And you have even worse instincts. Please THINK before you post.

Unfortunately your quotes are not factual. Go try to break 80.

She gave a "long-term deal" that can be opted out of without financial penalty after after the second season. That's a long-term deal in name only, and was essentially a PR gift to the current staff. They get to recruit and move forward while plausibly saying the AD is committed to them.

But in reality, Cromer negotiated the shortest possible nom- interim deal possible.

That's what I don't get about the criticisms of her on this. Barring an interim deal, which there are good reasons to think would have been very hard to get signed, she ended up with a deal that's as good as can be expected.

I struggle to see the leap from that to her getting schooled.

For some reason, which completely escapes me, a number of posters on this board think that Albin’s contract is “long-term”. The contract, although for a four-year term, only commits the university financially to Albin for TWO YEARS! And if you take five seconds to think about it, that’s the only aspect of the contract’s term that truly matters. Please get that through your heads.

I’ve always thought the AD was really behind the 8-ball when Solich announced his retirement just two months before the season began. That left no time to do anything but stay with the current staff at the time. Now, did Solich plan the timing of his announcement to have that result? Did the AD know in advance Solich would leave? Were conversations about a succession plan taking place well in advance of Solich’s announcement? All questions I don’t know the answers to.

This was a very-less-than-ideal situation that was created last summer for the AD to handle. She handled it as best anyone could. She respected an OU coaching legend’s desire to reward a long-time, loyal assistant (I’m confident that Solich wanted to have such loyalty rewarded), while doing so on a SHORT-TERM, two-year basis. This created the least amount of instability, while also creating a path to pivot in a different direction reasonably soon if needed.

If you think the team’s performance was bad this season, imagine what it would have looked like with a new interim head coach and a staff full of previous-coach assistants. The team’s record likely would have been worse. And the recruiting class of 2022 would have been completely abandoned. What high school kid would have been interested in listening to what an interim coach had to say? The answer is none, which honestly is probably only slightly worse than what the current situation is.

No other VIABLE alternatives to what the AD did have been presented in this thread, IMHO. And no, the AD doesn’t know me from Adam.

That's creative, I'll give you that.

But it's unclear to me why Solich would do that when the end result is to put his longtime assistant, and presumably friend, in a worse position. It feels like a pretty safe assumption that Frank's preference was for his guy, if for no other reason than it's a continuation of what he's built. I have a hard time seeing Solich agreeing to that knowing that it works against the interests of a coaching staff that was loyal to him.

Don't you think that Solich wants to see them succeed? Giving someone a single transitional year to be judged on isn't ideal. In fact, it's a solution you're suggesting specifically because it provides the quickest path to giving Albin the boot. Why is that in either Albin or Frank's best interest?

He would have loved the "gangsta rap" thread or at least the first half of it until it turned into a Springsteen thread. I should have never mentioned the Beatles and Stones. That was the opening for it to become a classic rock debate.

Let me clarify my statement. I would have been disappointed if they fired Albin but waited to do it. I understand that if you can't fire him for financial reasons then you can't fire him. I do believe, given the hand she was dealt, Cromer served Ohio well in essentially making the contract only a 2-year deal.