Seth Littrell Sighting

[Mean Green 93-98]

Seth Littrell has the best winning percentage of any coach since the Hayden Fry era.  We may feel like he underachieved, but apparently his tenure represents our ceiling.

[rcade]

29 minutes ago, tmjerm said:

In what way was he bitter?

When you leave without making a single public statement to anybody, not even one thanking the players or expressing any gratitude for a seven-year opportunity that sends you out of town as a multimillionaire, you're bitter.

Seth Littrell got big support in Denton. Only one coach in the conference had a higher salary. There was even a bowl game created for his team by an alumnus in 2021 so the Mean Green wouldn't miss a bowl at 6-6.

People are going to say Littrell didn't owe us any comment after being fired. That is true. It is also true he was as bitter as a dank IPA.

[rcade]

16 minutes ago, Mean Green 93-98 said:

Seth Littrell has the best winning percentage of any coach since the Hayden Fry era.  We may feel like he underachieved, but apparently his tenure represents our ceiling.

There isn't an FBS program that would accept a ceiling of .500 with losses in almost every bowl game, conference championship game and big OOC game.

[rcade]

33 minutes ago, GoGreenBeans said:

Maybe I missed it, but I don’t remember him being publicly bitter about the firing. Getting fired seems like a good reason to be bitter though lol

If I fired you and had to pay you $1.6 million to do nothing for the next 12 months, would you be bitter, or would it be the greatest thing that happened to you other than the birth of your children or the day you first tried Sriracha hot sauce?

[Mean Green 93-98]

19 minutes ago, rcade said:

There isn't an FBS program that would accept a ceiling of .500 with losses in almost every bowl game, conference championship game and big OOC game.

I wasn't pointing out Littrell's ceiling, I was pointing out our ceiling, and it's a simple fact.  And (1) yes, there are plenty of programs who would be thrilled to exchange what they had from the 2016-2022 seasons with what we had, (2) the other programs don't historically suck as bad as we have the last 40+ years.

Edited December 30, 2023 by Mean Green 93-98

[rcade]

2 minutes ago, Mean Green 93-98 said:

I wasn't pointing out Littrell's ceiling, I was pointing out our ceiling, and it's a simple fact.

It's not our ceiling. Darrell Dickey's team had a four-year run where the Mean Green won our conference every year, went to a bowl every year and won our first bowl game since 1946. It also included 8- and 9-win seasons during an era when UNT was playing body bag OOC games to fund athletics. Seth Littrell had only one season approaching that level of success.

[GoGreenBeans]

18 minutes ago, rcade said:

If I fired you and had to pay you $1.6 million to do nothing for the next 12 months, would you be bitter, or would it be the greatest thing that happened to you other than the birth of your children or the day you first tried Sriracha hot sauce?

You had me on board and then lost me at Sriracha hot sauce

[Mean Green 93-98]

3 minutes ago, rcade said:

It's not our ceiling. Darrell Dickey's team had a four-year run where the Mean Green won our conference every year, went to a bowl every year and won our first bowl game since 1946. It also included 8- and 9-win seasons during an era when UNT was playing body bag OOC games to fund athletics. Seth Littrell had only one season approaching that level of success.

You're cherry-picking.  Yes, Darrell Dickey's best year was better than Littrell's best year.  But for overall tenure, Littrell still had the higher win percentage.

[rcade]

5 minutes ago, Mean Green 93-98 said:

You're cherry-picking.  Yes, Darrell Dickey's best year was better than Littrell's best year.

My comment was about four consecutive years. Overall win percentage isn't the best metric for FBS coaching success. To be good you also need conference titles and big wins out of conference. Seth laid more eggs out of conference than Mother Goose.

[NT93]

When the argument over who was best is between Darrell Dickey and Seth Littrell…well that’s kind of like being the tallest midget (or possibly something more politically correct).

So I guess that kind of makes @Mean Green 93-98 correct.

Edited December 30, 2023 by NT93

[Mean Green 93-98]

33 minutes ago, rcade said:

My comment was about four consecutive years. Overall win percentage isn't the best metric for FBS coaching success. To be good you also need conference titles and big wins out of conference. Seth laid more eggs out of conference than Mother Goose.

