1-on-1 with DP – 93.7 The Ticket KNTK - Did Michigan make the best hire of the CFB coaching cycle?: December 29th, 12:00 p.m.

Episode Date: December 29, 2025

Austin and Jake discuss whether or not Michigan's hire of former Utah Head Coach Kyle Whittingham is the best hire of the 2025 head coaching carousel.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

It's time to go one-on-one with D.P. Coming at you live from the heart of Lincoln America, a 93-7-the-ticket and the Ticketfm.com. Sponsored by the Downtown Lincoln Foundation. Here is your host, Derek Pearson. Welcome to the second hour here of one-on-one on 93-7. The ticket myself, Jake Bockovan, along with Austin Orman, filling in for DP, who might be landing at some point here. I've been saying the whole time he's been flying to Las Vegas. The flight doesn't take too long.

I don't think so anyway. It's been a few years since I made it down to Vegas and lost all my money at the casinos. But in any case, hopefully he has fun. Everybody that's traveling, hopefully have some fun in Vegas as well. Obviously, that's kind of the big draw. bowl game is there's never a dull moment, never a dull hour, uh, in Las Vegas. So, you know, I know, hey, hey, I can say otherwise. You really, really. Oh, yeah. Maybe I just wasn't out looking and adventuring for the fun,

but 11 days in Vegas gets you down, man. It can't, of them consecutively. Yeah, if you, if you, if you kind of isolate yourself in your hotel room, it might, uh, is, well, you're not a big, uh, you didn't go to the table as much, did you? I did not. Yeah. I, yeah, not with, now with a kid and another one on the way. Yeah. I decided to be prudent. Fair enough. Yeah, yeah.

I get that, which is the deal. But, I mean, as long as you like gambling, there's never a dull moment in Vegas. But, you know, there's shows, stuff you can do. But, I mean, I could agree with you. I would, I've had people, I've had friends that moved to Vegas and, you know, it's on purpose. Or on purpose.

Yeah, it kind of takes away from the destination, right? Well, where are you going to go? Like, like, like cheap, easy place to go and, and just, you know, lose yourself for a few days. if not Vegas. If you live there, right. Yeah, if you live there, then it's just there all time.

Yeah, I'm not really sure. And there's not much around Las Vegas. It's just a desert. Right. So there's not much to travel. You just got to just got to stay in Vegas. Obviously, close enough to Los Angeles or something if you want to drive for your four hours.

But is that their version of like going to Kansas City? I think so. Yeah. I think we got it better. I'm not sure. Depends on what you want to do. But if you want to stay. away from highly populated areas.

Then, yeah, then we've got it better. So that's one way to look at it. But yeah, so Nebraska in Utah will, of course, play here. And we'll get to Kyle Whittingham. He took the Michigan job over the weekend. We can talk about that. There was a little bit of news here from the past hour. Marcus Freeman, of course, the Notre Dame head coach had been talked about,

a potential candidate for NFL coaching vacancies. He tweeted out 2026, run it back, go Irish. as it appears now that he's received an enhanced contract from the university. Sources has confirmed now to ESPN. So no Marcus Freeman to the NFL. He stays with the Irish, of course, again, who pouted their way out of going to a bowl game, which they were going to the playoffs. What are your kind of initial feelings on that?

Obviously, I love, you know, I'm a big college football first guy. I love the powers, even though a lot of people hate Notre Dame, at least to have some continuity and consistency there with one of the top young coaches in football in general. But then there's always the kind of the opposite side of that. It would have been fun to see him, at least get an opportunity in the NFL. Though I don't think, and he had been linked to the Giants, that's been a tough gig for many of the coaches the last decade or so. Yeah, it really has.

Tom Coughlin's probably the last guy to handle it consistently well. I'm fascinated to see if through the professionalization of college sports, we get more college coaches making the jump or fewer. college coach is making the jump, right? Because, I mean, you think about, obviously, you know, Matt Ruhl has been there. Carol gave it a trial. He was an NFL guy, then a college guy, then an NFL.

I don't know. That one's just its own sort of situation. And plenty more than I mean, Nick Saban, obviously comes to mind. And there have been some. It's not common, but it's not rare. But specifically for the head coaching job, you would think that off the top of your head, you know, well, Ohio State's pretty professional.

