletes, but have few top coaches to coach them up to their fullest potential to the point that they are stars who are ready to shine in the NFL.
Only three UT players total have been taken in the first three rounds of the NFL for the past three years. Yes, you read that right.
When Johnny Majors was on The Hill, he had topflight coaches who knew how to coach up the talent. Of course, Phillip Fulmer was recruiting as well then as he does now. The difference was that Majors had the coaches to take that outstanding raw talent to the next level. It showed in the fact that the Vols had first round draft choices flying out of Big Orange Country to bigger and better things. It also showed in the fact that a number of Majors' assistants went on to become coordinators and head coaches in the NFL, as well as at other bigtime schools in which they won championships and revitalized other programs and teams.
The NFL scouts know that much of the talent that Fulmer still recruits, while it is great, many times is regressing under the less than stellar coaching they're receiving. Tennessee had coaches on its staff for several years recently that are now holding forth at Kentucky, Kansas State, and MTSU, some of whom probably will be out of coaching soon altogether, since they can't cut the mustard. Do you think for one minute that NFL head coaches and general managers want players who were coached by those guys? No player on the offensive side of the ball was drafted from UT into the NFL this year for the first time in memory.
The NFL is a very sophisticated, smart organization. They know where the talent is and they know where the great coaches are. UT got several players drafted on Day 2 in the lower rounds this year and several more signed free agent contracts. However, the days of UT consistently having tons of players drafted in the first 3 rounds of the NFL draft are obviously over until they can prove that they have coaches on their staff that can coach up the talent.
The reason the Vols still get a lot of Tennessee players drafted, albeit in the lower rounds and as free agents, is that the scouts know that UT has an abundance of playing talent, but that their coaches on their own NFL staffs are going to have to get them to unlearn some of the things they were taught at UT and coach them up to the level that they should have been by a topflight college coach. The NFL teams aren't willing to spend big money on top draft choices that they have to bring along themselves. That money goes to the top talents who have had top coaches for 4 or 5 years in college that can thus immediately step in and play and make a difference on an NFL roster.
Until Fulmer realizes that his failures in hiring and retaining poor coaches is the bottom line reason for not only UT's dismal showings on NFL Draft Day the past 3 years but also for the lack of championships since 1998, the Vols will never progress beyond where they are now. The rehiring of David Cutcliffe was a step in the right direction, but there is other deadwood on the coaching staff that should have been replaced and some of the hires that were made in the off-season may be dubious at best. Steve Spurrier and Tommy Tuberville, on the other hand, hire the very best they can find.
Until Fulmer adopts the same attitude about hiring coaches that he does in recruiting players and goes after the very best in America, the Vols won't ever be winning any more championships at UT. His moves this past off-season were long overdue and may very well be far too little too late to right a sinking ship.
Just to clarify, no one liked Majors very much personally. He tried to intimidate everyone he met. He also drank to excess far too many times, but so did his own coach, Bowden Wyatt, which is what led to the downfall of what could have been a promising career. Even General Neyland hit the bottle too much and died of cirrhosis of the liver at the Oschner Clinic in New Orleans. We all have our faults, shortcomings, and mistakes we make in life.
However, one mistake that Majors didn't make was in the hiring of topflight coaches. He knew that he might not be the sharpest knife in the drawer when it came to coaching, X's and O's, recruiting, etc., and he surrounded himself with those who were brighter and who challenged his thinking, just as Coach Bruce Pearl does now in his careful hiring of assistants in mens basketball. The fact that so many of them went on to greater things as coaches proves that, or else they wouldn't have been in demand.
Contrast that to Fulmer, who is a good man who says all the right things, doesn't embarrass himself personally, but simply won't hire the best coaches to coach the best players. Perhaps Fulmer is insecure and doesn't want to see what happened to Majors happen to him by having an assistant take over his job. For whatever reason, though, the contrast is stark and great in that particular element. Fulmer's hires simply have not been the stellar ones that Majors' were.
Majors had several of his hires go on to be head coaches in the NFL, such as Dom Capers, Lovie Smith, Jon Gruden, etc. He had several more become top assistants in the NFL, such as Bobby Jackson, Joe Avezzano, Larry Marmie, etc. Several others have become top head coaches and coordinators at major colleges, such as Jackie Sherrill, Walt Harris, and others. When Fulmer's coaches ever do leave, they are mostly, by and large, either to get out of coaching, to make lateral moves, or to take lesser jobs. Rarely, if ever, do any of them move up to the heights that Majors' assistants did.
