ESPN published an article about Kalen DeBoer succeeding Nick Saban and Justin Fuente shared some perspective on why it didn't work for him with the Hokies.
https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/40858871/alabama-coach-...
Fuente said that Beamer couldn't have been more supportive but that maintaining the right alignment at the university among administrators and others in the department was the most difficult challenge.
"There wasn't one second that I felt Coach Beamer wished he were still coaching. He'd worked his butt off to make the program what it was," said Fuente, who is out of coaching and lives with his family just outside Dallas. "He was never a hindrance. Hell, we lived in the same neighborhood. His wife brought my kids cookies."
But with any coaching change of that stature, Fuente said, it's inevitable that some people at the university never get on board.
"If you don't have alignment, clear alignment, then you have no shot anywhere. And it doesn't matter if that's at Alabama or anywhere else," he said. "I made my share of mistakes and I don't regret being there or any of my experiences there, but there is going to be some difficulty along the way."
Fuente said probably the most important aspect for DeBoer is making sure the people above him mandate that the "things that need to be tweaked are tweaked." Saban has said many times that former AD Mal Moore was invaluable in helping set things up at Alabama where Saban could coach and recruit and not be bogged down with outside issues.
Joe Pendry, Saban's first offensive line coach at Alabama and one of Saban's closest confidants, used to refer to it as "having the stroke."
Not everybody is going to have that stroke, but Fuente said having the president, chancellor, board members and athletic director all rowing in the same direction is critical.
"And if not, it's death by a thousand paper cuts," Fuente said. "Any one thing is not that big a deal, but hundreds of them -- time after time -- just sink you."
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