Auburn football: 5 biggest blunders the Tigers coaching staff made in 2020
Gus Malzahn has won two-thirds of the games he has coached at Auburn, a number that rates 24th nationally among active head coaches at their current school.
That’s a good number in a vacuum. Except, Malzahn rates 6th in the SEC in that metric among coaches with 3 or more seasons at their present school, behind Nick Saban, Dan Mullen, Kirby Smart, Ed Orgeron and Jimbo Fisher.
Here’s the rub, too: No other SEC coaches have been at their current school 3 seasons or more. That means Malzahn is the least winning head coach in the SEC with 3 or more seasons at the same institution.
Even a season ago, Malzahn’s buyout was prohibitive, ranking as the 5th largest in the country. As of this month, it has dropped to $21.5 million. That’s a huge number, to be sure, but it’s now only the 5th largest in the SEC and, for the 1st time in his Auburn tenure, outside of the 10 largest in the country.
Those numbers are worth thinking about as the Auburn administration ponders the future of its coach, who has now lost at least 4 games for the 7th consecutive season. Even the shine of 2017’s SEC Championship Game appearance seems a distant memory for Auburn fans, especially as Lane Kiffin’s innovative offense appears to be waking the sleeping giant of Ole Miss to the west and, down in Texas, Fisher is finally delivering the promise implied in his 10-year megacontract at Texas A&M. Life in the SEC West isn’t easy, but as Auburn shuts the door on a disappointing 2020 this week at Mississippi State, the question that needs to be asked is this: Would a coaching change make life a little bit easier on Auburn?
Malzahn remains ever the optimist, telling the media Monday that he’s excited for the future on the Plains.
“Next year, I think it’s really set up. I’m really excited about that. I think we are going to be right in the mix next year and end up being one of the most experienced teams coming back. That’s when we’ve had the special year, when we’ve had one of the more experienced teams,” Malzahn said.
He may be right. But Malzahn and his staff did enough things wrong this season to make the discussion of just how long Auburn should go forward without a change a necessary one at an administrative level, not just a dialogue happening around Alabama holiday fireplaces.
Here are the 5 biggest blunders Malzahnn and the Auburn staff made in 2020.
1. Hiring Chad Morris as offensive coordinator
At SEC Media Days in July 2019, Malzahn said that giving up play-calling duties was a “mistake.” He was excited to be calling plays again ahead of the 2019 season, and he said he wouldn’t go back again and that “giving up calling plays was the product of bad advice.”
Those comments are what made Malzahn’s decision to surrender play-calling duties less than half a year later so strange. Even weirder? Hiring his old pal, Chad Morris, to be the new play caller. Morris built a fine reputation as an offensive mind at Clemson, but back in 2011, when he took over as Dabo Swinney’s offensive coordinator, the hurry-up, tempo-based spread offense he was running was still relatively new to the sport.
The sport has changed, and Morris hasn’t adjusted. His Arkansas offenses ranked 110th in total offense in 2019 and 111th in yards per play, and his 2018 offense was even worse, ranking 118th in total offense and last in the Power 5 in yards per play at 121st.
If you have confidence in yourself as a play caller, why in the world would you bring in an offensive mind whose offenses of late have been, well, offensive?
Auburn ranks 69th in total offense and 65th in yards per play, well below the numbers posted with Malzahn calling plays a season ago (64th, 47th).
Hiring Morris was a failure, and the project should be abandoned in 2021.
2. No overhaul of recruiting staff and personnel
A good place to spend the money tossed at Morris would have been on recruiting analysis or new recruiting directors. Levorn Harbin has had 2 seasons to fix what ails Auburn in recruiting, and remember, Harbin has a background as a defensive line coach. When your director of recruiting has a background in the area that is crushing your team, that’s a problem. Now, as Auburn heads toward a 3rd full cycle under Harbin’s leadership, it risks becoming systemic.
A change should have been made last winter. Auburn has traditionally been a top-15 or -10 recruiting destination in the 247 composite rankings. Malzahn’s current class ranks 41st. Of special concern is both sides of the line of scrimmage. The Tigers lack physicality and difference-makers on the defensive line (the biggest reason the Tigers have struggled on defense at times, a year after being elite nationally) and on the offensive line, where Malzahn seems all too content to rely on transfers.
Forget Morris. Gus should have called his own plays and hired new recruiting people with the Morris money to fix that part of his operation.
3. Anthony Schwartz was abandoned in the 2nd half of the season
Anthony Schwartz was a big recruiting win for Malzahn, picking Auburn over a hard-pressing Florida. For 2 seasons, we’ve heard about how magical the athlete with world-class speed is with the ball in his hands. Capable in the short passing game and as a threat in the run game, Schwartz should be ideal for Malzahn’s offense. The junior out of Fort Lauderdale even cited “offensive fit” when he decided to go to Auburn. On occasion, you still see why that “fit” seems ideal:
https://twitter.com/PFF_College/status/1175501687093698561?s=20
Why, then, did the “perfect fit” touch the ball 30 times in Auburn’s first 4 games but only 23 in the next 5? Why has he carried the ball out of the backfield only 4 times this season? How is it possible that with the game on the line against Texas A&M, your fastest, most electric player was limited to 3 touches?
