College football and college basketball are sports where a coach with reasonable success can hang around a while by winning consistently.
I believe, however, this is going to change rather quickly.
Did I see things in last Saturday’s Ohio Sate Buckeyes’ 13-10 loss to Michigan that will likely create reactions changing big time college football forever?
Ryan Day, The Ohio State University (OSU) Buckeyes’ head coach has pundits and fans speculating, “no natty, no job!”
Day, in other words, must win a national championship to salvage his position at OSU, especially following his team’s 13-10 home loss – his fourth in four recent seasons - to the University of Michigan (UM) Wolverines.
The loss alone is not what is bothering the press and the fans. Day’s Buckeyes, armed with the Big Ten’s best receiving corps, failed to convert on third down and 8 yards to go by running the ball instead of finding at least one among OSU’s stable of gifted receivers.
Bear in mind, Michigan’s best defensive back was also injured and not dressed for The Game.
Furthermore, fans are probably asking themselves, “How can a team who hired Chip Kelly as their offensive quarter actually decline in offensive performance year over year?”
Was Day born on third base and getting credit for hitting triples in recent seasons with some of Urban Meyer’s recruits? DO Big Tenn opposing defensive coordinators have the book on Chip Kelly’s offensive schemes?
The questions abound from last Saturday’s toppling of the Bucks from the #2 College Football Playoff ranking to #6 thanks to a poor offensive showing.
Look, I know I’m rambling, and the loss isn’t mind blowing, but it sure is frustrating.
Sprinkle some Name, Image, Likeness (NIL) dollars into the big-time college football mix, and other cash payments allowable in college football these days, and the job security, and the free time coaches like Steve Spurrier enjoyed in his heyday are outdated.
These coaches, paid as much as some NFL coaches in some cases, are under the hot seat in the new world order of big-time college football.
I’m certain someone – booster, influential alumni, to name a few – has already called Coach Day and told him how frustrated they are funding a team at premium levels facilitating the talent acquisition challenges to put together a team that underachieved last Saturday.
More succinctly, “We funded your program generously to assemble – on paper – one of college football’s best rosters. What in hell are you doing with our money?”
Wow!
Sounds like working for a public company when the shareholders aren’t pleased with some strategic or tactical decisions.
How long will boosters complain about a lack of depth on the Buckeyes’ offensive line and some of the in-game decisions made in one of college football’s greatest rivalry matchups (abandoning your stable of receivers to run the ball on third and eight)?
I’ve worked in a few publicly traded companies, and with the exceptions of those whose quarterly conference calls that sound more like a love-in, they’ll begin to play hardball with the athletic department.
Additionally, with other revenue sports competing for cash, and bear in mind Ohio State is comparatively a giant among its institution’s other revenue generating athletic programs, how soon will those who operate the other sports start clamoring for more funds feeling these monies are better spent in their programs.
Much the way college sports does anything, they change rules without completing the thought process on the effects of those changes, and bigger sums of money much more overtly used for big time college football might come under scrutiny and pressure from people less familiar with the inner workings of building a big-time football program.
It will either be justifiable or knee jerk, but the questions will have to be answered, and the eras coaches like Steve Spurrier enjoyed are certainly a thing of the past.