Did anyone hear the bell ringing, tucked inside Baylor's official announcement that Spavital will be offensive coordinator AND quarterbacks coach???

As the announcement added:

"Shawn Bell, who spent the 2021-23 seasons as Baylor's quarterbacks coach, will shift to coach the BU tight ends in 2024. Bell previously coached Baylor's tight ends in 2020, after working the 2018-19 seasons as the BU offensive line coach. Bell, who set 28 Baylor school records as a QB during his career from 2003-06, joined the Baylor staff as an analyst in 2017 following eight seasons as a high school head coach in the state."

Nice catch

Why is Bell even still here to ask quite candidly. He has coached every position on offense practically over the past seven seasons.

Some BMD must have hit big on a parlay when he hit Ziegler with that pass and owes him .

Stefano DiMera said:

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Some BMD must have hit big on a parlay when he hit Ziegler with that pass and owes him .

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I've heard it mentioned that his family has some big money friends within the athletic department that pushed to get him hired.

This is starting to feel like the situation where you are forced to hire the owner's nephew, and you're just moving him around from department to department to see where he can do the least amount of damage

And he's been bad at all of them

I don't recall Spavital's offenses focusing on tight ends, so instead of the receivers transferring out as people were initially expecting at the end of the sesaon it will probably be a few of the 18 tight ends (seemingly) we signed over the past few years. Maybe Bell can keep Dabney in tow, who is the 1 receiving tight end we should definitely hold on to.

I think it's likely Bell's bosses -- who have retained him at every opportunity -- know better than posters here how proficient he is or is not at his job.

Stefano DiMera]Some BMD must have hit big on a parlay when he hit Ziegler with that pass and owes him .


To be fair, it was an important pass. Second only to RG3s pass beating Oklahoma.

I thought his bosses were destroyers of programs you said. Now they make good calls or at least when it comes to Bell they do?

bear2be2 said:

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I think it's likely Bell's bosses -- who have retained him at every opportunity -- know better than posters here how proficient he is or is not at his job.

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anytime you disagree with someone on this board, you try to shut down discussion by playing the "that's not polite conversation" card. Please list all of Bell's accomplishments starting with the season he was hired. Surely there are so many to choose from? He has coached offensive line, tight ends, and quarterbacks, so there should be many accomplishments to choose from throughout his career at Baylor

PartyBear said:

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I thought his bosses were destroyers of programs you said. Now they make good calls or at least when it comes to Bell they do?

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Let's see if he can list at least 10 objective, non-speculative accomplishments of any of the positions that Bell has coached at Baylor.

What's funny is that Mack Rhodes used that exact same excuse to retain Dave. "you guys don't know about all of the good things happening behind the scenes that just aren't showing on the win/loss column"

2028: "Shawn Bell will now be the Assistant Backup Long Snapper Coach"

If Bell is required to be our football staff, that kind of crap is going to result in us not making a good hire in our next HC search. This type of crap with another former player having to be in the staff sent us into and sustained the dark ages.

BaylorLit 01 said:

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2028: "Shawn Bell will now be the Assistant Backup Long Snapper Coach"

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It is so weird how the guy is above critique. I'm going to start calling him Teflon Shawn because of his ability to keep his job and still have people stick up for him

PartyBear said:

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If Bell is required to be our football staff, that kind of crap is going to result in us not making a good hire in our next HC search. This type of crap with another former player having to be in the staff sent us into and sustained the dark ages.

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All of Dave's failures were pinned on Grimes. I don't consider the replacement of an offensive coordinator that big of an overhaul TBH. Defensive coordinator, strength and conditioning, and linebackers coach needed to go as well as a bare minimum

1. I get not liking anyone on our staff. They've been bad overall.
2. Asking for proof Bell is good is like asking for proof Bell is bad. They're both impossible as we don't really know what he does and what he's been told to do. It's all just guessing.
3. I'd imagine a guy like Bell is useful to a guy that's never worked here before as he and his friends will know people locally and at Baylor. That alone might justify keeping Bell on staff in a relatively meaningless role to a new OC.


Who knows, who cares? It's sink or swim time for Spav. I hope he does great. If not, none of these guys will work here in a year.

