Cut and Run

Nick Saban. Steve Spurrier. Butch Davis. Al Groh. And now Bobby Petrino. What do all these coaching names have in common? They are all college football coaches who made the jump to the NFL, failed miserably and had to slink back to the college ranks. Petrino is the latest to join this list after he abruptly resigned last night to go back to college to become head coach of the Arkansas Razorbacks. He didn’t even last one full season. He leaves after a 3-10 record and enduring the Michael Vick disaster. In Petrino’s defense, he never was able to coach the team he was promised because the biggest part of that team, Vick, is currently in federal prison for the next 23 months on dogfighting charges. So in that sense, you can understand why Petrino would choose to leave when he never had a full arsenal of weapons to turn the Falcons around. But not finishing out the season? That’s rough. Petrino is getting killed this morning in the Atlanta papers and rightly so. He simply looks like a quitter who couldn’t handle the pressure of the NFL, joining a list of names that includes the people at the beginning of this story. The lesson that should be learned by Falcons owner Arthur Blank and the rest of the NFL owners? Stop looking to the college ranks for head coaches. It’s a practice that doesn’t work and it has been proven over the years. Yes, there are a few exceptions such as Jimmy Johnson, John Robinson and Steve Mariucci that did win consistently but those guys are from a different time when instant gratification wasn’t the only thing. It’s a different world now and it is obvious that commitment means less to these college coaches than correcting their mistake of leaving college. If I was an NFL owner I wouldn’t go near a college coach to run my team. College coaches are used to being the kings of their programs. They are the focal point and to some degree the fans come to watch them coach because the players change so often. Obviously, that is not the case in the player focused NFL. The stars have the power in the NFL and guys like Petrino always think they can rise above it when the promise of total control is dangled in front of them by an NFL owner. But the personality of these coaches is to be in control of their team which, with the egos in NFL locker rooms, is easier said than done. Once the coach realizes the job isn’t what he thought it was he gets second thoughts and then you end up with situations like Petrino’s. It just looks bad and it’s time NFL owners start to see the trend here and stop embarrasing their franchises by giving these coaches a chance. I don’t feel sorry for Arthur Blank, but he should have known better.