Coaches are hired to be fired.
Bob Stoops, long-time head football coach of the University of Oklahoma, inverted that dictum. He retired on his own terms. After 17 years of winning, including recent back-to-back Big 12 titles as well as a national title, Stoops is stepping aside.
“The coaching life is like a relay race,” said Stoops at press conference, “and I’m thankful for my turn and am confident as I pass the baton.”
The 56-year old Stoops is replaced by 33-year-old Lincoln Riley. According to David Boren, president of the University of Oklahoma, Stoops’ “decision to step down at this time was motivated partly by his belief that he has the right successor already in place.”
Stoops is a coaching lifer. He is the son of a coach and his brothers are coaches, too, so when someone like him steps aside questions of why arise. If we take his statements at face value, it’s a lifestyle choice. Like a CEO, being the head coach of a major college football program is a 24/7 job. Unlike a CEO, the head coach is always recruiting new talent, making trips to the homes of 16 and 17 year olds to persuade them to play for his team. And again like a CEO, he is held accountable for the behavior of every one of his players on and off the field.
Recently Stoops has come under criticism for allowing Joe Mixon, a star running back, to play after hitting a woman in an off-campus bar. While Mixon did sit for his freshman year, he was allowed back on the team. The incident caused further criticism when video footage of the event came to light years later and showed Mixon coldcocking the woman. Despite that video revelation, Stoops allowed Mixon to play in their bowl game. Mixon has since turned pro. Whether Stoops’ decision on Mixon weighed on his decision to retire is not publicly known, but it does cast a light on the weight of scrutiny that college coaches face. Regardless, Stoops, like his peers, very well paid (over $5.5 million in 2016) and deserves no pity.
Stoops’ decision to retire does, however, raise questions about the nature of when and why leaders retire. While Stoops did not reveal insights into his personal decision-making he did note, and university president Boren echoed, that his successor is in place so why wait longer? That statement in itself is noteworthy because it highlights something that happens rarely in sports but does occur more frequently in business.
We judge leaders by what they accomplish, but not enough attention is paid to their leaving. A leader is judged by what she accomplishes but also by the condition in which she leaves her organization. As it applies to Stoops, he is a proven winner and will be followed by someone whom he and his colleagues have groomed to be his successor.
A leader’s legacy is a sum of pluses and minuses. Ideally you want the pluses to outweigh the minuses, so when a leader retires from an organization that is thriving and is secure in the knowledge that his successor is ready to carry on, he can then be judged to have done a great job.
Leaving a top spot is never easy, especially when you have held the position for a long time. But when you know you have done your best, there is nothing more to say.
Or as used to be said upon the death of a king: “The king is dead, long live the king.”
