With the quick retirement of Bobby Johnson the most sports apathetic university in a Big 6 conference is going to be looking for a new football coach. The biggest issue Vandy faces is the conference they play in. Academics are NOT a factor for the rest of the SEC football teams but it is at places like Vandy, Northwestern, Stanford and Duke.
Northwestern has found ways to win the conference and play in the Rose bowl and Stanford has been competitive from time to time. How do you generate excitement in the football program that cares more about GPA than 40 yard times? You have to hire a coach who is anything but conventional. Vandy can not and will not ever line up a conventional set and win in the SEC. They don't have the athletes and they never will. This is why Mike Leach should be the next head football coach at Vanderbilt.
Look at it from both sides. Leach is not going to get a coaching job better than what he had a TTU. No AD department will touch him but there is the beauty of Vandy. They have no athletic department. If they succeed (in Vandy terms) in football it is a bonus. There are no expectations and if they get pissed with Leach, which they will at some point, they'll cut ties and he'll be able to look at a HC job in DII. That is to the benefit of Vanderbilt because…
Leach is no dummy. He knows that with even marginal success at Vanderbilt, he might get another shot at something bigger. At this point in time I believe that to be 100% true. He can recruit smart kids to run his system and hope that can combine a weak non-conference with three SEC wins and they are bowl bound yearly. Leach can take all the credit and Vandy can get their small and wealthy alumni base fired up.
As much of a pain in the ass as Leach surely is, hiring him would at least give Vandy a fighting chance. Run that spread, take their beatings while being entertained on the football by the mad man of college football and take a shot at going to their fifth bowl game, ever.
