With its wide-open checkbook, its endless arrogance and its desperation to be relevant in football after more than a decade of mediocrity, it was easy to scoff at Texas’ decision to hire Steve Sarkisian at the end of 2020.
This was not landing a home run swing like Dabo Swinney or a surefire program-changer like Urban Meyer. Sarkisian had already been a head coach at two schools and not particularly successful at either stop. He’d been run out of the NFL after an unremarkable two years as the Atlanta Falcons offensive coordinator. A rehab stint at Alabama put him back on the radar, but let’s be honest: The next offensive coordinator to fail under Nick Saban will be the first.
Couldn’t Texas, with all of its ego and money, do better than this?
But for all the knocks on Sarkisian as a coach and program builder, he’s always been able to do one thing at an elite level — maybe the most important thing. The man can undoubtedly recruit.
And with one decision Thursday by a certain high schooler with a famous last name, that $34.2 million contract Texas gave Sarkisian makes a whole lot more sense than the day it was signed.
Hiring coaches is hard, even for Texas. The Longhorns have gotten it wrong (David McWilliams, John Mackovic, Charlie Strong, Tom Herman) far more than they’ve gotten it right with Darrell Royal and Mack Brown.
But getting in the ballgame with the nation’s best recruits is why Texas took a shot on Sarkisian, despite years of evidence that he does not stack up among the elite coaches in college football. When you land a quarterback prospect like Arch Manning, it’s a whole lot easier for the rest of the pieces to fall into place.
From the beginning of Manning’s recruitment, it was clear that he had a special relationship with and affinity for Sarkisian. The question was whether he’d actually have enough confidence in Texas’ future to sign on with a program that went 5-7 last year and lost to Kansas.
Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian during…