Sam Pittman almost definitely needs to get his offensive coordinator hire right this offseason if the head coach wants to keep his job at the helm of Arkansas football beyond the 2024 season. Dan Enos, who was hired late last offseason after Kendal Briles departed for TCU, was not it. Subsequently, the pressure is ramped up majorly for the Razorbacks and the head coach specifically.
So of course, we now have an emerging top target -- someone fans in Fayetteville and college football fans at large are intimately and wildly familiar with: Bobby Petrino.
According to ESPN college football insider Pete Thamel, the Razorbacks are "vetting" their former head coach to be the new offensive coordinator for Arkansas on Pittman's staff. Thamel also reports that Petrino has made noise on the recruiting trail that he's "in the mix" for an SEC offensive coordinator job after serving in that role alongside Jimbo Fisher at Texas A&M in the 2023 season.
Arkansas football rumors: Bobby Petrino in the mix for OC job
We'll start on the field, where Petrino has proven himself as an offensive mind and even as a head coach in college football. He lost just nine games over four seasons at Louisville before taking the Atlanta Falcons job that lasted less than a full season. That's when he made his way to Arkansas and, after going just 5-7 overall and 2-6 in the SEC in the first year, he had the team going a combined 21-5 overall and 12-4 in SEC play in his final two seasons.
He also won again in one year at Western Kentucky, coached Lamar Jackson in his second stint at Louisville, and was solid at FCS Missouri State before landing at Texas A&M.
But then you get the off-field issues and extra-curricular activities that have Petrino's name shrouded in infamy, especially with the Arkansas football program.
Why did the Razorbacks part with Petrino after going 11-2 and winning the Cotton Bowl in the 2011-12 season? Well, that comes down to the motorcycle incident that occurred in April 2012. Petrino was involved in a crash on his motorcycle and a whole mess of shady happenings unfurled from that.
Petrino initially lied in saying he was alone on the bike when, in actuality, former Razorbacks volleyball player and then-recently hired student athlete development coordinator on Petrino's staff, Jessica Dorrell, had been a passenger on the motorcycle. After that fact was revealed, the then-head coach revealed that he was having an affair with her. The subsequent investigation revealed that Petrino also went around affirmative action guidelines for hiring processes to hire Dorrell.
Some 10 days after this, he was fired.
There are two ways to read this out of Fayetteville. On one hand, hiring Petrino would reek of desperation. Pittman's job is safe for 2024, but it's assumed he'll be on the hot seat. Hiring someone with such a scandalous track record at this exact university is the action of someone who is grasping for life rafts.
On the other hand, Petrino has largely kept his nose clean and led the Hogs to immense success. Perhaps, more than a decade removed from the motorcycle incident and the neck-braced press conference that lives in meme lore forever, he's paid his penance and Arkansas is giving him another chance.
Or perhaps he's not hired at all. The fact that he's in the mix, though, is just another reason why college football is the dumbest, most beautiful sport on the planet.
