NON-ENDEARING TERMS

If UH wants a proven head coach, it had better rethink its stance on contract buyouts

As with the breakup of a couple you wanted to see succeed, it was disheartening to get the disappointing news via email on Sunday that Major Applewhite and the University of Houston were no longer an item.

“Houston Announces Separation with Major Applewhite” it read, as if the two were going to split for a while, seek counseling and perhaps try to work it out.

Um, no. That is not going to happen.

Instead, UH is going to pay Applewhite the near $2 million it owes him per their prenuptial agreement. They are done.

Coaches get fired. That’s the nature of the job. As Bum Phillips said, there are two kinds of coaches: “Them that’s fired and them that’s gonna be fired.”

I just wanted so much more for Applewhite. So did UH Chairman of the Board of Regents Tilman Fertitta and school president Renu Khator.

Just two weeks ago, Applewhite was in good shape. UH’s offense was so good this season that the school agreed to a new contract and huge raise for offensive coordinator Kendal Briles.

When Briles accepted a job at Florida State, just after the Cougars were trounced 70-14 by Army in the aptly named Armed Forces Bowl, UH and Applewhite’s relationship was not so secure.

The uncertainty existed despite Applewhite’s having posted consecutive winning seasons (7-5 in 2017, 8-5 this season). The last week has been very messy around UH.

As poorly handled as the situation was, UH’s problem isn’t in the firing of Applewhite. It is in the process that led to his hiring in the first place.

It is obvious UH will do whatever it takes to field a winning football team. It is talking a good game, a better game than it has since Bill Yeoman roamed the sidelines.

There is a much-needed energy in Fertitta and Khator’s approach. The university was once too willing to accept mediocrity. And often, even less.

One question is whether Fertitta’s emotional response to Tom Herman’s leaving for greener acres at Texas, a couple years after Kevin Sumlin took off for Texas A&M, help or hurt the program in the long run.

The hard line Fertitta drew on out clauses eliminated several more qualified candidates when Applewhite was hired. That mattered not to Fertitta, as he put importance on loyalty to the program. Period.

Fertitta doesn’t like the power position that coaches hold over schools. It is a power that allows them to negotiate workable buyouts. (Like the $1 million one West Virginia coach Dana Holgorsen has that helps make him an attractive option in UH’s coach search. Hint. Hint.)

Last year, on the inaugural “Texas Sports Nation” podcast, Fertitta told me he was going to bring the power back to UH.

“I said no more of this with college football contracts,” he said. “We were letting these lawyer agents come in and dictate to these (athletic directors) … ‘we won’t even interview for the job.’

“I said, ‘Don’t interview if you think you’re gonna have a contract that you can get out of. Don’t even come here.’ … It’s BS. We put an end to that.”

For that stand to work, Fertitta needed Applewhite to be great. While Applewhite was better than he is being given credit for, he wasn’t great.

Let’s not dwell on what went wrong under Applewhite. Granted, the mistakes he made as a first-time head coach are hardly extraordinary.

And all would have been overlooked had this year’s team not suffered a slew of injuries. The most significant ones cut short the seasons of quarterback D’Eriq King and defensive tackle Ed Oliver, two star talents who were UH’s best offensive and defensive players, respectively.

If you think some coaches will look sideways at UH because a coach who went 15-8 in two regular seasons was fired, imagine how their agents will squint at the punitive buyout clause Fertitta insists on having.

UH is in a great city and fertile recruiting area, and it has an excellent facility that fits. This is a place where one can win, and win big, despite the minuscule odds of earning a Power Five invite any time soon.

The school aspires to be more than a steppingstone and proving ground for first-time coaches.

Back at the turn of the century, before Fertitta and Khator raised the bar, Dana Dimel kept the job at UH after winning three games his first season and none the next.

UH then hired Art Briles, and everything changed. Briles went 7-6 in Year 1, then 3-8 in Year 2, but by the time he left for Baylor after five seasons, UH was seen as a program on the rise.

The rise continued through four seasons under Sumlin, leveled off in three years with Tony Levine, then spiked with a 22-4 record, including a Peach Bowl victory, in Herman’s two years.

Applewhite, who was the offensive coordinator with Herman, then became the fifth straight UH coaching hire whose first head coaching job was at UH.

But expectations were different for him than those who came before.

He won’t get the chance to see if he can meet those expectations because the patience afforded those who came before him no longer exists at UH.

A permanent separation after two years, two winning years, is an extremely short leash.

Not that UH should accept its lot in life. Figuring out how to change said lot is the challenge.

Whether a coach leaves on his own accord or is forced out, the frequency of separations is the true indicator of how your program is viewed and how your athletic department operates.

Whom UH jumps in bed with next, and the terms of that prenup, will give a clue as to whether UH is on the right track.