Not sure about this year. I know Plank among a few others were the driving force behind bringing him to Maryland. I think his expiration date has to be coming up soon. He hasn't recruited nearly as well as I thought he would have. If Locks can't keep the DMV talent in MD, how does anyone expect a PITT HC with less resources and less fertile recruiting territory at to be able to pull in top end area talent?
The Narduzzi Contract
- Thread starter TheWerewolfFromTwilight
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His last five classes were ranked 33, 19, 38, 33, and 54. They're currently 25th in the 2025 class. I mean, that's not awful for Maryland.
What those recruiting rankings show you are how unacceptable his 33-41 record at Maryland really is, especially considering the dog crap out of conference schedule they usually play.
Being in a division with Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, and Michigan State pretty much made them, Rutgers, and Indiana irrelevant.
They were like the bizarro Wisconsin. Wisconsin could recruit 45th, and it might have been better than every other team in their division (or maybe all but one). Maryland could recruit 25th, and it would have been worse than three or four teams in their division.
It was absurd how uneven those divisions were. Not saying you're wrong that they could have done better, though.
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He's missed on 80-90% of the top area players in the DMV for the past 4-5 years. Maryland is an after-thought for the top area talent in the DMV.
They would most likely do a lot worse than Narduzzi without improvements in NIL.
Fran Brown took over a 6 win program and won 9 games. Narduzzi revamped his staff and offense and went from 3 wins to 7 wins. If he were a first year coach, people would be riding his meat.
6 to 9 wins are good seasons at cheap programs like Pitt and Syracuse.
maybe if the 7 wins were "spread out" over the season. Starting 7-0 moved the goal posts. 9 wins was the new expectation. Losing 5 in a row, including two games that should have been wins, keeps me from celebrating the season.
Similar to the Coastal championship in 2018 that saw a 3 game losing streak to end the year and finish 7-7....another unsatisfying season.
I don't understand how you, NCPitt and others just readily accept the 7 win (or less) mediocrity and think it is all that can be achieved here. Paul Chryst literally slept walk to a similar record as Narduzzi. Why the fear of making a change if a putz like Chryst didn't have the bottom drop out?
But he's not.
You do that with a new coach and you see the hope for the future. You do that with a guy whose been somewhere for ten years and you see that he epically fracked up to get you into that position.
As always, context matters.
Chryst won a lot of games at Wisconsin. 7-6 was his best season at Pitt.
Starting 7-0 didn't make Pitt any more talented. 4 of the last 5 teams on the schedule had more talent than Pitt. BC has better talent than the team Pitt trotted out there yesterday.
I don't see how you expect a program near the bottom of the conference in NIL to achieve anything other than mediocrity. It can't be done.
This team is really young & normally, I would be excited about next year. That said, I think a lot of them are going to have options that are going to pay more than Pitt. I think it would be foolish for them not to follow the money.
Only he didn't. He had Pitt competing near the top of the ACC when NIL kicked in.
If you lag behind in NIL, there is no hope for the future. That's reality.
we keep hearing this, and I don't doubt you as you are a decent poster, but a chart or some data to back up your claim on NIL would be appreciated
Articles such as this suggest Pitt's NIL efforts are a f****ing joke.
Yeah. but it gives you an idea. If NIL wasn't prioritized then, what makes anyone think it is today?
Michigan just bought our best HS recruit. Capel whiffed on his top targets, all to better funded programs.
We can read the tea leaves.
When Narduzzi is selling # of TFLs & sacks as opposed to actual money to recruits & guys already on the roster, it's safe to say we're screwed & our NIL game is a joke.
You're wasting air (or in this case typing) trying to explain this.
If anything Narduzzi OVER PERFORMS relative to investment. He has been developing top players to transfer for a paycheck to other schools for 3 years now.
Furthermore, is it a surprise that minimal investment in talent like Holstein had us at 7-0? Our fanbase should look at that and be donating like crazy.
Instead they are brain dead and expected us to win games starting Yarnell and 5 lineman that should be working at Frick Coke and Coal. So instead they criticize the coach, continue to not invest and the world spins.
That article is meaningless. That was a $1 million investment to ensure every player got paid something. Even your 84th and 85th man. I am sure Pitt's payroll isnt good but there's no way it can be very far from middle of the pack in a league without big football donors for its teams. Like if Pitt is paying $5 million per year and NC State is paying $8 million and is say 5th, does it make it impossible to beat them?
