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Mar. 29—MORGANTOWN — There's no question college football is rapidly changing. Players are getting paid, universities are signing lucrative television deals and players can jump into the transfer portal and completely flip a roster. College football isn't the same as it was back in the day or even 10 years ago.
This rapid change has pushed out legendary coaches. The great Nick Saban retired and blamed name, image and likeness as the culprit.
Old-school coaches don't want to adapt. However, it's drawing in new, old NFL, coaches to the collegiate ranks like Bill Belichick because the NCAA is slowly adopting a professional model.
West Virginia football coach Rich Rodriguez isn't a new coach and isn't a former NFL coach. He started his coaching career in 1985, is 61 years old and is anti-TikTok, but he has accepted the drastic change and is in favor of the NFL model.
"I think a lot of coaches are, like older guys, old school guys, they just throw their hands up and say, 'I'm done, '" Rodriguez said. "It's frustrating, but that's a good challenge. It's a challenge. It's a new challenge. I better accept it as a new challenge and try to win at it."
Rodriguez wants there to be mini-camps, a draft and free agency. Not one for one, but an adaptation. Like how Belichick laid it out in an interview with Pat McAfee, the portal is free agency and recruiting is the draft. However, the NCAA hasn't fully committed, causing some problems.
"It makes too much sense not to follow the most successful professional organizations, " Rodriguez said. "Instead of what's the rule next week ? When you have to keep making a rule to adjust another rule, that means something needs to be fixed."
Rodriguez doesn't have the NFL coaching experience like Belichick, but WVU won't be behind in that aspect because Rodriguez said he's talked with NFL general managers and coaches in the pros about how the NFL operates.
Over the past couple of press conferences, Rodriguez was frustrated the most with the two portal windows, and he's not alone. Numerous coaches, not only in college basketball, have proposed one portal window after seeing the difficulties it's caused.
The first portal window opened during the College Football Playoff. Players on the competing teams had to decide to go out and look for a new home to get playing time or stay with their current teams and ride out the rest of the season, waiting for the spring portal.
Rodriguez voiced his opinions on the spring portal too, which comes up on April 16 and closes April 25th. The portal opens right after WVU's Gold-Blue game and final practice of the spring.
"How ridiculous is that ?" Rodriguez asked. "There's another portal thing coming up in a couple of weeks. I wasted all my time coaching this guy, getting him ready, and then he's getting a paycheck to go somewhere else."
That's the new reality in the current state of college football and is why some coaches have opted out of a spring game that's pretty much promoting your players for other teams to grab them.
Rodriguez said his squad doesn't have any players that he feels are "half in or half out yet."
Colorado coach Deion Sanders wants to practice against another team, like how the NFL has joint practices, for the Buffaloes' spring game. Rodriguez isn't opposed to the idea, reiterating his favor of the professional model. However, there are some downsides.
"You don't want to show someone out there, and then he does really good that day, and then somebody poaches him, " Rodriguez said. "I think they change the portal thing, I would be more agreeable to scrimmage against somebody."
The portal isn't the only problem Rodriguez has with the current NCAA rules. The yearly shrinking of the roster is also on his nerves.
The roster is capped at 105 players, 20 below what the Mountaineers have now. 105 players are far more than the NFL's 53-man roster, but Rodriguez thinks the larger roster size is better. There isn't a practice squad or free agents in college, so if a player gets injured, you can't call up or sign a player in his place like the NFL. It's work with what you got.
"It's a little bit different dynamic, and that's why you have to really be intentional about how you field your roster, " Rodriguez said. "Every coach is going to want more guys in their room with talent."
The landscape of college football is quickly changing. Rodriguez is one of the older coaches who hasn't thrown in the towel in defeat. He wants to continue to coach, and if that's the case, he's going to have to accept the changes, and he has.
Rodriguez and a majority of coaches in college football aren't happy with the state of the sport, especially watching the NFL on Sundays be so successful.
"We don't have all the structures that the pro model, NFL has, " Rodriguez said. "In my opinion, that's what we need to have. Let's copy them as much as we can. Let's not pretend that they are college student athletes. They're college /professional student-athletes."