No, would Ryan Day, maybe leave that list of candidates. Dan Lanning. down the line. I don't know because I still think there is a pretty clear delineation between what you need to be a good college head coach and a good NFL head coach. It's simpler in some ways than the NFL. You know, just just coach football. Just get down to business. You don't have to have glad hand as much. But also, could you argue it's higher stakes? You know, the 32 biggest franchises in the world. And if you're not doing that one job really well, you're out. Similar skills but different skills involved. I don't know if Marcus Freeman ever makes the jump. Maybe he does. Maybe he

doesn't. I still think they're two pretty separate realms. I'm going to be curious to see if the changes in college football lead to there being more guys that the NFL views is qualified if the system gets close to the NFL's or if it's still, it's just college down there. It's got to be a really special candidate for us. We're sure we'll interview you just to pick your brain, but we're just going to go someone that we know succeeded in the NFL. Again, it's so interesting. If there was a proven way that this is the route to go and work, then that's what everybody would do.

There's enough examples of, you know, taking NFL guys or taking college guys and are working, doing the same and it's not working. So it's really tough process to kind of figure out where you want to go there. But I would have liked to see Marcus Freeman and maybe we will someday get a chance at the NFL. Also, like guys that are just kind of college football guys and say, you know what? this is my gig. I'm going to stay here 30 years and this is what I'm going to do. And then there's no, remember at one time Kirk Farrants was a hot name in about the mid 2000s

about maybe taking an NFL job. Never did. The Giants. Yeah. Yeah. There's always going to be kind of some talks as long as you're successful. And that's that's what Marcus Freeman has been able to do there. Where would you rather than coach, college or NFL? Is it job dependent? I think it is job dependent. Because I thought that was interesting when you put it because there, and there are, you can see that in the salaries even. There are, like, there are college coaches that make what some of the lower level NFL coaches make.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. What is the, what's the worst NFL job that you would leave a top five college job for? Ooh, that's tough because you really would see that, right? Um, Giants? Like, would you, would you, would you, if you're Ryan Day, would you leave Ohio. state for Tennessee

and Cam Ward? I don't think so. I think that's one of those deals. Would you leave for Denver after Sean Payton retires? Well, now they're set up pretty well. A lot of it has to be kind of what the setup is, I think, and also like, if you're Ryan Day and Tennessee comes open, it's going to goes back to the conversation of like,

do I jump at the first one or do I wait to like build myself up until a good opportunity presents itself? If you're Marcus Freeman, let's say that, you know, this year, next year is it for Shane Steichen? Do you move down the road? Or would you want to go further away? You know, would you, would people understand if you left Notre Dame for just the Colts? You know, Notre Dame probably a top five college football job, top 10. Certainly even most accounts, Colts aren't a top 10 NFL job. No. I wouldn't think. Would that be a good enough reason to leave? You probably don't have to uproot your family necessarily. Move, but a little bit different. Would it be easier to take a job like that, closer to home, or would you rather go someplace further where you don't have to deal with the backlash of having left Notre Dame? That would be an interesting part of that, too, especially leaving the bigger institution.

I think you might want to get out of the state. But to your point, again, it just kind of depends on what do you, what is, what are your goals and what do you want to do? As a college coach right now, it's just, it's got to be a 24-7 job with just everything coming at you in all different angles and roster management, recruiting, and all that sort of stuff. deals. You know, it might be, you might get a little bit more sleep as an NFL coach if that's kind of what you're looking for, kind of more priority on game day and obviously still managing egos and that sort of stuff. But, you know, the GM will do a lot of the NIL bidding for you.

Obviously, none of the recruiting stuff. You'll definitely have an interest in a say so in the, in the scouting department and all that. But if you were an NFL coach, would you, I guess something for you as, how much of a say would you like in personnel? Would you want to go full Belichick coach and GM? Or do you just want to have, you know, a good, you know, professional working relationship with your GM? Because in college, I feel like head coach has a lot to say, at least the assistants have a lot to say. Bach, if you're an NFL head coach, do you want college level control of your roster? Or are you saying, well, my job's to coach who I got and I'll give a little input here or there? Well, I think you probably want, um, as much

say as you can get, right? I mean, obviously the GM at that level is a, is a, is a big time job you know they're hiring the top people they feel like um you know that can take on that responsibility but i was just kind of get caught up in like what if you never get your quarterback right or you don't get your opportunity certainly with your like top draft picks it'd be tough as a head coach to be like you know what we need a franchise leader we need this and then they you know draft a lineback and it's like well that helps but that's not that's not going to yeah help me kick the next big stuff right right right yeah i think that as a college head coach, having that much control, at least relative to, you know, the level.

