Most Cost Efficient Coaches

Just for fun, I figured I’d take a look at the most cost-efficient coaches based on annual salary* divided by the number of wins.

Former Arkansas/current Ole Miss HC Houston Nutt tops the list, barely skimming in under Mississippi State’s Sylvester Croom and Kentucky’s Rich Brooks. While it’s certainly not an exact science, it’s an interesting look at things. The three highest paid coaches – UF’s Meyer, UAT’s Saban, and AU’s Tuberville – rank 10-12 in conference, as they'd need nearly perfect seasons to rank closer to the top. Surprisingly (or not), former Ole Miss HC Orgeron ranked 9th in conference in cost efficiency despite being the 2nd lowest paid coach in the conference.


*I got this idea (and all salary data) from CoachesHotSeat.com, a great reference site that - in a lot of cases - actually has a scanned copy of a coach’s contract available for viewing.

Houston Nutt to Ole Miss

Just 3 years after striking out tremendously by hiring a nut as their head coach, the Ole Miss brass seems to have reversed their fortunes with the hiring of Houston Nutt. Nutt took a $.5M paycut to get out of Fayetteville, where he was the 2nd winningest head coach in Arkanasas history and had won 3 SEC West titles in 10 years, 2 of which earned the Razorbacks trips to Atlanta.

He’s stepping into a good situation in Oxford. While Orgeron couldn't coach his way out of a wet paper sack (PUNT THE BALL!), his tireless recruiting efforts restocked the barren cupboard left by former HC David Cutcliffe. Nutt is a proven winner and will come in with a chip on his shoulder and relishing the underdog role that Arkansas so often had. He’s shown an ability to win the big game (see last weekend), which is something the Rebels have lacked so desperately under Orgeron. Many times in this brief tenure, the Rebels played a superior talent close before Orgeron began to think… Once that happened, it was normally a bad thing for the Rebels.

As for the Hogs, not sure why so much of their fan base is celebrating Nutt’s departure. Sure he could have handled the Springdale situation better and he never won the SEC Championship Game anymore, but this isn’t the Southwest Conference anymore Hog fans… this is the SEC. The toughest conference in the country. You’re not going to win the conference every year and every team is going to have a down year.

Nutt was a consistent winner and rarely – if ever – had the most talented team. The Hogs won 8 games this year with nothing that even resembled a passing game with star WR Monk missing the majority of the season. His players would run through a wall for him and he would do the same. You could tell that with his interaction with McFadden after they beat the #1 team in the country on the road last weekend.

The Hogs are going to get much of the same reaction nationwide as Ole Miss got when they fired Cutcliffe 3 years ago. The difference being Cutcliffe left after a 4-7 season with no light at the end of the tunnel. Other than Patrick Willis, he left no SEC talent for his successor to work with. Meanwhile, Arkansas has won 18 games the last 2 seasons and is poised for another January bowl this year.

While the Hogs won’t turn to someone as unqualified as Orgeron, they may soon be wishing they never drove out Houston Nutt.

Random Randomness

*Not surprisingly, the recent firing of Ole Miss HC Ed Orgeron has sent waves of sadness through the other 11 schools in conference. Not only will there be no more Hummer commercials, but the Rebels are all but guaranteed to hire a more qualified candidate.

My guess is that this is the first of many tribute videos that pops up, though I doubt any will have a better soundtrack.


*MSNBC has a surprisingly in-depth breakdown of 7 of the top Heisman candidates.

*Many of you have probably already seen this elsewhere, but in case you haven't, listen to ACC referee Don Cherry's call from the Maryland/NCState game Saturday...


And if sounds vaguely familiar to anyone...

YawYawYawYaw YawYaw YawYaw Fired

If you're an Ole Miss fan, I imagine that today was a happy day for you. Three years after OM brass toured the country interviewing qualified candidates and ended up hiring the most untalented candidate (possibly ever in conference), they've realized the error of their ways and parted ways with Ed Orgeron.

While Orgeron certainly improved the talent level since the Rebs (justifiably) axed David Cutcliffe, O's in-game decision making was... well... bad. If you saw any of the Egg Bowl yesterday, you saw a Rebel team dominate an MSU team for 51 minutes before O decided to go for it on 4th down from midfield.

To mark the occasion, and just for old times' sake, let's all sing along...