Tony Levine update

It happened with Alvin brooks and the basketball team so anything is possible

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I met him in person a couple of times and he was noting but super friendly and encouraging. I thoroughly enjoy talking to him. As a coach I have been and continue to very critical of him, and he was paid a kingā€™s ransom with results that were not what we wanted. I do think he recruited pretty well, and he was well liked by the players.

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I would go with this. His sincerity and personality would make him a great salesman or anything emphasizing interpersonal engagement.

The problem that CTL ran into was he was that at that point in his career he was not ready to be a Head Coach. He did not have the experience or the rolodex he needed. He was a good and decent man who was over his head in the job. If we had more time to be average he may or may not have been successful but given the situation we did what wee needed to do. I wish him well in whatever he plans to do.

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Exactly correct.

Mack Rhodes hiresā€¦Levineā€¦not readyā€¦Jame Dickey, never qualified !!

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He got blasted too much on the old site, with some who kept saying he set the program back a decade. It was the opposite, he did good things for the program, but just didnā€™t win enough games (also a few terrible losses that just cant happen). He took over at a time where we lost pretty much every piece of a 13 win team. A lot of coaches turned us down because they knew there would be a drop off. I donā€™t think Sumlin would have gone better than 6-6 if he stayed for 2012. At the end of the day, he left the program with the talent and in the position to win the Peach Bowl. Maybe give him credit for getting OU on the schedule too since they didnā€™t see us as a threat when he was coach, lol. The mainstream college football fan will never remember he coached here. People who dont follow the program already assume it was Briles, Sumlin, then Herman. Letā€™s hope Applewhite makes a bigger impact, or at the very least doesnā€™t become well known for screwing up the program.

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Went to a handful of open practices as a student and he always came over and greeted us. Looking back I was a it harsh on that staff on social mediaā€¦ If it was in the cards Iā€™d welcome a return in some form on the administrative side.

from his post on twitter, it was about locationā€¦
he wants to be in houston to raise his kids
ā€”side note that likely meant he was serious about staying in houston when he took the job in 13. he just gave up a 6 figure job just to be in houston

we should definitely bring him in as the special teams coach, atleast give him an analyst job .(coaching jobs that dont have official titles for recruiting)

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WHEN TONY WAS OUR COACH MY SON-N-LAW TOOK HIS SON TO A
BIRTHDAY PARTY FOR ONE OF JACOBS FRIENDS. WHEN DAVID (S-N-L)
SAW THAT CTL HAD HIS SON AT THE PARTY DAVID WALKED OVER AND
INTRODUCED HIM SELF TO COACH T.L. HE TOLD THE COACH MY FATHER
N-LAW IS A BIG COUGAR FAN. HE IS NOT DOING WELL AND HAS BEEN
SICK. CTL ASK IF DAVID HAD MY PHONE NUMBER AND HE SAID YES HE
DID. CTL SAID LETS CALL HIM . DAVID PUT HIM ON THE PHONE AND WE
TALKED FOR 20-25 MINUTES. THAT IMPRESSED ME. VERY NICE MAN AND
GREAT PERSON TO MAKE THE CALL. THOUGHT A LOT OF CTL BUT LETS
FACE IT, HE WAS PUT IN A TOUGH POSITION WITHOUT THE BACKGROUND
TO HANDLE THE JOB. GOOD MAN THOUGH.

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I wish him the best. He may have not been the best football coach in recent memory, but he is by far the best human being thatā€™s happened to work as a UH football coach in quite some time.

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Think about thisā€¦if Levine had not been able to recruit so well Herman would have probably been here at least five yearsā€¦lolā€¦and that might have been a good thingā€¦

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Probably since a guy named Bill Yeomanā€¦

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I WAS THE PRESIDENT OF THE UH TAXI SQUAD BACK IN THE CBY
DAYS. I KNEW ALL THE COACHES AND CBY WAS A FINE A HUMAN
BEING AS EVER WALK THIS EARTH. HE WAS TOUGH AND REQUIRED
HIS PLAYERS TO PERFORM. THE MAN THAT WAS REALLY TOUGH
WAS TOM WILSON. THE BEST RECRUITER WE EVER HAD A UH WAS
DON TODD. THOSE WERE GREAT TIMES FOR UH AND A LOT OF
GREAT MEMORIES FOR THIS OLD COOG. WE STARTED OUT WITH
MEETINGS AT THE RIVER OAKS COUNTRY CLUB UNTIL WE BEAT
UT A FEW TIMES AND THEIR ALUMS GOT US KICKED OUT OF TH
ROCC. WE MOVED TO A BIG HOTEL ON 610. AND THEN TO SONNY
LOOKS ON MAIN STREET. THE SCHOOL TOOK OVER THE TAXI
SQUAD AND FORMED THE COUGAR CLUB. THATS WHEN JACK
PARDEE CAME IN.

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Yes Gene, I understand that the Taxi Squad meetings were moved over to the West Loop Marriott Hotel located on Loop 610 near San Felipe in the late '70ā€™s.

Back at the time, I worked for Prudential Insurance Company which co-owned that Marriott hotel (& adjacent office building & garage) in a real estate development partnership formed by Archie Bennett, Jr., a successful UH alumni & major supporter/contributor (who at the time was Welcome Wilsonā€™s son-in-law).

I worked with and for Archie Bennett, Jr. for several years in early to mid 1980ā€™s, and Coach Bill Yeoman recently told me that he referred to Archie at the time as ā€œthe Big Arch.ā€

Manā€¦that brings back a lot of memories !!

When I joined the Taxi Squad, the meetings were at Sonny Looks Steak House and a few years later we moved to The Marriott on 610. When we were at SLā€™s, there was a meeting where CBY said the Aggie administration saved the SWC from the aggies winning because they fired their head coach who had his team set to go on a run. I canā€™t remember if that was when the aggies brought in Tom Wilson or fired Tom Wilson, but it resonated with me all these years. When I see teams impatiently fire their head coach after only 3 or 4 years of progress, but not yet there.

I just looked it up and Tom Wilson was their coach from '78 to 81. He died of cancer 2 years ago at age 72.
(Iā€™m 71 and have reached that age where I see a lot of my friends passing. It sucks.)

Other great memories - While I worked with Archie Bennett, Jr., I recall that we had Johnny Goyen (former UH cheerleader, UH student body president, Houston City Councilman and the voice of the Cougars in the Astrodome) sharing space with us in the office building adjacent to the Marriott Hotel at 1700 West Loop South.

ARCHIE AND I PLEDGE PI KAPPA ALPHA TOGETHER. I WAS THE PLEDGE
PRESIDENT. ARCHIE WAS A CHARECTER HE GAYLAND MCCOIN AND I
WENT TO THE NATIONAL CONVENTION IN WILLISMBURG AND WASHINGTON
DC. WE HAD A GREAT TIME. WE STAYED AT ARCHIES AUNT IN TULCALOSO
AL. ON THE WAY UP. RAN OUT OF MONEY ON THE WAY BACK.

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Another great story and memory. Archie lives just north of the Galleria up in Dallas. He is Chairman of Remington Hotels as well as Chairman Emeritus of the Ashford Hospitality Trust.

https://twitter.com/CoachTonyLevine/status/954773786875883522

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