KD Hires An Alabama (Shula) Reject As His Next OL Coach

by Nestor on Oct 7, 2007 9:18 AM PDT in Football Comment 13 comments

Bumped. A post I wrote on February 14. GO BRUINS. -N

Bruins have hired Bob Connelly, the OL coach from fired (forced out) Mike Shula's staff from Alabama. Here is UCLA's official release:

Bob Connelly, who spent the last four years coaching the offensive line at the University of Alabama, has been hired to coach the UCLA offensive line, Bruin head coach Karl Dorrell announced today. Connelly has coached in a Rose Bowl, a Sugar Bowl and a Cotton Bowl.

"Bob is an outstanding communicator and teacher," said Dorrell. "He produced all-league performers at both Washington State and Alabama. I think he will bring a level of energy and expertise that will be a great fit for the young men in our program."

Uhm so what do Alabama fans think of Bob Connelly? Luckily we didn't have to dig to hard. We just went over to Roll Bama Roll, our outstanding SBN colleagues who are running one of the best college football blogs around.

Here is what Nico had to say about Coach Connelly over at RBR last November:

"Fire offensive line coach Bob Connelly. It is incredible how many times Bama's QB has been sacked in the last two years. Even if they aren't getting sacked, they're running for the their lives almost every passing play (which begs the question, why don't we use the shotgun more?)"

And here is what other RBR main page blogger - Todd - had to say about Connelly in October of last year:

Bob Connelly has to go. It's unthinkable that a coach working with BCS league talent can't have his players more prepared to play the game than he does. Injuries and inexperience are only excuses for so long, and there's no way any other major football program would stand for it's O-Line giving up 11 sacks in one game like we did in the Iron Bowl. JP is a tough kid, but he's taken way too many hits already and at some point he's going to get hurt having to scramble for his life nearly every down.

RBR wasn't only blog fed up with the coaching of Connelly. Here is another Bama blog - Journalism Is For Rock Stars - that was advocating for the firing of Connelly last November:

The Bama media people say that Connelly was listed as one of the Top 25 recruiters in the nation last year, and that's great. Make him some sort of full time recruiter. Kick him upstairs in some fashion. But while the Tide's stats look like they do, he should not be coaching the offensive line.

Team Yards Per Carry = 3.6
YPC Average:
Darby = 4.3
Johns = 4.4
Castille = 3.1

Total Sacks Allowed = 20
vs. Arkansas = 5
vs. Florida = 3
vs. Tennessee = 3

Red Zone Attempts/Scores = 43/33
18 Field Goals
15 Touchdowns
10 Missed Opportunities

vs. Arkansas = 5 att., 10 points
vs. Florida = 2 att., 6 points
vs. Tennessee = 3 att., 13 points
vs. Mississippi State = 4 att., 9 points

There's no excuse for someone not to get fired over numbers like these.

Yikes. I wonder if SPJ or St. Patrick has seen any Alabama tapes from last two years. He sounds like a quiet a "communicator" and a "teacher." Doesn't he? He sounds just like his new head coach. Average and mediocre.

Hope Connelly realizes if he cannot help Dorrell deliver a Pac-10 championship he will be looking for another job this time next year.

GO BRUINS

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OK. I'm scared now.

Any word on his WSU stats, though? Perhaps he was better in a different system?

MIM

by Meriones on Feb 14, 2007 2:13 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

Excerpts from the press release...

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Last season, running back Kenneth Darby rushed for 835 yards, left tackle Andre Smith earned first-team Freshman All-America honors and sophomore center Antoine Caldwell was named second-team All-SEC.
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>OK, their leading rusher goes for 835? Oh boyyy....

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In 2005, Connelly was named one of the nation's Top 25 recruiters by Rivals.com and his offensive line helped Darby rank second in the SEC in rushing and become only the fourth back in Alabama history to post back-to-back 1,000 yard seasons.
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>Not a bad line on the resume. If he's a high-energy guy and his experience helps us pull in higher-rated recruits, that's a plus.

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In 2004 ... his offensive line helped Alabama carve out the 20th best rushing attack in the country and the top rushing game in the SEC. The Crimson Tide also ranked second in the SEC in fewest sacks allowed.
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>Not bad, not bad at all. Were they his guys? Were they the prior coach's people? Was it a good class to begin with, or did he maximize the heck out of an OK group?

