My open letter to Texas Aggie fans

Dear Aggie Fan,
All the buzz is that you're going to get rid of coach Fran. Leading candidate according to the internets and such are Tommy Tuberville of Auburn and Jeff Tedford of California. Let's look at the resumes. I'll type slow so you can follow along.

Tommy Tuberville is such a well respected coach that his present university loves so much they flew Bobby Petrino in to meet with them before they officially fired Tuberville. Coming into this year, he's 71-29 in 8 years at Auburn, so he's averaged 9 wins and 3-4 losses. Throw out his 13-0 year in 2004, and he's a smooth 58-29. He's 19-16 against top 25 teams. He coaches Auburn, and the Tigers are always looking up at big brother Alabama in the state.

Jeff Tedford is 43-20 at Cal in five years. That's an average of 8-4. I know all you Aggies believe the academics at Cal and TAMU are similar, but I have two words for you. Kevin Murray. If those two words aren't enough, here are two more. Jamar Toombs. I don't know if I spelled it right, and am not taking the time to look it up. This ain't the NY times. Not that they'd look it up either. Anyway, where was I? So, Tedford is 8-8 against top 25 teams. Cal is at best the second highest profile team in the state. He'd fit right in.

This is not a plea to keep Coach Fran (as appealing as it may be for me as a Sooner alum) but I'm just asking you kids to consider who you're replacing him with. The two "leading candidates" per the computers and such are masters at the 8-4 record. Gary Gibbs can get you that. And your players will stay out of jail. And he's probably cheaper. My point is you ran RC off for going 8-4, give or take a game. Berry Tramel once wrote in the Oklahoman in 1998 that they fired Gary Gibbs for going 8-4, and they'd name the stadium after the next coach that could get them to that. Maybe that's all your shooting for. Or maybe the 500 record against top 25 teams is appealing when the current coach was 3-14 against ranked foes at the start of the year.

You gotta figger out if you want Aggie blood. Or not. But you've got to hire someone that has positive relationships with the Texas h.s. coaches, and isn't a snake. Fran's midnight ride out of Tuscaloosa, and the way he stiffed those players, soured many a coach on him, IMO. For that reason, or karma if you believe in it, he was doomed from the start.

So, here's my four point plan for building your team back to its normal luster, which means 8-3 or 9-3 and losing a bowl game. It might even turn out better than that if you're fortunate.

1) Hire Major Applewhite as your head coach. Sure, some of your fans have underwear stains older than him, but by all accounts, he's an up and comer. You won't have to pay him $2 million a year to coach, since you'll be paying Fran $2.0 million per year not to coach. You'll be taking the high road and joining forces with a former Longhorn, endearing yourself to the Texas h.s. coaches, and getting a good offensive mind. You also might really make some Longhorns mad, and that's always worth a few laughs as well. Hey, former Sooner great Darrell Royal jumped ship and coached the dreaded Horns for a few years. Since his name's on the stadium and all, I think that turned out okay. He didn't even have to pay money for it.
2) Hire John Blake as your recruiter. For all his warts, that man can bring in some talent. You just want someone else to coach it.
3) Hire Phil Bennett as your defensive coordinator. Phil's a class dude, and has proven to be a good defensive coordinator. He's a former Aggie that got thrown under the bus by RC if memory serves me correctly. For all we know, he could be a head coach too. It's tough to tell from the Hilltop.
4) Make Stephen McGee a slot receiver. Get a QB that's a running threat and run some sort of spread alternating Lane and Goodson as your backs. You might even think about using a tricky formation called "The I" and handing the ball to Goodson and Lane about 35-40 times a game.

The one variable to my plan is that Bennett was on Blake's staff for a year at OU. I don't know what they're relationship is. I know both were unemployed at the end of the year.

You can pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for advise like this, but here at landthieves, I'm giving it to you free.