Pat McAfee Provides Insight on Alumni Conference Call

In his introductory press conference, West Virginia head coach Neal Brown was sharing his vision for the Mountaineer football program and creating a culture centered around the players. One of those pieces was bringing back former Mountaineer greats.

“There’s been exciting former players that should be a visible part of our program. I want them to know they are welcome here. Jeff Hostetler, who’s doing wonderful work with the Children’s Hospital. Marc Bulger who reached out to me on Twitter. Tavon Austin, Major Harris, Pat Harris (Yes, it was supposed to be Pat White), Bruce Irvin, Darryl Talley, just to name a few. I want all former Mountaineer football players, ya’ll come see us. Please be apart of what is going to be the next chapter of Mountaineer Football.”

Aside from the fact he called Pat White “Pat Harris”, an honest mistake, that’s good news to a lot of former Mountaineers that felt unwelcomed in a place they once called home.

Most notably, Pat White and Steve Slaton voiced their opinions about not feeling welcomed on the Pat White Podcast following a 10-year Fiesta Bowl reunion during a home weekend versus Iowa State.

Slaton went as far as saying that he couldn’t even take his family into the Hall of Traditions where, you know, he contributed the best hardware in the facility. Meanwhile, Pat White, the only college quarterback to start and win four bowl games, two of which were BCS Bowl wins, arguably the best wins in program history, felt he was a “nuisance” after being invited.

There was a disconnect and the feeling around the players from the Rich Rodriguez and the Bill Stewart era that they were being pushed aside for a new era of Mountaineer Football.

Additionally, the Big East Football Conference that the Mountaineers reigned supreme for nearly a decade had been mostly absorbed by the ACC and the eventual collapse moved West Virginia into the Big 12.

Last week, former Mountaineer punter Pat McAfee reiterated those statements on McAfee and Hawk Sports Talk.

“For a long time, our class, our team was basically, I don’t want to say pushed out at WVU, but wasn’t very welcomed back to WVU because Bill Stewart was the coach after Rich Rod. Bill Stewart got fired. Dana Holgorsen got brought in, Oliver Luck moved the team to the Big 12, the Big East collapsed. I don’t want to say they were trying to bury our legacy, but it was kind of like our legacy was kind of the one they were pushing out.”

However, McAfee wasn’t taking shots at his alma mater, he brought up a Zoom call with former teammates that was held the night before and was explaining the disconnect between alumni and the previous coaching staff. As far as the Zoom call, McAfee said there were "30-50 people on the call" and “It was awesome!”

“One of the coaches is Jahmile Addae, who was a safety for our team, he was an “OG” to everybody,” said McAfee. “He was a couple of years older than us but he kind of tied in the ‘PacMan’ West Virginia team’ and then ‘our era of West Virginia team’, which is Pat (White) Steve (Slaton) Owen Schmitt - them. So, Jahmile Addae was like the OG to everybody. Everybody liked Jahmile. He’s now coaching at WVU and it feels as if Neal Brown is trying his absolute best to get the crew back into WVU.

“So, Neal Brown's trying to bring us all back and I think that zoom last night was a great couple of steps towards it."

His counterpart AJ Hawk, former Ohio State and Green Bay Packer linebacker, said its “a huge thing” to have alumni around.

“I think it helps with everybody when you get all the old guys to come back together,” said Hawk. “And then, your current players can see how tight the older players are and they come back and say wow this is kind of a special thing we should really try and invest in this whole program.”

Then, Hawk later adding, “It’s not good when a coach tries to alienate some of the alumni then all those alumni all are tight then they all collectively hate the current head coach and want him out of there.”

Naturally, there was chatter amongst former players and McAfee gave a little insight into his thoughts on Holgorsen.

“There was a slot of slander being said about the last head coach,” said McAfee. “There was a lot of sly jabs being taken at the last regime that was there, but after meeting Dana Holgorsen, like, that’s just not his thing. Like, he does not care about anything but his team. By the way, I don’t think that’s necessarily wrong, but I had a grudge against Dana Holgorsen. I did not like Dana Holgorsen because they tried to eliminate Pat White and Steve Slaton who basically out West Virginia map, I thought.”

“Once you understand him, it's just not his thing,” added McAfee. “It’s never going to be his thing to be like ‘let me reach out to the alumni’… he just wants to coach ball. By the way, I respected it after meeting him.”

Nevertheless, it's a new staff and a new era and Neal Brown has opened the door to all former players and its good to see the best era in Mountaineer football history will finally get the respect they rightfully deserve.

You can watch the full episode by clicking here. The segment starts a 41:35-51:10.

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