Thanks for the kind words.
Regarding your question:
1) They had Matt Campbell lined up with a UT loss to Tech at home at the end of 2019. Texas won and CDC balked at doing anything and persuaded enough folks to stay the course with him. I posted on this on the football board during the bowl season if you're looking for something contemporaneous at the time.
2) Given that, pre-corona, Herman had no allies and was hanging on by the skin of his teeth, the mandate was two top 5 recruiting finishes (2020 & 2021), a Big 12 title in 2020, and a playoff appearance, or damned near one. The recruiting stuff could be apocryphal and I was a skeptic at the time. The rest has been repeated in one form or another across $9.95er-land and I doubt all of the sources are the same.
3) The "$$ is lining up for Urban Meyer" train is starting to pick up steam. I have zero clue how much of that is real vs wishcasting.
4) I'm tired of this bullshit. If they go get Urban Meyer, yee-fucking-haw. I am guessing I was high and mighty about drawing the line short of Urban Meyer at some point. @SydneyCarton asked me & @HenryJamesthis weekend where we drew the line on a HC at Texas. Oddly, it turns out, I apparently draw the line just past Urban Meyer and long before JoePa, OU coaches in general, and Art Briles. I don't blame anyone for taking higher ground than that, but I've lost my illusions about the integrity of college sports over the course of the last decade plus and corona has sent me into NoFucksGivenLand in ways that nothing else could have. The dude is there for the taking, it would be a wonderful troll job on the Hermanosaurus Wrecks, and we'll win. Fuck it. We've got the embarrassment and lack of integrity with the current guy in charge, might as well have the fucking wins too.