Great observation here from former CB contributor Chris Jastrembzkzkzksi:

Bad month for nocturnal birds with an upright stance. Stan Drayton is OUT as Temple Owls football coach. Tom Herman is OUT as FAU Owls football coach. Mike Bloomgren is OUT as Rice Owls football coach. And then Brian Bohannon at Kennesaw State was canned as well. He probably got the biggest shaft out of the this group. Bohannon was the only coach in KSU history. The program started in 2015 and was playing its first in year in Conference USA after starting out in the FCS Big South before going independent. They were 1-9, but that firing was unpopular because the step up in competition was always going to be difficult.

Drayton was 9 and 25 so he got canned. No surprise there. Hermann, who had his moments at Houston and Texas, was just 6 and 16 at FAU. Bloomgren, who found success with David Shaw at Stanford, went six seasons at Rice with a 24-52 record.

Maybe the Owl is the problem? It’s just not an intimidating bird. Nobody fears playing the Owl. You gotta think bigger, like Philadelphia Eagles, Atlanta Falcons, and Louisiana-Monroe Warhawks. If you actually list out most of the bird mascot teams you’ll notice that the least-threatening birds generally correlate to stinkage:

  • Temple Owls – stink in both sports
  • Rice Owls – stink
  • FAU Owls – stink
  • Kennesaw State Owls – stink
  • Philadelphia Eagles – one of the great franchises in American sport
  • New Orleans Pelicans – stink
  • Atlanta Hawks – playoff team
  • St. Louis Cardinals – average now
  • Baltimore Orioles – perennial underachievers
  • Toronto Blue Jays – stink
  • Seattle Seahawks – usually average to above-average
  • Pittsburgh Penguins – deserve to stink for 20+ years, minimum
  • Baltimore Ravens – always a contender
  • Anaheim Ducks – less relevant than the Oregon Ducks
  • Arizona Cardinals – Q Gannon has ’em ahead of schedule
  • Miami’s Ibis – no clue if the Ibis is a cool bird or not
  • Iowa Hawkeyes – great name, great defense, ancient offense
  • ULM WARHAWKS – actually they’ve only 5-5, so average

Good luck to the four Owl programs with their next head ball coaches.