The Todd Dodge Equivalent Futility List

Things will get better. Every coach deserves at least 4 years. Todd Dodge will turn things around.

It's the common refrain from the few remaining die-hard Dodge supporters. If we'll just be patient, Coach Dodge will magically transform us into a powerhouse again.

But how many coaches who started as badly as Todd Dodge has have ever been successful? Heck, how many of them managed not to get fired before their 3rd season?

To find out, I looked through the records of every single coach with more than 2 seasons of experience listed on the College Football Data Warehouse. I want to know what history says about whether Todd Dodge can possibly recover from this poor a start to his college coaching career. So I went through all 5,610 coaches listed on the CFDW; all the way back through 1881, when M.C. Taylor coached Richmond in a home-and-home series against Randolph-Macon.

So, in nearly 130 years of college football... How many coaches in their first years as a head coach at the highest level have gone through 20 games with 2 or fewer wins and been allowed to coach into a 3rd season?

The answer is 26. Many more have been fired after two such seasons, but only 26 have been retained. I call the roster of 26 the Todd Dodge Equivalent Futility List.

How well did the decision to be patient with such an epically terrible start pay off for these other schools and their coaches? Judge for yourselves.

1. Joe Avezzano – Oregon State coach from 1980-84. Started 1-19, finished 2nd season with a 1-21 record. Retained for 3 more seasons, in which his team won 1, 2, and 2 games, respectively. Fired after 5 seasons with a final record of 6-47-2.

2. Bill Beall – Baylor coach from 1969-71. Finished 2nd season with a 2-19 record. Brought back for Year 3, in which his team went 1-9. Fired with a three year record of 3-28.

3. Cleve Bryant – Ohio coach from 1985-89. Started 2-18, finished 2nd season with a 3-19 record. Went 1-10 in Year 3, 4-6-1 in Year 4, and 1-9-1 in Year 5. Fired after five seasons with a final record of 9-44-2.

4. Frank Carideo – Missouri coach from 1932-34. Finished 2nd season with a 2-15-1 record. Brought back for a 3rd year, in which his team went winless. Fired after Year 3 with a 2-23-2 overall record.

5. John Coatta – Wisconsin coach from 1967-69. Finished 2nd season with an 0-19-1 record. In Year 3, his team finished 3-7 and Coatta was fired.

6. Bill Curry – Georgia Tech coach from 1980-86. Started 2-17-1, finished 2nd season with a 2-19-1 record. In his next five seasons at Georgia Tech, he posted 6 or fewer wins in four of them, including a 3 win season in Year 4. The highlight of his Georgia Tech career was a 9-2-1 finish in 1985, which he followed up with a .500 year before getting hired to coach at Alabama. In his first year at Alabama, he led the Crimson Tide to a 7-5 record, only the second time in nearly 20 years that the team had finished a season with 7 or fewer victories. Curry coached Alabama for 3 years, compiling a 26-10 record, but never managed to beat Auburn. Because of this, he was offered a new contract that didn’t give him a raise and took away his authority to hire and fire his own assistants. He resigned and accepted the head coach job at Kentucky. In 7 seasons at Kentucky, Curry only managed more than 4 wins once: a .500 year in 1993. He was fired after 1996, finishing his Division 1-A coaching career with a final record of 83-105-4. Curry has been hired to launch a D-1AA program for Georgia State; their first season will be in 2010.

7. John F. “Johnny” Druze – Marquette coach from 1956-58. Finished 2nd season with an 0-19 record. Retained for a 3rd season, when his team finished 2-7-1. Fired after 3rd year.

8. Kirk Ferentz – Iowa coach from 1999 through the present. Started 2-18, finished 2nd season with a 4-19 record. Ferentz enjoyed an exceptional 3 year run of 10+ win seasons from 2002-04, but hasn’t managed more than 7 wins in the other four full years of his career. To put it in terms Mean Green fans can appreciate, Ferentz hasn’t cracked 7 wins since Darrell Dickey was storming the New Orleans Bowl sidelines with his notes down his pants and Diet Coke Boy at his wing. Since then, Ferentz has broken .500 once (his 7 win year) Also important to note: Though Ferentz equaled Dodge’s record through 20 games, he did manage 3 wins in his second season and finished Year 2 with a higher record than even the most optimistic fan expects of Coach Dodge.

9. Jim Harkema – Eastern Michigan coach from 1983-92, hired away from Grand Valley State. Started 2-16-2, finished 2nd season with a 3-17-2 record. In his 3rd season, his team posted a 4-7 record. “Success” finally started in ’86, when Harkema enjoyed his first of four consecutive winning seasons (two of the four being 6 win seasons, and a third being a 7 win year) highlighted by a 10-2 record in 1987, his fifth season. Things collapsed again in 1990, when the Eagles fell to a disappointing 2-9 record, which was followed by a 3 win season in ’91 (this sounds vaguely familiar…). Harkema was fired in ’92 after an 0-4 start including losses to Akron, Louisiana Tech, and Kent State. Final Division 1-A record as a head coach: 41-57-5 including one Bowl bid.

