JessN: 2013 Fall Previews: Arkansas Razorbacks

capnfrog said:

I still can't figure out what happened other than losing their high profile coach. Could losing a Petrino type coach be the thing that brought them down? or were they on the way down if Petrino stayed or not?

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graydogg85 said:

IMO, Petrino was a blessing and a curse simultaneously for Arkansas. There are the obvious character issues that led to his demise, but in a lot of ways he didn't do them many favors on the field. He's a top-flight offensive coach, probably one of the three or four best in the entire game. But he and his staff really didn't recruit well at Arkansas. That's never been his forte, anyway and Fayetteville can be a tough sell when you're competing with LSU, Oklahoma and many of the Texas schools. He loaded up on offensive skill talent and left a dearth elsewhere. As long as Petrino was manning the controls, he had the burners on offense to put up PlayStation numbers against anyone not named Alabama or LSU and it would have continued to work if he'd stuck around. He's that strong of an offensive coach. But you remove him from the picture and it's really not hard to see why the wheels came off so quickly.

Bielema is a dang good coach too, IMO. But he's on the other end of the spectrum philosophically and good top-to-bottom recruiting will be an absolute necessity for his style of play to be effective. He's really got his hands full with that defense, which has been devoid of upper-tier SEC talent for years.

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chittlins said:

Exactly how is Fayetteville a tough sell? Fayetteville makes many best of lists, bet you think it's a small town too. There's over 400,000 in Fayetteville's MSA. Here read this: http://www.forbes.com/sites/ericaswallow/2013/07/31/arkansas-startups/ I've posted this before. Fayetteville is quicky becoming a destination school for those around the Dallas Metroplex. Fayetteville is a damn sight better than Norman, being close to OKC is plus there if you like flatness and tornados and stupid summer heat. I'm not even going to address Stoolwater and Lubbock. That 10% rule for public Universities in Texas is playing into our hand. It's excluding many an opportunity to go to Texas and/or A&M. Arkansas is offering in state tuition provided they met certain requirements on their entrance exams and if they are 27 or above some schollie money. Last year Arkansas set a record for incoming freshmen and hit an all time enrollment high. More freshmen came from Texas than from Arkansas. How's that relating to football? Well, Arkansas is recruiting several players that have siblings already in school here. Arkansas already has the scout's #1 ranked center for 2015 committed. A kid named Keaton Sutherland that plays OL is a 2015 kid, Arkansas and Oklahoma have already offered. He has two siblings attending Arkansas. Lets take highly rated 2014 target Soloman Thomas, Arkansas is right there figting with Texas and Stanford(presumed favorite). This a kid that rarely would give us a look. Why, his sister is in school here. Arkansas has surpassed 25,000 students and headed for 28,000 really quick. When I came to Arkansas in 93, there were around 13,000 students. There's over 200 million in off campus student housing just coming on line or coming real soon. Here's an example a block off campus and Dickson St. about to finish up.

Our lovely region has two Fortune 500 companies, Walmart and Tyson along with trucking'logistics giant JB Hunt. You should check out our job rates for folks with masters from our business school, Top 10 in the nation. Beating Stanford and others

Back to football, our run defense and DL is actually pretty good, the secondary can do nothing but be better than last year. Our problem last year was there was a culture of no accountability cause no one thought Johnelle would be around longer than a season and Paul Petrino isn't even a 5th of a playcaller his Big Bro is.

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