Put-up or shut-up time for Clemson’s Bowden

By Chris Preston  |   Thursday, June 05, 2008  |  Comments( 16 )

 Clemson Tigers
For Detroit Lions fans, it's likely Wayne Fontes still haunts their dreams. You remember Fontes, the cherubic yet perennially perplexed-looking head coach allowed to prowl the Lions' sideline for nearly a decade (1988-1996) despite fans repeatedly calling for his job and countless premature eulogies by the national media. But Fontes kept his job...
What's the buzz about?

Log In above and share your thoughts on this topic with other fans!

CommentsComments: 16
 No.1
RazzMaTazz		 02:05 PM
06/05/2008
Bowden won't be fired, even if he goes 6-6. Clemson's athletic director just foolishly negotiated a contract (running through 2014) that includes a $4M buy-out. That buyout decreases by $500k/year until it bottoms out at $2M for the rest of the contract. I just don't see Clemson paying $2M (let alone $3.5M) to buy out Bowden. So love him or hate him (or anywhere in between) Bowden will be a Clemson for many years to come.

Buy-out's cut both ways, but I just can't imagine Clemson needing the protection from Bowden walking out because I just don't see any big time school giving Bowden a better offer than what he has at Clemson. No big time football school wants to hire a coach that finishes in the upper-middle-of-the-pack for NINE YEARS-- while teams with weaker recruiting classes (like Wake Forest and VT) win the ACC. They want a championship (or at least a whiff of a championship) once in a while. And if you can't win an ACC title, what are your chances in the other conferences? So there was no need for the AD to agree to such an outrageous buy-out. If anything, the buy-out should have been tied to performance.

Bowden has kept his job because he wears his Christianity on his shirtsleeve. The administration and many of the fans in care more about that than championship football. If the guy wasn't shirtsleeve Christian, he'd have been canned a long time ago. Don't get me wrong. I'm a Christian, first-and-foremost myself, but Clemson is a state school, so they should hire a coach based on on-field and off-field performance, not religious beliefs. Anything else is just state-sponsored religious bigotry.

But since we're stuck with him, I sure hope he gets it together and wins the ACC this year, and for many years to come. Like Charlie Brown (after years of Lucy pulling away the football before he kicks it) I hate to get my hopes up, but Clemson really SHOULD win the ACC this year. At this point Clemson would be favored in every game by the odds makers. Clemson should legitimately have a shot a going undefeated and, if so, (arguably, illegitimately) get a shot at the national title. Then again, Clemson has been favored all of its games (except FSU) for the last few years, and yet Bowden's crew has managed to lose enough games to blow the ACC title. Can't wait to see how it turns out. But I can guarantee you that Bowden won't lose his job, either way.

Go Tigers!
 No.2
HML		 08:24 PM
06/05/2008
Good write-up, Chris. Hard to disagree with what should happen should Clemson flop again (of which there is a high likelihood). Personally I think he should have been shown the door 4 years ago. But Razz is correct unfortunately; Bowden put Clemson over a barrel with the Arkansas fiasco (as if he was ever going to get hired, please!) and got what he wanted again. I'm not sure there is another coach out there who has done so little with so much who has such a stranglehold on a major university.

Clemson's got to be the most overhyped team in the NCAA. After several years of underachievement under Bowden it's strange how the national media is still going to hand the team a top-10 ranking this year. Based on what? Oh yeah, potential. Definitely not production. IMO BYU deserves that spot more than Clemson.

Bowden produces flashy, overhyped teams who completely lack mental toughness. That's why they never get over the hump. He can't coach 'em up; that's more than proven. They can't beat good teams, period.
 No.3
cdr4tigers		 10:28 PM
06/05/2008
Well, the 2 posts above are pretty much the vocal minority here in TigerTown. Razz is a poster I know from thetigernet website who is a constant Bowden-basher and the other poster sounds like a possible gamecock fan in disguise {not that one could be blamed for being in disguise these days}. People like these and the "writer" of this article like to overlook the obvious real reasons that TB is still head coach at Clemson and will continue to be. Primarily, he has taken a program that had been decimated by the two previous staffs into nothing more than .500 or barely above team year in and year out and built in into a 8-9 win machine in the last few years. He has also taken us from a program that could not even
win it's own state in recruiting and turned it into a national contender in that category over the last couple of years. The extra wins and championships are in route. Only problem is that everybody wants it all yesterday. And we are not "fellow" anything with Alabama, btw. If we had a coaching carousel like that university then maybe folks like Razz would be happier. Not for me, thanks. I'll take the high-road, slow-steady results driven program that TB and company have brought to Clemson any day of the week.
Comments that include profanity, or personal attacks, or antisocial behavior such as "spamming" or "trolling," or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. We will take steps to block users who violate any of our terms of use. You are fully responsible for the content that you post.