Hogs will be better with Morris, despite what you think you know

In the wreckage of a 2-10 season that left no one in Arkansas happy (well, except for some internet sociopaths who delight in other’s misery), everybody has a solution to fix things.

Nobody that really matters cares about those solutions, by the way.

Chad Morris inherited a mess.

Bret Bielema had success at Wisconsin while Barry Alvarez was looking over his shoulder, but in Fayetteville he basically had no adult supervision and did little to rebuild the wreckage he inherited from Bobby Petrino.

While it’s true this Razorback team had better players than Colorado State, North Texas, Ole Miss and Vanderbilt, there were too many upperclassmen comfortable with losing.

Something happened above the shoulders to this program somewhere along the line in the 2016 season. I didn’t know it and thought they would be excited with a fresh approach at the top and buy in.

That was off … by about a mile or two. Very few players performed even at the level they did last season, which was 4-8 in case you forgot.

Fans think the coaches can control the players like they could 30-40 years ago. Lou Holtz could do things in his day with the Hogs not even he can do now.

Coaches who once motivated through fear are really hamstrung now. Players just quit before the fourth game of the year or transfer out if they don’t agree with the coach and there’s not a single thing now the coach can do about it.

It doesn’t take many of those before you have a numbers problem, which creates a depth problem, which means you are not going to win very many games.

Long gone are the days when a coach could come in run off all but about 25 players (like Bear Bryant did at Texas A&M in the mid-1950’s). In today’s game you will get your brains beat in if you tried to play with just 40 people because you’ve got to have that number at a minimum to have even a decent team.

No, this year there wasn’t a thing Morris could do about players who wanted something different from the plan he was selling.

That’ll be cleaned up now. With a large group of redshirt freshmen this year and a recruiting class that is being sought to come in and contribute immediately, let’s wait a year or two to judge.

And in case you’re wondering about those freshmen, every championship coach I’ve heard over the last 12 years has told me they don’t recruit players to redshirt … they only recruit players to contribute immediately.

It wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility that Morris evaluated what he inherited, much the same way Holtz did in 1979 when he said, “I oughta redshirt everybody we signed,” but couldn’t and several contributed to a 10-1 season before a Sugar Bowl trip against No. 1 Alabama (Bryant’s last national championship powerhouse).

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Morris will have 43 players on the roster next year that are his players. This past season he had 18. That’s a big difference.

With a schedule that might be even more favorable next season, if we’re back here at the end of November with another 2-10 mark I may have a different opinion.

Until then, let it ride with Morris.

Malzahn out at Auburn?

The rumor mill is flying that Gus Malzahn may be a multimillionaire in a position to do whatever in life he wants to do in a month or two.

Turns out, Gus Malzahn's job at Auburn isn't nearly as safe as once thought. There is a serious movement among high-powered officials at AU to fire him. To the point that a replacement has been identified and initial meetings held to gauge interest. Happy, Monday.

— Josh Moon ?? (@Josh_Moon) November 26, 2018

Moon is a columnist with ALReporter.com, which is primarily a political website for Alabama politics … which is exactly the perfect place to pick up behind-the-scenes info as there isn’t a lot of separation between sports and politics in that state.

Trying to nail down a few details, but the candidate they have apparently approached – and who has been receptive to their interest – is a very well known and successful college coach. https://t.co/TX9JLw5oKs

— Josh Moon ?? (@Josh_Moon) November 26, 2018

It took a few of posts on the Twitter to figure out who he was talking about.

Here's what I can tell you re: Bob Stoops/Auburn. A meeting took place a few weeks ago. It involved Stoops and at least two AU powerbrokers. It went unexpectedly well. /1

— Josh Moon ?? (@Josh_Moon) November 27, 2018

Now, of course, Stoops is vehemently denying talking to anybody connected with Auburn about a coaching job, insisting he’s happy in retirement in Norman, Oklahoma.

However, a $75 million retirement plan like Jimbo Fisher got at Texas A&M could be enough to lure him out of there.

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My only thought is to thank Auburn and Malzahn for their agreement last December.

Brown heading back to North Carolina

Mack Brown used success at North Carolina years ago to vault himself into the Texas job and now multiple websites are reporting he’s heading back there.

According to these reports, Gene Chizik will be coming on as defensive coordinator and Kliff Kingsbury as offensive coordinator.

Chizik left the Tar Heels a couple of years ago to watch his son finish high school and now that’s apparently over. Kingsbury got fired Sunday after a six-year run with the Red Raiders.

And before anybody guesses, former Tech coach Mike Leach shot down any discussion of him leaving Washington State to go back.

“They still haven’t paid me for 2009,” he said Monday.