Tramel: NFL teams scour the college ranks
motivation, like with Jim Harbaugh and Pete Carroll. Discipline, like with Greg Schiano.
General excellence, like Stoops produced for almost a decade, might still attract the NFL, but that excellence at OU has given way to general consistency, which won’t entice the pros.
Mike Gundy never is mentioned for the NFL, though his collegiate accomplishments trump Schiano’s and match Harbaugh’s. Gundy, I suppose, isn’t seen as the offensive mastermind in Stillwater, just the guy who knows what he wants to do and how to find someone who can deliver, from Larry Fedora’s quick tempo to Dana Holgorsen’s Air Raid.
Of course, you never know. It only takes one general manager (or owner) to like one college head coach, and a marriage is made, even if it seems a dubious union.
Patriots owner Billy Sullivan hired Chuck Fairbanks in 1973, even though the Sooners ran the wishbone. Jerry Jones hired Barry Switzer in 1994, even though Switzer was a wishbone aficiona- do and hadn’t coached even that in five years. Bill Bidwell hired Bud Wilkinson in 1978 even though when Bud last had coached, at OU 15 years earlier, the Sooners and everyone else still were playing single-platoon football.
Hiring college coaches was all the rage in the ’70s. No college coach got an NFL head coaching job from 1961-70, and only eight in the 40 years before that. But then they came in droves.
Dan Devine and Tommy Prothro in ’71. Bill Peterson and John Ralston in ’72. Fairbanks and Don Coryell in ’73. John McKay, Dick Vermeil and Lou Holtz in ’76. The trend slowed, eventually to a trickle. Between 2002 and 2010, only three college coaches were hired — one of them was a joke, the Raiders’ Lane Kiffin, and the other two, Miami’s Nick Saban and Atlanta’s Bobby Petrino, lasted a combined 45 games.
But now comes the newest wave, some with great success.
Jim Harbaugh might not be the best football coach in own family — or he might be the best football coach in the world. Super Bowl 47 will help us know. Carroll, thought to be an NFL failure when he went 33-31 with the Jets and Patriots in the ’90s, has turned the Seahawks into a power.
NFL decision-makers often are lemmings. The success of the 49ers and Seahawks will cause them to scour college campuses.
They all would covet Saban. And Stanford’s David Shaw, Penn State’s Bill O’Brien, Notre Dame’s Brian Kelly and Texas A&M’s Kevin Sumlin remain hot candidates. Plus others we don’t see coming, since college football is loaded with Greg Schianos.
Or even Stoops and Gundy. You never know.
NORMAN — The misdemeanor marijuana possession charge against Oklahoma receiver Jalen Saunders was dropped Tuesday due to a lack of evidence.
Defensive back Cortez Johnson, who was arrested with Saunders early Dec. 2, pleaded guilty to one count of misdemeanor marijuana possession and will be placed on probation for six months.
The news was first reported by SoonerScoop.com, the Rivals site that covers OU.
Saunders and Johnson were arrested and charged after being pulled over early in the morning on Dec. 2 — hours after the Sooners’ regular-season finale win at TCU.
Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops waited until one week before the Cotton Bowl to announce whether Saunders would play, which he did; Saunders caught nine passes for 63 yards in the Sooners’ 41-13 loss to Texas A&M.
Saunders transferred to OU last May from Fresno State, and was expected to sit out this entire season, per NCAA rules. His waiver request for immediate eligibility was initially declined, but that decision was overturned on appeal days before Oklahoma’s fifth game of the season.
Saunders, who will be a senior in the 2013 season, caught 62 passes for 829 yards and three touchdowns over the nine games in which he was eligible.
In his third game this past season — a 30-13 loss to Notre Dame on Oct. 27 — Saunders caught a schoolrecord eight passes in the first quarter alone, finishing with 15 receptions for 181 yards.
Saunders made perhaps his biggest impact in the Sooners’ final three games of the regular season. In a Nov. 17 win at West Virginia, he caught seven passes for 123 yards, including a 76-yard touchdown.
The next week, when Oklahoma edged Oklahoma State 51-48 in overtime, Saunders had 10 receptions, 162 yards and one score, and added an 81-yard punt return touchdown.
And in Dec. 1’s victory at TCU, Saunders hauled in seven receptions for 108 yards and a touchdown. Hours later, he and Johnson were arrested.
Johnson sat out all of last season after transferring from Arizona. He’ll be a redshirt sophomore next season.