[autotag]Sam Pittman[/autotag] may have had one of the busiest and stressful offseasons that an Arkansas coach has ever had. After the wheels fell off early in the 2022 season and the Razorbacks limped to a 7-6 finish, Pittman virtually cleaned house when it came to key staff members including both coordinators – [autotag]Barry Odom[/autotag] and [autotag]Kendal Briles[/autotag].
Odom left to become the next head coach at UNLV, which could’ve been expected at some point as he has previous head coaching experience and no signs of giving up on running his own program. The most unexpected move was Arkansas losing Briles, who left for the same position – offensive coordinator – at TCU, after receiving a raise to stay with the Razorbacks. Mississippi State made a serious push to bring Briles to Starkville before TCU did, which he then used as leverage to receive another raise. When he tried to do the same after the Horned Frogs came calling, Pittman and Briles parted ways.
Brandon Marcello, national writer for 247Sports.com, isn’t a huge fan of Arkansas losing both coordinators and in his latest column “Coaching Carousel: Winners and Losers” listed Arkansas among the “losers” of this offseason.
“Arkansas lost this offseason more than half of its staff, including both coordinators who deserve a heap of credit for the Razorbacks’ sudden turnaround in 2021,” said Marcello. “Change could be a good thing, sure. Either way, this is an inflection point in the Pittman era.”
To replace Odom, Pittman hired former UCF defensive coordinator Travis Williams and former Florida State defensive backs coach Marcus Woodson as co-defensive coordinator. As for replacing Briles, Pittman turned to a familiar face in Dan Enos to run the Arkansas offense after having previously served as the Razorbacks’ offensive coordinator from 2015-2017.
Williams and Woodson don’t have experience being coordinators at the SEC level and while Enos has plenty of SEC experience – including a pretty successful couple of seasons last time he was in Fayetteville – there’s going to be a big adjustment for he and his players. That could be the reason why Marcello isn’t very high on the Razorbacks entering a critical juncture in the Sam Pittman era.
One thing that Marcello didn’t highlight was the other hires that Pittman made this offseason which were widely applauded. He hired [autotag]Ben Sowders[/autotag] from Louisville as strength and conditioning coach, [autotag]Morgan Turner[/autotag] from Stanford as tight ends coach and [autotag]Deron Wilson[/autotag] from Florida as defensive backs coach.
I think if you zoom out and look at Arkansas’ offseason from a bigger perspective, Pittman did about the best job anyone could’ve in his position. Will all of these hires pan out and be considered “home runs” in the end? Time will tell.
For now, it’s best to have patience and see where this goes. Spring practices are right around the corner and that will give us a better glimpse into the future of Razorbacks football.
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