Until he proves otherwise, it is time to stop buying what Joey McGuire is selling

It is hard not to like Texas Tech football head coach Joey McGuire. In fact, some might deem that task nearly impossible.

He's one of the most gregarious and personable people in his profession. Always with a smile on his face, he's brought some much-needed energy to a Red Raider fan base that, after the inglorious Kliff Kingsbury and Matt Wells eras, had grown apathetic by the time he arrived.

However, McGuire is now in year three of his tenure. That means that the results on the field have to mean more than the handshakes and smiles that he hands out in the offseason.

What we saw on Saturday night against FCS opponent Abilene Christian did nothing to help McGuire instill confidence in his constituency. In fact, in the 52-51 overtime win, McGuire may have lost some of the support of his fan base.

We aren't to the point where anyone should be calling for McGuire's head on a platter. Even if Tech would have lost to the Wildcats in week one, McGuire wouldn't have been on the hot seat given all the good he's done for the program, especially off the field.

However, it is fair for Texas Tech fans to start approaching McGuire with a touch of cynicism. After all, we all know people who require us to tap the breaks whenever we interact with them. Those whose exuberance often leads to visions of grandeur when humility should rule the day often can't refrain from being overly excited.

McGuire seems to be one of those people. Ask him a question and he's going to give you a full dose of sunshine and unicorn kisses along with his answer. It's just who he is. He can't help himself.

So of course, in the spring of 2023, he told us that his second team at Texas Tech would have beaten by 14 points the 2022 Red Raider team that won eight games. Later that offseason, he openly talked about winning the Big 12. But what happened? The 2023 Red Raiders won only six regular-season games to limp into the postseason before finishing 7-6 by winning a lower-tier bowl game.

Then, this offseason, while he toned back the grandiose statements a bit, he did sell us on the fact that his program would feature a defense that was the deepest that he had coached. That depth was going to make a massive difference in how the Red Raiders played on that side of the ball. However, the first time we saw that defense put to the test, it gave up over 600 yards of offense and 51 points to FCS opponent Abilene Christian.

Along the way, Tech got only one sack, on the final play of the game (thankfully) and repeatedly allowed ACU wide receivers to run free through the secondary. It was one of the worst defensive showings in Red Raider football history, and that's saying something.

Now, Tech fans are fearful that the program is about to regress on that side of the football. Worries abound that this defense is about to put forth a showing similar to 2015 or 2016 when Tech ranked last and second to last nationally in total defense respectively.

That's not what we were sold by McGuire during the offseason. Maybe, he was fooled by what he saw in the spring and in fall camp. After all, with no exhibition games in college football, week one is often a crapshoot.

However, that doesn't change the fact that it is getting harder to buy into this program's constant internally generated hype.

Now, in McGuire's defense, he needs to hype up his team in the locker room. After all, no team is going to succeed when the message coming from the top is one of pessimism. What's more, part of his job is to sell his program to the community that supports it.

Thus, we shouldn't want McGuire to change who he is. One of the reasons he was hired at Texas Tech was because of his effervescence. It can be infectious at times and it is perhaps his greatest strength. To ask him to shelve that part of his personality and suddenly become a realist would be like asking a fish to stop swimming in the river and instead walk on land.

Rather, the change needs to come from the fan base. Instead of automatically buying into what this program tells us each offseason, we have to look at the situation with a close eye and make our own judgments.

We should have seen all of the turnover on the defensive side of the football and known that this year might be a struggle, especially with most of the defensive line and secondary being first-time starters at the college level. Similarly, smart fans should have looked at the rebuilt offensive line and known that counting on three Group of 5 transfers to start in the Big 12 was going to be a risky plan.

Yet, many of us bought into the hype surrounding this program for a second straight year. I'm as guilty of it as anyone as I thought that this could be an eight or nine-win team in the regular season.

What we saw on Saturday night, though, suggests otherwise. Will this team bottom out and miss a bowl game? While that's possible, it doesn't seem likely given the weakness of the schedule this year and the mediocrity of the middle of the Big 12.

Still, what's been sold to the Texas Tech fan base is championship-caliber football. However, now in year three of the McGuire era, we've yet to see anything close to resembling that. So until the product on the field begins to live up to what is being sold in the offseason, it would be wise to ignore the pie-in-the-sky rhetoric we are fed each offseason and remember that this program still has yet to turn the corner.

Only when that happens should we start to take McGuire's word when it comes to the quality of his team. Until then, we should proceed with caution and enough cynicism to keep us from being burned once again.