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USC is hiring Lincoln Riley from Oklahoma as its new HC

I am clearly in the minority with this take, but I think Riley will not meet expectations at USC. Kiddo's to them for making a splash hire and backing up the brinks truck though
I think the ceiling for USC w/Riley will be the better Oregon teams of the recent past. USC will never be as good as the top 2 teams in the SEC.
 
What makes you think this?
Let me preface this by saying that I think Riley is a hell of a FB coach.

You pay a guy $15 million per year (if rumors are true), it is pretty clear to me that you expect to be winning NC's, and I don't think Riley's offense fully utilizes USC's built in advantage in the conference. They are the only team in the league that consistently has grown men on both Off, and Def fronts. Playing the spread/air raid doesn't utilize that advantage, and allows teams like Oregon and Utah to have a legit shot at beating them year in and year out.

OU dominated a down BigXII with two heisman quarterbacks. I think he will find it harder than everyone here thinks, to run the table in the PAC, and will probably end up with 1-2 losses every year, or just getting into the playoff only to be knocked out early. Basically, I foresee SC being the *new Oregon (under Kelly) in conference. While that is certainly nothing to scoff at by any means, that isn't what the expectations will be for a guy that you're paying $15 million per year.
 
Let me preface this by saying that I think Riley is a hell of a FB coach.

You pay a guy $15 million per year (if rumors are true), it is pretty clear to me that you expect to be winning NC's, and I don't think Riley's offense fully utilizes USC's built in advantage in the conference. They are the only team in the league that consistently has grown men on both Off, and Def fronts. Playing the spread/air raid doesn't utilize that advantage, and allows teams like Oregon and Utah to have a legit shot at beating them year in and year out.

OU dominated a down BigXII with two heisman quarterbacks. I think he will find it harder than everyone here thinks, to run the table in the PAC, and will probably end up with 1-2 losses every year, or just getting into the playoff only to be knocked out early. Basically, I foresee SC being the *new Oregon (under Kelly) in conference. While that is certainly nothing to scoff at by any means, that isn't what the expectations will be for a guy that you're paying $15 million per year.
I agree with a lot of this. I don’t think his teams were ever that tough or disciplined and I think that is the problem at USC. We will see if he can fix that
 
Best reaction to USC hiring Riley I've seen so far is from the UCLA fans. They are acting as if Riley is overrated, OU has been imploding the past two seasons and that all UCLA needs to do to keep beating USC every year is to get a better DC.
 
Let me preface this by saying that I think Riley is a hell of a FB coach.

You pay a guy $15 million per year (if rumors are true), it is pretty clear to me that you expect to be winning NC's, and I don't think Riley's offense fully utilizes USC's built in advantage in the conference. They are the only team in the league that consistently has grown men on both Off, and Def fronts. Playing the spread/air raid doesn't utilize that advantage, and allows teams like Oregon and Utah to have a legit shot at beating them year in and year out.

OU dominated a down BigXII with two heisman quarterbacks. I think he will find it harder than everyone here thinks, to run the table in the PAC, and will probably end up with 1-2 losses every year, or just getting into the playoff only to be knocked out early. Basically, I foresee SC being the *new Oregon (under Kelly) in conference. While that is certainly nothing to scoff at by any means, that isn't what the expectations will be for a guy that you're paying $15 million per year.
Fair enough, but I would say that USC hasn’t been recruiting in recent years like I think Riley will recruit there. While they certainly aren’t running the Air Raid, the offenses that Bama has been winning with in recent years have been Spread and more finesse passing based and their stars are QBs and WRs, instead of RBs.

Also, there is really only one program in the country consistently going 12-0/13-0 before the CFP in recent years, so saying USC will lose a game or two every year isn’t the disappointment it sounds like, IMO.

End of the day, though, I think their success will be limited by what their defensive recruit looks like, particularly on the DL and front seven. Riley will have USC as a top offense in short order, but he and Grinch haven’t been able to solve the Defensive issues at OU.
 
Fair enough, but I would say that USC hasn’t been recruiting in recent years like I think Riley will recruit there. While they certainly aren’t running the Air Raid, the offenses that Bama has been winning with in recent years have been Spread and more finesse passing based and their stars are QBs and WRs, instead of RBs.

Also, there is really only one program in the country consistently going 12-0/13-0 before the CFP in recent years, so saying USC will lose a game or two every year isn’t the disappointment it sounds like, IMO.

End of the day, though, I think their success will be limited by what their defensive recruit looks like, particularly on the DL and front seven. Riley will have USC as a top offense in short order, but he and Grinch haven’t been able to solve the Defensive issues at OU.
No real disagreement here, other than to point out that the PAC is looked down upon nationally. A one loss USC team will still have a harder time making the CFP than a one loss tOSU or Bama....and likely gets knocked out all together if that loss is a weird Pac12 after dark loss to Wazzu or something. I think Riley will recruit lights out and win a LOT of games at SC. I guess my overall point is this; if I was willing to pay $15 million a year to poach a head coach, I probably would have gone a slightly different direction.

I do very much look forward to how this will impact the conference going forward, particularly the SC-fucla rivalry. Those games will be super fun to watch IMO.
 
I am clearly in the minority with this take, but I think Riley will not meet expectations at USC. Kudos to them for making a splash hire and backing up the brinks truck though
There is certainly plenty of history to suggest that he will epic fail as most big hires do. We'll see as Dan Hawkins would say.
 
No real disagreement here, other than to point out that the PAC is looked down upon nationally. A one loss USC team will still have a harder time making the CFP than a one loss tOSU or Bama....and likely gets knocked out all together if that loss is a weird Pac12 after dark loss to Wazzu or something. I think Riley will recruit lights out and win a LOT of games at SC. I guess my overall point is this; if I was willing to pay $15 million a year to poach a head coach, I probably would have gone a slightly different direction.

I do very much look forward to how this will impact the conference going forward, particularly the SC-fucla rivalry. Those games will be super fun to watch IMO.
Kind of chicken and egg though. Pac 12 is looked down on because it’s flagship program hasn’t been relevant in the CFP era. If the conference has Oregon and USC in the top 5-10 consistently, the conference is right there with the B1G and SEC.

Also, what direction would you have gone for $15m/year? Nick Saban? Kirby? Dabo? Brian Kelly? Urban? There really aren’t any other coaches you’d pay $15m/year for and Riley is right there with those guy as a top 5 proven CFB coach.
 
I personally don't see Riley as quite as good as his pricetag would indicate, but he will pull up USC to a national playoff contender at minimum, and quickly. His OU teams were talented, but they also were just short of being a complete team, despite seemingly having the athletes. They had some bad losses but way more close victories. I just didn't see them as elite, and thought they were actually slipping. And I continue to wonder if their offensive system doesn't create the problem on defense.

But with that said, USC is a plum job. He will instantly stockpile NFL talent there and have sick recruiting classes.

I sort of expect that the bottom will be "Why can't USC beat Alabama with all of this NFL talent" in a few years.... What a loser!
 
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