This whole debate is riddled with the doog narrative that in a top 10 program coaches cannot be expected to be great recruiters and great position coaches.
This is obviously not the case and Saban would never put up with it (and—in fact, he doesn't). The funny thing is that people who think Saban is the bee's knees are here arguing against what he does.
There is no god damn reason to keep anyone on this fucking mediocre offense. How could there be?
The defense needs a massive talent upgrade to be elite.
What would Saban do? Saban only has guys who are great position coaches and great recruiters.
Any arguing for low standards are just doogs trying not to get their hopes up.
And for the 'recruiting doesn't matter' crowd - DIAFF. Saban spends all his fucking time recruiting.
Not wanting to burn things to the ground doesn't mean that you're Doogish or have low standards ... as you've said elsewhere if the changes made in the offseason were 1) replacing Smith, 2) replacing Malloe, and 3) having a 10th coach in place to take over for Lake whenever it is that he leaves would make you super excited with the offseason.
It's obvious that you'd want to have a coaching full of elite recruiters and coaches. The reality though is that there aren't that many assistant coaches that fit that bill. And, when you do have those that fall in that category like Jimmy Lake, at some point you're in a position where they likely are going to leave to advance their career. You obviously take what you can get in those situations but that's also a line where you're walking a state of constant change on your staff.
Let's talk about talent on both sides of the ball ...
1) The defense over the last 2 years has largely been good enough to compete at a national level ... no question that we could use more edge rushing ... no question that DL recruiting may put us in a bad position in a couple of years ... but by in large the defense is playing at a level that you can work with at a national level.
2) We know that Browning is likely not a national level QB ... we have 3 QBs coming in over the next 2 classes (and a 4th if Eason transfers here) that have the tools to be better than Browning ... we've been fine at the RB position and the future also looks bright here ... between the 2017 and 2018 classes we're bringing in a total of 5 high end WRs ... at the TE position, bringing in back to back classes of Bryant/Culp is outstanding ... OL recruiting is getting better with Huff
The margins for the program right now are small ... that's what they are at the elite level. Small differences mean everything. Before the season while previewing, one of the things that I called out was how the kicking game may bite UW in the ass. It did basically 2x this year and almost did against Utah. Talking about the kicking game isn't sexy. It's a lot more fun to talk recruiting and which coaches aren't doing their job. But kicking is a detail. It's a detail when the margins are small that gets magnified.
I'd love to be wrong on this someday, but the history of our program suggests that we will never have the kind of talent on our roster that a USC, Alabama, Ohio State, Oklahoma, etc. have. A far more comparable example is Clemson as you've pointed out numerous times. That's doable. And yes, we need to finish out our classes just a little bit better to get the numbers that we want there. But it's doable. But getting to the Alabama and SC levels ... that's just not likely and we shouldn't be holding ourselves to that standard.