PN was very instrumental in getting HL hired here. HL took care of him with that contract and that's the biggest problem now. Buying him out and paying for a new HC will cost way too much unless you get a coach like Huff that Sauce mentioned. Lots of moving parts behind the scenes that people aren't aware of. A team doesn't just lose 5 straight without having dissention etc. Our team was not prepared and players look lost. No excuse for the VA and BC losses, NONE! Hope we can bounce back and right the ship. H2P!!!!
Yea, I wish I was a fly on the wall of the locker room. What we saw transpire the last 5 weeks of the season in the way lack of focus, prep and effort suggests the existence of some team morale/ psyche issues. The one complication of new players being added to and subtracted from the roster annually is that it doesn’t exactly encourage team cohesion and strong bonds between team members.
Mack Brown just said UNC is at 12 million fwiw
That sounds about right. We had it confirmed as $6 million for NIL going into 2024 by the press (e.g. PSN reported live from a kick off meeting) but that's across all sports. Basic salary for football players is allegedly around $45k, obviously some top recruits will get extra, though I'm not sure if that includes money from the Alliance 412 million per year. And a few might even get "actual" NIL for doing ads or whatever.
The per player amount is rumors, I can't confirm it, only that I've heard a similar number from multiple people (but could be the same rumor.) Whatever the exact amounts, it's considered fairly low for a Power Four team.
It's not fairly low. It's pathetic.
$5 million is what it takes to compete at a high level in basketball.
Boise has had massive success since their inception in 1996. They are 283-85 since then, with 15 conference championships and a 13-8 bowl record. From 2002-2020, they were ranked at some point, either preseason or during the season, every year. They have major bowl wins in the Fiesta bowl in 3 different seasons, with no losses. They've had 2 undefeated seasons and 6 one loss seasons. Highest ranking #2, with 6 seasons being ranked in the top 10 at some point.
Pitt since 1996 is 196-164. Bowl record is 7-12. Three conference championships with 1 outright, 2 shared. Pitt has been ranked at some point during 14 seasons since 1996. No undefeated seasons, no major bowl wins, no one or two loss seasons either. Highest ranking of #13.
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I don't necessarily agree.
If a new coach comes in here and does it in the same way Narduzzi did, largely with a young team, new style of offense, etc., like you say it generates some excitement and hope for the future. However, if he's only being paid a paltry $3 or $4 million, Pitt is once again going to have to pony up the money and commit somewhat long term to keep him. And if they choose not to, there's a good chance they pull a Todd Graham or Paul Chryst and actively seek other suitors. And the next time Pitt hires a Todd Graham or Paul Chryst that bolts for greener pastures, that coach is most likely going to take as many key contributors with him as he can.
Two things we can safely say about Narduzzi, he's committed to Pitt and view it as his destination job. He will make changes things clearly aren't working.
1. There's more downside than upside for a coaching change right now.
2. The price tag isn't worth it
3. Any hope is false. The ceiling is fairly low right now for the football program. Pitt's biggest problem is talent acquisition. It's been the biggest problem since the Gottfried era. The NIL/Portal era have just made it worse.
4. In my opinion, it actually feels much more hopeless to skirt the real issue that plagues the program (talent procurement) and pretend there are magical coaching work arounds to compete at a high level.
There absolute is. And it all revolves around the amount of any potential buy out. If Pitt could walk away from Narduzzi today free and clear, not owing him a penny, they'd be idiots to not do so.
Of course as we have seem way too often in the past, people making decisions like that at Pitt frequently are idiots.
I wouldn't say the decision makers at Pitt are idiots. Over the course of the last 40 years, They have a s few idiotic decisions, but for the most part, they do fairly well for the amount of financial support and fan interest.
Any coach that win between 6 & 9 games doing really well at Pitt. It's not a school where you can win at a high level.
Actually what the last couple of decades has shown is that any coach can win between 6 and 9 games at Pitt.
Narduzzi. Chryst. Graham. Wanny. Walt.
We are coming up on three decades of mostly mediocre coaches producing mostly mediocre results.
That's because they can't recruit anything better than mediocre talent to Pitt.
Pitt hasn't had a single Top 15 class since the Gottfried era.
I guess Nick Saban was just a mediocre coach at Michigan State & suddenly transformed into a good coach at LSU.
Since Walt Harris, Pitt has gotten mediocre results despite really shoddy recruiting.
