Major was a great QB here. A terrific leader. He was, I thought, a successful OC at Bama. He is also a guy who never played running back, and is a slow white guy. Not that there is anything wrong with any of that. He is reportedly a fine recruiter. Seems like he should be hired as co OC, or QB coach. What do you think will be his real duties here, since I don't see him as being genuinely a "running backs coach." There are others who bring a much better running backs resume for that.
Not sure why there is so much hand wringing over what position he coaches. It's not uncommon at all for a coach to be in charge of a position that he didn't play. He'll be telling the guys which gaps to hit, where to slide for certain protection packages, etc. He'll do just fine. And if he can rub off on GD at all in terms of playcalling, so much the better.
Not to diminish the role of Rucker had at Texas, but from a technical standpoint running back is one of the easier positions on the field. There is some mechanical aspects, but much is the coach properly channeling the backs skills and instincts.
Major mentioned when he was a GA here that received lots of exposure to coaching different positiions. I'm sure he was exposed to different ideas at his other coaching stints as well. Don't let the fact that he was a slow white QB lead you into thinking he can't coach running backs. The 2 best position coaches at UT are not coaching postions they played in college (Akina was a QB, and Kennedy was a QB also).
Rucker's playing career in football was on the defensive side of the ball...he also began his coaching career on defense. That said, he has been a very good RB coach for the past twenty years.
His duty is to kick-*** in massive amonts. Pretty easy for him since he's been doing that ever since he popped out of the womb.
What most people are forgetting is that a former QB could coach any and every position on the offense. A QB has to know all routes run by the WRs, all routes run by the RB, where the RBs block, fake, and take handoffs from, where and hwo each linemen makes their blocks and every variable in between. it is part of being a QB. when Major was still a QB at Texas, he probbvaly oculd've coached the RBs while he was still the QB, because he ahs to know everything they are doing anyway, and he is a studious, meticulous football brain.
