When your football program is in the condition of the University of Hawaii’s, your options are somewhat limited when hiring assistant coaches.

Forget reports of scores and hundreds of applicants for the defensive coordinator and linebackers coach openings. College football coach is among the many occupations now where everyone applies for everything –that’s one of the ways the world has changed because of the Internet. You don’t even have to pay for stamps and copies at Kinko’s to submit your resume.

The question is how many of the applicants are serious. That number is decreased dramatically when they start to consider the cost of living here and what Hawaii is willing to pay.

Then there is the very possible chance that anyone who takes a job with UH football right now may be looking for a new one again in a year. That’s the stark reality when a head coach goes 4-20 in his first two seasons. The previous staff was pushed out after winning two more games than that — in just one season.

I have to admit I was like many of you and did not know who Kevin Clune was before UH hired him Tuesday. We were told this was going to be a splashy hire, but as a friend said, this made less of a ripple than a penny in a wishing well.

But at least Clune comes in for a $160,000 annual salary, which is $90K less than his predecessor, Thom Kaumeyer.

On the plus side, Clune has spent the past few years helping to build one of college football’s better defenses.

The word I get from people who know him is that Clune is a tireless worker. One person who worked with him went as far as to say, "He’s got no life, so he will put all his time into the defense."

Everyone describes him as "smart."

Red flag? The same guy who said Clune will work his okole off and is very good on X’s and O’s — a guy who has known him a long time — added that "it’s gonna be a challenge for him to relate to the Hawaii kids."

We’ll see how that plays out. But it points to one reason why there should be at least one full-time coach on staff who has run through the Aloha Stadium tunnel in a UH uniform. One who can talk to recruits about why he became a Rainbow Warrior and why the prospects should, too, from the heart.

With Tony Tuioti’s release, there is no former UH player on staff … there are four with Utah or Utah State ties. Yes, there are ex-local high school stars, but no UH football alums. That’s why I was hoping for former Rainbow player and coach Rich Ellerson as the new DC.

I do like the idea of taking a guy away from the staff of a fellow Mountain West Conference team, assuming he’s good. Joey Porter would fall into that category, as does Clune.

Porter, a retired NFL star, played at Colorado State and was a student assistant on the Rams staff in 2013. He’s a candidate for the open linebackers coach job here. So is Kurt Gouveia, who has two Super Bowl rings and is from Waianae.

Great players don’t always become great coaches. But at least the first fan reaction wouldn’t be, "Who’s that?"

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Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783. Read Quick Reads at staradvertiser.com/quickreads.