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Hogs have fared well in this spot against Aggies before
A&M has been down this road before with a high-priced coach and the Hogs won most of the time then and playing the Aggies will be important for Chad Morris.
Right now Arkansas fans are seeing every glass as half-empty.
Coming within one strike of winning a national baseball championship has brought out years of frustration for a fan base that almost expects to get close to a title, but never there.
That’s not the case with the Texas Aggies.
At A&M, they expect to win a national title. Every year.
After all, they are the largest school in the Southeastern Conference with a huge and fanatically loyal fan base. Former coach Jackie Sherrill told me one time they had more alumni making over $100,000 a year than the rest of the SEC combined.
That’s how they raised the money to rebuild Kyle Field to over 102,000 capacity in near-record time.
They want a national title NOW. The Aggies have spent $16.2 million over the last seven years for guys to NOT coach there anymore.
Razorback fans will point out the $12 million or so Bret Bielema is being paid not to coach in Fayetteville, but the Hogs didn’t give Chad Morris a 10-year deal at $7.5 milion a year … all of it guaranteed and in College Station they don’t pay it out over time. Both Mike Sherman and Kevin Sumlin got their complete buyout in less than a month.
But don’t despair, Hog fans. Texas A&M’s history on these things isn’t great and Arkansas is a big reason why. Shoot, the Aggies haven’t won any kind of national title in football since over two years before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor.
The Hogs have ruined some big years for A&M.
In 1975, the Aggies rolled into Little Rock in December undefeated. Frank Broyles wanted to move either the Texas game or Texas A&M to the end of the schedule for competitive purposes. He used his always great relationship with ABC and talked Emory Bellard into moving the game there after Darrell Royal said no.
Arkansas won the game, 31-6 and the Aggies ended up finishing 11th in the nation after rolling into Little Rock ranked second. The Hogs’ win threw the Southwest Conference into a three-way tie for the title, but A&M had arrogantly declined to get into a bowl triad with the Sugar Bowl and Bluebonnet Bowl.
Since it was Cotton or Bust in College Station, they ended up in Memphis’ Liberty Bowl against USC, where they lost, 20-0. Bellard, was coaching Mississippi State by the end of 1978 after walking away from the mess at A&M in midseason that year.
Before the 1982 season, the Aggies hired Sherrill from Pittsburgh, where he had won 83 percent of his games over five seasons. After coming to College Station, he won just 65 percent of his games there and stepped down when the NCAA came calling, although they never found Jackie guilty of anything.
Most of his problems at A&M were with Arkansas. He won only two of six matchups with Ken Hatfield. Mention Hatfield to Jackie and he almost has to excuse himself to go be sick. The Aggies never finished higher than sixth.
R.C. Slocum was next and he lasted the longest — 14 seasons — but never finished higher than seventh and retired after the 2002 season so they could hire Dennis Franchione from Alabama, who had just gone 10-3 but didn’t want to deal the NCAA sanctions coming down.
When Franchione went to the Tuscaloosa airport to go interview in College Station, Paul Bryant, Jr., met him and told him if he got on the airplane, don’t come back. He didn’t and was fired after a five-year record of 32-28.
Then was Mike Sherman followed by Sumlin, and neither achieved the level of success Aggie fans expected. Sumlin set the bar ridiculously high for himself with an 11-2 record, finishing fifth in the last polls, beating Alabama and just missing a title with close losses to Florida and LSU.
He never got close to that again at the end of a season.
Now it’s Fisher’s turn.
Like Sherrill in 1982, he comes in as the high-priced coach who had a big-time record in another conference. Remember, Sherrill was the first coach to get over $100,000 a year with that contract and he was the Aggies’ second choice.
Bo Schembechler of Michigan came close. He visited A&M chairman Bum Bright in Dallas, but backed out of a deal after he got home to Ann Arbor. Dallas Cowboys personnel guy Gil Brandt was the chief dealmaker in college football back then and he got the job for his friend Sherrill.
By the way, either of those are the two guys I would want on my side in a fight. They would either pay the other guys off or talk ’em out of it.
Jimbo was the first choice in College Station. It wasn’t a big secret he would entertain offers to leave Tallahassee. Everybody on the planet thought he was going to be in Baton Rouge in 2015 before backing out and giving Les Miles a few more games before getting fired.
A&M fans are expecting results immediately. Whether that’s realistic or not is anybody’s guess.
Arkansas hasn’t beaten the Aggies since Bobby flew through the handlebars on the road to Elkins.
Right now, the Hogs are tied for their longest losing streak in history against A&M. The last time Arkansas lost six in a row to the Aggies was 1938-43.
There is some similarity to Sherrill taking over. High-priced coach, big-time league (back then the SWC was on a level with the SEC and had more speed).
The Hogs changed coaches after Sherrill’s second year, bringing in Hatfield, who at the time had only succeeded at Air Force with a gimmick offense (yes, that’s what a lot of folks thought at the time).
Hatfield’s gimmick offense produced four wins in six tries. Then Petrino’s gimmick offense won three in a row before Smiley and Bert couldn’t figure out how to beat the Aggies.
History says this series has always been tight. Even the last five seasons featured three overtime losses where Bielema seemed to invent new ways to lose to the Aggies.
Two coaches that under-achieved have been replaced with guys expected to win. Fisher’s expected to win big immediately. Morris has a little more breathing room.
But, oh, the final caveat here?
Morris graduated from Texas A&M.
When the Aggies fired Sumlin in December, they immediately went after Fisher. Morris apparently didn’t even get a nod in his direction from his alma mater.
It will mean something to Morris.
Whether he admits it or not.