Again, this is a Morris problem — and that makes it a Malzahn problem.
4. Another inexplicable loss where the team wasn’t ready to play
When Auburn fans say they want a change, they aren’t talking about Iron Bowls, which Malzahn has won with enough regularity to be a thorn in Saban’s side. They probably aren’t talking about the LSU game, either, which Malzahn has consistently had his teams ready for, even when they come up short as they did in 2019.
What they tend to be referring to are the inexplicable losses, like this season’s baffling 30-22 egg at South Carolina. The Gamecocks would finish the season playing a different quarterback than the one who beat Auburn, and as a team would win only 1 other game. That’s bad stuff. It’s also a trend.
In 2016, Smart’s 1st season at Georgia, Auburn had won 6 straight games and was a better team than the Bulldogs. The Tigers scored on their 1st possession of the game and didn’t score again, losing 13-7 in a game Smart has pointed to as a game-changer for him in Athens.
In 2018, Auburn was a 20-point favorite at Tennessee, which had been blown out by West Virginia, Florida and Georgia. Auburn played awful and lost 30-24, handing Jeremy Pruitt his first SEC victory.
This is the type of thing that happens to Malzahn too often — and remember, but for some generous officiating Auburn absolutely should have lost to Arkansas and might have lost to Ole Miss. Both of those losses would have been to 1st-year head coaches engaged in potentially lengthy rebuilds. Yikes.
5. Why brag about a ‘deep QB room’ if you never sit a struggling quarterback?
Bo Nix has rallied to put together a season that statistically more-or-less matches his 2019 SEC Freshman of the Year campaign. Nix’s passer rating is up 2.5 points despite 1 more interception than last year (in fewer games and 100 fewer attempts), and his rushing numbers have improved slightly, from 3.2 a touch to 3.6, on nearly identical attempts. That’s fine, and Nix is still young and getting better.
But Malzahn boasted this offseason that he has “the deepest quarterback room since I’ve been here.” That’s great, but what’s the point of all that depth if you won’t sit a struggling quarterback?
Nix’s game log in the 3-game stretch from Georgia through South Carolina saw the Tigers go 1-2, with the lone victory a referee assist against Arkansas. Nix’s numbers in those games: 53.9 completion percentage at a woeful 5.5 yards per attempt, with 1 touchdown and 5 total turnovers. That’s miserable stuff, and Malzahn probably could have earned the respect of the players — and either taught Nix a valuable lesson or helped him preservce confidence (or both!) — by simply shifting gears for a few quarters, especially in the South Carolina game, where Nix’s mistakes cost the Tigers a game.
Instead, Malzahn pressed forward without using any of the depth he built, presumably because a bad Nix was still better than any of the other options. If that’s the case, you have to wonder how good the quarterback room is in the first place.
How they have used Schwartz his whole career is mystifying. Why not use his speed and get him the ball behind the defense or at least in the open field. Jet sweeps, bubble screens and short crosses where he starts in front of all or most of the defense just wastes his speed.
I’m not sure how Gus or Morris is expected to fix a life time of bad fundamentals from Nix. You see his arm strength and potential but when things get hot he reverts back to what he did in high school. It’s easier to make good habits than to break bad ones. His lack of fundamentals is his fathers fault.
Ive never been high on Schwartz. Sure he’s fast, but after that what does he offer? Average route running, average hands, can’t block. He’s a track star playing football. He is improving however and hope he can take a big step next season. I still think Stove is a far better receiver than Flash. As for trying to get him behind the defense, we’ve tried and failed, in large part due to bad line play. He gets his sweeps and bubble screens a plenty but lacks the agility/tackle breaking ability to break one.
As for Bo, his fundamentals are a mess. You see spots where when he does apply them, it works out well, and when he doesn’t, he misses wide open receivers (Stove in the AM game). Hopefully another offseason can fix it. We will ha e to wait and see.
I agree on Schwartz. I always say, “he’s a track player who plays football, not a football player who runs track.”
When Bo Nix stands in the pocket and stops tap dancing, the results are often what everyone thought they would see when he came out of high school. To this point, he better leave if Gus stays, if he doesn’t there is no future in the NFL.
