College Football: Team Performance Analysis

Since the inception of College Football, there has always been this notion that when a team is performing poorly that a change in coaching has been deemed necessary. However, the underlying question remains; is this really the best long term plan? Authors Adler, Berry, and Doherty decided to take an in-depth look to see if this truly does help the program or does the program remain where it started. The purpose of this paper is to analyze their work on several different aspects. First the reader will have a better understanding of the author’s research and what they found. Following that, the reader will see the author’s strengths and weaknesses of their paper. Finally, the author of this paper will elaborate on Adler, Berry, and Doherty’s
findings and how it applies to their coaching situation. Authors Adler, Berry, and Doherty took it upon themselves to look into the age-old question of College Football.
The main purpose of their work is to truly see if, in the long term, a head coaching change truly helps troubled programs turn their program around. Adler, Berry, and Doherty (2013), wanted to see if a coaching replacement really does assist with team’s on-field performance. In order to compile their data, they looked at two different situations. In order to do this, the authors compiled their data from the years 1997 to 2010. According to Adler, Berry, and Doherty (2013) “[they] use matching techniques to compare the performance of football programs that replaced their head coach to those where the coach remained” (pg. 1). Essentially, by doing this, they were able to see the long-term success of programs that fired their coach compared to programs that retained a coach despite poor on-field performance. The authors concluded that although it seems that a coaching change is the only logical conclusion it is not the best conclusion. As the authors state (2013) “Despite the fanfare that often accompanies the hiring of a new coach, our research demonstrates that at least with respect to on-field performance, coach replacement can be expected to be, at best, a break-even antidote” (pg.21). Their data provided proof that within the first two years there is an immediate success. However, in their third year the team’s on-field performance returns to their initial
point prior to firing the previous coach (Adler, Berry, Doherty 2013). Therefore, the authors found that it is better to keep your coach then it would be to fire and hire a new one. The author’s article does have significant strength’s that support their study; however, there are some weaknesses that remain despite their work. The authors did a great job at elaborating the time frame in which they collected their data. Adler, Berry, and Doherty also stated exactly what their study was looking for along with how they were coming to their conclusions. They also did a good job to explain that their study does not look at certain situations such as injuries, strength of recruiting, and other factors outside of coaching that would impact on-field performance ( Adler, Berry, Doherty, 2013, pg. 3-4). On the contrary, there is one glaring weakness that stands out above the rest. The biggest weakness observed is that this is the first study of its kind; there are no other studies that focus on coaching changes at the college level. As authors Adler, Berry, and Doherty (2013) express, “to date, studies investigating leadership succession effects in sports focus almost exclusively on professional teams (for two expectations, see Fizel and D’Itri, 1997,1999). In this article, we present the first analysis of the effects of performance-based coaching replacements on the performance of college football teams” (pg. 2). At its core, this is a weakness as their previous data and studies come from a different situation that is not directly correlated to this particular study. Another weakness observed in this paper is there is “one possibility is that coaching replacements affect the quality of player recruitment that, in turn, affects performance” (Adler, Berry, Doherty, pg. 19). As this is just a theory there is no validity to this possibility as there is no empirical research. With that being said it is fair to say this article has both its strength’s and weakness that both support and question their findings on this particular topic. As one can see authors Adler, Berry and Doherty attempt to answer the age old question; is it truly beneficial to a program to replace their head coach.
As their article does an in-depth look in relations to college football it can be applied to the high school level as well. The question stated is will a college team benefit from a new coach; however, one can ask the same for a small private high school on Long Island. As St. Dominic’s in Oyster Bay completed their third year in their league there were several murmurs if their coaching staff should be replaced. The coaching staff at St. Dominic’s has completed their third season and despite a post-season berth, the on-field performance was still below the expectations of parents, players, and some of the administration at the high school. However, entering the fourth season the athletic director has decided to continue with the same staff as he believes finding a new coach in the team’s fourth season would be detrimental to his program. The current article provided support for the athletic director’s decision as Adler, Berry, and Doherty provided proof through their college
study. In conclusion, the authors Adler, Berry, and Doherty provided empirically proof that firing a head coach after a poor on-field performance is detrimental to the program. Through their long-term study, they were able to provide both strength’s and weakness in their writing to support their claim. Finally, this research can be applied to the high school level as the coaching staff at St. Dominic’s provides support to their claim through the athletic director’s decision.