Lay the blame of this stinker of a Chargers season at the feet of General Manager A.J. Smith. People instinctively want to blame head coach Norv Turner for the 4-8 disaster, but the poor guy probably should not be there in the first place.
It is Smith who couldn't get along with Turner's predecessor, Marty Schottenheimer, and fired him. It is Smith who replaced one of the most successful coaches in NFL history with one of the least successful, then saddled him with out-of-place defensive coordinator Ted Cottrell, who might have been outstanding if his players had different sets of skills. It is Smith who then emasculated Turner by describing him as a system coach and intimating that he was calling the shots, thereby costing the new guy any chance of gaining respect from players or fans. It is Smith who ran Donnie Edwards out of town, a linebacker who always has well over 100 tackles a year. No Chargers linebacker will this year.
It is Smith who seems to place little value on arguably the most important unit in football, the offensive line. In Monday's San Diego Union-Tribune, columnist Tim Sullivan hits the nail on the head. The offensive line, once very good, is not so hot anymore. With Cris Dielman out with the flu against the Falcons, there was no room for the Chargers greatest weapon, LaDainian Tomlinson, to run. He got just 22 yards on 14 carries Sunday, and is averaging just 3.7 yards per carry this season, something he hasn't been remotely close to since 2004's 3.9 ypc. He's on track to his lowest number of touchdowns since his rookie season. Their starting right tackle is a second-year former sixth round draft choice.
Now Smith is no terrible GM by any means. He's done a pretty good job in trying to hold the nucleus of this team together under sometimes difficult circumstances. Some in this town try to annoint him a genius, however, and it just isn't the case. He's made some good decisions and some bad ones. The 2008 season is one in which his poor decisions have come back to bite us all in the butt.
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The Chargers experience of firing Schottenheimer in an attempt to bring in a supposedly better coach should give pause to Aztecs fans, who let go Chuck Long in, well, an attempt to bring in a supposedly better coach. You get someone like Turner who fits the system, created it, even, and you think its ideal. But it doesn't work out.
If a pretty good GM like Smith can blow the biggest decision he'll ever make, how will a below-average athletic director like Jeff Schemmel do for San Diego State's football opening? Fans are cringing over the very real possibility that Schemmel will try to bring in his old buddy Glen Mason who, like Turner, has a career losing record at Kansas and Minnesota.
The encouraging sign regarding the Aztecs situation is the high profile role being played by university President Dr. Stephen Weber. I honestly don't remember his presence at the news conference in which the firing of Tom Craft was announced. Maybe he was there. But he apparently played a major role in getting rid of Long. Maybe he can prevent Schemmel from making a huge mistake.
Mason not only doesn't equal Turner, he is far less than Chargers coach.
While I've been upfront with my contention that SDSU had to bite the bullet to fire Long, I am agnostic about his replacement. All of the potential new coaches who've been mentioned have points both good and bad, including Mason.
Whoever it is, though, has a chance to do something no Aztecs coach has been able to do since Denny Stolz in 1986 -- hit the ground running. All coaches since then had to come in and repair damage before they could even think of winning. Long has fixed many of the troubles he inherited in 2005. His problem, the reason why he wasn't ever going to be a winner, is he couldn't inspire the troops, come up with a decent game plan or manage a game properly. If the next coach can do that, and take advantage of some of the gifts the outgoing staff will leave behind, the Aztecs could reach .500 quickly and start going to bowl games if not next year then the year after.
The new coach will have an outstanding sophomore quarterback, a decent corps of receivers, an offensive line that while young will be much bigger and have more depth than before, a deep and experienced defensive line, and young linebackers who might supplant the starters of the past couple of years. Large holes exist at running back and the secondary.
Stolz, by the way, went to the Holiday Bowl his first season.
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