Jim Grobe was offered NU job in 2007....

cm husker said:
Red Five said:
The tweet say KEEP 3 assistants. So choose 3 of:

Watson, Gilmore, Jordan, Wagner, Rudolph

Cosgrove, Wyatt, Busch, Elmassian

Bo only kept 2.
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Which kind of puts a hole in Grobe's claim.

I would have been very disappointed if Grobe was hired in '08. He's never impressed me. Would have felt a lot like the Riley hire... maybe it would have worked out, but not particularly exciting.

p.s. Dodd must need some clicks if he's digging up stories that are 10 years old... Husker fans are reliable in that way.
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I asked Severe about the 3 assistants on Twitter, and Severe made it seem like it also included other assistants that Osborne wanted brought back from the 2003 staff (Brown & Cotton).

 
cm husker said:
p.s. Dodd must need some clicks if he's digging up stories that are 10 years old... Husker fans are reliable in that way.
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Dodd is at Big XII media days. Grobe is the new coach at Baylor. I doubt he specifically asked him about the Nebraska job. Probably a question about coaching somewhere besides Wake.

 
Red Five said:
cm husker said:
p.s. Dodd must need some clicks if he's digging up stories that are 10 years old... Husker fans are reliable in that way.
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Dodd is at Big XII media days. Grobe is the new coach at Baylor. I doubt he specifically asked him about the Nebraska job. Probably a question about coaching somewhere besides Wake.
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Red Five said:
cm husker said:
p.s. Dodd must need some clicks if he's digging up stories that are 10 years old... Husker fans are reliable in that way.
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Dodd is at Big XII media days. Grobe is the new coach at Baylor. I doubt he specifically asked him about the Nebraska job. Probably a question about coaching somewhere besides Wake.
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Good point. I spaced on the fact Grobe is at Baylor now.

 
Grobe spoke about this in 2014 when he left Wake Forest:

Grobe also symbolizes the cautionary tale of what can happen to a coach who doesn't jump when his resume reaches its peak. Nebraska pursued Grobe in 2007 before hiring Bo Pelini. So did Arkansas in 2007, prior to landing Bobby Petrino. Grobe was mentioned in the 2008 Clemson search before Dabo Swinney got the job permanently.

When asked if he regrets not taking the Nebraska job, Grobe doesn't hesitate. "I do now, I didn't at the time," he said. "I honestly took great pride in Wake Forest. I had some really good friends there. I trusted some people there. I thought Wake was a little different than other schools. I really, at the time, felt we were going to get a bigger commitment in terms of facilities and support for the program that never really materialized. We loved all 13 years we were in Winston-Salem, but I’m not real happy with the way things ended."
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And here's Sam McKewon's take on that:

We'll set aside whether Grobe was actually truly offered the job over current head coach Bo Pelini -- Grobe probably would have had to accept some of the assistants that then-AD Tom Osborne strongly suggested to Pelini -- but let me tell you how I read that answer.

Grobe regrets not leaving Wake Forest, which clearly peaked in 2006, 2007 and 2008, and he regrets not sticking to what made Wake Forest a decent program in the first place. He thought the administration would build him facilities to compete. Apparently, they're not good enough. He drifted away from his misdirection run offense to a pro-style attack. With success, he started getting into the living rooms of better recruits, which meant more talent, and, in his case, meant more headaches.

What's really interesting about this Grobe story isn't some wistful notion that Nebraska would have been better for him. It's that Grobe got away from his principles for building his program, administrations couldn't deliver the all the facilities he wanted, and Wake Forest got worse.
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I do remember when Pelini was hired it was widely accepted that Shawn Watson had been retained at Osborne's insistence. Or at least very, very strong recommendation.

So there might be something to Grobe's story.

 
Guy Chamberlin said:
I do remember when Pelini was hired it was widely accepted that Shawn Watson had been retained at Osborne's insistence. Or at least very, very strong recommendation.

So there might be something to Grobe's story.
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I remember this as well. In fact, I remember hearing something about Grobe wanting to keep all his assistants, and that being a sticking point back in 08. I don't remember where I heard it, but I definitely heard it (as a rumor) back then. It may have been from my brother-in-law, who is a long-time HS assistant coach in Houston. Not a new rumor to me, anyway.

 
zoogs said:
Where's BigWillie? I know he refuted this story several times -- including a claim that the rumor was invented as a joke on some forum playing into the plane-watching frenzy. Of course, maybe they inadvertently did get the actual plane ... which would be quite the twist!
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I agree with knapp and Mav here. The Grobe story sounds self-serving; it's popped up in the media and is nice for Grobe to claim. It also paints him in a particularly noble light. It wouldn't stun me if it were true, but really now: Bo's hiring seemed inevitable from the moment Steve Pederson was fired.
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It was a complete sham. Basically a guy on a board that i was also a member of created the Grobe rumor and it took off. It was pretty funny to watch it all unfold

 
So let me get this straight.

NU's guy they wanted for 2004 was Houston Nutt, ended up with Callahan.

For 2008 they looked at Grobe, hired Pelini.

For 2015 they looked at.............Riley.

All different AD's and NONE of them looked for a splash hire? So the common denominator is DBHOFamer Harvey Perlman?

 
Coach Power'T said:
So let me get this straight.

NU's guy they wanted for 2004 was Houston Nutt, ended up with Callahan.

For 2008 they looked at Grobe, hired Pelini.

For 2015 they looked at.............Riley.

All different AD's and NONE of them looked for a splash hire? So the common denominator is DBHOFamer Harvey Perlman?
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You're probably leaving out about ten steps in each of those job searches in your quest to again say, "I hate Harvey Perlman."

 
I have a tough time buying this story as well. Perhaps Grobe was in the running and felt as though the job was his to lose. However, a guy with Grobe's credentials doesn't turn down a job at Nebraska over a couple coaches. That just doesn't happen.

 
Coach Power'T said:
So let me get this straight.

NU's guy they wanted for 2004 was Houston Nutt, ended up with Callahan.

For 2008 they looked at Grobe, hired Pelini.

For 2015 they looked at.............Riley.

All different AD's and NONE of them looked for a splash hire? So the common denominator is DBHOFamer Harvey Perlman?
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Dave Wannstedt says "Hi"

 
knapplc said:
Coach Power'T said:
So let me get this straight.

NU's guy they wanted for 2004 was Houston Nutt, ended up with Callahan.

For 2008 they looked at Grobe, hired Pelini.

For 2015 they looked at.............Riley.

All different AD's and NONE of them looked for a splash hire? So the common denominator is DBHOFamer Harvey Perlman?
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You're probably leaving out about ten steps in each of those job searches in your quest to again say, "I hate Harvey Perlman."
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He's also leaving out the uncomfortable truth that making a "splash hire" at Nebraska is not the easiest task for any AD. For all of our advantages, there are enough recruiting disadvantages to make the top coaching candidates think twice. Our high expectations in spite of those disadvantages are a double-edged sword. I'm glad we have high expectations, but let's not be naive about our hiring potential.

I think that in order to be successful at Nebraska you either need to be a "big name" that attracts recruits, be willing to work your @ss off in recruiting, or cheat in recruiting. (in addition to coaching well) I am certain that we have hard-working recruiters and hopefull that we will see the results of good coaching this year.

 
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