Jimbo Fisher out at Texas A&M
Jimbo Fisher has been fired at Texas A&M.
He will be taking $76m with him, with a $20m due within the first month of termination, and then he gets a $7m annuity over next 7 years.
He might be touchable during that time.
The writing was on the wall
“They won’t fire him, the buyout’s too big”, boosters told me over and over again last year after another moribund offensive performance – particularly against a they-turned-out-to-be-awful Appalachian State team.
To be honest, it was the 38-22 win over LSU at the end of last season that probably saved his job. If they had lost that, Texas A&M would have been looking for a head coach last autumn.
By the start of last season, about half of the team had hit up the transfer portal. Of those half, a lot of them had gone the ‘Jimbo Way’ by ending up in trouble with the police. Most of it was minor shit, but it was still the Jimbo Way.
The man was the ideal oil prospector – hit the oil, damn the environment after. Unfortunately for him, the environment was meant to be a consistent battle to be the No.1 team in the SEC West, but a 27-22 conference record, as well as 12-14 record against Power 5 teams and a 42-25 overall record simply wasn’t going to cut it.
Amusingly, he ended up with a worse winning percentage (.650) than the man they ran out of town (.677) to get him.
Weird, considering that he was a recruiting genius, signing brilliant rosters between 2019 and 2022. This year has been good too (No.4), as Fisher continued to mine the talent of The Lone Star State.
The expectations
I tweeted Texas A&M blogger and editor of ‘Good Bull Hunting’ Robert Behrens (@rcb05) to get his thoughts on what Texas A&M – a team that hasn’t won a National Title since 1940 – actually is.
His reply was succinct: “One of the top schools nationally in revenue, facilities, fan support, access to recruiting hotbeds. If you ask a coach what they need to win, there’s nothing A&M doesn’t offer at an elite level. The winning history isn’t there, but all of the ingredients to be a top program are.”
Someone – I forget their name – also remarked that people talk about Texas A&M’s “rich history” but they can’t work out a time when they actually had a decade of actually being good.
The ‘Wrecking Crew’ – the name given to defenses that won eight Southwestern Conference titles between 1985 and 1995 and a Big 12 Conference Title in 1998 – was a fun time. The 2012 Johnny Manziel Heisman season was a blast. I’m sure the Bear Bryant time at Texas A&M was fun, but I don’t remember it – unlike the priest at my church, who was there during those days and was full of piss and vigor today after hearing of Jimbo’s demise.
But that’s it. The RC Slocum years from 1989 to 2002, when he finished no lower than 3rd in 13 years (before he was shitcanned for daring to have a not-winning (6-6) season) are the only times that stand out during since the end of World War II.
But there were some highlights
During his time, there were some highlights.
The victory against No.1 Alabama on a last second field goal in 2021 will live long in the memory. So will the smashing of No.5 LSU.
There were also some bowl game victories, but nothing in terms of SEC West titles….the same fate that befell Sumlin before he was moved.
You can’t survive on ‘close run losses’
Where Texas A&M struggled were the close-run losses. They were 4-10 in games decided by 8 points or less since 2021, and their skid had reached seven before the boot hit his behind on Sunday.
They had been awful on the road, losing 9 straight (and by that we mean not in JerryWorld or a neutral site venue), which included a loss to Miami that looks increasingly more baffling bearing in mind how bad the Hurricanes look at the moment.