As Texas heads into another bye week after an underwhelming 2-2 start to the season, there’s more negatives than positives floating around.
To put it simply, the coaching staff has been the Achilles heel of Texas’ football program since Mack Brown left the program in 2013.
It’s not necessarily that Texas is losing a game or two, it’s how they’re suffering these losses. The Longhorns are not playing fundamentally sound, disciplined or smart football this year. Each loss has been littered with bonehead penalties in crucial moments, dozens of missed tackles and questionable play-calling on both sides of the ball.
More importantly, there’s a noticeable player development issue. Under fourth-year head coach Tom Herman, these are now considered familiar failures. Where is the accountability?
Herman has compiled three consecutive top eight recruiting classes in the nation. According to 247Sports’ 2020 Team Talent Composite rankings, Texas has the No. 5 most talented roster in the country this season.
The majority of big-time programs listed within the top 10 have consistently competed for championships. Texas is the odd man out, therefore there’s no excuses at this point. The talent on the Forty Acres is not being molded and/or utilized enough to where the blame eventually has to fall on the shoulders of the head coach.
Due to the heated arguments surrounding Herman’s future in Austin, we’ve decided to take a closer look at the direction this program has gone after the departure of Brown.
Data analyst and college football stats expert Kyle Umlang noted that Herman and Strong have both earned more per season at Texas than Brown.
Brown received a salary raise by more than 500% in 2010, which brought his total salary to about $5 million dollars. This impressive bump in pay followed nine consecutive 10-win seasons, eight bowl wins, four BCS Bowl berths and two national championship appearances.
Strong had the sixth-richest salary in college football with a base salary of $5.2 million in 2016. According to USA TODAY Sports annual NCAA salaries, Herman’s base salary in 2019 was $6.75 million, marking the seventh-highest annual salary in college football.
It gets worse. Umlang took it a step further to state that if Brown were to repeat his six worst seasons at Texas from 2014-2019, the Longhorns would have seven more wins than they do today.
Although it’s unlikely for Herman to be relieved of his duties during an unusual pandemic season, it doesn’t appear that he’s the one to right the ship at Texas.