Has the beginning of the end started for Morris’ tenure with Hogs?

Maybe the biggest thing Chad Morris had in offering any degree of hope for Arkansas fans was his ability to get big-name recruits headed to Fayetteville to bail out a program headed down like the Titanic.

Now he’s starting to sound like the band playing as the boat headed to the bottom of the Atlantic.

“We’ve got to keep developing the guys that we have, we’ve got to continue to recruit and
we’ve got to go back to work, one day at a time,” he said Saturday after getting trampled by Auburn.

He either doesn’t get it or doesn’t know what to do about it. That’s not good for a coach less than two years into a massive rebuilding project.

With the news Sunday he’s now lost a third highly-regarded commitment, the Razorbacks have fallen to No. 44 overall in the 247Sports.com composite rankings.

And that is a big-time problem.

Oh, and it’s really not helping his cause that one of the quarterbacks that transferred out after the first season is undefeated as a starter and coming to play the Hogs in November.

Are we seeing the beginning of the end for Morris at Arkansas?

“We’ve just got to go back to work and make some plays,” he said Saturday in more of what is becoming a tired mantra that apparently is making a lot of fans want to puke.

Morris’ explanations are starting to sound like excuses. It would be one thing if there was any glimmer of hope, but apparently he doesn’t want to put some youngsters in because he’s afraid of failure.

That sounds more like a high school coach talking than an SEC coach. Does Morris understand he’s in a league where, as former defensive coordinator and interim coach Joe Kines said, “they’ll slit your throat and drink the blood?”

Coaching mistakes turned what should have been a 5-7 season last year into a 2-10 record and sitting at 2-5 this year instead of 5-2.

Now THAT is a problem for Morris.

“We’ve just got to go back to work,” he said repeatedly Saturday.

When you hear that it conjures up visions of a coach that is treading deep water and somehow gets the idea that if he just keeps paddling in the same position he’s going to figure out where dry land is.

The last coach kept talking about “being close” and was still singing that song in his farewell press conference.

Does Morris have a team that has no confidence in the coaching staff and that is filtering down to recruits? Why else would a highly-regarded committed player suddenly open his recruiting back up right after an official visit?

As the Hogs head out of town this weekend to play the No. 1 team in the country, Morris better start figuring it out. Right now the only thing he’s figured out is how to be in the deepest dive in program history.

But at least he’s saved the redshirts on some fairly talented freshmen. He’s kept some redshirt freshmen from being thrown to the wolves.

Will the next coach send him a thank you message?