Why I Don't Want to See "Jim Donnan" and "Georgia Bulldogs" in the Same Story Ever Again

I have to agree. I was at UGA during the ‘Donnan Year’s and when thinking about it, I get a bad taste in my mouth and pain in my belly. My first thoughts about those years are wasted potential (2000 season), choking big games (almost every one of them), losing to Tech multiple 3 consecutive seasons, and rushing the field b/c we beat an average TN team (granted, he only played a part of our long losing streak to them). My point is by that time (2000), our program was only marginally better than it was in Donnan’s first season.

As much as he likes to remind people Richt’s best season was with his players, Donnan’s best season (‘97) was with Goff’s players. After that point, you could pencil in 8-4 – win most games we should and rarely win a meaningful game.

Hall-of-Fame Worthy???? I kinda take the baseball route when thinking H.O.F. – if you have to think/debate about it, then the person/player doesn’t belong. My criteria is probably a little tough though. I’m of course discounting his Marshall years when it’s by far his finest tenure because his UGA years did little for his H.O.F. induction.

Congrats Donnan.

I believe there’s a little bias playing a role here. Certainly, growing up in southeast Georgia watching Georgia Southern football games, I love Erk Russell. He deserves to be in the College Football Hall of Fame. Like you stated, he resurrected a program at GSU, won three national titles, and had a record of 83-22-1. No one could tell you that he is anything other than a Hall of Fame coach.

However, one has to be a head coach for atleast ten years to be eligible for the College Football Hall of Fame. I would love to see this rule changed, or exceptions made, but when do you draw the line? If you lower the bar to eight years, then you have arguments for six. It’s an unfortunate rule, no doubt. Erk was a top-tier coach a major program for much longer than Jim Donnan…he spent 17 years as the defensive coordinator at UGA. That’s more time than Jim Donnan spent at Oklahoma, Marshall, and Georgia combined.

This brings me back to the point of bias, however. Let’s give Donnan his due. He was a very good offensive coordinator at Oklahoma and coached under Barry Switzer. The team had three consecutive 11-1 seasons from ‘85 to ’87. He won a national championship in 1985 largely due to the team’s offensive prowess. Oklahoma’s wishbone in the mid-eighties was nearly unstoppable. He won a national championship at Marshall and only one season with less than 11 victories (his first, if I’m correct). I understand that’s a bit easier to do when you have a playoff system, but it’s nonetheless impressive.

Finally, I think the major issue at hand here is not the fact that Erk deserves the honor more than Donnan, it’s the ten year head coaching minimum. Jim Donnan is being inducted as a member of the 2009 “Divisional Class” of the Hall of Fame. He coached at a 1-AA school for six years, and then had a mediocre head coaching job at Georgia for five years. This gave him eleven years of head coaching time. Erk, on the other hand, was a head coach for only eight years, but has a much more impressive resume than Donnan in that time. As I see it, here’s what it comes down to: Donnan is being rewarded for six years of superb coaching at a 1-AA school, with his time at Georgia being largely disregarded. If the committee is going to disregarded the record, why not disregard the time? If one is going to be inducted into the “Divisional” class of the HOF, why not have differing time constraints for eligibility? I respect the requirement of ten years of head coaching experience, but simply don’t understand the method in this situation. You can’t have your cake and eat it too. If the five years of mediocrity in Athens are not being considered as criteria, then they should not count as years spent as a head coach. My vote, for what it’s worth, would be to move to a five year requirement per division and do away with this nonsense.

but we should still appreciate what he put in place for us. His teams were oozing talent, but couldn’t “finish the drill.”

I equate Donnan with Ron Zook. As an assistant, Zook was to defense as Donnan was to offense. Both coaches recruited well, won a few big games, but ultimately finsihed 8-4 and lost some unexplainable games. I feel that if Donnan went to a smaller school in a lesser conference, he could have moderate success similar to the Zooker.

Donnan was an excellent recruiter, no arguement or doubt about it. But being a good recruiter and a bad head coach at a major college program, good offensive coordinator, and successful head coach in D1-AA should not be a pass to the hall of fame.

To me…the only measurement that counts in coaching is…did you leave the program better than you found it? And Jim Donnan undoubtedly did.

Is he a tool? Yes.
Should he be in the Hall of Fame? No.
Should he have benched Quincy in ’00? Yes.

But look at the mess he found. No one wanted the job in ‘96, and we were literally in danger of being passed by Tuberville’s Ole Miss squad and/or South Carolina’s program when he arrived. Hell, Glen Mason turned us down for goodness sake.

When he left, he had returned us to winning 8 games a year … which is what Dooley won while he was in Athens.

And more impressively, he has never spoken an ill word about UGA since his departure other than to mention his contempt for Mike Adams.

I’m glad he’s gone. But I don’t think he deserves nearly the contempt you threw his way.