What if Charlie Strong and Texas are both better off splitting up?

Every week feels like a referendum on Charlie Strong at Texas, but this one really is. Strong is 3-4 in his third year, and there’s also the matter of how much Baylor bothers Texas.

Regardless of the defensive implosions (bad!) or recruiting coups (good!) or stubborn loyalty to assistants (real bad!) that have swung his stock, I can’t help but think that one of Strong’s maxims — the theme he kept coming back to during our interview in August — is his potential undoing in the neck-deep politics of Texas football:

It’s just about the players, so just worry about the players.

“You win and you’re fine with the boosters. They’re going to say what they’re going to say anyway, but you have to win with them. If you tack on the outside stuff to [the coaching], where would you stop? It really could be something new every day. And you could deal with it all day, every day.”

That may read like coachspeak, and in the context of a lot of other jobs it can be, but not at Texas. Locking out the world and focusing on your team means losing opportunities to build equity among powerful people in the vast Texas booster-sphere. Granted, that equity usually comes via pains in the ass and meddlesome money men with gross senses of entitlement, but hey, that’s college football.

In the course of securing my interview with Strong, I spoke with a number of boosters, some young and some seasoned, none of whom agreed to go on the record and put their names next to their opinions on Strong. Such is the murky water of Texas.

But they did deliver something of a consensus. For all Mack Brown’s coaching faults, he was undefeated at dinner, be it with one booster or 1,000. A week ago last October, one donor told me a story about Brown blowing into his West Texas city on the offseason circuit:

He would come in to our town once a year, sometimes not even that often because we weren’t a big-priority alumni market, and we knew it. That was fine.

Some years we would get a basketball coach. But when he did, he remembered your name. Every coach comes to town and remembers the high school coach’s name, or the guy who owns the whatever factory, but Mack remembered your name. Seriously. He shook my hand one time and asked how my little brother was doing, because we’d both met him at the same event two years before. I’m nobody, I’m just a lawyer.

Mack would piss you off in Red River [against Oklahoma] and then win you forever in May and June.

That’s not Charlie. It never will be.

Strong’s a smart, sharp, engaging man, but he’s not Brown. And in a vacuum, he shouldn’t have to be. Charlie’s 14-18 and Mack was 27-9 in his first three seasons, but Brown would later survive bad years at Texas because he was a politician.

Fan equity offered him the benefit of the doubt when he couldn’t beat Bob Stoops or when he’d regressed as a “CEO coach” following the 2010 Rose Bowl. “Playing the game” with the dollar men that lope around Texas’ power structure insulated Brown from most problems for years.

Regardless if that’s OK or sane, that’s always going to be Texas. Strong’s reputation among peer coaches hasn’t changed an iota. I’ve had four Power 5 head coaches mention the same line to me in the last three months: “It’s not like Charlie forgot how to coach. Maybe it’s just not going to fit.”

Maybe Texas wins out, starting this weekend against a Baylor program it’s grown to revile. Or maybe Strong and Texas move on, and maybe that’s the best scenario for both.

If they do split, you can’t blame either for their decision to join up.

Strong was one of the hottest coaches in the nation in 2013, and an eyeball test of Texas’ roster wouldn’t have revealed a lot of long-festering problems.

Strong, from August: “I remember before I took this job, I had a guy tell me, ‘You may not want to take that job because of what all comes with it. But you can’t tell them no, either.’”

Fresno State fired head coach Tim DeRuyter on Sunday after a 1-7 run that followed a 3-9 2015.

Then the usual thing happened: names floated out from various media members. In this instance, ex-Cal head coach Jeff Tedford and Alabama OC Lane Kiffin, himself a Fresno alumnus, led the pack.

You’ll see these “leading candidate” lists emerge more as we enter firing season after Thanksgiving (it comes sooner every year). This concept of an immediate list is a function of the Twitter era, born out of team-specific message boards in the 2000s.

I’m often asked how this happens, how, moments after a coach is fired, we in the media seem to have a shortlist of candidates ready.

1. Coaches love to gossip, especially assistant coaches. Compared to most job fields, the number of available full-time coaching positions at the FBS level is small. Staffs make frequent changes, and coaches move around a lot.