I mean, sure, you don't control your players. They're not just there to do your bidding. But being able to say, you know, I want X, Y, and Z, being able to be in all those meetings, being able to say, hey, sorry, there's not really going to be room for you on the team next year. We should probably be looking at other options for you. Now that you can't do that in the NFL, but it seems a little bit different, right? Because you're not really cutting players in college, at least as we traditionally think of the term. I would think that being hands-on, being able to, you know,

get closer to handpicking your roster, getting the recruits from the areas of the country that you like to go visit and have connections to. Could be, you know, somewhat helpful as a college head coach. But then in the NFL, too, it's, yeah, I mean, I want to have some say over my guys, but these are the best of the best. You know, we'll evaluate them,

but they should all be able to do a relatively similar job. Sure, I have an archetype of a guy I like, more or less. But I wonder how many coaches crave that roster control down to the final 53 man spot versus the 105 in college. And how many are just like, dude, I'm just here to coach football. Just give me players and I'll get something out of them.

Well, it's really interesting because obviously in college football, you've got recruiting advantages when we're talking about like roster management at Tulane in Texas A&M. Those are going to be different things, right? And when you kind of do that in the NFL, like, yes, it plays out that way. But how much better are the top rosters than the bottom rosters? They are, right?

I mean, it's evident when you see it. But every NFL game, as we know, I mean, the Steelers had everything to play for. So he dropped one to the Browns, right? I mean, it can happen. And that can happen in college football too. But I guess my point is you can put in like extra work and, you know, depending on the spot that you can be to like actually build the advantage as a college football coach. Whereas an NFL coach, everybody's getting the same amount of roster spots.

Everybody's getting the same amount of draft picks. There's no like built in advantage or regional advantage or anything to that. that case. So it's, it's interesting, you know, to talk about the power dynamics of it, of how much power you'd want. But altogether, it's just a different game they're playing to a degree as well. It is in different players like play different games. You know, so maybe there's some college coaches that like that regionality. So I know I can get what I want right here. Maybe there's some that are that, you know, that's too many recruiting trips. That's too many visits in mom's kitchen, you know, for mediocre food. They have to ask like, tastes really good. I don't know.

But that's where I'm curious, again, as we see the college football model become similar to, but not one to one like the NFL model, if NFL teams will view college coaches or have college coaches that start to view themselves more of that NFL model of, hey, this is what I'm good at. My skill set fits, right? I'm not just the scheme guy in college. I'm not just the one-trick pony that finds a guy from, you know, backwater, Texas, that's going to be the next big thing. No, I can work with big talent.

Now, I can work with egos. I've had to deal with that in college now. I understand at least better than most college coaches how the salary cap works. Now money plays into some of these determinations. I could see college saying or the NFL saying to college coaches, yeah, you're getting more of this on the job training. We'll take more chances on more of you. I could also see the NFL saying, that's cute.

Your system's not ours. You got to really pay your dues and be absolutely the best of the best. And have nothing left to prove in college before we take you. But it's interesting. dude, the two there, I mean, you're just talking, you're kind of thinking about through job security is how quickly, you know, that could change in both sides of it. But like you said, there might be a little bit more leniency one way or the other. It's just, it's intriguing. I'd like to see it. I mean, very few can kind of do both. I think Pete Carroll is fascinating and, you know, kind of

the history of coaching to have kind of been able to do that. And obviously struggling now with, with Vegas and getting that thing pumped up and rolling again. But still, you know, to have to have that sort of success and all the different skills we're talking about, all the, you know, kind of different games that they're playing, to have success at both levels, as we've seen with, you know, the Bill Belichick's, I mean, he's had success at both levels in like the Bill Belichick, Doc. Right. Like, you talk about the top name, the top name.

That's what's so interesting. Best college football coach ever, Nick Saban, he couldn't get it done in the NFL. Best NFL coach ever, at least according to, you know, the championships, Bill Belichick, not after a good start at North Carolina. And again, Steve Spurrier, the fun and getting off. I mean, bringing that to the NFL, didn't work out. There's just example after example of where it doesn't. And then there's the few examples where it does. And it reminds you more than anything as we go through those coaching cycles is just the excitement and the hope and the opportunity of a new coach and what it brings and what this could be. And the reality that more

often than not four or five years later, regardless of who you're bringing in, you're looking for somebody else. Somebody else. Time is a flat circle. Dread it or run from it. The coach hiring cycle arrives all the same. Now, I wanted to go back to that coaching hiring cycle because Kyle Whittingham now hired by Michigan. Of course, you look at some of the big moves this offseason. James Franklin to Virginia Tech, obviously Lane Kiffin to LSU, Kyle Whittingham, to Michigan, Matt Campbell, even to Penn State. Do you feel like if you're Florida and you picked up John Summerall. And I'm not to say, you know,

a group of five coaches moving up that, you know, UCLA, Oklahoma State, Auburn, these teams doing the same thing. But if I sit back and look at it, Kyle Whittingham just became available, that's a top 15 coach coming into the year.

