Coach Franklin had to go.

I am somewhat surprised by the number of people questioning  Coach Tubervilles decision to fire Tony Frankln and that are now defending him and his system. I read the Smart Football article about Franklin and his offense and all I can say is that made me MORE certain that he was not the man to be our OC. Listen, Aug. 30th was not the 1st day that Auburn hit the gridiron trying to run Franklins offense. As impressed as I was looking at the Airraid system when he came aboard and as impressive as we played against Clemson three weeks into the change, I am absolutely DISMAYED at how totally ineffective the offense is after having 9 months to work on it. He had NINE MONTHS to coach his co-ordinators and his players on how to run the offense and failed MISERABLY. Nine months is a long time folks when all you have to do is talk football. Franklin obviously could not make his system work in practice, so he did not win the respect of the coaches to get them to buy into his system. I say this is obvious because Auburn's preseason practices were kept under wraps and they obviously worked on other formations than the spread. When the 1st game came around we were expecting lightning and fireworks and what we got was chaos and mistakes and confusion and a scoreless half against ULM. I'm sorry but I don't see how that is an acceptable outcome after nine months of preparation. The fact that things only seem to have gotten worse only backs up my position. The offense was not working and we were not going to be successful running the spread the way Franklin had it installed. If Franklin was not being allowed to run his system to his liking, again that is HIS FAULT!!! He had nine months to get buy in from Tubs and gain his confidence and obviously never got it. If he didn't have the guts to stand up to Tubs and tell him either he runs the system his way or he quits, then how do you think he looks to his players? Impotent is how he looks. I don't blame Tubs if he reigned in Franklin if what he was seeing in practice was what we were seeing in games, which is total ineptitude.

The bottom line is things were only going to get worse if Franklin stayed. Coach Tuberville had no confidence in him, his players think the offense stinks and is inept, the fans of course are frothing at the mouth, and we were likely going to lose the rest of games running the spread, aside from UTM. Now as much as firing Frankin may hurt our recruiting I don't think it could be hurt nearly as bad as going 5-7 or 6-6, with a totally moribund offense incapable of scoring in its featured offensive formation and getting anihlated by Georgia and Alabama.  Tuberville can not afford for it to look like he has lost control of his program, not with Saban enjoying a breakout season with the Tide. Trust me we were going to lose plenty of recruits anyway. The good news is we will still get plenty of recruits who want to play for Auburn and Coach Tuberville, because if things don't change and the players don't tighten it up, there will be plenty of positions open for incoming freshmen to compete for.

I am convinced we have enough talent on this team to score 20+ points on anybody and if we utilize that talent properly enough to keep oposing defenses on the field as opposed to ours, we can beat anybody. Line up our guys on the line, let them fire out at the defense from a 3 pt stance and we will see some big improvements. That change alone may be worth an extra touchdown per game.  When we get the running game going well, it will be much easier for Todd or Burns to pass.  The key to our succes going forward will be executing and not making mistakes, getting rid of the chaos surrounding Franklin and his system I think will help acheive that.