Al Golden

[BauerOutage]

Nope its as 50/50 as it gets.

Disagree. Freeman can pick up the slack on LBs. Golden has been on the same level as Lea.

 

[Crazy Balki]

Enjoy him now, because Golden is probably going to join the Bears staff next year.

 

[T-Boone]

If he does leave it shouldn’t be for more money. Offer him enough to warrant serious consideration.

 

[Crazy Balki]

If he does leave it shouldn’t be for more money. Offer him enough to warrant serious consideration.

I don't think it's gonna be a money issue.

I think if he can land a DC slot in the NFL, it's going to be hard to turn down. It's a bigger stage and you don't have to recruit.

 

[thekid33]

I publicly apologize for every negative thing I've previously posted about Al Golden.

 

[Irishdrunk]

I don't think it's gonna be a money issue.

I think if he can land a DC slot in the NFL, it's going to be hard to turn down. It's a bigger stage and you don't have to recruit.

We will see. We need to see ND making investments in staffing, including retention of the best part of the staff.

 

[drayer54]

I’ve never enjoyed watching our secondary as much as I do with Golden. Brilliant scheme last night.

 

[irishff1014]

 

[Ophiocordyceps]

As an early Christmas present, could Phil take a few snaps under center next week?

 

[irishandy]

Our D kept Marvin Harrison Jr. in check & Caleb Williams in check.

The D is getting better & better each week.

 

[Grahambo]

Time to give some love to Mike Mickens.

 

[Giddyup]

O’Leary/Mickens combo working great.

 

[PANDFAN]

Oh but the casual bitching drunk trolls on IE would have you believing he is a bottom of the barrel DC

 

[Sea Turtle]

I love you. I honestly love you.

 

[Jiggafini19Deux]

Doesn't get the credit and respect he deserves for what they've done this season. Held the mighty Buckturds to 14 points, absolutely rattled the returning Heisman Trophy winner and assumed NFL number one overall draft pick, etc.

He's playing himself into an NFL DC gig if this keeps up. Then he won't have to worry about being called a lazy recruiter.

 

[IA4irish]

Great coach. Still not a great recruiter. I don’t think he stays at ND long because of Freeman’s recruiting requirement

 

[Katzenboyer]

I will give credit where credit is due...Golden has been awesome.

I still worry about the "do or die" drives that his teams consistently fail to stop (OSU, Marshall, Stanford last year) but no complaints with how he has the defense playing. I still think he has his shortcomings, I still think his defensive recruiting is lackluster, but his gameplans this year have been 👌

 

[notredomer23]

One thing that hasn't been mentioned is just how good the red zone defense has been. It was an autoscore last year and ND was near the bottom of the rankings. This year ND is 4th.

 

[ThePiombino]

So who wanted Al Golden fired? I’ll take a good coach over recruiter every day

[ Clark Lea has entered the chat ]

Sent from my Pixel 8 Pro using Tapatalk

 

[ThePiombino]

As an early Christmas present, could Phil take a few snaps under center next week?

Phil-a-palooza package?

Sent from my Pixel 8 Pro using Tapatalk

 

[gregm83]

At what point are you worried he leaves now?

 

[NDMatt91]

At what point are you worried he leaves now?

I'm not worried if he leaves. He's a solid DC but a horrific recruiter. If he's an A- level DC and a D level recruiter, I'd be totally fine with bringing in someone who is a B/B- level DC and a B/B- level recruiter.

 

[Old Man Mike]

With our year-to-year schedule and play-off ambition we need A-Level DCs EVERY season.
If the rest of the staff can cover for him, an A-Level DC is still a priority. Maybe Freeman can become solely a head coach administrator type, who is the de facto high-involvement recruiting coordinator, since that seems his genius sweet spot. Deion Sanders seems to be that sort of HC. I feel strongly/intuitively that without A-level DCs and OCs we cannot compete for the big title.

 

[NDMatt91]

With our year-to-year schedule and play-off ambition we need A-Level DCs EVERY season.
If the rest of the staff can cover for him, an A-Level DC is still a priority. Maybe Freeman can become solely a head coach administrator type, who is the de facto high-involvement recruiting coordinator, since that seems his genius sweet spot. Deion Sanders seems to be that sort of HC. I feel strongly/intuitively that without A-level DCs and OCs we cannot compete for the big title.

A big issue is that on the defensive side of the ball, Mickens is really the only solid recruiter. Washington is by no means a bad recruiter, but apparently he's inconsistent with his effort. Golden puts in little to no effort and doesn't really seem to care about recruiting. O'Leary is very inconsistent. He struck out at Safety in the 2022 class, we were 1-2 Safeties short last year, and in this class he has taken multiple projects. I actually think Urlacher can be a good player, but I'm not sold that he's a Safety (I'd like to see him beef up and be a OLB).

 

[Jiggafini19Deux]

At what point are you worried he leaves now?

I'm not worried about it. I think it is a certainty at this point and because of that the job opening is going to attract a lot of attention. He was a position coach in the NFL for a long time after crashing out of the HC gig at The U of Miami. He came to ND and parlayed it into a rejuvenated career.

Hell of a story for the program to tell when hiring assistants.

 

[NDisme]

At what point are you worried he leaves now?

I’d be surprised if he’s here next year

 

[NDMatt91]

I’d be surprised if he’s here next year

Agreed, I think he gets an NFL gig.

 

[Giddyup]

Pay the man. You guys talk all day about retaining and hiring. He’s one guy I’d make it hard to leave.

 

[GoldenAura]

I’ve always had a feeling he would be moving on after this season.

 

[Giddyup]

He doesn’t recruit anyway, very similar to NFL. I’m sure that was part of his demands in taking the ND job. I think Freeman is comfortable carrying that recruiting weight.