10. David R. Hart – Pittsburgh coach from 1966-68. Finished 2nd season with a 2-18 combined record. Brought back for a 3rd season in which he went 1-9 for the third consecutive year before being fired.

11. Kim Helton – Houston coach from 1993-99. Started 2-17-1, finished 2nd season with a 2-19-1 record. Finished Year 3 with a 2-9 record. In his remaining four years, he finished above .500 twice and 3-8 twice. Total career record: 24-53-1, including one bowl appearance, a Liberty Bowl loss to Syracuse in 1996.

12. Tom Lovat – Utah coach from 1974-76. Started 2-18, finished 2nd season with a 2-20 record. Brought back for a 3rd (and final) season, in which his team finished 3-8.

13. George MacIntyre – Vanderbilt coach from 1979-85. Started 2-18, finished 2nd season with a 3-19 overall record. Retained for 5 more years, only one of which his team finished with a winning record.

14. Robert C. McNeish – Virginia Tech coach from 1948-50. Finished 2nd season with a 1-15-3 record. Brought back for a 3rd season, in which his team went 0-10 and was outscored 430-72 on the season. It wound up being McNeish’s last year as a college head coach.

15. William M. “Bill” Meek – Kansas State coach from 1951-54. Finished 2nd season with a 1-18 record. Ultimately coached 17 seasons at 4 different schools, only winning 8 or more games once in his career. Meek’s teams finished with 4 or fewer wins in 7 out of his 17 years as a head coach, including a winless season at SMU. Final record: 77-90-6 with zero Bowl appearances.

16. Bill Michael – UTEP coach from 1977-1981. Started 2-18, finished 2nd season with a 2-21 record. Went 2-9 in Year 3, 1-11 in Year 4, and started 0-2 in Year 5. Despite giving him 5 years, Michael only managed a career record of 5-43.

17. Timothy “Tim” Murphy – Cincinnati coach from 1989-1993. Started 2-17-1 through 20 games, finished 2nd season with a 2-19-1 record. Went 4-7 and 3-8 in subsequent years. Murphy nearly doubled his career D-1A win total when his team went 8-3 in 1993, after which he left to go coach at Harvard. Career D-1A coaching record: 17-37-1.

18. Joe Novak – Northern Illinois coach from 1996-2007. Started 1-19, finished 2nd season with a 1-21 record. Went 2-9 in Year 3. In 12 full seasons, only finished more than 1 game over .500 4 times, highlighted by a 10-2 season in 2003. Retired after finishing the 2007 season with a 2-10 record.

19. Thomas J. “Tommy” O’Boyle – Tulane coach from 1962-65. Finished 2nd season with a 1-18-1 record, retained for two more years. Went 3-7 in Year 3 and 2-8 in his final year as head coach.

20. Dean Pees – Kent State coach from 1998-2003. Started 2-18, finished 2nd season with a 2-20 record. Retained for 4 more years, with a combined record of 15-31. Went 1-10 in Year 3, posted his only winning season in Year 4 with a 6-5 record, then went 3-9 and 5-7 in his final two seasons before being fired.

21. Francis X. “Frank” Reagan – Villanova coach from 1954-59. Finished 2nd season with a 2-18 record. Retained for 4 more years, posting 5-4, 3-6, 6-4, and 0-4 records (14-18 combined) before being terminated mid-season in Year 6.

22. Charley Shira – Mississippi State coach from 1967-72. Finished 2nd season with a 1-17-2 record. Retained for 4 more seasons in which he compiled a 15-28 record. Best results came in Year 4, with a 6-5 record. His other seasons resulted in 3, 2, and 4 wins.

23. Jim Shofner – TCU coach from 1974-76. Started 1-19, finished 2nd season with a 2-20 record. Brought back for 3rd season, when TCU went 0-11. After a winless Year 3, Shofner was fired.

24. Robert Harry Stiteler – Texas A&M coach from 1948-50. Finished 2nd season with a 1-17-2 record. Brought back for 3rd season, when he went 7-4. Despite the improvement, it was his last season as a head coach anywhere.

25. Rick Venturi – Northwestern’s head coach from 1978-80. Started 1-18-1, finished first two seasons at 1-20-1. Brought back for 3rd season, went 0-11 and was fired.

26. Richard “Dick” Voris – Virginia’s head coach from 1958-60. Started 1-19, brought back for third season. Fired after an 0-10 record in Year 3.

