I heard for nearly eight years that it's Bush's fault. Now I hear that everything is Obama's fault. I hear my pastor-wives friends always wanting to fault the church's problems on the former pastor. Now here it's all Pelini's fault...or Osborne's fault...or Frank's fault. I am always amazed in our world that when someone does well in their first few years in a new position it is never the previous regime's "fault."
To totally discount the decisions and actions of the predecessor is probably naive too don't you think? In your examples your church, the United States of America and Nebraska Athletics, football specifically, are not start ups. The actions, inactions, decisions made, situations not addressed, problems not properly identified by all the previous leaders in your church, the U.S., and Nebraska athletics are the reason those things are in the positions they are. We also give credit those who came before when they aid in the successes. Without the leadership of the previous pastor, maybe you don't have a new annex, without policies created by previous presidents, later successes maybe aren't realized, without Callahan's recruiting classes, maybe Pelini only wins 6 games year 1.
Now if we had to totally start over with each change in leadership, you would have a point. But we don't, so we have to live with and adjust for the mistakes of our predecessor as well as be thankful for their successes.