Coach Derek Mason and the Peter Principle

Early September or late summer (yes, I typed summer; it's not officially fall yet) is my favorite time time of the year for sports.  It's like an explosion of goodness: U.S. Open tennis, college football, NFL, MLB playoffs looming and almost time for NBA and NHL training camps to begin.  It's a true horn of plenty!  This cornucopia of sporting goodness always gets my juices flowing and hence, I am motivated to dust off my personal blog.

Over the past year and a half, the different faces of manhood/adulthood have eroded almost all of my personal blogging time.  As a husband and father with busy career and school (MBA) endeavors, my personal blogging time has been almost zilch.  That being said, there's nothing like this time of year to change all of that, albeit for only a respite.

My favorite team, the University of Tennessee Volunteers, features a very young roster under second year head coach Butch Jones.  The youthful Vols are incredibly athletic, confident and really fun to watch. Their upcoming schedule is brutal (next game is in Norman, Oklahoma), but it's nice to see them beat two genuinely quality opponents in Utah State and Arkansas State to kickoff the season.

While I have been pleased with my Volunteers, I have been utterly stunned by the level of ineptitude exhibited by the Vanderbilt Commodores.  The previous three seasons under now-departed head coach James Franklin were historically excellent for the Dores.  A 6-7 season and two 9-4 seasons culminated with two bowl wins in two seasons had Vanderbilt fans believing that the days of being a SEC doormat were over.

Over the past week in my MBA studies, I read numerous academic articles about the Peter Principle (and subsequently wrote about it).  The principle is named after Laurence J. Peter, and it basically states that managers/candidates/employees are promoted on the merits of what they have accomplished in their current role(s) instead of valid and accurate projections of how they will fare in their new and advanced roles.  The principle sadly concludes that managers often rise to a level of incompetence.  Typically, the principle applies to managers who work and subsequently rise to their new perches all within the same organization.  For the purposes of this blog post, I am applying the principle to coaches being promoted from coordinator at one school to head coach at a different school.

When the Peter Principle is framed in a college football coaching context, it sometimes comes to fruition, and sometimes it doesn't.  When a coach spends his years working his way up the ranks as a position coach and coordinator, many of the attributes are transferable to the role of head coach.  However, there are a myriad of tasks a HC much execute and hats he must wear that are not measurable until the coach is thrown into the fire.  Unfortunately for Vanderbilt, it appears the Peter Principle is being played out in the Derek Mason era.

Mason played his college football as a defensive back at Northern Arizona from 1989-1992.  He has been coaching since 1994 at a number of stops and in a wide range of capacities.  He has coached wide receivers, defensive backs and running backs.  He has worked for small colleges, big-time programs and even in the NFL (Vikings DB coach 2007-2009).  Most recently, Mason was the associate head coach and defensive coordinator at Stanford where he had a bevy of successes.  Vanderbilt hired Mason due to his successes at Stanford as a coordinator and associate head coach, and thus far, it has not translated to successes as a head coach.  Vanderbilt has been throttled by Temple and Ole Miss by an overall tally of 78-10 AT HOME!  Through two dreadful games, Vanderbilt has played an assortment of quarterbacks, and they have not scored a single offensive touchdown.  It's been turrible (Sir Charles).

The Peter Principle is not a hard and fast rule.  The fact that someone is given a chance to be successful in his or her chosen field is what makes American elitism possible.  Conversely, in many nations, blue collar workers are stuck at that level for their entire working lives without much hope for upward mobility.  In the United States, there certainly exists roadblocks and glass ceilings (in some instances), but in theory, upward mobility is possible for everyone who works hard and makes their own breaks.  That's exactly what James Franklin did.  Franklin has a similar coaching background as Mason, and Franklin's first head coaching opportunity was at Vanderbilt.  Unlike Mason, Franklin was not promoted to a level of incompetence.  Rather, he was promoted to a role in which he thrived, and he will continue to thrive at Penn State.  Sure, he rubbed a lot of people the wrong way while at Vandy (UT fans and Todd Grantham), but he was highly successful at a place that hasn't experienced a ton of wins over the years.  Franklin is the antithesis of the Peter Principle.

Coach Mason seems like a real stand up guy, and he has been very successful in his past roles.  I don't doubt whatsoever that is a quality man, but it seems he has been promoted way over his head in a Derek Dooley-esque fashion.  It's only been two games; maybe he can turn it around.  Vandy just looks so putrid, and their fan base seems to have been zapped of all the positive energy that Franklin infused into the program.  It's hard to believe it has fallen so fast.