What's a Good/Bad/Average/Over achieving first season for Harsin. All the possibilities.

Gus would have gone 7-5 with that schedule.

Anybody more than 7 is good
Anything less than 7 is bad
7 wins is meh

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In a normal year yes but this is a first year coach who has a schedule containing

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this is a normal year.

I just want to look like we prepare for each game, and our guys progress.

I think Harsin ought to be able to complete a season - even his first season - reasonably close to your average Gus. It's a new staff and system, sure, but he didn't inherit a complete shitshow.

I want to see 7-5, with us looking competent, well-prepared, showing consistent signs of progress, and looking reasonably competitive in our losses. That, to me, would be "meeting expectations".

6-6 would be a bit of a disappointment, given some of the talent on this team (Bigsby, the secondary, and the linebackers, particularly). But it depends on how we look. Was that 6th loss due to a questionable call, or did we get blown out 55-0?

Winning the bowl would be a very nice bonus. A lot of football fans might think that winning a "meaningless bowl game" after a 6 to 8 win season is insignificant -- but with our bowl history over the last several years, that one thing would be a real sign of progress.

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I just want to look like we prepare for each game, and our guys progress.

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and if something isn't working on O, we can make adjustments.

There will be growing pains with a new O and D philosophy. Both will be quite different than what we have been running. I want to see improvement from week to week. I want to see a well coached/disciplined team. If we get those two things, we will have a successful season, IMO.

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I just want to look like we prepare for each game, and our guys progress.

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This right here. I want our players and coaches making new stupid mistakes each week and not the same ones over and over and over.

As I've said before, this is a "cultural change" type of transition.

For point of reference, here's AU's schedule for two previous "cultural changes". First, 1981, Dye's first year:

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9/5 vs. Texas Christian (2-7-2) W 24 16
9/19 vs. Wake Forest (4-7) L 21 24
9/26 @ *Tennessee (8-4) L 7 10
10/3 @ Nebraska (9-3) L 3 17
10/10 vs. *Louisiana State (3-7-1) W 19 7
10/17 @ Georgia Tech (1-10) W 31 7
10/24 vs. *Mississippi State (8-4) L 17 21
10/31 vs. *Florida (7-5) W 14 12
11/7 vs. North Texas (2-9) W 20 0
11/14 @ *Georgia (10-2) L 13 24
11/28 vs. *Alabama (9-2-1) L 17 28

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We beat a terrible TCU team in the opener, then fell to an equally bad Wake squad in game 2. A lot of players got R-U-N-N-O-F-T in the wake of that disaster, and the following week we took a pretty good Johnny Majors-coached Vol team to the limit in Neyland, then traveled to Nebraska and fought a vastly more talented Husker team to the wire before faltering late. We got better in practically every game by the end of the year, held our own against defending NC UGa (lol), even took the lead in the 4th qtr in the IB when Bryant was going for Stagg's record.

Now, the 1999 AU schedule, as Tubs struggled to clean up Bowden's mess:

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9/4 vs. Appalachian State (non-IA) W 22 15
9/11 vs. Idaho (7-4) W 30 23
9/18 @ *Louisiana State (3-8) W 41 7
9/25 vs. *Mississippi (8-4) L 17 24
10/2 @ *Tennessee (9-3) L 0 24
10/9 vs. *Mississippi State (10-2) L 16 18
10/16 vs. *Florida (9-4) L 14 32
10/30 @ *Arkansas (8-4) L 10 34
11/6 vs. Central Florida (4-7) W 28 10
11/13 @ *Georgia (8-4) W 38 21
11/20 vs. *Alabama (10-3) L 17 28

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Sidestepped a disaster in the Appy State "Buyout Bowl" when we came from behind late, then waxed Idaho and LSU (the Cigar Game). Were leading Ole Miss in a game wherein they had vowed revenge for 'stealing their coach' until Leard got hurt, then floundered horribly behind our 2nd string QB Klein and a bunch of less-than-SEC caliber RBs (Don Timmons, TYFYS). Somehow we managed to play defense well enough to beat Jackie Sherrill's best MSU team, but collapsed in the end, blowing a 13-point lead in the final 2:30. When Leard came back we rallied and blew out UGa between the hedges and again took a lead into the 4th in the IB before DuBose's eventual SEC Champs wore us down.

I expect this year to be something along these lines as Harsin establishes an identity. The one advantage we have is that we are far more physically talented relative to our opponents than those '81 and '99 teams were. Unfortunately, we face a tougher schedule than either of those years.

tl;dr answer:
Good - 8 wins
Average - 6-7 wins
Bad - 5 or fewer wins
Overacheving - 9 or more wins

I don’t care about the win loss numbers during the coach’s first year. There are other things I’m looking forward to seeing though to help judge what we got as HC.

I feel like we lost a lot of starters via attrition and I know there is a learning curve with the new playbooks, and new regime. 7-5 is something I’d expect from a first year head coach,