Continue reading...
This rapid change has pushed out legendary coaches. The great Nick Saban retired and blamed name, image and likeness as the culprit.
Old-school coaches don't want to adapt. However, it's drawing in new, old NFL, coaches to the collegiate ranks like Bill Belichick because the NCAA is slowly adopting a professional model.
West Virginia football coach Rich Rodriguez isn't a new coach and isn't a former NFL coach. He started his coaching career in 1985, is 61 years old and is anti-TikTok, but he has accepted the drastic change and is in favor of the NFL model.
"I think a lot of coaches are, like older guys, old school guys, they just throw their hands up and say, 'I'm done, '" Rodriguez said. "It's frustrating, but that's a good challenge. It's a challenge. It's a new challenge. I better accept it as a new challenge and try to win at it."
Rodriguez wants there to be mini-camps, a draft and free agency. Not one for one, but an adaptation. Like how Belichick laid it out in an interview with Pat McAfee, the portal is free agency and recruiting is the draft. However, the NCAA hasn't fully committed, causing some problems.
"It makes too much sense not to follow the most successful professional organizations, " Rodriguez said. "Instead of what's the rule next week ? When you have to keep making a rule to adjust another rule, that means something needs to be fixed."
Rodriguez doesn't have the NFL coaching experience like Belichick, but WVU won't be behind in that aspect because Rodriguez said he's talked with NFL general managers and coaches in the pros about how the NFL operates.
Over the past couple of press conferences, Rodriguez was frustrated the most with the two portal windows, and he's not alone. Numerous coaches, not only in college basketball, have proposed one portal window after seeing the difficulties it's caused.
The first portal window opened during the College Football Playoff. Players on the competing teams had to decide to go out and look for a new home to get playing time or stay with their current teams and ride out the rest of the season, waiting for the spring portal.
Rodriguez voiced his opinions on the spring portal too, which comes up on April 16 and closes April 25th. The portal opens right after WVU's Gold-Blue game and final practice of the spring.
"How ridiculous is that ?" Rodriguez asked. "There's another portal thing coming up in a couple of weeks. I wasted all my time coaching this guy, getting him ready, and then he's getting a paycheck to go somewhere else."
That's the new reality in the current state of college football and is why some coaches have opted out of a spring game that's pretty much promoting your players for other teams to grab them.
Rodriguez said his squad doesn't have any players that he feels are "half in or half out yet."
Colorado coach Deion Sanders wants to practice against another team, like how the NFL has joint practices, for the Buffaloes' spring game. Rodriguez isn't opposed to the idea, reiterating his favor of the professional model. However, there are some downsides.
"You don't want to show someone out there, and then he does really good that day, and then somebody poaches him, " Rodriguez said. "I think they change the portal thing, I would be more agreeable to scrimmage against somebody."
The portal isn't the only problem Rodriguez has with the current NCAA rules. The yearly shrinking of the roster is also on his nerves.
The roster is capped at 105 players, 20 below what the Mountaineers have now. 105 players are far more than the NFL's 53-man roster, but Rodriguez thinks the larger roster size is better. There isn't a practice squad or free agents in college, so if a player gets injured, you can't call up or sign a player in his place like the NFL. It's work with what you got.
"It's a little bit different dynamic, and that's why you have to really be intentional about how you field your roster, " Rodriguez said. "Every coach is going to want more guys in their room with talent."
The landscape of college football is quickly changing. Rodriguez is one of the older coaches who hasn't thrown in the towel in defeat. He wants to continue to coach, and if that's the case, he's going to have to accept the changes, and he has.
Rodriguez and a majority of coaches in college football aren't happy with the state of the sport, especially watching the NFL on Sundays be so successful.
"We don't have all the structures that the pro model, NFL has, " Rodriguez said. "In my opinion, that's what we need to have. Let's copy them as much as we can. Let's not pretend that they are college student athletes. They're college /professional student-athletes."
Continue reading...
