RE: CBS Sports/Houston Nutt on UConn Radar...
Ole Miss fan here. I post on the Memphis board from time-to-time because I like to keep up with the hometown team. Saw this and thought I'd offer my two cents on Houston Nutt. I hope this doesn't come across as too critical because I like Houston Nutt. I've always thought him to be a good coach, but he has some attributes that do not serve him well in the program building business. With the proper support, I think he can do well just about anywhere.
First of all, Nutt is good with people. He has a folksy charm about him that plays well in and outside the locker room. Not sure how that will play on the East Coast, but he loves to tell stories and he can relate to kids in the South. I think he is a brilliant motivator when he wants to be (more on that in a second).
Nutt has a reputation -- a misinformed one, IMO -- of not being able to recruit. Much of that derives from his professional circumstance. At Arkansas, he never really had to recruit. It's a one school state and the Hogs got their pick of whoever they wanted. And the state, along with NW Texas, produced enough talent to keep Arkansas football relevant.
On the flip side, Houston had to recruit at Ole Miss. With Mississippi State 90 miles south and split allegiances throughout the state, not to mention LSU and Alabama setting up camp in South and East Mississippi, it is imperative you be able to recruit at Ole Miss. I do think it took him a year to realize that, but he came on strong with Top 20 classes in 2009, 2010 and 2011. The same charm Houston doles out on alumni and in the locker room works on the recruiting trail, too.
Nutt does have a recruiting problem, though. He takes a lot of chances on academic and socially borderline kids. This is a noble quality and is rooted in his own upbringing, but it did not always serve him well at Arkansas or Ole Miss. You are going to need a very strong academic counseling program around his team -- Houston and his staff are not going to be stewards off the football field. You will need folks who will literally walk kids to class and make sure they stay out of trouble. He will recruit 5 - 6 players a year who require this level of attention to maintain eligibility.
Style-wise, Nutt runs his offense out of the wildcat formation. He believes in it to a fault. He's definitely an offensive minded coach, with a run-first lean. He came up in the generation of coaches just prior to the offensive whizzes today (Briles, Sumlim, Malzahn, etc), but unlike many of them who would just as well not have to play defense, Houston does believe in having a strong defense. He's kind of old school in that winning to him means running the football and stopping the run. His style is nothing fancy, but it's effective when he has players that can run it.
His teams are not going to have a lot of penalties. His kids are going to know their assignments and execute them. You will have a lot of games that are 14-10 or 21-14 at the half and the next thing you know, you've won by 20-30 points. He loves big offensive linemen who just wear down the opponent and often times, his games get blown open in the second half. It's going to be rare that he doesn't have his team in position to win the game when he's motivated (more on that in a second).
He has earned the moniker "quarterback killa" primarily because of his inflexibility with his offense, IMO. He recruited a great passing quarterback at Arkansas in Mitch Mustain (sort of forced into recruiting him, it seems - I'm not sure he would have done so had he not been from Springdale, AR). He inherited a great passing QB at Ole Miss in Jevan Snead. Nutt could not/would not adjust his system to fit the talents of either. This inflexibility ultimately cost him his job at Arkansas and largely influenced Snead to leave Ole Miss prior to his senior season.
Houston is a very emotional guy and it shows in his coaching. I think this is what helps make him a great motivator, but I also think it does his teams a disservice. Houston is prone to get nervous in big moments and it shows on the sideline. I think kids see that and sometimes get nervous, too, at least until they figure out that's just "coach being coach." It becomes a real problem when that nervousness degrades into panic. It doesn't happen a lot, but when it does, the sideline basically collapses into chaos and confusion and a close game will be lost.
Finally, let's talk about motivation. Nutt has a huge ego (what coach doesn't?) and his needs a lot of attention. When it doesn't get that attention, it always seems drama breaks out - not all of it his own, mind you. It wasn't so much a problem at Arkansas, where he was a native son and had a great relationship with Frank Broyles. If Houston ever needed anything there, all it took was a phone call and he got it. Not so much at Ole Miss, where he had a bad working relationship with his AD and basically had to justify every request with a business case. Houston was often told "no" at Ole Miss. I believe (although I have no way to prove it), after having been told "no" so much, Houston checked out on Ole Miss. He lost his motivation to work and so he just quit. It is going to be very important for you to have an AD that Houston can get along and who will work to get him most everything he wants.
Bottom line is Houston Nutt is a great people person with great motivation skills and good game management skills. But keep in mind, he is a football coach -- not a program builder. He needs lots of support to maintain the program at a level his salary commands. (And trust me, if you hire him, Jimmy Sexton will make sure he commands a high salary.)
(This post was last modified: 11-03-2013 11:43 AM by Draelius.)
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