I think you're entirely missing my point.  If you want to say Dickey had the better coaching tenure, fine.  So a coach with a 0.396 winning percentage represents our ceiling.  Either way, it's clear to those who have followed North Texas for any time that our ceiling is not very high, despite what we might want it to be or believe it can be.

[LongJim]

[Venson]

I don't hate Seth because I always knew that his heart was not here. His heart was always with OU and I don't blame the man because that is his alma mater and where he always wanted to go since he was a child. He was hoping his success ay UNT would lead him to OU as the HC, but it did not. He ended up there as an OC. If we could find a great HC that was also a UNT alumni, we wouldn't be upset if his heart was always on coaching UNT even if he was coaching at UTSA or SMU to get to UNT. I really wish that PC got some good coaching experience other than the RB coach because I know that he loves UNT.

[rcade]

I did not expect any Mean Green fans to take the position that Seth Littrell's record is our ceiling in football.

If I thought that way I'd be getting in line to drink Guyana Punch.

[Cr1028]

9 hours ago, rcade said:

It's not our ceiling. Darrell Dickey's team had a four-year run where the Mean Green won our conference every year, went to a bowl every year and won our first bowl game since 1946. It also included 8- and 9-win seasons during an era when UNT was playing body bag OOC games to fund athletics. Seth Littrell had only one season approaching that level of success.

Usually I agree with you Rogers but the early Sun Belt and the collapse of Big West football was the absolute best thing to happen to Dickey’s NT career. 

From October 13, 2001 to September 10, 2005,  Dickey’s teams won 26 consecutive conference games. The streak was bookended by wins over the MUTS. The week before the streak started we lost to 2-9 conference mate ULM. The game that ended the streak was a loss to 4-7 Troy. The combined record for the 26 teams run through was 99-203. If you exclude the 26 losses from NT, their combined record was 99-177. Of those 26 wins, just three came against bowl-eligible teams.

Additionally, we lost to future conference mates Troy at the end of ‘01 and FAU at the start of ‘04 which would’ve shrunken the streak to 13 games if they had been in our conference at the time.

[rcade]

7 hours ago, Cr1028 said:

From October 13, 2001 to September 10, 2005,  Dickey’s teams won 26 consecutive conference games. The streak was bookended by wins over the MUTS. The week before the streak started we lost to 2-9 conference mate ULM. The game that ended the streak was a loss to 4-7 Troy. The combined record for the 26 teams run through was 99-203. If you exclude the 26 losses from NT, their combined record was 99-177. Of those 26 wins, just three came against bowl-eligible teams.

Additionally, we lost to future conference mates Troy at the end of ‘01 and FAU at the start of ‘04 which would’ve shrunken the streak to 13 games if they had been in our conference at the time.

Under this kind of thinking nothing we achieved in the Sun Belt could ever matter because of the teams in it.

Dickey's team lined up against our opponents 26 times in a row and beat them. We had some of the most exciting moments in my 34 years as a UNT fan during that run. I am not going to downgrade the achievement because the Sun Belt was the Sun Belt (which it isn't anymore, go figure). And I certainly don't want to act like we lost conference games because of two games against future conference foes. Pride in the Mean Green doesn't have to be as complicated as precalculus.

[UNTLifer]

On 12/30/2023 at 10:03 AM, tmjerm said:

Seth is a helluva coach.  Some of y’all are still salty and it’s gross.  Under achieved here in the long run, sure.  But he was always pure class and absolutely elevated the program.  We eventually plateaued and needed a change, but I’m grateful for what he did here.  Multiple things can be true at one time and I wish our fanbase had enough class to make him feel appreciated. 

Amen.  He was upset to leave. Probably the only Coach in our modern era to feel that way. 

[MeanGreenTexan]

On 12/30/2023 at 2:30 PM, rcade said:

When you leave without making a single public statement to anybody, not even one thanking the players or expressing any gratitude for a seven-year opportunity that sends you out of town as a multimillionaire, you're bitter.

Seth Littrell got big support in Denton. Only one coach in the conference had a higher salary. There was even a bowl game created for his team by an alumnus in 2021 so the Mean Green wouldn't miss a bowl at 6-6.