Generally everyone knows everyone, and it’s a cliquish culture. The hotel lobby at AFCA, the annual college coaches convention, is 1,500 paunchy men in khakis reenacting the lunchroom scene from Mean Girls. On Wednesdays, they wear windbreakers.

This is no secret among athletic directors. Some, like Arizona’s Greg Byrne, demand omerta during coaching searches.

“My policy is, if your name gets out there during a search, regardless of whether or not you or your camp leaked, we’re done,” the AD told me back in March.

2. The media trades attention for information. Reporters develop relationships with coaches, with whom they trade rumors and information year round. This is a major part of our jobs, and favoritism is a natural byproduct. Conspiratorial fans often lose the forest for the trees when they accuse a media member of being pro or anti a particular team. The bias is usually rooted in the staff or head coach, not the school.

As a consumer of news, you want us to have these relationships, because often, they bypass school media restrictions. More importantly, they favor direct sourcing over speculation.

If you’re a Fresno fan examining these lists of candidates, look at the media member providing it: is it someone who regularly interacts with coaches and administrators? If the answer is yes, they’re probably a (big) step closer to the truth.

3. Agents are salesmen. You’re a reporter, and you hear about DeRuyter. One of the first things you’ll do is reach out to agents to ask if their clients would be interested in the Fresno job. Maybe their client genuinely is. Maybe their client wants to drum up attention to leverage a better deal at their current job.

Usually the agent will ask if you’re “putting that out there or not.” Sometimes they object, but not often. Sometimes they text you first. Demand, perceived or otherwise, is a great for their client, and the agent isn’t being publicly sourced. That’s often how deep things will get.

If an agent tells you Coach X “would be interested if Fresno called,” technically you can type on Twitter: “one name to watch out for at Fresno is Coach X.” What does “one name to watch out for” mean? Whatever you want it to. Is it possible Fresno hires X? Maybe. Is it possible Fresno has no interest in X? Maybe.

4. Assumptions are everywhere. Between a twice-weekly podcast, radio spots, and phone calls with sources, I’m almost certain that at some point in the last year I’ve mentioned Fresno and Lane Kiffin would “make sense.” DeRuyter had a bad ‘15, and the Bulldogs have lost momentum as an elite G5 program. Meanwhile, Kiffin is rebuilding his career as a title-winning coordinator and has ties to both the Bulldogs and the state of California.

All of that is public knowledge. A connection makes sense, but it doesn’t mean it will happen. And the effective OC of a really good team “makes sense” for a lot of jobs.

So, without knowing the intentions of either party, go ahead and tweet, “Lane Kiffin to Fresno makes a lot of sense.” You’re not wrong. Then watch others do the same.

Eventually, the echo chamber will speak back to you on a radio show or podcast: “So, lot of talk out there about Fresno and Lane Kiffin.”

Houston now has two (2!) losses this season, yet nary a bit of buzz around their head coach leaving has subsided in the least. According to “reports” on social media, Herman had already interviewed for one Big 12 job before this season started.

Herman never met with Baylor in July (that’s me, a reporter who contacted multiple parties in question, telling you this), just like he hasn’t “all but” signed to be the next head coach at Texas.

Here’s Herman, responding (ostensibly) to that tweet:

Is Herman a candidate at Texas if the Horns fire Strong? Absolutely. In the framework of “making sense,” the pairing is so complementary to both parties it’s freaking preternatural.

If Texas is open in December, will Herman be near or at the top of their targets? Yes. Would he and agent Trace Armstrong talk with the Longhorns? Yes, of course. As a reporter, I can confirm that. I didn’t (just) read that on Twitter.

But ask yourself: if you’re Texas or Herman, why would this make sense right now, on Oct. 27? If you’re Texas AD Mike Perrin, why would you “all but lock in” a single candidate in late October? You’re Texas. You can set the terms of the entire job market if you so choose. Why wouldn’t you?

Regardless of what happens with Strong, what if Herman and Houston lose two or three more games this season? That’s a different sell to your rank-and-file fans and your splintered booster culture.

If you’re Herman, this makes even less sense. If the Cougars finish 10-2 or 9-3, you’re still one of the most coveted head coaches in years. What if USC opens? Notre Dame? What if Ed Orgeron really is just the interim at LSU? What if the Beastie Boys decide to tour again and ask you to rap in place of MCA (rest in peace)?

Actually, I’m gonna start a rumor on that last one right now: