Hogs fans must peek behind curtain for better understanding of coaching search

Path to new Arkansas Razorbacks coach lined with lies, misinformation

Arkansas Razorbacks coach Sam Pittman before game with the Arkansas State Red Wolves at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock, Ark. / Nilsen Roman-allHOGS Images

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Over the decades, there have been a ton of coaching searches, but rarely has there ever been even the slightest nod to pulling back the curtain as to how things unfold from the eyes of a journalist.

However, in light of there being an expectation of as many as 27 openings after all but the tiniest handful of schools refused to fire coaches last season in regard to future unknowns like revenue sharing and an unforgiving recruiting calendar that would have decimated rosters, it makes sense that readers need to know how to process the information floating around out there.

The first thing to understand is every journalist worth his salt knows he is being lied to or given bad information at pretty much every point during a coaching search. That doesn't mean we don't all have very good, well-meaning sources.

Just about all of us do. However, that also means understanding there will be times trusted sources will pass us information pointing to a specific coach with the need to kick up a lot of smoke around a specific candidate to draw attention away from the person who really is the target. The last thing Arkansas needs is another school realizing the Razorbacks might be about to sign the coach they covet when they think they have him in line.

Unfortunately for the Hogs, they have been on the bad end of this stick quite often. Also, because things change quickly since the slightest thing can sway a coach who appears locked up to go in a different direction, our trusted sources often come to us certain they know who the hire is going to be only to find our a little later that is no longer the case.

The most troublesome people this time of year are those who want to believe they are important. These are often low level or new boosters who have just enough connections to be dangerous and somewhat believable, but aren't high enough up the pecking order or trusted enough yet on the inside to have true concrete information.

Typically, these are the ones who are the loudest. We hear from them the most and they get the most upset when a reporter doesn't immediately rush to a computer to hammer out a story about this "quality" information from a prime inside source.

Unfortunately, some of the newbies to the coaching search game or those who aren't trained journalists who whipped up a podcast or found a following on social media don't know the difference. They're going to think they've got the greatest scoop of all time when the name they are running with is probably the favorite of one single booster who isn't in actual consideration at all.

The most important thing to remember is no matter how good our sources are, until the coach is announced, nothing is legitimate. For instance, if James Franklin pulled up in the driveway of most people's homes the Sunday after Thanksgiving and sat down at the table over a glass of sweet tea and said he took the Arkansas job, they would be tempted to tell everyone.

Heck, he might even pull out a copy of a contract with his signature on it that shows a specific amount and number of years with the Arkansas athletics logo emblazoned across the top. That would make this information iron clad, right?

It's possible, but not likely. While this scenario is unlikelyh to ever happen, if it did, my gut as a journalist would tell me there's a 99.9% chance Franklin is not going to be the new coach at Arkansas. See, he is using me to report specific terms of a contract.

He wants it reported that someone has seen a contract with specific salary for a set number of years so he can get another school to outbid what is obviously a fake agreement. When he walks out of my home, he's going to keep his phone nearby waiting on his agent to call and let him know the school he actually wants to coach has agreed to the terms they wanted to pry from them as a result of my technically accurate, but misinformed reporting.

The only thing certain in a coaching search is just about everything a journalist is told is either a lie or old intel. Even the stuff that turns out to be true is too absurd to believe at times.

Take for instance the story of Mike Leach in the last Razorbacks hiring cycle. The idea that someone in the inner circle at Arkansas deliberately chose to pass over Leach, dooming athletics director Hunter Yurachek to have to dive in the non-coordinators bin to find Sam Pittman, because this person thought Leach might say something weird at the press conference seemed too ridiculous to believe.

However, as time passed by and the hiring of Pittman came and went, more and more sources began to suggest this was actually true. Eventually, several years later, someone came forward willing to talk about what went down on the record.

So, the biggest thing to know is no one truly knows anything outside of Yurachek and maybe two or three boosters. Everyone else just thinks they might know something or are actually wise enough to realize they don't.

That doesn't mean don't have fun with it. Still, don't waste time listening to plane trackers until a small window surrounding the game against Missouri.

Don't get too caught up in that one guy who is dead certain he has a guy who saw a famous coach walk into the football offices because that's not going to happen until the night the hiring is announced.

At best, there will be a Zoom call between Yurachek and the coach he is going to hire. Just having fun watching the names flow across the screen as journalists do their best to work out the odds as to who might be coming and that person's pros and cons.

About an hour after we know for sure, you will know also.

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