What I believe and what I know

This is going to be a long post, but this is all info I have received first hand or message board chatter hobbled together from the past 12-15 months.

I was told last January that the hiring of Golesh set Auburn back 5-6 years. I didn't believe it at the time, but I do now and it has nothing to do with AG and everything to do with the Program as a whole. (from a friend who was on the previous two staffs.) I thought he was just salty about not being retained.

First off the hiring of AG was basically backdoored in by Cohen and a lot of money people were blindsided by it. (this is from a friend who is a big time donor)

The money folks were fine with the hiring of DJD as HC and Buster Faulkner as OC after the Sumrall hiring was also botched by Cohen.

Cohen also wanted to trim some of the budget in the recruiting network and off field staff.

That started with Will Redmond who, imo, is the best in the business at what he does. From my understanding Golesh was under the impression that that network would remain completely intact when he was hired and was a big reason he came here.

When Redmond wasn't retained all of the information and scouting reports they had ready to go for the portal also went with him.

Golesh had to scramble and put together the off field staff in time for the portal so he went with people he knew, the only problem was they had scouted for players they thought would fit at USF and be productive players for them at that level not at a p4 school.

With the mass exodus of players that we had someone had to replace them so once again he went with familiarity and that caused a lot of the issues that we are currently having with the OL and QB.

Byrum was paid very well, but that is because some places had also offered him a pretty good bit of money to come there.
There is basically no chance he is benched for the backup because Tia simply isn't a player that is capable of playing at this level from what I hear.

Imo, We don't get better until Cohen is gone and that is a common sentiment among most everyone of importance at AU.

I think a change happens sometime between now and the end of this year regarding Cohen and if it doesn't, I would be highly surprised.

As for a replacement, I know that some people have talked to Bruce about it, and right now he isn't really interested, but I think they could have a framework in place that could make him take the job.


So basically Golesh was dealt a really shite hand and is having to make the best of it. That doesn't excuse everything we have seen on the field so far, but it is a large part of it.