After starting the season 7-0, no one would’ve predicted Pitt to finish the season losing their final five games but that’s exactly what happened.
As a result, a lot of tough questions will be asked and plenty of roster decisions will have to be made.
Before all of that takes place, a bigger question needs to be answered.
Does Pat Narduzzi have it in him to continue the difficult task of coaching in modern day college football? What I mean by that is all the financial and roster decisions that start today for the Panthers football program.
As we all know, college football has completely changed and is no longer just about coaching and recruiting players, that for the most part, will be on your roster for 3-4 years.
Those days are long gone and likely never coming back.
Coaching college football today means signing a player for one season and then hoping he doesn’t leave after the season for a better financial opportunity.
Coaching college football today means having a high school player committed to you for 6-7 months and then finding out a week before National Signing Day that he’s leaving because another program is offering him more money.
Coaching college football today means determining what your NIL Budget is for the season and what players you can afford to keep, and what players you’ll have to encourage to move on to another program due to financial constraints or because you need his slotted salary to spend at another position.
You get the point, coaching today is no longer just about coming up with a game plan and or changing a system, it’s big business and it’s a year-round job.
I have zero doubt that Narduzzi completely despises all of this and simply wants to coach football and would rather never hear the word NIL ever again.
Unfortunately, that’s not an option and we get back to my original question, Does Pat Narduzzi have it in him to continue the difficult task of coaching in modern day college football?
Over the last year in both college football and basketball several top coaches, most notably Nick Saban, Jay Wright and Tony Bennett, walked away because of this aspect of the sport.
Last year, the trend also started of college coaches moving onto the NFL for the same reason. Jeff Hafley left as head coach at Boston College to become defensive coordinator of the Green Bay Packers and Charlie Partridge left Pitt to coach the defensive line for the Indianapolis Colts.
Partridge, in particular, hated the direction that college football was headed.
Pat Narduzzi is just 59 years old and theoretically has plenty of football left in him.
I just wonder how much longer he wants to continue doing it in this current environment. Instead of coming up with a way to improve the team for next season, his thoughts and the thoughts of the coaching staff are likely on which players on their roster are other programs going to try and buy away from them.
If Narduzzi is physically and mentally in this for the long haul, my suggestion to Pitt is to help him out and bring in a football general manager. Stanford University did this yesterday with the hiring of former star quarterback Andrew Luck.
Hire someone that Narduzzi can work with that has modern football knowledge and the art of juggling a salary cap. This person would also work in conjunction with Chris Bickell and the 412 Alliance.
Narduzzi has enough to worry about and juggling a financial spread sheet shouldn’t be one of them. The general manager would work in conjunction with Narduzzi and Bickell on every aspect of the current and future roster.
Along these lines, another addition that I’d like to see Pitt make is to add some sort of modern-day NFL liaison.
One of the things that Narduzzi has done really well is develop players and get them to the NFL. With how critical fundraising is to programs today, Pitt needs to be leaning on these current and former players to give back to their former team.
For example, how about seeing if a legend like Aaron Donald, who’s still living in Pittsburgh, might have some interest in being this Pitt/NFL liaison? Having a legend like him, who already gives back generously to Pitt, might carry some weight.
College football has changed and it’s time that high level college athletic departments like Pitt do the same.
New athletic director Allen Greene was the start of changes at Pitt, and if Pitt truly wants to compete for championships, it’s time that we see some more.
