So many sources said the message from management was win or you’re fired.
“Message from management?” You just revealed the extent of your knowledge. Debbie Yow is the only management and she didn’t, wouldn’t, shouldn’t be putting out any “message” about Doeren being fired, possibly being fired or any other condition for his employment prior to her meeting with Doeren.
Rye does an excellent job of speculating on reasons why Doeren would be fired. Makes sense but it’s still speculation. People so strongly believed that Doeren was set to be fired because of the W/L before the UNC game that they thought it was fact. It was not.
We are finding out now how well Doeren had the program planned out and how the plan was to be executed. I don’t know about since then but Yow met with Doeren personally at least weekly his first five years going over the staffing, staff salaries, renovations and financing of renovations, prioritization and a myriad of other details.
99.9% of the fans back then (we are a lot smarter about these matters now) couldn’t tell squat about how the program was doing without looking at the W/L record and that didn’t reveal much. Debbie Yow was intimately aware of how the program was progressing. She was partners with Dave building the football program we are only beginning to enjoy.
The Holes are a good example illustrating how misleading the W/L can be. They had an 11-1 regular season record including a division championship. Look at how that “program” is trending. There are Wolfpack fans today who think Fedora is a great head coach. He’s a great OC and this is his second program he has let go to hell while having a great offense.
I’m sure that Yow had conversations with DD about delegating responsibilities to his coordinators. I’m equally sure he listened. Doeren is not a great field coach but so what? Drinkwitz can get it done within Doeren’s parameters. Hux, god bless him, kept his ego in check and let DD be involved without causing a problem. With Ted Roof on the sideline, Doeren needs to let Hux and Roof manage the defense.
Doeren needs his head in the game to make good decisions only he can make. He makes the “go-or-no-go” decision on 4th down. Drink makes the play call. It’s how HC’s keep good coordinators. Good OC’s double check with the HC before the play is sent in.
He’s the team communicator with the Referee and he works the referees — in a respectful manner of course. With responsibilities delegated he will make the decisions he has to make, better ones. He needs to be the head “Attaboy” man when the D has a 3 and out or a stop on 4th down or goal line stop. The those attaboys are important coming from the HC.
Debbie is Dave’s boss and she needed to coach him on things he may not have learned as a DC or with a familiar staff and NI. We give Dave credit for all he has accomplished and we should give credit to Debbie Yow for training and developing Doeren. Forget the “she shouldn’t have to’s,” somebody had to do it. It was her responsibility to do so and she did it. And I doubt he knows it.
IMO Ted Roof is going to be the key to our going over the top on defense this year and in the future. Just having him coordinating the back 5 and probably the back 7 will eliminate a lot of indecision and misalignment. Patrick doesn’t need a lot of coordinating with the D-line. With Hux in the booth and Roof on the sideline, I doubt we will recognize the results. Word is filtering out of the “locker room” our defense is going to be greatly improved. All the fear about losing 4 to the draft is just that, fear. This D-line is not going to be as good as 2017 but the defense is overall going to be much better.