And he's a top 15 team now. There's nothing that changes in my mind about that. James Franklin, Lane Kiffin, these are top 15 type of coaches in my mind, at least entering this past year. Maybe Franklin gets bumped down to 20th or whatever, but he can't fall that far for his bill of work.

I just feel like, maybe, you know, this is late in the process. I thought, who is Michigan going to have left to kind of go after? And they might have made the maiden, other than Lane Kiffin, I think this is probably argued, and just because Lane Kiffin's younger, that's the only reason that I think maybe I would rank that ahead of how Whittingham at Michigan,

I think the, the styles kind of fit. Whittingham has proven enough for years and years and years at Utah. I think it's a fantastic hire for the Wolverine. I do too, and not one they could have planned on. unless i i don't believe that well hey i mean he stepped down and then conveniently michigan comes open do you think they fired trone more because kyle wittingham was available no i really don't i think this was just one of those kind of like you know the arc of the union of the NBA universe just

always bends back to the lakers right like a don't should not have been available but he was and of course it had to be oh he's only shop to the lakers though yeah right but same kind of thing with michigan right like is michigan that special ask them they think they are did they deserve Kyle Whittingham for everything they've been through? No, they fell butt backwards into Kyle Whittingham. We should all be upset about this. Even if it's for, what, 66? Yeah, yeah. Five years, six years. We should all be wildly upset about this. I mean, good for them. They landed on a fantastic candidate that should have plenty left in the tank to help that university get back on the right track. But are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? It's another

example of Michigan getting off essentially Scott Free. I think they might have even upgraded from Jim Harbaugh with Kyle Whittingham. Maybe, and I get it. Harbaugh won the title, but did he really come on? You know that conversation again. Wittingham's a heck of a college football coach. Michigan had no idea he was going to be available unless the private capital group that invested in Utah is funded by Michigan people who wanted to kick him out the door and like, hey, Kyle, look, we got a spot for you. Come on over.

But there's no way that was what happened. Michigan just fell butt backward into Kyle Whittingham. It pisses me off. They don't deserve him. He deserves better. He deserves better. than the mess that institution is right now. It's a great football fit. And I hate that it's a great football fit because he didn't deserve to get pushed out of Utah like it seems like made have happened behind the scenes.

And Michigan, sure as heck, didn't deserve to get a coach like that to fall into their lap. No, they should have wandered the wilderness. They should have, you know, had to get lucky on hiring a coordinator or take a swing on, I don't know, whoever Eastern Michigan's coach it, me, you know, or Toledo's guy, hire Candle. He looks good in blue and gold.

I don't know, but no, you get Kyle Whittingham. Yeah. Are you kidding me? That's what I'm saying. I mean, I feel the same way. No, I don't have as much hatred toward Michigan as you do. So again, I was kind of like the brand. It's just like, really?

It just worked out well for. Really? Those people? Them? Why do bad people have good things happen to them like this? I just, I think it is, it is, like we said, just, just great kind of football on the field works also breaks away from the Jim Harbaugh kind of coaching tree, right? And so doing that, so I saw somebody on Twitter also pointed out like the only women he followed, Kyle Whittingham on social media is like his wife and his daughter.

He hasn't posted in 11 years. Yeah. All that sort of stuff. So it's definitely a change in what has been going on there and a very much needed cleanup for the University of Michigan. But, you know, obviously they've got their bowl game against Texas still coming up. But it feels far from any sort of reset is going to be neat in place in Ann Arbor. it feels like you can kind of pick up where the last stuff left off, which is building its way back toward competing with the top teams in the Big Ten.

So Michigan, I don't feel like is going to take too much of a dip here. I've loved Kyle Whittingham and what he's done for years at Utah again, I think he's undoubtedly a top 15 coach in college football. Elsewhere in the Big Ten, Penn State poaching DeAnd Lynn from USC, former Nittney Lion defensive back, three-time All-Big Ten get, in fact. in the conference moving across the country. I was not as sold on that higher some people were for USC,

but he did some legitimately good work. Bach and again, it's just these big schools, right? Michigan falls into Kyle Whittingham. Penn State can play the alumni card, not for Terry Smith, but for Deanton Lynn and bring him home.

