Grade Eric Hyman's job performance since taking over at A&M.

C -


Dude just rubs me wrong. I don't like his decisions with the bball program either

There's legitimate concern about the direction of the Men's Basketball and Baseball programs, though it's hard to know how much Hyman's hands are tied due to the huge amount of $$ we're spending on Kyle and other renovations/construction.

Speaking of which, we had a banner year w/ donations, and ADs usually get some credit for fundraising results. But w/ the excitement over the SEC and Johnny, it's hard to say how much credit Hyman deserves on that, too.

I will give him credit, though, for scheduling Arizona State and the UCLA series. That's at least an A-. But overall, I'd say he gets an Incomplete. We'll know better in two years. We'll see how Kyle turned out, and Kennedy will either have turned around the basketball team, or will have been replaced.

I will be 100% honest. I don't care about basketball or baseball. I care about the money I'm going to spend on tailgating, and I haven't seen anything on the renovation of Spence.

Never hear about him other than people wanting Kennedy fired. Thats about how it should be.

I can't give grades on unsubstantiated rumors.

If he has conflict with Sumlin, it's a problem. But he is Sumlins boss. On the other hand I trust Sumlin's evaluation of what's best for Aggieland over Hymen's.

The next thing is the Kennedy situation. An aggressive AD would hire the La Tech coach. It now looks like Kennedy is going to get at least another year. If Kennedy is a bust next year my grade of Hymen goes way down and he would have about one more mistake before I would be in favor or evaluating his progress at the position.

But for now he seems to keep a pretty tight lid on the AD which I like. He also is very professional.

D

He pissed off Sumlin, gave Childress an unwarranted extension, has refused to fire Kennedy, his cronies are pissing off people in the AD that the players like, and he unnecessarily aired dirt laundry about meeting with the Manziels.

He has had nothing to with fundraising - that's a windfall that fell into his lap - so he gets no offsetting credit for that. Kyle is Chancellor Sharp's vanity project, so he gets no credit for that. He didn't hire Sumlin, so gets no credit for that.

So the things HE controls, he's fumbled.

He also got Sumlin to accept a raise and not go to USC or elsewhere. He extended Blair. He held off a run on Henry from the sips in spite of not having been able to get an Outdoor Track Facility built.

I agree the fundraising isn't his primary responsibility but he deserves some credit, same story with the Kyle and other football renovations. The AD is still a factor in all of that.

While I agree that all signs are pointing to it being time for Kennedy to be let go I don't know that that decision has truly been made yet. I don't think the Kennedy interview means anything, I mean Mack Brown was acting like he wasn't even in hot water right up until the very end. We haven't heard anything from Hyman directly on that issue.

I don't think it was a terrible decision not to fire Childress after last season and until this year is over its hard to judge baseball.

I also expect the tailgating to continue to improve because he did such a good job of that at USC.

I also haven't seen him say anything to the football program other than "whatever you need" to Sumlin outside of the suspension issue.

He did get the UCLA and AZ State games scheduled and he appears to be able to get what we need out of the SEC office but that's hard to tell.

Hyman is aloof and not very personable but he is also clearly a professional AD that treats this as a business. As long as we have guys like Jason Cook I don't know that we have much of a need for an outspoken AD and honestly there is benefit to him being quiet and hard to read.

I'd give him a B+, but I am also looking at him compared to our last 3 AD's Byrne, Groff, and JDC and you could argue he has been better than any of them.

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As long as we have guys like Jason Cook I don't know that we have much of a need for an outspoken AD and honestly there is benefit to him being quiet and hard to read.

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Cook is a good example of things Hyman has done. Rather than be outspoken himself, he brought Cook into the AD to be the voice. We all love Jason Cook and Hyman gets all the hate. And yet Cook is simply the voice of Hyman.

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Cook has always had a part in crafting the message since even before Hyman.

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of course. But now he's crafting Hyman's message. He decides how it is presented, but he doesn't make the underlying decisions. Hyman operates entirely in the background.

We're taking advantage of the wind at our backs. But instead of coaching changes, we're investing in capital (Lohman Lobby, Slocum Nutrition Center, new lockerrooms, Olsen scoreboard, WCWR, SECN infrastructure, Reed upgrades). And I'm mostly happy because there are no corners being cut. Everything we are doing right now in facilities is simply top of the line.

That's a choice of short term pain for long term gain. And just like with Dollar Bill, people weren't happy about it. But the role of a good AD is not to win most popular.

Solid.