I think darth is dead-on with his question in how aub has primarily used schwartz. does he have bad hands? can he honestly not catch the ball?
if he’s truly a bad route runner, just have him run flag or post routes. with his speed and unless he truly can’t catch, the %s are bound to fall in aub’s favor that he’ll either make a big play or draw a flag from the db. above is obviously simplistic, but what malzahn/morris/etc. is doing with him is clearly not working and taking the best advantage of his speed
The problem with Schwartz has been durability and inconsistent at catching the ball. Teams play back on him and don’t allow him to beat them deep so that’s why he can’t seem to breakthrough. Other than being fast he’s really limited and when everyone knows you’re the fastest guy on the field then they’ll try to limit and scheme around you.
Some of these are pretty far fetched when considering this year. #1 should be the RB rotation starting the season. Even now, Richards should be #2. If you’re talking about over Gus’s tenure, the biggest blunder has been OL coach hires and never truly changing the offense. Gus has never been able to adapt the offense or hand over the offense to someone that could.
1. Chad may be a symptom but he is not the real problem. Coach Jarhead retired that trophy three years ago
2. Could anyone recruit passengers to the Titanic post ice berg?
3. Since when did Auburn ever have a pass offense under Malzahn.
4. Losers lose and Jarhead is the master of that.
5. The deep QB room now plays for Kentucky, Liberty and Kent State. The rest are in high school.
The real problem is you have an AD who was hired based on his melanin and the good ole boy he replaced sank Auburn’s ship with this killer contract plus hiring Pearl who will single handedly complete the utter destruction of all revenue sports when the NCAA gets done or does anyone think self imposing means there is no cause for alarm? Just covering their hindquarters from having institutional control?
Jacobs didn’t handle Gus’ contract. It was Gouge.
It wasn’t Gouge. It was JJ and that crooked Leath with the full support of Harbert. One of the problems now, is that we have an AD who is a fund raiser and a real nice guy and a President who would rather be dead than caught near an athletic facility. That leaves a split BOT making all the decisions.
You are spot on. It does not matter who works out the contract. If it is not approved by the BoT it is not valid. THEY deserve them blame for the position AU finds itself in. They are the businessmen that should have known better. They were blinded by the fact that Gus beat Bama and UGA and forgot there are more than 1-2 games in a season.
JJ didn’t have a thing to do with it. Just Leath.
I meant Leath.
Blackmon needs to stick to covering Florida. He doesn’t know as much about Auburn as he thinks he does.
He’s one of the many UF grads writing on this site that were hired by the UF grad editor. And they are free to spew whatever biased BS they feel like.
I guess this is series of negative articles about every team written by child.
Hey war eagle…..just curious…who is jarhead you are referring to in posts?
I’m inclined to ask the same question after reading this article and the following comments Dawg. I wasn’t going to say anything until that particular shortbustic statement.
Jay Jacob’s, former AD
Just five?
So, Gus is saying he has not had an experienced team in 7 years? He was pretty experienced last year everywhere but QB and still lost 4 games. At the rate that Nix is progressing he will still be playing as well as he did against Oregon next year, if he stays. We are young has been the mantra since 2014.
I clicked to see what was on this guy’s list. His #1 was my guess.
I get so tired of hearing Malzahn’s excuses, but what is even worse is hearing how bright the future is. We’ve been hearing that for 6 years, Gus … it’s always “we’re real excited about next game … next season … we’re gonna be great next time … tomorrow … blah blah blah.”
And yet nothing changes.
Auburn and Malzahn need to go their separate ways. “But but but who could Auburn get?”
I dunno … there are a dozen or so coaches who might do better than Malzahn.
But here’s a better question: where could Malzahn go that is better than Auburn? There isn’t anywhere he could go. Auburn is Malzahn’s ceiling. He won’t be going to a prominent P5 program as head coach. He might land something like … I don’t know, Arizona or Illinois … but he won’t be leading them to anything other than mediocrity. More likely, Malzahn will end up in the Sun Belt.
Like most former AU coaches, Gus can and probably will retire. He won’t need the money, and he’s already said and proven that he doesn’t have the fire to get to the top anymore. I could see him going back to Arky State or a high school program because he’s bored.
AU has made some coaches richer by firing them than they would have gotten coaching. But if they are not working out you have to make a move.
There are a lot of coaches AU could get. If the current one is not getting the job done and you do not try you are basically saying you quit. It will get to the point that his recruiting will get even worse. With 6 days to go AU is ranked 42 with 12 commitments. It is kind of hard to fail some student majoring in business when AU signs a contract like Gus’ and does not apply consequences when the expectations are not met.
He would be a wonderful coach for either side in Ravine Bowl.
Ever heard of it?
The annual game between Oauchita Baptist vs Henderson State. Its played Arkansas every year (except this year).
A perfect fit
Chad Morris the gift that keeps on giving… think he whacks him this off season? I mean I hope not it’s money we don’t have to pay the high school coach.
Neil keeps referencing the money being paid to Morris. It’s not that much cuz Gus wanted to give another F you to the Hogs, as did Morris, so the contract is minimal. Arkansas is paying Chad a lot more than Auburn is currently.