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"Glad to be here," Rich Brooks said with a grin when it came his time to talk at this week's SEC media days.
And unlike some of the others who preceded him on the podium, the Kentucky football coach really was.
After a 3-8 2005 season and a 9-25 three-year run in Lexington, fans and media called for Brooks' head. But in a strange twist in a profession where coaches get pink slips after winning seasons, school officials opted to extend Brooks' contract a year, ensuring that all 12 SEC coaches from last season would be back for this one.
It's the first time that's happened in the SEC since 1988. And it's the same story in the ACC, where everyone but Duke's Ted Roof has been coaching at the same place since 2002.
Is this a sign of athletics directors and boosters becoming more patient? Has the pressure to win and win big been dialed down a notch? Not a chance, say the coaches who find themselves on "hot seat" lists every time they lose a few in a row.
"What does that tell me?" N.C. State's Chuck Amato cracked. "It tells me 'Wait till next year.' "
Amato knows better than most. He built his alma mater into a nationally ranked contender his first four years in Raleigh with Philip Rivers as his quarterback.
But since Rivers left for the NFL, the Wolfpack has won just six of 16 conference games. How does a team go 3-5 in the ACC, fans grumbled, with three first-round draft picks on defense, including Mario Williams, the No. 1 selection in April's draft?
In a business where big bucks and great expectations have merged to create legions of impatient fans, the fact that there have been no coaching changes in the SEC or ACC is considered highly unusual.
"And that tells you everything you need to know about the state of coaching the state of our game," Tennessee's Phillip Fulmer said. "I'm not complaining. That's just the way it is. We live in a microwave society. People want it now."
Perennial winners not immune
Fulmer has won nearly 80 percent of his games in 14 seasons in Knoxville. He's turned the Vols into a perennial power, winning a national title, coaching in 11 January bowl games and watching 64 of his former players get drafted by NFL teams thepast 10 years.
All that went out the window in 2005, when Tennessee plummeted to 5-6, lost to Vanderbilt and missed out on a bowl. It's led some fans and commentators to ask with straight faces if Fulmer's in danger of losing his job if the follies continue this fall.
"Expectations are high at Tennessee and, frankly, I'd like to think that we had something to do with raising those expectations," Fulmer said. "But every coach knows what he's getting into when he decides to do this. If you can't handle criticism and you can't handle pressure, this is probably not the job for you."
Turnover was down nationally in the profession this year, with just 11 of the 119 Division I-A teams making changes. That includes Northwestern, which promoted assistant Pat Fitzgerald to head coach when Randy Walker died suddenly.
A year earlier, 24 jobs changed hands, the same number as 2001 and 1997. The 11 new hires were the fewest since 1996, when a record-low nine of 111 switches were made.
"All it tells me is that I should hold my breath and close my eyes," Clemson coach Tommy Bowden said. "It's just a weird set of circumstances. The profession is just so demanding and the expectations are so high that there is going to have to be change on a regular basis."
One unusual set of circumstances leading to recent stability in the ACC is the fact that five of its 12 teams are being coached by alumni: Amato at N.C. State, John Bunting at North Carolina, Frank Beamer at Virginia Tech, Ralph Friedgen at Maryland and Al Groh at Virginia.
"Schools tend to be a little more patient when it's one of their own," said Friedgen, who won 31 games his first three seasons but has gone 5-6 in each of the past two. "But they won't stay patient forever. Not in this environment. The stakes are too high."
Building periods shortened
Once upon a time, coaches got five years to build a program before they got called into the athletics director's office. Now, it's five winning seasons and one losing one, and you're out (David Cutcliffe at Ole Miss). Or worse yet, three years, two bowl appearances and an early exit (Tyrone Willingham at Notre Dame).
Blame chat rooms, talk shows and 24-hour-a-day sports on television. Before the world became so connected, coaches had more job security.
"For the longest time, athletics directors felt that if a program was in tough shape, you had to give a new coach five years to get things straightened out," said Vince Dooley, Georgia's winningest coach and its athletics director from 1980 to 2004. "Now the consensus seems to be you can't afford to wait five years if it things don't appear to be going in the right direction.
"Back then, you had a sense of what a coach could do after three years. But now athletic directors are acting on it."
If things were as they are now back in the late 1980s, Beamer likely wouldn't be entering his 20th season at Virginia Tech. His first five Hokies teams went 22-32-1 from 1987-91. The next year, Tech joined the Big East and won just two games.
But Beamer's boss, Dave Braine, stuck with his guy through the tough times. Today, the Hokies are among college football's perennial powers.
"If I was a young coach today, I would never have made it," Beamer said. "You'll never see another athletic director stick with a coach that long if he's losing."
Big money carries big risk
Bobby Bowden is set to begin his 31st season as Florida State coach. Joe Paterno is heading into No. 41 at Penn State. Enjoy it while it lasts, Bowden said, because you'll never see longevity like this again.
"The way the world is now, you might see a guy stay at the same place for 20 years in the future," said Bowden, Division I-A's all-time winningest coach. "But not 30. No way, brother."
That's because if a coach can perform at a high level in this cauldron for a relatively short time, he can be financially set for life.
In 1979, Lee Corso signed a contract at Louisville that paid him $15,000 per season. Earlier this month, Bobby Petrino agreed to a new deal with Louisville that will pay him $25.5 million over the next 10 years.
That's why Bowden said coaches have no reason to complain about pressure and ever-increasing expectations that come with the job.
