I don't want to rehash the Willingham hiring. I think ND did well. The lowest risk route is to find a coach who has been successful at another place as a head coach. Success, by my definition, means taking a program significantly above its natural average, which is the level to which the program gravitates under an average coach. I've said in earlier posts that ND's natural average is about .675 and Stanford's is roughly .425, so Willingham's winning rate of .549 bodes well. O'Leary would've been successful too in all probability as his winning percentage in the low .600's at GT was probably about the equivalent of Willingham's at Stanford.

The Zook hiring at Florida doesn't make much sense to me. He has no head coaching experience, anywhere. He was the defensive coordinator at places that didn't seem to have particularly good defenses. He might turn out to be a good coach along the lines of Stoops or Coker (although Coker just has one year in), but this seems like a huge gamble to me. For every one of these guys, there are quite a few Bob Davies.

I think Georgia Tech did pretty well on Chan Gailey. He was to my mind the best of the post Jimmy Johnson head coaches at the Cowboys. He went 18-14 there, but managed to get himself booted out of the Jerry Jones asylum. One disadvantage to a former pro coach who isn't coaching college football right now is that we can safely assume that he hasn't been watching tape of high school football players much. Evaluating talent at the two levels is different, so you never quite know how he'll work out, but this is a decent hire.

DiNardo's hire at Indiana also makes a certain amount of sense. He really did a pretty good job at Vandy (19-25) and was 32-24 at LSU. For awhile he looked like a miracle worker, but the Tigers really went over the cliff with 4-7 and 3-8 teams the last two seasons (although, of course, Davie couldn't manage to put LSU away that 4-7 year until then end and wound up getting Jarious's knee rolled up on that idiotic safety play). The slide at LSU is worrisome, because it would suggest that he isn't really a good judge of talent. But given what IU probably had available to it, the Hoosiers probably did OK here.

Buddy Teevens at Stanford has disaster written all over it. Although he had some mild success at Dartmouth and Maine, he was 10-45 at Tulane. He left and immediately Tommy Bowden got Teevens's 2-9 squad to 7-4 and 12-0. Teevens was the the offensive coordinator for Spurrier at Florida for three years. Does anybody really think he was the brains behind the operation there? Also, hiring a guy with a first name "Buddy" to coach at Stanford seems about like hiring a guy with a first name of "Winthrop" to coach at Mississippi State.

Here are a few guys who would make my long list, and who aren't the usual suspects like Belotti and Stoops. Some of them may have problems about which I don't know (and Pruett at Marshall would've made this list but for them going on NCAA probation). But here some coaches who would deserve a good hard look, in my opinion.

Bill Snyder, KSU (105-49-1). Now a legend at what was probably until then the worst program in America. He's a little long in the tooth now (probably early 60s), but he could coach my team anytime.

Sunny Lubick, CSU (74-34). Roughly .700 at a place that was at best a hit-or-miss proposition before he got there. He's beat CU several times, something that was nearly unthinkable before he arrived.

Ron McBride, Utah (85-56).  Like Lubick and Snyder he's no spring chicken, but he can coach a little. The Utes physically dominated USC in their bowl game.

Randy Walker (15-18, Northwestern; 59-35 Miami of Ohio).   Does this combination of schools sound familiar to you? OK, he's not Ara, and he's off some radar screens because the Wildcats didn't perform to expectations this year, but his long term records suggests he'll be successful.

David Cutliffe, Mississippi (20-13).  Nice job in a tough conference with lots of recruiting competition.

June Jones, Hawaii (21-16).  He took over an 0-12 team and turned them into winners.

Steve Logan, East Carolina U (65-51).  Pretty good job at a state that's not even a state.

John L. Smith, Louisville (34-15).  He took over a 1-10 squad.  It won't be long before he's gone somewhere else.

Mike Krucek, U Central Florida (26-18).  Just a little bit of recruiting competition in that state, wouldn't you say?

Jim Leavitt, U South Florida (35-20).  Suggested to me by another poster, but a fine job starting off a new program in a state with the toughest recruiting competition.