The sport of college football has changed wildly in the last decade or so. More than at any other time in the history of the game.
Rules aren’t the only things that have altered. Have you taken a look at conferences lately? Any notion that tradition and pageantry were the crux of the sport has gone out the door. Folks who believe that are foolhardy anymore.
The way most of us think about the game has changed. Back in the old days – read as recently as three years ago – a team like Arkansas’ would have a primary goal of reaching a bowl game. A mark like that would be termed a successful season most years. Arkansas has, after all, never been a national-title contender in the modern era.
Combine that changing definitions of what it means to have a quality season with what coach Sam Pittman has established in three years at the helm. He took over for the worst coach in school history, Chad Morris, and has led Arkansas to three straight bowl invitations (remember the first year that bowl was wiped out because TCU had too many players in COVID-19 protocols). By nearly all measure, those three seasons would be called a success.
Is a bowl in 2023 good enough, though?
The byproduct of success is the expectation of more success. It’s like the economy. If you aren’t making more money every year, you’re losing money. Sort of how we all got into this predicament in first place.
Anyway, nary an Arkansas fan would call a 6-6 season with a bowl invite at the end of the year successful. How about seven wins in the regular season? Maybe. The Hogs play in the SEC, which isn’t exactly kind to its members – cannibalism is the standard.
Eight wins, surely, would qualify. Arkansas hasn’t had an eight-win regular season since before Bobby Petrino wrecked his motorcycle with a staffer on the back. If Pittman were to lead the Razorbacks to eight wins, in the SEC, in this day and age, you better believe that’s a quality season.
But if he doesn’t? What if Arkansas gets to seven? Or only six? Is that a bad season?
No. It isn’t. But one of the changes for the worse we’ve endured in college football, politics, the economy, you name it, in recent years is the tendency to look at everything in black or white. Good or bad. Pittman could win eight games and it is a success. He could win six or seven and it is, for lack of a better term, fine. Less than six? Well, that’s troubling.
The reality is the most likely scenarios are those six and seven. Granted, we picked eight wins here. Just keep in mind, if that doesn’t happen, if it’s another usual Arkansas football season – they’re perpetually .500, basically – don’t be too quick to term it a massive disappointment. Nor a magnificent accomplishment.
It’s just, well, fine.
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