Handing out the Grades: Baylor

With the end of each college football season, there comes the hiring and firings as schools evaluate their program and whether they meet their expectations. Hiring a new coach is a dicey process and making the right or wrong hire will determine the success of the program over the next 10 years. Let’s look at this winter’s changes and hand out the grades.

Baylor (3-9)
- Guy Morriss is the perfect example of a school making the wrong hire and the program sinking further into depression. After some short, moderate success at Kentucky, the Bears brought in Morriss to resurrect their struggling program. 18 wins and 40 losses later, it is obvious that that is not the case. It leaves the Bears exactly where they started, in the bottom of the Big XII, needing to rebuild.

The Bears turned there attention to their most famous alum, Mike Singletary. Singletary, however, was smart enough to avoid a career land mine. Left without option #1, the Bears made a savvy hire in Houston head coach Art Briles. Briles boasts over a decade of coaching Texas High School football, and also the last five years turning around a Houston program that had come on some tough times. Briles is known for his high octane offense, as well as mentoring Philadelphia Eagles quarterback, Kevin Kolb.

The task ahead of Briles is daunting, but Texas is a state full of talent, and Briles has over 20 years of experience in the state of Texas. He is a hire that will allow Baylor to beat out Rice, TCU, SMU, and Houston for recruits, something they hadn’t done in previous years. He should also be able to improve the Baylor offense that couldn’t seem to come together in Morriss’ spread attack. Briles may not be able to turn around this Baylor program, but he certainly is one of the best candidates that Baylor could come up with, with a job that is currently so undesirable.

Grade: B

Baylor Finds Their Man! It's Guy Morriss! Okay...Not Really

Baylor has apparently found their new head coach and it isn’t Guy Morriss, which is more than I thought they would be able to pull off. The new man will be Houston head coach Art Briles, who after five seasons in Houston, will take over the suffering Bears program.

The move could end up being a shrewd one for the Bears as Briles history as the head coach of Stephenville High School, and then his successful transition with Houston. He rebuilt a suffering program at Houston using a high octane passing attack. He initially took the job at Houston and immediately signed quarterback Kevin Kolb (a 2nd round pick for the Philadelphia Eagles in 2007) whom he built the Houston program around. No word on whether he has any NFL quarterbacks he can bring with him to Baylor.

Even after Kolb left, Briles lead the Cougars to an 8-4 record this season. Familiar with the Texas recruiting scene Briles may help give Baylor a much needed boost in the Texas recruiting wars. While he doesn’t have the star power that Baylor had hoped for like a Mike Singletary, he might have a chance to bring the program back to respectability.

That being said, it is Baylor. They play in the Big XII and are the only private university in a conference full of large public universities. They just don’t seem to fit, and it seems like the only way they can succeed is if they do more with less.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=3131738