Coaching Comedy

Tell me if you've seen or heard any of these stories before:

Ron Zook displaying unconscionable stupidity and timidity by failing to go for a first down in the middle of the fourth quarter.

Tom O'Brien displaying the very same (Zookian) qualities with his jawdropping (well, not really) punt on fourth-and-one at the Clemson 43 with roughly three minutes left in a game his North Carolina State team TRAILED?

Greg Robinson coaching defense. (Says it all, doesn't it?)

Dan Hawkins presiding over a fourth-quarter train wreck against a Big 12 foe he should beat.

Jimbo Fisher failing to handle his timeouts properly in the fourth quarter of a tight game.

Dabo Swinney looking on in horror as his Clemson offense and special teams implode on several different levels.

Cal looking awful on the road. (The Bears won, but only because they were playing Washington State. Any other Pac-10 team would have drummed Cal out of town by at least 14 points.)

Missouri and Gary Pinkel forfeiting a good September and October with a November nosedive.

Steve Spurrier failing to get his South Carolina players to show more mental toughness than a bowl of soggy cereal.

Dennis Erickson failing to turn around a talented but enigmatic Arizona State quarterback, leading to yet another stomach-punch road loss.

Neil Callaway of UAB taking one great week of work and throwing it down the drain with a stink-bomb the very next week.

Vanderbilt having no clue what to do on special teams, a sign of very poor attention to detail on the part of the coaching staff.

Pat Fitzgerald watching in anguish as his Northwestern team yet again squanders a perfectly outstanding first half by shriveling in the second half (and giving up a last-minute touchdown just before halftime to get the bad juju flowing).

Some of the above examples represent genuinely bad coaching; other examples merely illustrate how consistently some credentialed men have failed to change the subcultures at their programs. In any case, it remains a point of perpetual fascination that so many of the same programs and coaches display so many of the same tendencies in losing causes.

When Tom O'Brien wins a conference championship with bold playcalling; when Ron Zook doesn't shy away from grabbing the brass ring; when Jimbo Fisher uses his timeouts wisely; and when Missouri puts its foot down in the final five weeks of a season, you'll know something has changed.

Michigan State has achieved a culture shift. So, too, have Oregon (dating back to last year), Central Florida, Stanford, Louisville, Syracuse, and a few other programs if you look hard enough. However, for most teams and coaches, the more things change, the more they stay the same. College football is strange - strangely beguiling - that way.