These are the facts that are absolutely true and straight. Here are the numbers of how many UT players were taken in the first 3 rounds (Day One) of the NFL Draft in the past 3 years:
2004 - Zero
2005 - Two
2006 - One
It is startling and shameful that UT won't hire coaches to get our abundant talent coached up to get it drafted high anymore, like it regularly did under Majors. Once Majors got the talent restocked at UT, there were multiple selections in the NFL Draft on Day One from UT annually until he was fired. That is a serious indictment on the current coaching staff, not on the players themselves. If anything, the talent level being recruited has gone up, not down, since Fulmer became head coach, and yet the NFL realizes its not being coached up to top NFL standards once it gets here. Many NFL general managers, coaches, scouts, etc., will tell you that in private. Most don't want their comments made public in the media. However, the draft results speak for themselves. The numbers don't lie.
While the Vols still get a lot of lower-round picks and free agents taken, the difference in money is enormous. UT is simply doing these kids an injustice and costing them millions of dollars by not providing them with top coaching. That's also beginning to have an effect in recruiting, as it makes Fulmer's job so much harder to attract top talent when he has nothing to show them on what his last several classes have done in the draft. He has less to sell because he refuses to hire top coaches. That's the bottom line. It showed glaringly in this year's drop-off in recruiting and it's very difficult to get it turned around.
Remember that Fulmer took over a program that was laden with talent. He didn't have to rebuild and retool a program. He has yet to prove he has those capabilities. So far, he hasn't. UT still doesn't have the top talent in coaching on either side of the ball that they could have, considering their ability to pay as much as anyone nationally.
Those players that are taken from small schools are the exceptions, rather than the rule. The NFL mainly drafts players from schools that recruit a lot of raw talent and then has coaches that coach them into NFL material BEFORE the draft. Those that have to be coached up to that status AFTER the draft still get drafted, but in the lower rounds or as free agents.
If Fulmer stays around for another 2 or 3 seasons, we will see for sure whether he is or was a better coach overall than Majors. Right now, the jury is still out on that for sure. Remember, Majors took over a program that had virtually no talent and brought in top coaches to bring it back to respectability and won several SEC championships with it. He left it in top shape with enough talent to win national championships, just like he had done at Pittsburgh.
So far, Fulmer hasn't won any more national championships than Majors, nor has he won any more SEC championships. Remember, too, that Fulmer has never had to rebuild from the depths that Majors found the program in when he returned in 1976 and never will have to rebuild from those depths, since he continues to recruit well. If he had, it is questionable whether he would have any better record now than Majors had when he was fired. The way things are going, Fulmer's record is on a steady decline.
Fulmer MAY be a better coach overall than Majors, but we just don't know that yet. Fulmer is coming up on the same number of years that Majors was at UT and he hasn't accomplished any more yet in his overall coaching career than Majors did. He hasn't put Tennessee in any more major bowls than Majors did. He hasn't won more topflight bowl games than Majors did. He hasn't beaten his top rivals consistently, either. He still has a losing record against Tuberville, Mark Richt, Nick Saban, Spurrier, etc. He may be overtaken even by Mike Shula.
If they thought they could use UT as a stepping stone to a major college head coaching job or an NFL job, assistant coaches would come in droves, just like they did under Majors. Majors was a bear to work for but his assistants endured his demanding demeanor because they knew they would be able to move up by being on The Hill and getting their players coached up into the NFL.
They came in droves in the 1980s and 1990s because they knew that the head coach at the time would give them the opportunity to coach and that they wouldn't be micromanaged. The atmosphere for assistant coaches under Majors was far different than it is now. Fulmer couldn't hire topflight ones in the off-season for several reasons, including the fact that some believe he won't be around much longer and that his ship is sinking. That was never the aura that was created around Majors. Even though he had bad years, there were no thoughts he would be terminated until the very end.
Majors had a track record of hiring top coaches. Fulmer doesn't. Good coaches gravitate to those who have the reputation Majors had in getting them better jobs. Fulmer never has enjoyed that reputation in the coaching profession, simply because he hasn't earned it and hasn't proven it.
Fulmer's record vs. Urban Meyer, Steve Spurrier, and Mark Richt, his primary competition in the rough and tumble SEC Eastern Division, is a combined 3-13, for only 18%. His record against Tommy Tuberville since he went to Auburn isnt any better, nor was it against Nick Saban when he was at LSU What will be his record vs. Mike Shula after this season?