"This is life we want. This is the life we asked for," he said. "We asked for this pressure and they gave it to us."
And unlike some of the others who preceded him on the podium, the Kentucky football coach really was.
After a 3-8 2005 season and a 9-25 three-year run in Lexington, fans and media called for Brooks' head. But in a strange twist in a profession where coaches get pink slips after winning seasons, school officials opted to extend Brooks' contract a year, ensuring that all 12 SEC coaches from last season would be back for this one.
It's the first time that's happened in the SEC since 1988. And it's the same story in the ACC, where everyone but Duke's Ted Roof has been coaching at the same place since 2002.
Is this a sign of athletics directors and boosters becoming more patient? Has the pressure to win and win big been dialed down a notch? Not a chance, say the coaches who find themselves on "hot seat" lists every time they lose a few in a row.
"What does that tell me?" N.C. State's Chuck Amato cracked. "It tells me 'Wait till next year.' "
Amato knows better than most. He built his alma mater into a nationally ranked contender his first four years in Raleigh with Philip Rivers as his quarterback.
But since Rivers left for the NFL, the Wolfpack has won just six of 16 conference games. How does a team go 3-5 in the ACC, fans grumbled, with three first-round draft picks on defense, including Mario Williams, the No. 1 selection in April's draft?
In a business where big bucks and great expectations have merged to create legions of impatient fans, the fact that there have been no coaching changes in the SEC or ACC is considered highly unusual.
"And that tells you everything you need to know about the state of coaching the state of our game," Tennessee's Phillip Fulmer said. "I'm not complaining. That's just the way it is. We live in a microwave society. People want it now."
Perennial winners not immune
Fulmer has won nearly 80 percent of his games in 14 seasons in Knoxville. He's turned the Vols into a perennial power, winning a national title, coaching in 11 January bowl games and watching 64 of his former players get drafted by NFL teams thepast 10 years.
All that went out the window in 2005, when Tennessee plummeted to 5-6, lost to Vanderbilt and missed out on a bowl. It's led some fans and commentators to ask with straight faces if Fulmer's in danger of losing his job if the follies continue this fall.
"Expectations are high at Tennessee and, frankly, I'd like to think that we had something to do with raising those expectations," Fulmer said. "But every coach knows what he's getting into when he decides to do this. If you can't handle criticism and you can't handle pressure, this is probably not the job for you."
Turnover was down nationally in the profession this year, with just 11 of the 119 Division I-A teams making changes. That includes Northwestern, which promoted assistant Pat Fitzgerald to head coach when Randy Walker died suddenly.
A year earlier, 24 jobs changed hands, the same number as 2001 and 1997. The 11 new hires were the fewest since 1996, when a record-low nine of 111 switches were made.
"All it tells me is that I should hold my breath and close my eyes," Clemson coach Tommy Bowden said. "It's just a weird set of circumstances. The profession is just so demanding and the expectations are so high that there is going to have to be change on a regular basis."
One unusual set of circumstances leading to recent stability in the ACC is the fact that five of its 12 teams are being coached by alumni: Amato at N.C. State, John Bunting at North Carolina, Frank Beamer at Virginia Tech, Ralph Friedgen at Maryland and Al Groh at Virginia.
"Schools tend to be a little more patient when it's one of their own," said Friedgen, who won 31 games his first three seasons but has gone 5-6 in each of the past two. "But they won't stay patient forever. Not in this environment. The stakes are too high."
Building periods shortened
Once upon a time, coaches got five years to build a program before they got called into the athletics director's office. Now, it's five winning seasons and one losing one, and you're out (David Cutcliffe at Ole Miss). Or worse yet, three years, two bowl appearances and an early exit (Tyrone Willingham at Notre Dame).
Blame chat rooms, talk shows and 24-hour-a-day sports on television. Before the world became so connected, coaches had more job security.
"For the longest time, athletics directors felt that if a program was in tough shape, you had to give a new coach five years to get things straightened out," said Vince Dooley, Georgia's winningest coach and its athletics director from 1980 to 2004. "Now the consensus seems to be you can't afford to wait five years if it things don't appear to be going in the right direction.
"Back then, you had a sense of what a coach could do after three years. But now athletic directors are acting on it."
If things were as they are now back in the late 1980s, Beamer likely wouldn't be entering his 20th season at Virginia Tech. His first five Hokies teams went 22-32-1 from 1987-91. The next year, Tech joined the Big East and won just two games.
But Beamer's boss, Dave Braine, stuck with his guy through the tough times. Today, the Hokies are among college football's perennial powers.
"If I was a young coach today, I would never have made it," Beamer said. "You'll never see another athletic director stick with a coach that long if he's losing."
Big money carries big risk
Bobby Bowden is set to begin his 31st season as Florida State coach. Joe Paterno is heading into No. 41 at Penn State. Enjoy it while it lasts, Bowden said, because you'll never see longevity like this again.
"The way the world is now, you might see a guy stay at the same place for 20 years in the future," said Bowden, Division I-A's all-time winningest coach. "But not 30. No way, brother."
That's because if a coach can perform at a high level in this cauldron for a relatively short time, he can be financially set for life.
In 1979, Lee Corso signed a contract at Louisville that paid him $15,000 per season. Earlier this month, Bobby Petrino agreed to a new deal with Louisville that will pay him $25.5 million over the next 10 years.
That's why Bowden said coaches have no reason to complain about pressure and ever-increasing expectations that come with the job.
"This is life we want. This is the life we asked for," he said. "We asked for this pressure and they gave it to us."
