FWIW, all smart ass comments aside, I'm not entirely convinced of the "good will" line of reasoning. This is such a bottom line business that really nothing else matters besides winning. It's why I laff like an idiot hyena at the "OKG" shit; because nobody should GAF about it, and nobody really does. Winning fixes er'thing.
I don't think the argument is Ewatarded or anything. It's chintresting, but I'm not convinced it's an important thing. It sounds made up. Talk me into it, but before trying, consider how everyone around here fawned all over Pete's smart ass media retorts when Washington was winning this shitty little dreck conference. Nobody fucking cared, and in fact, they ate it up like fucking candy.
Again, convince me. I'm listening. For real.
When I talk about goodwill, it's how a string of good years often can lead to having a bad year explained away as being a massive outlier ... a "nothing to see here" type of situation.
In some respects, Pete has found himself in this position with the results of the last 3 years. It's why for this year up until yesterday it was largely easy to explain away most of this year's disappointments. Cal was a strange game with some execution errors really coming back to haunt ... not to mention having a lead that you couldn't close on in the last 2 minutes. Against Oregon it was a game that could have gone either way with a handful of plays and youthful mistakes really being an issue. Stanford was a game that the entire team didn't show up to. A concerning element of the program has been that one of those games happens each year ... but by itself whatever. But everything came to a head yesterday against Utah. Getting to halftime up 1 was the worst the situation could have been. The mismanagement of the end of the half was giving Utah free points. Just poorly managed. The execution errors popping up all over the place. The lack of on-field leadership. Everything came to a head and did so in a way that it's painfully obvious to even the casual fan.
Pete's not getting fired ... but what is he going to do about it. Is he going to give the same answers he's given all year? Is he going to run his staff back? Is he going to recognize he needs to adapt and change because the conference has caught up to him? The average fan (including myself) can't tell you how to run a program ... but what we can say is that we know from experience that insanity is doing the same thing over and over without change.
I think to what kind of goodwill Mark Helfrich built up at Oregon after getting to a national title game. Then within a few years, things get hard and challenging with no answers to address. That goodwill got eroded and it went from "we know what you're capable of" to "we don't think you can do it again."
Ultimately, it is a "what have you done with me business" ... results matter. They will always matter.
The thing with Pete that really concerns me at this point is how rigid he is in talking about process. Process matters ... I 100% get that and am a believer in it. But at the same time results matter as well. Excellent process is the foundation to delivering exceptional results. When you don't have the results though, it's fair to start questioning the process. It's just a little too much head in the sand to say that the results are unlucky and the solution is to double down on the process.