The Case for Tommy Tuberville's Ouster

Tuberville had it coming. Okay, okay, that might be overstating the issue a little bit. Like so many other situations, however, the surface-level analysis isn't quite as convincing when you take a closer look at it.

To be certain, there is going to be absolutely no shortage of commentary in the coming days excoriating Auburn for firing a guy for one bad season. In fact, that's already started.

The problem, of course, is that when considering how to proceed, an athletic department is looking at the future. Past accomplishments are only relevant in as much as they are indicative of future success, and there's certainly an argument to be made that Tommy Tuberville's future at Auburn was not all that bright.

You have to give Tuberville his due. In his 10 seasons at Auburn, he amassed a .680 winning percentage (.634 in conference) including a 12-8 record against their two main rivals, Alabama and Georgia. He won the SEC and went undefeated in 2004, and finished second or better in the SEC West seven of his 10 years.

There have been a lot of comments that Auburn "owed" Tuberville another year. I'm not so sure. Tuberville wasn't a volunteer by any stretch of the imagination. He was a professional football coach making millions of dollars a year. For $3.5 million a year, you don't accrue good will, you perform. When you stop performing, your employer has to figure out whether you're worth your salary any more.

But the issue is much more one of trajectory than altitude. If your pilot is about to crash the plane into the ground, you don't trust him because, hey, 10 minutes ago you were at 10,000 ft . . . you take the controls and pull up to avert disaster. To that end, it's worth looking at Tuberville's conference record since 2004:

• 2004: 9-0
• 2005: 7-1
• 2006: 6-2
• 2007: 5-3
  
• 2008: 2-6

That's an increasing number of SEC losses in every year since his undefeated season. Even more disturbing is the vast difference in expectations and results, particularly in 2008 but, to a lesser degree, in 2006 and 2007.

Also disconcerting to Auburn fans is this team's trajectory in light of the meteoric rise of Nick Saban's Crimson Tide, who will be playing for a conference title and a shot at a national championship just one year after going 0-for-November and losing to Louisiana-Monroe.

That power shift is highlighted by Tuberville's perceived laziness on the recruiting trail. His duck hunting trip to Arkansas in the height of recruiting season underscores a general feeling that he's getting his lunch eaten on the recruiting trail by half of the SEC, to say nothing of Saban's utter domination in that arena last year. Even more painful, you can bet, is watching Alabama recruits make a huge impact on the field this season, which suggests that either a) Saban recruited players that were already ready to play college football or b) he coached them up to game-readiness in extremely short order. It's probably some combination of the two. People realize that you can't be competitive on the field every year if you're not competitive on the recruiting trail every year.

Then there's the handling of Tony Franklin. Whatever the reason was for bringing in the spread guru, Tuberville severely botched the hire and transition. Franklin wasn't allowed to tailor his offensive staff. Fire them? Hell, he had to interview with them. In what world should the offensive coordinator have to interview with the position coaches he's about to be in charge of? Once he was on the scene, it was clear that he wasn't really allowed to run his offense. It's conceivable that his loyalty to his position coaches hamstrung the offense and torpedoed the season. It never really seemed like the players or staff bought in to Franklin's system, and that started at the top.

To fire Franklin in the middle of the season after never really letting him run his offense could have potentially poisoned the well of offensive coordinators, making it nigh impossible to find a decent one willing to put his head on the chopping block, especially given the perception that, if Tuberville did come back, it was really only a matter of time, barring some miraculous recovery.

Finally, there's the realization that getting Auburn from 2008 form back to the machine they were in 2004 isn't a one year job, and might not even be within Tuberville's capacity:

This is not a one year job. This week's discussion should not be about giving Tuberville another season, but rather do they have faith he can rebuild the program over the next couple of years. With the team in its current state, it's hard to see things getting significantly better next season.

Do Auburn officials, alumni and fans have a strong enough stomach to go through this process with Tuberville? I'm not so sure. When you are paid $3.5 million annually, you don't let a program get away from you. And you certainly don't lose by 36 points to a team you've owned for the past six years. Saturday was no aberration. Alabama passed Auburn so quickly that none of us saw it coming. This falls squarely on the shoulders of Tuberville.

Would I have pulled the trigger on Tuberville so soon? I don't know, I'm sure glad I didn't have to be the one to make that decision. It might have been worth giving him another year, but that's a risky proposition, too. If that plan fails, Auburn will have fallen another year behind. One can only hope, for Auburn's sake, that they didn't make this jump blindly, it will spell lots of trouble for Auburn if they don't pull in the right coach as soon as possible.