I kind of love that for Penn State. He did some pretty good work, who I don't think Penn State, you know, was perfectly nice to Tom Allen and get rid of him, but making Jim Knowles as highly paid as he was. interesting move for him, but hey, follow the money, good for you.

But again, to get another solid defensive coordinator in Deant and Lynn, I love that for Matt Campbell too, because even if Lynn's been gone, you assume there's got to be some love for him still back home and as Matt Campbell makes a move to a new area, having an alum like that on staff, I think that's a really good hire for Penn State. I think that is really good hire for him. I haven't got your thoughts in general about Matt Campbell at Penn State, though, because again, as we go kind of through this hiring cycle and talk about, you know, the favorite hires. And again, I'd say Lynn Kiff and Kyle Whittingham are far above just like proven of what everybody else has is able to kind of

throw out there. Of course, you would have a pretty good argument for Coach Campbell and, you know, two of the winning of seasons in Iowa State football history, all of that. But again, following the James Franklin era, is that the guy, and that's what kind of makes the Michigan part kind of interesting, if Penn State could have landed Kyle Whittingham, would that have been a better hire? And I would think at least as far as stability and proven success. Again, you kind of have the Lane Kiffin discussion again where he's younger and so maybe more long-term stability there. But as far as like who's going to compete next year, I think, you know, I think Michigan's in a pretty good position compared to Penn

State. And we'll see. I mean, Matt Campbell has had some up and down seasons at Iowa State. The ups have been very high. People are very excited about that. And maybe that's, you know, maybe that's because it's Iowa State that you kind of go back into those peaks and valleys. But But, I mean, that was the talk all along about Penn State. It's like, well, what's the next guy going to do to possibly match or surpass what, what Coach Franklin has done there? I think that Matt Campbell has obviously a great opportunity in front of him. I think it's much more likely that Lane Kiffin flames out at LSU, but I also think

Wayne Kiffin will probably have an easier time taking the next step in his course. career, right? Because what was the thing with Ole Miss? Never win the big one. Couldn't go over the hump. One game short, never had that, that it factor. Same sort of thing for Campbell and Iowa State, right? I mean, just, I think, got the first Big 12 championship game appearance, at least a long time for them last year. Hey, guess what? One step short against the Arizona state team that makes the college football playoff. I think if things go south for, for both Lane Kiffin and Matt Campbell, it will be irreparable between Lane Kiffin and LSU. And obviously, it's pretty irreparable right now between Lane Kiffin and Old Miss. I think that if Matt Campbell doesn't work

out for Penn State, it's, well, you know what? We like what we saw. Weird that it took us this long to get there. It just didn't work. Matt Campbell will land on his feet. Lane Kiffin will get another job somewhere too. I'm just not sure what level. Matt Campbell, I think, has a much better likelihood of, if it doesn't work at Penn State, he'll still be respected enough across the industry to still go back to a Big 12 school or a Big 10 school and something like that. Lane Kiffin, I'm not not so sure. Maybe Lane can talk his way into an ACC job. We'll see. But I think that the ceiling is equally high for both of them. I think both coaches can win a national championship at their new school. But I think if things go south, they're more likely to

go further south quicker and more dramatically for Lane Kiffin. Part of that is just his personality. And the personality of LSU. Right. Yeah. Not like things haven't gone drastically south for Penn State. You know, before. We've been over that. I don't need to do it again. But I think LSU would be more of just a crash out, a flame out, you know, steaming train derailing off the tracks, as opposed to just like a crumble. He's good, but is he really what we paid for? You know, he's James, diet James Franklin at Penn State. It will be exciting. Of course, that's part of the kind of the year one talk next year. We'll see. We do it every year. This has been a very exciting

and interesting, obviously, coaching cycle. I'd say up there, Nick for the longest time was saying it's going to beat the year that Kelly and Lincoln Riley, you know, made their moves. I would say it's close. I don't know if it's, that was kind of the part of that was the initial shock factor of kind of, okay, this is part of the new age of college football. Yeah. I don't know if it's quite hit that, but it certainly hasn't been short of any soap operas. Oh, yeah.

So, I mean, I think you could probably put it our put it on par with that offseason and that coaching cycle. All right. Let's take quick break. We got more to talk about coming up next year on one on one on 93. the ticket watch live on facebook youtube or twitch you're listening to one-on-one with dp on 93-7 the ticket and the ticket fm dot com