Out With the Old--In With the Nucleus

Over at Shakin the Southland Dr. B has a great post on getting to the root causes of Clemson's collapse. He says it much better than me but I already had this post so here it is. I basically was griping about Bateson and thinking that he has had enough time here at Clemson. Maybe he can get an admin job too...haha. (the title of the post is an old Simpsons quote by the way)

Is Bateson in any danger of losing his job? I ask because I really hope we get a change here. I want a complete re-tooling of our conditioning with support staff focused on diets, weight, eating healthy, etc. I think our strength program is outdated and teams like Bama, LSU, and now USC are way ahead of us.

USC changed its S&C coach three years ago which corresponds with our losing streak to them. Coincidence? Maybe but part of playing soft is the offseason conditioning. Too many players never gain the muscle they need or they turn into being too muscular (or something)and become slow like Goodman this year. Its problematic.

I'm also sick and tired of seeing players put on FAT during the season. Way too many examples and stories of guys admitting to it over the years. You can't rely on personal responsibility when you want to be a champion, you need to demand personal responsibility through accountability! Part of it is a dedication from the athlete but mostly it is not having a structure in place that regulates these things. That is reason enough for me to show Bateson the door.

In my last post I was venting and said Dabo meet the hot seat, blah. That kind of talk is counterproductive and I know it. But I maintain that beating USC is one of the main criteria for being the head coach at Clemson. He must not lose for a fourth straight year. That being said Dabo needs to continue to make the changes necessary to be a championship team. Last year he earned all of our respect by hiring Morris and Caldwell. This offseason (or even after the ACC Champs game) we need to make our team stronger and tougher--make the changes needed in the S&C program.

The other day I watched the video of the Power Hour for the redshirt frosh. Why is this something new? It boggles my mind how little investment we make in those redshirting. I am also amazed at how little historically (well the past 10 years) our players have benefited from the redshirt year. That has got to change as well.