It seems like a lot of the immediate reaction to Scot Loeffler’s hiring as Auburn’s offensive coordinator had to do with how long it took to hire him away from Temple.
That translates into he couldn’t possibly have been head coach Gene Chizik’s first choice. It would certainly seem that any coach would leave Temple for Auburn in about a second.
Perhaps the fascination with the timeline of Loeffler’s hiring had something to do with the fact that most had no idea who he was or his track record. Or maybe it’s part ego where everyone believes that only the first choice can be successful.
Loeffler probably was not Chizik’s first choice -- as you might expect, Chizik has so far refused to discuss the process he went through to arrive at Loeffler.
But ultimately it makes no difference if Loeffler was the first choice or the 10th. It will only matter how well Loeffler recruits and then coaches those players and the players he has inherited on the Auburn team.
And to get some idea of how successful he will be in those two areas, one can look back at where he has been before and the job he did at those previous stops.
After his playing career ended at Michigan, Lloyd Carr thought enough of Loeffler that he hired him when he was still in his 20s to be the quarterbacks coach.
Loeffler worked with five quarterbacks while at Michigan that were drafted into the NFL. It is certainly a fact that four of those quarterbacks have had little to no success in the pros.
But the one that did is Tom Brady, who has won three Super Bowls for the Patriots and has a chance to win another one on Feb. 5.
Loeffler also worked with Tim Tebow during Tebow’s final season at Florida in 2009. Tebow passed for 2,895 yards and 21 touchdowns with a quarterback efficiency rating of 164.17.
“I think that it is extremely, extremely important when your offensive coordinator is your quarterback coach,” Chizik said. “… I wanted somebody that I knew could take a quarterback and develop him to get him to where we needed him to be to win championships. Scot certainly has had a proven record to do that.”
Another subject of conversation around the hiring of a new offensive coordinator has been would Auburn continue to run a spread offense such as the one that Gus Malzahn ran during his time on the Plains, or would Chizik opt to go in a different direction?
It would appear at this point that the offense will be varied and designed to fit whatever suits the offensive talent the best.
“… Take our personnel here and we are going to build a system to get our playmakers the ball,” Loeffler said, “and do everything in our power to make sure we are helping our defense and our special teams.”
That sounds like Auburn may not run its offense at the break-neck pace it did under Malzahn. Too often the Tigers had drives that were 2 minutes or less and whether they scored or not, that kind of pace simply means that the defense is back on the field too quickly.
Another hint at what Loeffler and Chizik have in store for the offense is the transfer of fullback Jay Prosch. The Pro Football Weekly All-American could have transferred anywhere to be closer to family in Mobile, Ala., but he chose Auburn.
One would think there was some conversation about the fullback’s role in the new offense. That is a position that didn’t exist in Malzahn’s spread offense, although there was an H-back.
Chizik had the task of replacing both of his coordinators during this offseason.
Malzahn left to be the head coach at Arkansas State, while defensive coordinator Ted Roof left for UCF, then left there for Penn State.
He first hired Brian VanGorder from the Falcons to take over for Roof, and while it might first appear that VanGorder’s hire was the better of the two, only time will tell if that is indeed true.