For every coach that Majors either supposedly ran off or left on their own, he always replaced them with topflight talent. There was rarely any second-guessing of any of Majors' hires. That's because most everyone recognized them as outstanding coaches when they were hired. That hasn't been the case with Fulmer.
Let's compare. Each won a national championship, though Majors' was at Pittsburgh.
Majors won three SEC championships. Fulmer has won two so far. Majors also won other championships as a head coach prior to coming to UT. Edge to Majors.
Wins and losses aren't comparable because Majors took over a program that was at rock bottom and had to rebuild it from scratch, practically. Fulmer took over a program laden with talent that should have won several championships in a row. When Spurrier went to the NFL, several more should have been won. Even if you compare wins and losses, Fulmer's record against top teams and top coaches is abysmal, as has been pointed out elsewhere.
Here are the First Round NFL draft choices that Majors produced:
Robert Shaw
Roland James
Anthony Hancock
Willie Gault
Reggie White
Clyde Duncan
Alvin Toles
Tim McGee
Terry McDaniel
Anthony Miller
Keith DeLong
Charles McRae
Antone Davis
Alvin Harper
Dale Carter
Chris Mims
Todd Kelly
It's arguable as to whether Heath Shuler or James Stewart should be credited to Majors or Fulmer, as both were recruited and mostly developed under Majors and the coaches that Majors hired. Thus, both of them could most likely be considered both Majors' & Fulmer's.
Here are the first round draft choices Fulmer has produced:
Peyton Manning
Terry Fair
Marcus Nash
Al Wilson
Jamal Lewis
Shaun Ellis
John Henderson
Donte Stallworth
Albert Haynesworth
Jason Allen
It's worth noting that there were no first-round draft choices from UT in the 2003, 2004, or 2005 drafts, despite having had Top 10 recruiting classes in the years those classes came in, as those were the recruiting classes immediately following the national championship.
It's also worth noting that instead of having the first round draft choices drop off precipitously, as they have under Fulmer, they continued to steadily increase under Majors. Out of the 15 years that majors was the coach, there were 1st round draft choices in 12 of them, showing remarkable consistency. Out of the 14 years that Fulmer has been at the helm so far, there have only been 1st round draft choices in 4 of them, if you don't count Shuler and Stewart in Fulmer's total.
In terms of All-American players, Majors produced these:
Roland James
Willie Gault
Jimmy Colquitt
Reggie White (also in the College Football Hall of Fame)
Jimmy Colquitt
Bill Mayo
Tim McGee
Chris White
Harry Galbreath
Keith DeLong
Eric Still
Antone Davis
Dale Carter
Carl Pickens
John Becksvoort
Fulmer has produced these All-Americans:
Leonard Little
Peyton Manning
Al Wilson
Cosey Coleman
Deon Grant
Raynoch Thompson
John Henderson
Travis Stephens
Dustin Colquitt
Keving Burnett
Jesse Mahelona
Michael Munoz
Jason Allen
As you can see, Majors and his staffs had longer lists in both cases than Fulmer and his staffs. Remember also that many of the people that Fulmer had on his staff for a long time were Majors hires. The list of All-SEC selections is also similarly weighted in favor of Majors & his staff. Since both coaches were head coaches for approximately the same length of time now at UT, and since Fulmer was credited with some wins in Majors' last year, it is fair now to compare and assess both of them on these bases. In light of this, how do we review these metrics of measurement? For sure, it can't be said that Fulmer is far and away a better coach than Majors when you consider all of them collectively or even one of them individually, can you?
I personally liked Bill Battle better than I liked Johnny Majors, and I also liked Buzz Peterson a lot. The most likeable guys, a players coach like Fulmer, aren't always the ones that do the best jobs. Most players who played for General Neyland and Bear Bryant will tell you that they either feared or hated them. I doubt many players will tell you that about Fulmer. Do we want someone who is well-liked or someone that wins championships consistently?
As UT mens basketball head coach Pearl has said, he wants to be feared and hated by everyone except Vol fans. Tennessee needs a coach of its football team who has that same mentality. South Carolina has one now. If UT had hired him when he left the NFL, perhaps they might be on the upswing now, as the Gamecocks are. Of course, he would have a lot more to sell at Tennessee than at South Carolina, too.
Not only was Majors a better coach and better judge of talent, he also had the guts to get rid of coaches who were not doing their job. He also inherited a program that was in the toilet, not one that was on top. UTs facilities were awful when he arrived and he got them built back to the point that when Fulmer took over both the talent and the facilities were topflight.
Majors built the program back up to national power, winning 3 conference championships his last 5 years, with a lot of local players. He didn't have to have top recruiting classes every year to win like Fulmer does. There's no question that Fulmer is a better recruiter, but Majors was the better coach, better judge of talent, better at hiring topflight coaches, and better at keeping discipline within the program, both on and off the field. You knew that if you didn't perform up to your potential, there would be consequences, including being fired as a coach or benched as a player. Ask anyone who played for him and they'll tell you that they may not have liked him, but they respected him. I'm not sure Fulmer has that kind of respect now. Whether he can regain it or not is questionable.
Unless Fulmer gets it turned around this year, he may end his career with 1998 being the last year he won a championship of any kind whatsoever. If UT can't at least win the SEC championship once a decade, we need a new head coach, and we're approaching a decade now of being without such a championship.
The facts speak for themselves and can't be argued with. Fulmer has built himself a record, as did Majors. Both their records are about the same length now as far as the time they were head coach at UT, so it's interesting to compare the numbers. From what i can tell, despite all of the hype and publicity about Fulmer being the winningest coach, etc., the stats clearly show that Majors was the better coach over time, especially under their respective circumstances.
Would Fulmer have ever been able to rebuild the program from rock-bottom? We'll never know. However, once Majors got things rocking and rolling, he didn't let it slide like Fulmer has.
One thing that was pointed out to me recently was that fact that when the NCAA announced the impending deletion of Proposition 24 players from Division 1 rosters, UT imposed the rule some two to three years before it actually went into effect at other schools that we played. The UT administration decided UT would get a head-start and went ahead and implemented it some two years before the rest of the SEC had to do so. Thus, Majors could not recruit players like Tracy Rocker. Auburn came to Knoxville ranked #1 in the country in 1985 & and had some 13 starters who were Prop 24 students. They would not have been admitted to UT, but were hellacious athletes that Majors would have loved to have recruited had he been allowed to do so.
The Vols still beat Auburn that year, 38-20, and went on to spank Miami, who also had a ton of Prop 24 players, 35-7. Miami was saying if they won that game, they would prove they were national champs. Arguably, UT was the best team in the nation that year. Had the Vols had Prop 24 players on their team that year, they would have had the most outstanding group in UT history and would have easily won the national championship. With that sort of momentum, with Majors having had won 2 national championships within a decade of each other, including his at Pitt, who knows how many more he might have won? For some reason, that just flies right over the heads of so many who analyze Majors career.
By the way....just an afterthought: Fulmer doesn't seem to be able to recruit good tight ends, but two Middle Tennesseans that other Southern schools got signed NFL contracts this month. Wallace Cooper, the TE at Auburn, wore the Vols out in the 2 games he and Tuberville beat them 2 years ago, and Crenshaw, who played quarterback in the Nashville area, played TE at Florida State and is now an NFL draftee.
Majors made the changes to stay modern and stay abreast of the times. He wasn't afraid to change offensive or defensive schemes or go after certain different players from what he had recruited previously. The good coaches change and adapt to any time. Fulmer is just inflexible and refuses to do it. His hand was forced when Randy Sanders quit.
There is no question Fulmer is still a great recruiter. However, the entire point being made by this is that he still refuses to hire the very best coaches available to coach the talent he recruits. Majors never was afraid to do that. Of course, things have changed. However, Fulmer hasn't. Majors proved he could change with the times.
Coaches who can push the talent to the next level are just as abundant today as they were during Majors' era. He simply would hire them and Fulmer won't. The proof is in the fact that 1st round draft picks are fewer and farther between now for UT, even though their recruiting is still as good or better than ever. There is no inconsistency involved in that argument whatsoever. In fact, both facts point up the weakness in Fulmer as a coach compared to Majors.
The point is that Fulmer is getting more than his fair share of talent. He has no doubt had much better and talented material to work with than Majors ever did and has done less with it, as you can see from the fact that fewer are now being drafted in high rounds. The argument that there is more parity now just doesn't wash. Those that UT competes against are subject to that same parity. Tennessee still out-recruits them but they aren't out-coaching them in the big games that matter. Majors took less and made more with it. Fulmer is taking more and makes less with it. There is no other way to look at it. The only difference is that Fulmer is pulling down a much higher salary and isn't producing at the level commensurate with what he's being paid.
of those seasons would have been outright SEC titles.
