Good article by Pete Fiutak.
Nice article… I agree with him…until the team shows me something more than what happened last year, I’m not buying into anything but another mediocre season. ESPN predicts 6-6. 
The last two games put a bad taste in the mouth’s of all Hog fans. Win those two games, and most of us would be much more excited. IMO
I am still looking forward to the season, but concerned.
For the past 45+ years since I was a very young lad, I always get excited for Razorback Football to begin each season.
As usual I’m overly optimistic and this year will be no different.
Yes it is time to be better than 6-6, 7-5, & 8-4 would create a little buzz. But I need a 9-3 or better regular season record at this point to really stir my hormones!
WPS!!!
Agree. Need to be better. Defense was not only bad last year it was an embarrassment. The second halves of those two games were embarrassment, but so was Auburn, Bama and LSU not only scoring, but scoring at will. Yes, the Razorbacks need to be much better and I am not buying into anything until I see it on the field. I can handle loosing games to those teams, but not even show up is not acceptable.
He puts it plainly…the simple fact is that we need to win…we pay BB a great salary…we dont pay him to be 7-6 and have a lost look on his face when the opposition starts steamrolling us in the 2nd half…
when he came in he stated he wasnt here to compete with Bama…he was here to beat Bama…which he shouldve never have said…
its simply time to hush the mouth and coach…and win…our state backs the team and we do everything he and Jeff Long asks us to do
its time for them to win…compete at a high level and move our program forward
No doubt the losses to MU & VT, especially in the fashion we lost them, made a huge difference in the season & how fans feel right now. Even 5 months later I can’t explain how a team can be so dominant in the first half & be so dominated in the 2nd half. Like almost everyone else, I’m going to need to see some results on the field before I start believing again. (I still believe in the coach, still think he’s got the program headed in the right direction, & still think he needs more time. However, I know what will happen if we finish 7-6 or maybe even 8-5 this season. A whole lot of people will scream for a coaching change & the discontent alone can make it harder to recruit & make predictions of “mediocrity” from this staff a self-fulfilling prophecy.) I yearn for a 9 or 10 win season, but can’t claim I expect one this year.
Every school pays their coach a great salary. Someone making $4 million per year is going to lose when that is the figure every coach has eclipsed.
And for what it’s worth, Bielema is at best the sixth-highest paid coach in the SEC West. Dan Mullen’s contract has some wording that suggests he might be paid more than Bielema, but doesn’t have specific figures. All anyone knows is that the average is $4.275 million over so many years.
I’m amazed at the people who say, “CBB should’ve never said he came to win the SEC West or to beat Alabama, not just compete with them.” If he’d said, “I just came to Arkansas to be competitive,” he would have been run out of Dodge quicker than he could have said, “Woo, Pig.” He said what every confident coach would say. Maybe he said it a bit louder or a bit more boastful, but I don’t want any coach who just wants to compete. I want a coach who will say, “I will bring Arkansas what they’ve never had before and that’s an SEC championship.”
I want that coach. I also want that coach to be given time to right a ship that was going in a very bad direction. Time, no doubt, is running out on CBB to deliver, and I am as big a fan as the next one in wanting more than 7-6 or 8-5. I’m cheering for a better record this year, but the most important thing I want to see is marked improvement in the defense, the offensive line and the kicking game. CBB has to deliver, at some point, some double-digit victory seasons. I don’t think we have to accept “mediocrity,” but I also don’t think we can use the salary CBB makes against him when it is bottom tier in the SEC West.
I hope he came to the SEC with the goal of winning the West and beating Alabama. That should be the goal of every coach who ever coaches at Arkansas.
BB needs to find a way to not blow leads, beat am and find a defense
I think CBB has done a really good job at building depth and getting quality players. IMO, we have a solid 7-9 win team consistently. but, agree with the author, we have not had a really good team or a great team under CBB. There have been no McFadden’s, Jones or Mallets walking through the door. Some of that is luck, some of it is having a successful program that kids want to be a part of. Maybe if a kid like Grant Gunnell would come to Arkansas, other very good players would follow.
This is year 5 and this is HIS team…Time to put up or shut up.
I would like to say that I don’t care how many wins we get, but I do care. But I care more about how we play. I want to see the fight and desire and hustle that didn’t show late in the year and during a few games earlier. Great effort goes a long way with me.