Krieg said:

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1. I get not liking anyone on our staff. They've been bad overall.
2. Asking for proof Bell is good is like asking for proof Bell is bad. They're both impossible as we don't really know what he does and what he's been told to do. It's all just guessing.
3. I'd imagine a guy like Bell is useful to a guy that's never worked here before as he and his friends will know people locally and at Baylor. That alone might justify keeping Bell on staff in a relatively meaningless role to a new OC.


Who knows, who cares? It's sink or swim time for Spav. I hope he does great. If not, none of these guys will work here in a year.

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The fact that no one who thinks he's good can provide evidence of the good things he's done is evidence that he's not that good, wouldn't you say? He has been here for YEARS now, so there's got to be some skins on the wall that he can show for his time here. That's not unreasonable to ask

Bell is not bad!

This program now deserves to be playing UMHB and Howard Payne as conference games. Maybe that's been the goal since 2016.

No Quarterback said:

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Krieg said:

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1. I get not liking anyone on our staff. They've been bad overall.
2. Asking for proof Bell is good is like asking for proof Bell is bad. They're both impossible as we don't really know what he does and what he's been told to do. It's all just guessing.
3. I'd imagine a guy like Bell is useful to a guy that's never worked here before as he and his friends will know people locally and at Baylor. That alone might justify keeping Bell on staff in a relatively meaningless role to a new OC.


Who knows, who cares? It's sink or swim time for Spav. I hope he does great. If not, none of these guys will work here in a year.

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The fact that no one who thinks he's good can provide evidence of the good things he's done is evidence that he's not that good, wouldn't you say? He has been here for YEARS now, so there's got to be some skins on the wall that he can show for his time here. That's not unreasonable to ask

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I don't follow recruiting, at all, but maybe they think he is an asset in that front.

Again, I don't really care, but it's not like we can point to a reason he's bad apart from the offense itself being awful. That might be fair, but a TE coach in an Air Raid offense is barely a coach anyway.

chorne68 said:

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Bell is not bad!

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and I've seen leprechauns mermaids! I mean, I didn't have my camera with me at the time, but trust me

BaylorLit 01 said:

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2028: "Shawn Bell will now be the Assistant Backup Long Snapper Coach"

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This is side-splittingly funny, I don't care which side of the debate one is on!

canoso said:

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BaylorLit 01 said:

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2028: "Shawn Bell will now be the Assistant Backup Long Snapper Coach"

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This is side-splittingly funny, I don't care which side of the debate one is on!

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Agreed, I gave it a star!

BellCountyBear said:

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This program now deserves to be playing UMHB and Howard Payne as conference games. Maybe that's been the goal since 2016.

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No need to bring UMHB name into the same sentence as Baylor....We had an opportunity to hire Coach Fredenburg and didn't....He built that program up and it's been successful for almost 2 decades...

DanaDane said:

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I don't recall Spavital's offenses focusing on tight ends, so instead of the receivers transferring out as people were initially expecting at the end of the sesaon it will probably be a few of the 18 tight ends (seemingly) we signed over the past few years. Maybe Bell can keep Dabney in tow, who is the 1 receiving tight end we should definitely hold on to.

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There's a video out there that has him describing how WV got way more effecient by utilizing the Tight Ends more.

chorne68 said:

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Bell is not bad!

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Who's he successfully developed? He'd fyuck up a Polaroid.

No Quarterback said:

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Krieg said:

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1. I get not liking anyone on our staff. They've been bad overall.
2. Asking for proof Bell is good is like asking for proof Bell is bad. They're both impossible as we don't really know what he does and what he's been told to do. It's all just guessing.
3. I'd imagine a guy like Bell is useful to a guy that's never worked here before as he and his friends will know people locally and at Baylor. That alone might justify keeping Bell on staff in a relatively meaningless role to a new OC.


Who knows, who cares? It's sink or swim time for Spav. I hope he does great. If not, none of these guys will work here in a year.

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The fact that no one who thinks he's good can provide evidence of the good things he's done is evidence that he's not that good, wouldn't you say? He has been here for YEARS now, so there's got to be some skins on the wall that he can show for his time here. That's not unreasonable to ask

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Any case against Shawn Bell as a position coach is massively overstated. His O-line was infinitely better than his direct successor's, his tight ends (young Sims and Dabney) were bright spots in an otherwise dismal offensive season in 2020 and his record as the quarterback coach was mixed but hardly terrible.