People are going to say Littrell didn't owe us any comment after being fired. That is true. It is also true he was as bitter as a dank IPA.

I know I’d be so very chipper & ready to speak highly of my former employer immediately after being fired.  Obviously you agree!  </sarcasm>
 

On 12/30/2023 at 2:32 PM, rcade said:

There isn't an FBS program that would accept a ceiling of .500 with losses in almost every bowl game, conference championship game and big OOC game.

I KNOW you’ve been around here long enough to pine for .500 ball like the rest of us were during Dodgeball.

You wanna know why we don’t accept sub-.500 ball now?   Seth Littrell’s early success.  Plain & simple.  When he could no longer meet those standards, he needed to go.  That doesn’t make him “bitter”.

[Meangreen Fight]

On 12/29/2023 at 7:48 PM, peanuts104 said:

Screw SL. Objectively bad head coach and apparently a mediocre OC, though *to be fair* they did lose their starting QB to the portal, which is also really telling imo.

I didn’t log a response because they very valid opinions.  I wouldn’t call him a bad head coach but absolutely ordinary.  Never understood the confidence in him viewing his resume before he got here.   And I think we will see what he really is an OC next season.  

[Meangreen Fight]

On 12/30/2023 at 12:00 PM, Cr1028 said:

Littrell gave PC his first college coaching job. That is one reason to not hate the man into perpetuity. He didn’t take us from 7-6 to 1-11. He took us from 1-11 to 7-6. Some of you forget that.

 

On 12/30/2023 at 10:03 AM, tmjerm said:

Seth is a helluva coach.  Some of y’all are still salty and it’s gross.  Under achieved here in the long run, sure.  But he was always pure class and absolutely elevated the program.  We eventually plateaued and needed a change, but I’m grateful for what he did here.  Multiple things can be true at one time and I wish our fanbase had enough class to make him feel appreciated. 

I am not salty at him at all.  But he is just an ordinary coach nothing special at all.  The record is what it is.  Nothing special, not horrible but nothing special.  How he performed is what I expect BARE MINIMUM from any coach given the resources relative to his conference peers.  He CONSISTENTLY came up short.  And many times those conferences peers operating with less out coached him.  That is just the fact.  So I remember 1-11 but it is not some monumental accomplishment to go 7-6 given all the resources to be better than that.  Decent man, consummate, professional but that should be standard for any coach who gets an FBS head coaching job.  I appreciate that he did not leave the program in  shambles.  

Edited January 2 by Meangreen Fight

[NT80]

1 hour ago, Meangreen Fight said:

I am not salty at him at all.  But he is just an ordinary coach nothing special at all.  The record is what it is.  Nothing special, not horrible but nothing special.  How he performed is what I expect BARE MINIMUM from any coach given the resources relative to his conference peers.  He CONSISTENTLY came up short.  And many time those operating with less out coached him.  That is just the fact.  So I remember 1-11 but it is not some monumental accomplishment to go 7-6 given all the resources to be better than that.  Decent man, consummate, professional but that should be standard for any coach who gets an FBS head coaching job.  I appreciate that he did not leave the program in  shambles.  

Yes, he never talked bad about the program but didn't communicate well with the fanbase.  He elevated us from 1-11, but couldn't take us to consistent winning and was stuck at .500. 

His looking to jump to K-State at the peak of his tenure here was expected.  After he declined it, I believe he lost interest in us. 

It was time for us to go in another direction for the kind of money we were paying him.

 

Edited January 1 by NT80

[Travis]

On 12/31/2023 at 10:10 AM, UNTLifer said:

Amen.  He was upset to leave. Probably the only Coach in our modern era to feel that way. 

I recall a very salty DD leaving.  Black jerseys and all. 

[UNTLifer]

7 minutes ago, Travis said:

I recall a very salty DD leaving.  Black jerseys and all. 

I meant upset in that he didn’t want to leave. 

[Wag Tag]

Twins stay he is still our coach today.  

[Travis]

9 minutes ago, UNTLifer said:

I meant upset in that he didn’t want to leave. 

I didn’t get the impression DD wanted to leave at all.