From Death To The Rebirth Of Life. Pittman Deserves Coach of The Year For Job Well Done At Arkansas

The Arkansas Football program seemed doomed for a brief while that felt like two decades.

This roster had plenty of talent on it to win more than eight games in three seasons. No one can tell me otherwise. The top 25 to mid-30s were always represented in the recruiting classes. Though it does not guarantee success in the SEC, the hardest football conference in the world, it should keep a program afloat and enable it to defeat its weaker non-conference rivals.

An unacceptable road loss Colorado State in week two of the 2018 season was a shocker. Losing to North Texas in blowout fashion was absolutely embarrassing. The beginning of 2019 included a humiliating setback against lowly San Jose State and a rout of Ty Storey-led Western Kentucky.

Do you really think that players who have graced the Cardinal and White like Devwah Whaley, Cole Kelley, Treylon Burks, Trey Knox, Santos Ramirez, McTelvim Agim, Chevin Calloway, Scoota Harris, Jonathan Marshall, Mike Woods, Montaric Brown, Kam Curl, Bumper Pool, Dre Greenlaw, Joe Foucha, Rakeem Boyd, Nick Starkel, Jalen Catalon, Myron Cunningham, Dalton Wagner, Ricky Stromberg, and countless other players were not good enough to be better than two or three consecutive seasons? These players should be commended for the hell they endured during the Chad Morris era.

That’s what has frustrated myself covering the Razorbacks over the years. Finally, a coach who this team will absolutely fight for. Not only fight but run through walls and shatter ceilings that are above them to rise from the dead! Perhaps this Razorback program wasn’t dead… it may have been thriving the whole time. Hungry for the day it would be unleashed to eat!

This program is being built as a winner. Built on the confidence within themselves that “who we have is all we need,” famously said by Sam Pittman.

There is an absolute hunger for success. A hunger to be better each game! Look no further than the starting quarterback.

There are still two games left in the season for KJ Jefferson, the Razorback quarterback who did not get off to a fast start but has since put up one of his best statistical seasons in recent memory.

For 664 yards, five touchdowns, and zero interceptions in the previous three games, Jefferson has completed 79 percent of his passes. How’s that for efficiency.

His touchdown to interception ratio of 20:3 is the best since Brandon Allen’s seasons in 2014 and 2015. He has demonstrated that he is the best heading into the upcoming season, when he might surprise everyone by winning the Heisman Trophy.