He may be a good guy IRL. But, It sure didn’t help when he referred to TO as a crusty old f—k, or “wanted to read a real newspaper like the New York Times”, or a number of I can’t wait to get out of this place kind of things.
Bill Calahan--makes history.
- Thread starter skintight
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As I wrote, one of his screwups was failing to embrace Tom. He’s a good coach but he clearly didn’t read the room very well. Because of that there’s no way in hell Tom was going to keep him even if he had fired Coz.
My son is good friends with one of the Raiders that played for Callahan.
He told my son the players wanted to "Code Red the sonofabitch."
I know that. There were some veterans in particular who led a revolt. I’m just telling you that a family member of mine who provided personal professional service to head coaches and players including Tom, Frank and Callahan said he was a good dude. That doesn’t mean he related well to guys like Tim Brown or Jason Peter.
I understand the hate for Callahan. I don’t necessarily agree with the degree of hate for him. He was a blue collar work his ass off guy. He wasn’t good at kissing the right asses.
I'm sure Callahan was a good dude, but if you've got a certain number of key players who want his ass gone, he's gone.
No big secret, this happens all the time and the Saban's, Osborne's are big enough to overcome it. Callahan wasn't.
I never did hate Callahan, thought he was a helluva offensive mind, but he wouldn't "at least" move Cosgrove to just a position coach and bring in a good DC, Callahan may have been able to stick around.
I didn't like his approach to Tom's legacy, the removal of the pictures of many of the great players who helped build this program, and i especially didn't like his treatment of the walkons. The dude never understood that the QB's best friend might have been that 4th team defensive tackle who was being treated like a non-person. Sent the message that if you weren't productive for me, you would/could become a non-person too.
There is no doubt Callahan made some mistakes that could have only been forgiven by winning a LOT of games. I think he’s grown as a coach since then. All I hear now from guys playing for him more recently is positive things. Just as I’ve posted over the last few years, Pelini would probably do some things differently if ever given another shot at being a power 5 coach. I think Bo would be a much better head coach today than he was at NU. Likewise I believe Callahan today could be a better head coach now than he was then.
Callahan could have walked through Lincoln slapping people's wives and everyone would have loved him if he would have won. But he didn't. His defenses generally sucked and his offenses generally beat up on bad teams. Nothing to do with grudges. He's a great oline coach. Not a great head coach.
I remember being down 30-0 to OU and we kick a FG as time expired to lose by 27. What a bitch move, that’s the Billy C I think of
I also remember him having the players sing to the student section after wins. That was ghey as f. I hate made up traditions by people who clearly are temporary.
He sucked as head coach, nice guy or not.
