Joel Nielsen signed a contract extension in November of 2016 that will pay him a base salary of $428,000, which made him the highest-paid athletic director in the Mid-American Conference. What concerns me the most is the new contract runs through June 30 of 2021. That means Nielsen really doesn't have any pressure on him to make the football program more competitive. Should Nielsen decide to make a coaching change and the one he hires sets the football program back even further, he still gets paid $428,000 over the next four years. Kent State will not buyout his contract under any circumstances.
In the South, where football is a religion, athletic directors are fired if their hires do not win. But this is not exclusive to the South. Even at Nebraska, the AD was fired after losing to Northern Illinois. The last major move of the athletic director was giving head coach Mike Riley a contract extension that could keep Riley in Lincoln through the 2020 season.
As the athletic director at Kent State, Nielsen has hired Darrell Hazell and Paul Haynes. On the surface, it appeared that Hazell was a great hire based on the 2012 season. But if you look deeper, you will see that Hazell was able to win because he was the beneficiary of Doug Martin's recruits. Martin's last two recruiting classes (2009 and 2010) were ranked 1st and 2nd in the MAC respectively.
The fact of the matter, if Hazell didn't have the talent that Martin recruited he would have struggled just like Haynes is now, and maybe even more. But because Hazell just happened to be in the right place at the right time, he was able to parlay his success at Kent to a $2M salary, 6-year contract at Purdue much like Stan Heath when he took the Flashes to the Elite Eight with Gary Walter's players and then promptly left for big bucks at Arkansas. But after mediocre seasons at Arkansas and South Florida, Heath was relegated to an assistant coach role until this year when the Orlando Magic hired him to coach their new G League affiliate in Lakeland, FL. As for Hazell, he became a wide receivers coach for the Minnesota Vikings after Purdue realized it made a big mistake in hiring him. Is there a chance Hazell could become a head coach again? Perhaps, but every time Jeff Brohm wins big at Purdue, the odds of that happening become unfavorable for him. Yesterday, the Boilermakers defeated Minnesota 31-17.
Haynes, like Hazell, has not had strong recruiting classes either, but if Nielsen hadn't forced Martin to resign, we might still have NFL-caliber talent on the field today. If you have forgotten, Martin recruited Roosevelt Nix, the 2010 MAC Defensive Player of the Year and current fullback for the Pittsburgh Steelers, along with NFL draftees Dri Archer, Jameson Konz, Usama Young, Jack Williams, Julian Edelman, Brian Winters, and former NFL defensive lineman Ishmaa'ily Kitchen. Martin also recruited Josh Kline, an offensive lineman for the Tennessee Titans.
Do I think Kent State can recruit these type of players again? I guess it's possible but highly unlikely since Miami, Ohio, and Toledo now have indoor practice facilities that didn't exist when Martin was recruiting. Realistically, Kent State can only hope to recruit blue collar type players who are willing to work harder than higher rated recruits. That is what Coach Haynes has done but with the high number of injuries, the program has not yet reached the desired level of competitiveness.
Perhaps if Nielsen is lucky, he might find an inspiring coach to come to Kent and recruit three-star players. On the other hand, he might find a coach who cannot recruit even blue-collar type players that Kent has now. And if that is the case, we will be looking at the first winless season since 1998. Furthermore, the program will most likely see lopsided scores it had under Dick Crum and Pete Cordelli. And should that play out do you think that will upset Nielsen? I doubt it because he will still collect his $1,712,000 and then retire.
In the South, where football is a religion, athletic directors are fired if their hires do not win. But this is not exclusive to the South. Even at Nebraska, the AD was fired after losing to Northern Illinois. The last major move of the athletic director was giving head coach Mike Riley a contract extension that could keep Riley in Lincoln through the 2020 season.
As the athletic director at Kent State, Nielsen has hired Darrell Hazell and Paul Haynes. On the surface, it appeared that Hazell was a great hire based on the 2012 season. But if you look deeper, you will see that Hazell was able to win because he was the beneficiary of Doug Martin's recruits. Martin's last two recruiting classes (2009 and 2010) were ranked 1st and 2nd in the MAC respectively.
The fact of the matter, if Hazell didn't have the talent that Martin recruited he would have struggled just like Haynes is now, and maybe even more. But because Hazell just happened to be in the right place at the right time, he was able to parlay his success at Kent to a $2M salary, 6-year contract at Purdue much like Stan Heath when he took the Flashes to the Elite Eight with Gary Walter's players and then promptly left for big bucks at Arkansas. But after mediocre seasons at Arkansas and South Florida, Heath was relegated to an assistant coach role until this year when the Orlando Magic hired him to coach their new G League affiliate in Lakeland, FL. As for Hazell, he became a wide receivers coach for the Minnesota Vikings after Purdue realized it made a big mistake in hiring him. Is there a chance Hazell could become a head coach again? Perhaps, but every time Jeff Brohm wins big at Purdue, the odds of that happening become unfavorable for him. Yesterday, the Boilermakers defeated Minnesota 31-17.
Haynes, like Hazell, has not had strong recruiting classes either, but if Nielsen hadn't forced Martin to resign, we might still have NFL-caliber talent on the field today. If you have forgotten, Martin recruited Roosevelt Nix, the 2010 MAC Defensive Player of the Year and current fullback for the Pittsburgh Steelers, along with NFL draftees Dri Archer, Jameson Konz, Usama Young, Jack Williams, Julian Edelman, Brian Winters, and former NFL defensive lineman Ishmaa'ily Kitchen. Martin also recruited Josh Kline, an offensive lineman for the Tennessee Titans.
Do I think Kent State can recruit these type of players again? I guess it's possible but highly unlikely since Miami, Ohio, and Toledo now have indoor practice facilities that didn't exist when Martin was recruiting. Realistically, Kent State can only hope to recruit blue collar type players who are willing to work harder than higher rated recruits. That is what Coach Haynes has done but with the high number of injuries, the program has not yet reached the desired level of competitiveness.
Perhaps if Nielsen is lucky, he might find an inspiring coach to come to Kent and recruit three-star players. On the other hand, he might find a coach who cannot recruit even blue-collar type players that Kent has now. And if that is the case, we will be looking at the first winless season since 1998. Furthermore, the program will most likely see lopsided scores it had under Dick Crum and Pete Cordelli. And should that play out do you think that will upset Nielsen? I doubt it because he will still collect his $1,712,000 and then retire.
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