Chow hiring official and more thoughts

I already blogged about this earlier, but it’s official now, as a press release has been posted on the official site. A quote from head coach Rick Neuheisel:

“Norm brings great offensive expertise to the job,” said Neuheisel. “He has enjoyed tremendous success throughout his career and has been the architect of some of the most explosive offenses in college football history. We are thrilled that Norm has decided to become a Bruin. What youngster who plays offense in high school wouldn’t be excited about playing for a school with Norm Chow as its offensive coordinator?”

The more I think about this, the more I’m convinced that this is going to work. As the same old ESPN.com article points out, Pete Carroll and Chow had a very limited relationship before Chow came to USC. That worked out well.

And Chow chose to come to UCLA, he wasn’t forced to. So the issue of him being an offensive coordinator at a school that turned him down for head coach is a non-issue. Chow is old enough and has enough money to retire or take a year off if he wanted to. But Chow wanted to coach at UCLA. That means a lot.

No, I don’t expect UCLA to have great success in 2008, considering the Bruins have a tough schedule and most of the starters from last season’s team gone. Hell, Pete Carroll and Norm Chow went 6-6 in their first season at USC, and for a UCLA comparison, Ben Howland had a losing record in his first season as head coach. But with this coaching staff, the pieces and potential for huge success is in place — something UCLA football fans haven’t been able to realistically say in a while.

(Again, major hat-tip to Bruins Nation for finding the press release first.)

Lawrence Tynes changed his life with one kick

Going into last night’s NFC Championship game, I had no real rooting interest except to see the weather get as cold as possible.

That changed after Lawrence Tynes missed the potential game-winning field goal at the end of regulation, his second-straight miss in the fourth quarter.

Had the Giants ended up losing in overtime, Tynes’ life would have never been the same. (I’m not the only one who thinks so, Larry Brown Sports had very similar feelings to me.) I know it’s just a football game, but football means so much to people in this country that Tynes would have never been able to live it down. Giants fans would hate him forever, and football fans everywhere would associate Tynes with being a huge goat, along the lines of Scott Norwood. Everyone would have reminded of his huge let-down when it mattered the most.

But Tynes was given a third chance to win the game, his longest field goal of the night — 47 yards — and he nailed it.

Unless you’re a Green Bay Packers fan (or a Giants hater), it’s hard not to feel good for him. Lawrence Tynes joins instead joins the very forgettable list of almost goats who were saved, along with Byung-Hyun Kim.

70 days away

There’s 70 days left until that best day of the year, MLB Opening Day.

70 is also the number of runs Mark Grudzielanek scored in 2007. While that stat is completely useless, I just needed an excuse to write about Mark Grudzielanek because of his freakishly long last name. Just look at it how long the name is on the back of his jersey:

Grudzielanek has had some good seasons too. In 1999 as a Dodger, Grudzielanek hit .326 (6th best in the NL), which helped him have an OPS+ of 110. In 2003 as a Cub, he hit .314, and in obscurity in Kansas City last year, hit .302.

But really, just look at that name:

70 more days people, until we get to see guys named Grudzielanek and Mientkiewicz and Duchscherer take the field.

Norm Chow named UCLA’s offensive coordinator

UPDATE: It’s official now. Chow’s coming to UCLA.

While it’s not up on the official site yet, both the LA Daily News and ESPN.com are reporting that UCLA has hired Norm Chow as its new offensive coordinator.

Wow. I shouldn’t have to tell that this is an amazing hire. While I objected to Chow becoming UCLA’s head coach, I’m thrilled with him becoming the offensive coordinator. Just look at his track record, he’s arguably one of the best offensive coordinators in the history of college football.

I found this in an ESPN article about Chow written in 2001 (before Carson Palmer and Matt Leinart became stars under Chow):

In 18 seasons as offensive coordinator, Chow coached six of the top 12 career passing efficiency leaders and 11 quarterbacks who rank among the top 30 in NCAA history for single-season passing yardage. The Cougars scored 30 or more points in 106 of 181 games. His list of pupils include Robbie Bosco, Steve Young and 1990 Heisman Trophy winner Ty Detmer.

Chow coached Philip Rivers, who broke seven school passing records and was named ACC Freshman of the Year last season. The Wolfpack offense finished second in the ACC behind Florida State (396.2 yards per game), with Rivers throwing for 3,054 yards, 25 touchdowns and 10 interceptions.

That would be impressive even without considering what he did at USC, where he built probably the best offense of the decade around Palmer, Leinart, Reggie Bush and LenDale White.

A great job by Rick Neuheisel for convincing Chow to come to UCLA. It probably wasn’t easy to sell Chow on coming to coach at UCLA after spending the last three years in the NFL.

The season opener can’t come soon enough, and it’s still seven months away (Aug. 30). Major hat-tip to Bruins Nation for alerting me to the good news.