In the world of sports, there are takes and there are hot takes. Then there’s the gem the University of Missouri Director of Athletics Jim Sterk dropped today.
"I think all signs point to greatness. One is he had a tremendous amount of experience. For the offense I think Drew has a ton of confidence in him and his play calling. The staff is meshing and they really like each other." – Jim Sterk on new #Mizzou OC Derek Dooley.
— The Bernie Miklasz Show (@BernieShow) April 24, 2018
HOOOOOOOOOO boy.
Derek Dooley, former Tennessee head coach, was recently hired on at Mizzou as offensive coordinator for the football team. Mizzou had the top offense in the SEC in nearly every category last season, and with the departure of former offensive coordinator Josh Heupel to UCF, Dooley doesn’t exactly have an uphill battle to make this Mizzou offense great. With that in mind, it seems the Dooley hype train is already screaming off the rails, and the season hasn’t even started yet.
To be fair, though, Dooley has a history of pretty solid offenses on his teams. The Bray-Hunter-Patterson offense in 2012 is still being talked about. As a position coach in Dallas in the NFL, the Cowboys consistently had respectable wide receivers, as well.
But “greatness?” GREATNESS?! What “signs” is Sterk looking at here?
Dooley has a 32-41 overall record as a head coach in college. Obviously, he didn’t take the same position at Missouri, but even his recruiting record is against him. Many of the high grade recruits he did land either had character issues that highlighted their careers more than their play on the field or transferred before their careers were over at Tennessee (see Da’Rick Rogers, DeAnthony Arnett, Cameron Clear, etc.). Dooley’s most infamous class was his last one, where he neglected to sign a single offensive lineman, a feat rarely achieved by any coach worth a damn in college football.
His NFL career wasn’t much better. Almost every Dallas Cowboys game you watched featured Dez Bryant pacing on the sidelines yelling at Dooley as he tried to calmly look straight ahead without making eye contact. There always seemed to be drama in the wide receiver room in Dallas, and apparently the rift between Dooley and his best receiver was the root of a lot of problems. Needless to say, that issue has since been resolved.
Derek Dooley, Dez Bryant and Brice Butler are now all out of the WR room.
Safe to say that's where Jason Garrett and Scott Linehan thought that the WR room was a problem last year.
— Marcus Mosher (@Marcus_Mosher) April 13, 2018
All this isn’t to discredit Dooley and his career, thus far, he has certainly had bits and pieces of success along the way.
But what sane person has the gall and audacity to say that “all signs point to greatness” for Dooley? Someone that the state of Missouri’s tax payers are paying $700,000 a year for, it sounds like. Historically speaking, people in charge that are delusional don’t generally fare well, so keep an eye on this situation going forward.
Dooley returns to his old stomping grounds when Missouri travels to play Tennessee in Knoxville on November 17th.
