Frank Spaziani: NCAA FBS Coach of the Year

[ObserverCollege]

I have shared these truths in other forums, and I feel I have to come here and pay respect where it is warranted. Despite your disloyal fanbase, your lack of talent, your lack of speed and athleticism, and your lack of significant recruits, somehow your Coach Spaziani is making a run at NCAA FBS Coach of the Year. Yes, even ahead of Coach Weis, who has performed miracles this year exhuming the Irish from the vestiges of Ty Willingham's Reign of Terror.

This isn't something that just HAPPENS, particularly when you are guiding a perennial Top-25 team, one that represents the back-to-back ACC Atlantic Division champions (although that's just postseason, not preseason when it matters before injuries and flukes happen). It's always coaches expected to have terrible teams who win COY. Thus, you have to frame the media's perception of your team (the people who vote on Coach of the Year), and then manage that perception so that a mediocre coaching job is recognized as extraordinary.

Now how do you do that? Well, there are a number of steps to take:
1. On background, you CONSTANTLY remind friendly media about the offseason events that occurred, building the assumption that the players have no reservoir of prior success from which to build resilience.
2. You keep telling the media that you don't know what kind of team you have. You ignore the talent at O-Line, RB and WR, and focus on how you'll replace QBs who were substandard to begin with (on a 9-5 team, no less).
3. No matter what, it's the PLAYERS' fault when something goes wrong. Coach Spaziani, you trained under Tom O'Brien; you know how it works. Nobody is going to name you Coach of the Year when you say "I need to coach better" or "Our staff needs to get out of the way of our returning all-ACC offensive linemen". Basic Resume 101.
4. You constantly bemoan your players' lack of athleticism, and make sure you don't mention ONCE the players' athletic advances under the post-TOB S&C program (see Loscalzo, Jason). ESPN Gameday has a nice 20-years-running file of comments on BC's lack of athleticism. Don't make them switch up midstream.
4a. When your team has a slow start (thanks to a poor game plan), tell the halftime interviewer that you hope you don't get run off the field. Then, if you can somehow keep it close, you get credit for averting a blowout despite the "obstacles".
4b. If you do jump ahead, be sure to go prevent defense and prevent offense. Try to run out the clock. Now, you might think, "But OC, don't you want to rout the other team?" Ah, but who gets the credit when it's a blowout? Not the coaches, but the players. Media hordes will start taking another look at the players' talent levels, and some Posnanski amongst them might start crowing that the players are committed to training and have the brains to develop themselves to their fullest. That happens, and you've just handed COY to someone like Chizik.
5. Who was the 2007 ACC COY? Jagodzinski? Uh, no. Beamer? Sorry. Try Al Groh. That's right, AL. GROH. He took a team that lost to WYOMING (establishing their "poor talent"), and then made sure to cry "lack of talent" as they skated past one team after another. Hampered by the presence of players like Chris Long & Branden Albert, and coaching nobodies like Mike London, Groh wound up collecting the 2007 ACC COY.

And there you go. You have to give credit where it's due. What Spaziani is performing is miraculous, turning media perceptions such that he can sneak in and win COY. If he can just get to 7-5, he's in. What an honor. What a credit to the hours and hours of PR work, off-the-record lunches, and strategic leaks you need to perform to earn a ticket to Orlando in December to be honored as the Miracle Worker of Miracle Workers. Well done.