Penn State athletic director Sandy Barbour said Wednesday that football coach James Franklin is not on the hot seat. That’s good news for Franklin, and, frankly, he shouldn’t be on the hot seat. Yet.
Barbour’s vote of confidence went a bit too far when she said, “He’s not on the hot seat, and he’s not going to be on the hot seat in December.“
Every football coach, unless he is egregiously bad — or gets into trouble — needs until the end of his fourth season before he can truly be evaluated just because turning over a roster and developing young players takes time. However, the program under a new coach does need to show some tangible signs of progress by the end of the third season.
A great example is Dave Wannstedt, who was hired at Pitt before the 2005 season. He inherited a team coming off a Fiesta Bowl appearance, but the Panthers missed a bowl game in his first season. In 2006, they had a complete collapse down the stretch to miss a bowl game for the second year in a row.
His third season started off on the wrong foot, as quarterback Bill Stull was injured in the first game and the backup quarterbacks were not ready to play. The Panthers began 2-4, and there was talk that Wannstedt needed to be fired after a Wednesday night home loss to Navy in their sixth game. The next week, the Panthers beat No. 23 Cincinnati and went 3-3 down the stretch. That included the season-ending 13-9 upset of No. 1/No. 2 West Virginia. That season ended 5-7, but the Panthers showed progress down the stretch in beating two ranked teams despite a bad quarterback situation. That earned Wannstedt a contract extension.
Had Wannstedt lost to Cincinnati and West Virginia, Pitt would have finished 3-9. At that point, Wannstedt being fired would have — and should have — been on the table.
The next year, 2008, the Panthers went 9-4 and made the Sun Bowl. They were a 28-21 loss at Cincinnati (which finished 11-3) away from winning the Big East title. That was progress, but it began at the end of year three.
That brings me back to Franklin, who has done a good job of recruiting and built a young team with a lot of talent. At this point, he deserves to have a fourth year, but he has to show some signs of progress down the stretch. He has yet to beat a ranked opponent. He has yet to beat a Power 5 team that has finished with more than eight wins. He has yet to compete for the Big Ten title.
Then there’s the elephant in the room: He’s 0-7 against Michigan, Michigan State and Ohio State and is coming off a 49-10 drubbing at the hands of the Wolverines. There were sanctions, and it takes time to build a program, but in Year 3, there is no way Michigan (whose coach is in his second season, by the way) should be 39 points better than Penn State.
Barbour should have stopped short of saying Franklin will be safe in December. If he gets blown out by Ohio State and Michigan State and loses to Iowa — the three best teams left on the schedule — to finish 7-5, what exactly will be the tangible sign of progress? Maybe he should get a fourth year regardless, but if the Nittany Lions finish 7-5 and Frankliln is 0-9 against the best three teams in the Big Ten East, that is a fairly big indictment of the progress of the program.
Athletic directors make votes of confidence all the time, and usually it’s the kiss of death for coaches. So, I’m sure Franklin will be evaluated in December like most coaches are, and if it’s determined he isn’t getting it done, he will be fired anyway. But why would Barbour stick her neck out that far to suggest Franklin has job security regardless of what happens, when he has yet to prove he can beat the best teams on his schedule?
Let’s get one thing straight: This is Penn State we’re talking about, not Kent State, so the idea that the Nittany Lions should celebrate moral victories is silly. This program should be measured by a high standard given its history, tradition, fans and resources.
Penn State should compete for Big Ten titles regularly, and the Nittany Lions should be able to beat the best teams on their schedule with some degree of regularity. They’re too good of a program to accept the mediocrity it has received from Franklin, but the good news is there are at least three more opportunities for him to notch a “signature win” down the stretch. He needs to win one of them, and if he does, that’s at least a sign that the team is progressing and getting closer to competing with the top teams in its conference.
If he doesn’t win one of those three games, hopefully Barbour will reconsider her stance in December. It will be very fair to question the direction of the program and whether Franklin is the guy to lead them back to glory.
Follow Paul Zeise on Twitter @PaulZeise.
First Published: September 29, 2016, 4:59 p.m.
