Earlier this week, it appeared that Fred McNair would be the new head football coach at Texas Southern University.
He left behind his status as one of the famed alums – both as a player and coach – at Alcorn State University.
Appearances have proven to be deceiving. Recent reports have suggested that the Texas Southern Board of Regents is not all-in on McNair taking the job. They are considering an ex-NFL player with zero coaching experience — Houston Texans great and sure-fire Pro Football Hall of Famer Andre Johnson — for the position.
The Tigers have no one else to blame but themselves for the roasting they’ve incurred online and in various media circles.
They’ve handled this entire situation poorly.
HBCU Sports publisher Kenn Rashad reported before the end of the season that Clarence McKinney, in his fifth year as head coach, would not have his contract renewed, and that had been decided about halfway through the season.
Texas Southern athletic director Kevin Grange denied the report, saying nothing had been decided. Yet once the season ended, the school announced that McKinney’s contract had not been renewed.
Knowing that you won’t be retaining a coach and denying media reports to save face is just one bad idea in this whole situation. Another is not giving your athletic director the power to hire the coach he feels is the best fit for the program. Fred McNair would be the best fit with a team like Texas Southern that needs a firm hand to lead its team to success.
He was an all-SWAC quarterback at Alcorn State, eventually handing the reigns over to his younger brother, the late, great Steve “Air” McNair. After Jay Hopson left Alcorn for Southern Mississippi, McNair stepped in as head coach and guided the Braves to two SWAC championships and Celebration Bowls. They were a couple of bounces away from the SWAC championship game this year.
While one could argue that McNair took a dangerous risk of resigning from Alcorn to accept a job that still faced board review, that still doesn’t excuse Texas Southern’s foolishness in the least.
Grambling and Southern moved to fill their coaching vacancies quickly – although Southern really needs to reevaluate why they let their new coach be dressed down with him sitting in their board meeting.
And in case no one noticed, the early college signing period for recruits was Tuesday. Christmas is right around the corner. HBCU athletics math is tricky in some cases.
And the worst idea of all is one that I’ve discussed before in a previous column: considering a splashy, name-brand hire, knowing the absolute hit-or-miss element of it all is insane.
Do I think Andre Johnson could be the answer for Texas Southern? I don’t know. He’s never coached anywhere to have a frame of reference. Even more terrible still is this delay has Ed Reed back on social media, angling for yet another HBCU lead job when he could easily just take a coaching position at a predominately white school if he wants to get into the profession that bad.
I’ve always been of the mind we can’t always worry about what the outside world thinks of us as HBCUs and our HBCU athletics programs. This is one of the times when you must look at what is happening with a program and ask yourself, “What are they doing?”
I don’t even know if Texas Southern can answer that for themselves.
