Florida State has fired Willie Taggart effective immediately

The Willie Taggart era is over in Tallahassee after almost two short years following an embarrasing, blowout loss to a not very good Miami team. It was a game that looked eerily similar to 2018 with an egregious amount of pre-snap penalties, horrendous special teams, and coaching decisions that are the result of being disorganized. How many times can you call a timeout on a special teams play because you only have ten men on the field?

Florida State is 4-5 and on the cusp of missing a bowl game for the second straight year. It became readily apparent that FSU was a rebuilding not reloading job after last year but for the second straight year FSU is about to go 0-3 vs Clemson, Miami, & UF with a host of other embarrassing losses in the interim.

Willie Taggart’s record was 9-12 (6-9 in the ACC) and that simply isn’t going to get it done.

It’d be passable if FSU was showing significant progress in all three phases but the offense & defense remain undisciplined with pre and post-snap penalties, and the special teams remain awful.

When the same problems from 2018 continue to rear their ugly-head in 2019 after overhauling most of the offensive staff you start to wonder if the problem starts up top.

The biggest question is why now for a decision that’s going to cost FSU at least 17 million dollars?

We’ll have more on this question later on in the week but a lame-duck coach sticking around for another year might crush the local economy. The advent of college town as another revenue source for a fairly young football program/athletic program in general would lead credence to the idea that saving five million a year from now by keeping Taggart an extra year would actually do more damage than the extra year paid out by firing him now.

One thing that FSU fans should keep in mind is that the next coach isn’t about immediate national relevancy; it’s about getting back to respectability. About FSU becoming a disciplined, well-coached football team.

You can fire one coach in two years and have a decent shot of maintaining your reputation as a top-tier job that coaches want to come and work for but if you you fire two coaches in a four-year span you risk becoming Tennessee. The next hire doesn’t have to be perfect but whomever they are they will have to be in Tallahassee until at least 2023 in my opinion.

Personally, I really wanted Willie Taggart to work out. How many coaches you know sign a contract only to immediately give back to the program? But you can’t always get what you want and after 21 games it’s clear that Willie Taggart isn’t the answer to Florida State’s football problem.