Wreck'Em Red
Fansided

Looking Back At Kliff Kingsbury’s Biggest Mistakes

By Matthew Conner

AUSTIN, TX - NOVEMBER 24: Head coach Kliff Kingsbury of the Texas Tech Red Raiders surveys the field as the team arrives before the game against the Texas Longhorns at Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium on November 24, 2017 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images)
AUSTIN, TX - NOVEMBER 24: Head coach Kliff Kingsbury of the Texas Tech Red Raiders surveys the field as the team arrives before the game against the Texas Longhorns at Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium on November 24, 2017 in Austin, Texas. (Photo by Tim Warner/Getty Images) /
facebooktwitterreddit
Prev
3 of 6
Next
(Photo by John Weast/Getty Images)
(Photo by John Weast/Getty Images) /

Hiring His Friends As His Initial Coaching Staff

When Kliff Kingsbury was hired at the age of 33, he was long on charisma but short on coaching experience.  It would have made sense for him to surround himself with veteran coaches that have been through the college football wars.

Instead, he hired a group of coaches that more closely resembled a frat house than a coaching staff.  Of the nine assistants he hired in 2013, five were in their 30’s and had less than a decade of coaching experience.

What’s more, the majority of his hires were former teammates or were friends he knew because they were alums of Texas Tech.  By assembling a staff that included former Red Raiders like Sonny Cumbie, Eric Morris, Mike Smith, Trey Haverty and Kevin Curtis, Kingsbury thought he was putting together a group that would relate to high school targets and set the recruiting trail on fire.

That did not happen.  What did happen was that the staff was often out-classed by other coaching staffs.  Kingsbury’s team was frequently out-foxed by the likes of Bill Snyder, Gary Patterson or Dana Holgorsen and it became apparent that Kingsbury’s staff was more glitz than substance.

And what hurt the most was the fact that one of the only real veterans on the staff and the most important coach Kingsbury hired, turned out to be a disaster.   Kingsbury brought Texas A&M linebackers coach Matt Wallerstedt on as his first defensive coordinator but he lasted only sixteen games before residing amid a cloud of controversy..

This was a crippling blow to Kingsbury’s program.  The team had to finish the 2014 season with Mike Smith as interim defensive coordinator and when David Gibbs was hired to the position in 2015, he was Texas Tech’s seventh different defensive coordinator in seven seasons.

More from Wreck'Em Red

The result was that Kingsbury’s defense was in shambles and it took Gibbs three years before he was able to put together a representative defense.  Unfortunately, that period coincided with the career of Pat Mahomes, preventing Tech from making the most of having a top-10 NFL Draft pick at QB.

Kingsbury should have filled his first staff with a more diverse group of coaches.  He would have been wise to find at least one assistant with head coaching experience to be a mentor and to help him see the error in his ways.

Additionally, his staff would have benefitted from the perspective of more people from outside of the Texas Tech family.  But by the time Kingsbury hit his fourth season, only two of his original assistant hires were still on staff and when Eric Morris left this offseason, all of the 2013 assistants were gone.

Turnover on a coaching staff is unavoidable but in Kliff Kingsbury’s case, most of the turnover was a result of his attempts to fix problems caused by his unwise hirings in 2013.  In each of Kingsbury’s firs four seasons, he had to replace multiple assistant coaches as he tired to put out fires.

Now, Kingsby has a much more well-rounded staff in place and the results were evident in 2017, especially on defense.  But had Kingsbury not hired a bunch of his friends and set up his first catchings staff to look like the cast of a Vince Vaughn movie, he likely would not be coaching for his job in 2018.

Home/Texas Tech Football