Clark: FSU was left with 'no choice but to make a change'
It was the one sentence that caught my eye from the Florida State press release.
I'm quite sure it caught yours, too.
When FSU President John Thrasher was explaining why the administration had decided to fire Willie Taggart after just 21 games, he said: "I think very highly of Coach Taggart and wish him well, but in the interest of the university we had no choice but to make a change."
No. Choice.
That's what Taggart gave FSU leadership after Saturday's embarrassing loss to Miami.
I think we all knew, after that debacle, that his days in Tallahassee were numbered. I can't say I expected that number to be 0, but this did seem like an eventuality since Miami iced away the game yesterday.
Because nothing was getting better. There was no real hope. To any of this.
When Taggart was hired, it was thought his recruiting prowess would be such that the Seminoles would be hauling in All-Americans and five-star recruits like another Alabama.
And in his first two months, Taggart did a terrific job salvaging a Top 10 class.
But then the 2019 class was rather pedestrian by FSU standards, and this one wasn't shaping up to be anything special either.
Why? Because kids have eyes. The people that help them make decisions -- whether it be parents or high school coaches or family friends — have eyes, too.
They saw what we saw. A program with no real proof that it was improving. And the big-time prospects were staying away in droves.
**ALSO SEE: Recruits react to news of Taggart's firing**
It was easy for Taggart to sell Florida State when he hadn't coached a game - great tradition, good facilities, passionate fan base, recent success.
But when the recruits saw the actual product he was putting out, well, that's a pretty good reason why the five-stars were taking their talents to other places. Because they, like you, like me, like the administration, weren't convinced Taggart was going to turn this thing around.
You know the FSU decision-makers wanted this to work. Desperately.
They're about to pay a whole bunch of cash to a guy to not coach their football team. They didn't want to do that. Nobody wants to do that.
So they were looking for any glimmer of hope that Taggart was going to put out the dumpster fire. Any at all. When they hired him in December of 2017, they in no way were expecting to be buying him out just 21 games later.
But they in no way expected to see 12 losses during that span. They didn't expect to see so many humiliations. They didn't expect to see half-empty stadiums. They didn't expect to see a defense that looked completely lost at times and an offense that looked completely overwhelmed at times.
Because that's not what Florida State has EVER been. I mean, not since the mid-1970s anyway.
But they saw all of that. A lot of that.
And when you're thinking about season-ticket sales for 2020 and beyond, when you're thinking about booster money, when you're thinking about a roster that appears to be getting less talented, when you're thinking about how many laps Clemson and Florida are ahead of you by, and the fact that you seem to be going backward while they're speeding up, well, you can see why Thrasher felt there was "no choice" but to make a change.
Because if anything, Florida State football is in worse shape now (on the field anyway) than it was when Taggart took over. And it was a dumpster fire then.
The Seminoles are 4-5. Again. In danger of missing a bowl game. Again. And are constantly getting blown out by rivals.
When you look at this program right now, what is better than it was in 2017?
The defense? Nope.
The special teams? Not really.
The offense? Yeah, but barely. And that's with a million-dollar coordinator running the show and a supreme talent at running back.
And you know what's not any better at all? The record. That kind of matters. Especially at a place that hadn't had a losing season since the year Taggart was born.
Now the Seminoles are staring dead ahead at two in a row.
Should a head coach get more than 21 games to prove himself? Yeah, typically. Absolutely.
Especially when said head coach inherited a mess, which is something athletic director David Coburn admitted to a few months ago in an interview.
They just needed to see something — anything — out of Taggart to make them feel like he was the right guy for this job. Or at least the right guy for a little while. To make them feel he was at least capable of getting this program turned in the right direction.
An upset win maybe? Those are allowed.
So are wins over Miami. The last guy did that a lot.
Maybe a more disciplined team, one that wasn't one of the national leaders in penalties.
Maybe an offensive line that didn't completely wilt when it faced anybody with a pulse up front. Or maybe a game plan that took into account those issues at the line of scrimmage and adjusted accordingly?
Maybe a QB signee the last two years?
Maybe a star-studded recruiting class for 2020? That certainly would have at least given the administration pause about making this change, if they thought the cavalry was on the way in the form of some four- and five-star phenoms.
But they got none of that.
What they saw on Saturday, in their eyes was the absolute final straw: Taggart's team getting obliterated by a rival, again, his team getting penalized 10 times, again, his team seemingly having no fight, again, his team having no answers for a good defensive line, again, his offense making no real in-game adjustments, again, and a stadium not even close to capacity, again.
No. Choice.
That's what they felt like they were left with. I can't blame them.
Taggart is a good person. I believe that.
He made his players go to class. That was important. He has class. That's important, too.
I hope he gets another chance as a head coach, and I hope he has success. Truly, I do. We need more good people in the college football profession. We need more nice guys who are actually decent human beings.
But, as we all know, you don't get paid millions of dollars by these universities to be nice.
You get paid to win games.
Taggart couldn't do that. And there was no evidence he was about to start doing it either.
Which is why he's gone after just 21 games.
Contact senior writer Corey Clark at corey@warchant.com and follow @corey_clark on twitter.
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