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In 2003, Connelly's line led a rushing attack that netted 2,067 yards, fourth best in the Southeastern Conference, and produced two All-SEC linemen.
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>So that's, what, about 172 a game? Hmmm.... for our guys, it was:

2006 -- 129.8 rush yds/ game
2005 -- 160.7 rush yds/ game
Anyone know what kind of offesne they had then? Option? pro-style? WCO? Spread?

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Alabama played in three bowl games during his four seasons...
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>Guess what, so have we. Big woop.

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Prior to coaching at Alabama, Connelly, 36, spent two seasons tutoring the offensive line at Washington State. In Pullman, his 2002 squad allowed just 24 sacks in 424 pass attempts while helping the Cougars win a share of the Pac-10 title and play in the 2003 Rose Bowl. His 2001 unit gave up 27 sacks in 434 attempts and WSU played in the Sun Bowl.
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>Now this actually sounds promising. By comparison, this is what we did:

2006 -- (Colletto) 40 sacks, 400 pass attempts.
2005 -- (Cable) 25 sacks, 389 pass attempts.

This looks like a positive for Connelly's OL experience. At least his numbers are closer to
Cable than Gepetto.

MIM

by Meriones on Feb 14, 2007 2:31 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

Good fit for Dorrell's System

18 Field Goals and 15 TD's in 43 red zone appearances? Sounds like he is almost ready for Dorrell's red zone system.

Rush up the middle for no gain
Rush up the middle for no gain
Lateral backwards to the sideline for a loss of 2
Field Goal attempt

It almost looks like Dorrell picked up someone that he could blame when we get 1 TD out of 5 red zone appearances again. We may get to watch imitations of the Washington game several times this season.

Doesn't look good, but I will save judgment for when I see how well the line plays. I didn't get to watch Alabama much this year and see how they did other than to read the box scores.

by Rhapsode on Feb 14, 2007 2:41 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

actually

I beg to differ, although I'm just splitting hairs, but I remember Dorrell's third down play was to throw 7 yards when we needed 9 for a first down.

by hawk on Feb 14, 2007 6:02 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Same as it ever was

I'm glad to hear Bob's coached in the Rose, Sugar, and Cotton bowl, let's ask him what he thinks about coaching in next years Boise Bowl.

by bcrack on Feb 14, 2007 4:01 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

I heard this guy may have problems

coaching the line (apparently he makes his formations too obvious), but I did hear that he is a monster recruiter. Dorrell may be concentrating on getting talent, instead of coaching them up.

by trainwreck84 on Feb 14, 2007 6:22 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

Recruiting for 2008 is Not Relevant to KD's Future

No matter what happens next year, KD will only be here one more year.

If he does not win, with the returning talent he has, he will be fired.

If he does win, he will leave.

He needs a real OL coach more than he needs a recruiter.

But, since we will turn over so many players, a good recruiter may help whoever takes the head coaching position for 2008.

It still seems like a very weak hire by a very weak coach -- a coach who seems afraid to surround himself with talented experienced coaches.

sjh

by Class of 66 on Feb 14, 2007 6:41 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Ho hum

More mediocrity. Seems to me, unfortunately, that Coach Dorrell is simply irrelevant. It will be up to the team (again) to win in spite of having a head coach who is way over his head and can't get out.

by Fox 71 on Feb 14, 2007 8:58 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

Go back a few years and ...

substitute "Lavin" for "Coach Dorrell". Feel the same?

Does this make me a LaRouchie?

sjh

by Class of 66 on Feb 15, 2007 5:03 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Not only that, sj

But a pinko, and an imperialist running dog, and a capitalist lackey stooge. I can't remember the other stuff that used to find its way into the Daily Bruin (sometimes called the Daily Worker when we were there), but those epithets probably apply, too.

But I would never call you a trOJan.

(My favorite was "imperialist running dog." I never knew exactly what that was, but I sure hoped I wasn't one.)

by Fox 71 on Feb 15, 2007 6:00 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

As much venom as we threw his way...

...I actually think Connelly might work out well for ya'll. He's not the best line coach out there, but he should be able to work in the UCLA system better than the one Shula ran. Anyway, good luck to you guys. I hope it works out well for the team and Coach Connelly.

by Todd on Feb 15, 2007 9:49 AM PST reply actions 0 recs