Wisconsin is a very interesting program to me. They have had a long, consistent run as a quality program, in a BCS conference, and yet they still seem a bit undervalued to me. I’m not sure why their coaches are leaving, hopefully to take promotions, but if I was a coach or a recruit the strength and stability of that program would be very appealing.

I’m not overly concerned about the ND coaching losses. But when a coach has a reputation (whether fair or not) as a red faced tyrant, the offense stagnates, and 3 offensive coaches leave–two for lateral moves to work for a more successful coach, I can see how people might conclude that the program/head coach is weathering a storm. If you dig a little deeper and find out that 1 of the departing coaches was nudged overboard, another was passed over for a promotion, and 3rd had significant financial incentives to jump ship, the situation suddenly looks a lot less dire. But most people don’t dig deep–they just jump to conclusions. I also think that multiple, recent BCS bowl appearances give a coach some additional ballast and until Kelly gets that, he’ll be an easier target for this type of speculation.

What do you mean “nudged overboard”? Did Kelly not want Wariner back? There may have been chemistry issues that I don’t know about, but I thought our O-line was much improved this year. They went a really long time without giving up a sack, and the running game nearly had TWO 1000 yard rushers. he was already offensive coordinator, so I don’t think you mean that he was the one who was passed over for promotion, so I’m just curious if you’ve heard anything about why he was pushed out. Now that I think about it, was it his offensive coordination rather than the play of his o-lines?

Erik–You never know what to believe, but Irish Illustrated and ISD have both suggested that Molnar was encouraged to find employment elsewhere. While the o-line play was definitely improved this year, the o-line did not play well in big games. That may not have been enough for Warriner to get pushed out, but speculation is that Kelly was not completely happy with his performance, and was not worried that he would leave once Kelly chose to promote Martin to O.C. instead. No one knows for sure if this is what happened, but it is every bit as plausible, if not moreso, than the alternative–that Kelly sucks and all his coaches are looking to make lateral moves out of South Bend.

I don’t think BK has said yet, but most expect Booker to stay on offense, most likely coaching the receivers while Alford moves back to RB.
Martin is expected to coach the QBs.

The question this all points to is an interesting one (amongst other questions/thoughts) – re: if a program can become bigger than any one coach (or coaches). Jay put it out on TPG that ND should aspire to get to that level where the program is sustainable and handle the plug and play nature of coaching changes. I think that seems rather impossible – and probably reserved for few programs, less than you can count on one hand even. Is Wisconsin one of these programs? Bielema is often praised for running a consistent program, having taken the reins over from Alvarez who gave him a great start – we’ll see how big of an impact six coaches make. Maybe my timeframe to judge a program is too short – and maybe if you want to determine if a program is successful enough to withstand coaching changes, you need to have a longer view of time. Unfortunately, with our recent history, you can make an argument that ND is not at that level at this current time.

The only issue I have with the “Bigger than the Coach” idea is that I just don’t buy that the dominant programs of the recent era really are bigger than the coaches. Alabama without Nick Saban will look like what?