He became a punching bag here for some inexplicable reason. But if he wasn't considered an asset he'd have been let go on any number of occasions before now. Instead, he was hired and promoted by Rhule and retained multiple times by Aranda, who is literally coaching for his job next season.

I'm with Krieg. I don't really care one way or another. This whole staff is as likely as not to be fired at some point next season. But those who are convinced that Shawn Bell sucks at his job and is some sort of albatross around this staff's neck have no more information on which to base that opinion than folks like me, who feel he's likely an average, run-of-the-mill position coach.

I'm told Bell is there for recruiting

bear2be2 said:

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No Quarterback said:

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Krieg said:

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1. I get not liking anyone on our staff. They've been bad overall.
2. Asking for proof Bell is good is like asking for proof Bell is bad. They're both impossible as we don't really know what he does and what he's been told to do. It's all just guessing.
3. I'd imagine a guy like Bell is useful to a guy that's never worked here before as he and his friends will know people locally and at Baylor. That alone might justify keeping Bell on staff in a relatively meaningless role to a new OC.


Who knows, who cares? It's sink or swim time for Spav. I hope he does great. If not, none of these guys will work here in a year.

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The fact that no one who thinks he's good can provide evidence of the good things he's done is evidence that he's not that good, wouldn't you say? He has been here for YEARS now, so there's got to be some skins on the wall that he can show for his time here. That's not unreasonable to ask

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But if he wasn't considered an asset he'd have been let go on any number of occasions before now.

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You know, this would be a valid argument if not for the fact that Dave Aranda is still our coach heading into 2024. It's speculation that relies upon the competency of his superiors, and that's not something I'm willing to vouch for

No Quarterback said:

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bear2be2 said:

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No Quarterback said:

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Krieg said:

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1. I get not liking anyone on our staff. They've been bad overall.
2. Asking for proof Bell is good is like asking for proof Bell is bad. They're both impossible as we don't really know what he does and what he's been told to do. It's all just guessing.
3. I'd imagine a guy like Bell is useful to a guy that's never worked here before as he and his friends will know people locally and at Baylor. That alone might justify keeping Bell on staff in a relatively meaningless role to a new OC.


Who knows, who cares? It's sink or swim time for Spav. I hope he does great. If not, none of these guys will work here in a year.

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The fact that no one who thinks he's good can provide evidence of the good things he's done is evidence that he's not that good, wouldn't you say? He has been here for YEARS now, so there's got to be some skins on the wall that he can show for his time here. That's not unreasonable to ask

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But if he wasn't considered an asset he'd have been let go on any number of occasions before now.

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You know, this would be a valid argument if not for the fact that Dave Aranda is still our coach heading into 2024. It's speculation that relies upon the competency of his superiors, and that's not something I'm willing to vouch for

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I'm willing to vouch for Matt Rhule's competency. And regardless of how we feel about a Aranda (my opinion is well established), he's reached the self-preservation stage of this process. If Bell truly was a weak link, or considered so anyway, there have been multiple convenient opportunities to dump him.

It appears this is simple. Bell is from Rhule's tree so he is wonderful and all the incompetent people running our football program are only competent when it comes to giving Bell a new position to coach.

If Bell being on staff is Aranda's call. Fine. If a HC at Baylor is now required to have Bell on staff somewhere we will have trouble when we have a HC vacancy.

Nooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!

74Bear said:

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I'm told Bell is there for recruiting

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Not doing a great job there either!

-failed to land Novosad last year. Factors there outside his control, but that data point stands

-Couldn't apparently develop drones or shapen enough for them to not transfer. You could argue that drones was a bust since he's not doing much at his new school, but that's still a miss

-Bohannon never developed into a great passer. That was the reason cited for giving the nod to Shapen

-Quarterback commit this year is a composite #102 in the nation that has no other P5 offers. A poster that I won't name wanted to argue that this particular recruit is a 'developmental project'. well, a few issues there: the time for developmental project has come and gone, Bell hasn't proven that he can develop a project quarterback, and apparently no other P5 school sees the potential in that project to warrant an offer. And that's all I'll say about Bennett.

-sawyer Robertson. OK, looks like he might have potential. You'd think that they would've given him more playing time this year, but I believe he was hurt at least some of the year

Granted Bell probably has his hand in recruiting other players that I'm missing, but these are the quarterbacks, and he's currently the quarterbacks coach (or was until today I guess)