So of the 26 coaches who started as badly as Todd Dodge has, here's your analysis of how well patience paid off for their employers:

11 were fired after their third season and never worked as a head coach again.
1 was fired after his fourth season.
3 were fired after their fifth season.

Of the remaining 11 coaches...
4 only had one winning season in their careers.
3 never won more than 6 games in a single year.
2 others managed one eight win season apiece, but never earned a bowl bid.

There are four "success" stories: Novak, Harkema, Ferentz, and Curry, all of whom have coached at least 100 games at the highest college level of their time.

Of the four, only Ferentz has a career record that isn't at least 10 games under .500.

Harkema has a winning percentage two one-thousandths of a point higher than Darrell Dickey in an almost identical number of games. (Dickey had 42 wins in 106 games vs. 41 wins in 103 games for Harkema)

To state it as frankly as possible, only the four aforementioned coaches out of the entire history of college football have ever started this badly and managed to take their team to what would qualify as our LAST level. Of those four, only two have taken their team to the "next" level that we were gunning for when Darrell Dickey was replaced as head coach: Kirk Ferentz and Bill Curry.

According to history, we have a 2 in 5610 shot (that's .000356, for anyone without a calculator) that Todd Dodge will be as good as Bill Curry or Kirk Ferentz. There's no precedent for anyone who started this badly ever doing any better than those two did.

So here's a question: If we want this generation's Bill Curry... Why didn't we just hire him while he was unemployed and we were looking for our new head coach? Don't say money or facilities, because Curry took a 1-AA startup job at Georgia State. For anyone unfamiliar with the school, Georgia State is almost identical to UT-Arlington in terms of academics, athletics, statewide prestige, and enrollment. The combined annual price tag that Georgia State will pay for Curry and all of his assistants, secretaries, and operations people is $800,000.

If North Texas wanted Bill Curry, he was available and we had the budget for him. Why not just hire him and skip the learning process?

Here's another question: If we want the next Kirk Ferentz... The rumors are swirling that he might be looking for a new job after this season, if not sooner. If he's fired, why not just hire him outright instead of hoping the odds favor us with his equivalent? Because when it comes to coaches who started as badly as Todd Dodge or worse through 20 games, Ferentz is by far the best case scenario.

And Ferentz is only on the Todd Dodge Equivalent Futility List because we haven't gotten to games 21 or 22 yet, both of which Ferentz won while still in his 2nd season. Unless Dodge beats Western Kentucky AND Florida Atlantic, both on the road, Ferentz will have gotten off to a better D-1A start than Dodge.

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A brief sideline, because I know what the inevitable excuse will be: But no other coach has ever inherited such a dysfunctional/underskilled/undersized/insert bullshit, inaccurate-excuse-here team!

I think this is still a pretty damn talented team, but for anyone who truly thinks Todd Dodge inherited the toughest situation in college football history, at least consider the following three counterpoints.

Jack Lengyel started his head coaching career with Marshall in 1971, 10 months after Marshall's football program was nearly shut down when 37 players and 8 coaches died in a plane crash. Lengyel coached a roster consisting of the survivors plus a number of freshmen (at the time, the NCAA forbade freshmen from participating in varsity football, so no other team Marshall faced played so much as one freshman). Lengyel supplemented his team with various athletes recruited from Marshall's other varsity sports (baseball, basketball, etc.). Despite these significant disadvantages, Lengyel managed to tally 4 wins in his first 20 games, double Todd Dodge's win total through the same number of opportunities.

1970 must have been an atrociously bad year for collegiate football aviation, because that same year, Wichita State suffered a similar tragedy when one of their team airplanes crashed, killing 16 players (almost all were starters, all were major contributors) and disabling others. Also killed in that crash were Wichita State's Athletics Director, Associate Athletics Director, Head Football Coach, Booster Club chairman, and several members of the training staff. Bob Seaman, one of the surviving assistant coaches, was named the new head coach. Seaman actually won 7 out of his first 20 games, including a winning season in Year 2.

Again, I disagree with the "bare cupboard" excuse people throw out to justify Dodge's poor start. But for a moment, let's accept the excuse as fact.

Is an empty cupboard worse than a full graveyard?

And hey, speaking of death... What about post-death penalty SMU? Forrest Gregg started his college coaching career at Southern Methodist after the school had spent two years without a football team. He arrived to find a roster full of freshmen, almost all of them shorter and smaller than Gregg was at age 56.

He only needed 12 games to tally his third win.

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North Texas is going through one of the all-time worst starts to a coaching career in college history. A start so bad, only 26 men have ever matched it and not been fired after two seasons.

This is not just a rough beginning for Todd Dodge. This is failure on an epic scale.

I'm not saying "fire Todd Dodge"!

What I am saying is, if Todd Dodge isn't fired, this is what history tells us we can expect.

It is a very ugly picture of our future.