10 most overrated head coaches in college football ahead of 2022 season (#4. PJ Fleck, Minnesota)

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4PJ FLECK
HC Minnesota

Another coach that the media fell in love with before his time in the Power Five and even since he took over at Minnesota is PJ Fleck.

Fleck started gaining national attention for his crazy sideline antics and high energy such as sprinting down the field at the end of quarters to screaming “Row the Boat” during post-game interviews. He was considered one of the best young football coaches after he turned Western Michigan around in just one year. He went 1-11 with the Broncos in his first season in Kalamazoo and then 8-5 over the next two years. He finished with a 13-1 season and Cotton Bowl appearance.

That was enough to earn him a job in the Power Five at Minnesota. He always just seemed like a Big Ten guy as he’s from Illinois and spent time as an assistant at Ohio State and Rutgers. Minnesota seemed like a good fit for him and he’s done a decent job, but certain people still drool over him despite a 35-23 record over five seasons with three bowl berths.

Fleck has won more than seven games just two times and he has five or fewer wins twice which also isn’t great. He isn’t recruiting at a super high level and he isn’t winning consistently. I think he’s good for Minnesota, but he’s not a top-half Big Ten coach yet he’s treated as one.

saturdayblitz.com

10 most overrated head coaches in college football ahead of 2022 season

Some college football coaches just get far too much credit for leading their programs and these are the 10 most overrated ahead of 2022.
saturdayblitz.com saturdayblitz.com

Go Gophers!!
 



A_Slab_of_Bacon said:
“Overrated”. Aka “I don’t like it, but I’m not capable of making a good argument.”
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Honestly, I can't take an article seriously that is based on the idea of being over or underrated. What rating does this refer to? If someone were to say PJ is the best head coach in America, then yes they are overrating him. If someone said he's the 100th best head coach in CFB, he is underrated. What "rating" are we using as the baseline?

And yes I know this article probably isn't meant to be that serious, more just getting a rant off of my chest.
 

So I clicked the story to see who his top 10 consisted of. Writer is a Michigan State fan according to his bio.

His list includes - Ferentz, Allen, Fitzgerald, Fleck, and Franklin - so 5 Big Ten coaches out of the 10 he picked.

Pretty weak "article" even by the already low Fansided standards.
 





I believe his salary rank is usually somewhere around 7th or 8th in the BT. Just a quick search of BT coach rankings and almost consistently they have him 8th. He's ranked exactly where he should be at this point.
 



Lets take Fleck out of it because I'm biased. But this part was funny "he has had 5 or fewer wins twice, which isn't great". Yeah, his first season and the COVID year.

Fitzgerald? LOL. The guy has won 8+ games 6 times at NW. He also finished 7-1 during the COVID season.
 



How can he count the COVID year when we only played 7 games? Was he supposed to be 7-0 that year? 20-6 over the last two real seasons is underachieving.?... WE'VE MADE IT!!!


BigGopher69 said:
This guy is a jackass, were not a blue blood program. I will take 3 bowl wins in 4 years with an 11 and 9 win season. I don't count the Covid year and the first year probably shouldnt count either.
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MaxyJR1 said:
How can he count the COVID year when we only played 7 games? Was he supposed to be 7-0 that year? 20-6 over the last two real seasons is underachieving.?... WE'VE MADE IT!!!
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We would only have to have gone 6-1 to avoid his 5 wins or lower threshold. But yeah, treating 2020 like a regular year and dinging a coach for their record during it is pretty weak. But it fit his narrative so he went with it.
 


Bob_Loblaw said:
Lets take Fleck out of it because I'm biased. But this part was funny "he has had 5 or fewer wins twice, which isn't great". Yeah, his first season and the COVID year.

Fitzgerald? LOL. The guy has won 8+ games 6 times at NW. He also finished 7-1 during the COVID season.
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I think Fitzgerald is really good but overrated personally under .500 50% of the time on conference play.

Finished last place in his division 3 of the last 9 years.

He has some good ups. But people think of him as a top 20 coach. Top 20 coaches don’t get last place 33% of the time.
 

MNVCGUY said:
So I clicked the story to see who his top 10 consisted of. Writer is a Michigan State fan according to his bio.

His list includes - Ferentz, Allen, Fitzgerald, Fleck, and Franklin - so 5 Big Ten coaches out of the 10 he picked.

Pretty weak "article" even by the already low Fansided standards.
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Ferentz years of success, Franklin doing pretty well, and Fleck, Allen and Fitzgerald are doing pretty darn good and schools that historically aren't good.
 

I rather have a Hall of Fame person as my coach, I believe Fitzgerald is a Hall of Fame person with roots in his program. PJ has brought energy do the program, he has had a rotating door for coaches. Not the smartest guy in the room, he makes up for it with energy. Only Div 1 program in the state, great resources and new facility. I have been following these blogs for awhile, good information, but if the fan base was so happy with the program, we would not be wasting time talking about anything but the players and how they are going to win.
 


Some guy said:
I think Fitzgerald is really good but overrated personally under .500 50% of the time on conference play.

Finished last place in his division 3 of the last 9 years.

He has some good ups. But people think of him as a top 20 coach. Top 20 coaches don’t get last place 33% of the time.
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Fitz is an interesting one, if he ever went on the open market he would be highly sought after by lots of NFL and college jobs. When you consider the limitations Northwestern faces in terms of recruiting he has done an amazing job there. Yes they tend to be up and down but he has finished in first or 2nd in the west in 4 of the last 7 seasons. At a school like Northwestern that is super impressive.

He seems perfectly content to stay at Northwestern. He is young enough that he could still make the jump to the NFL or some other team at some point but at least up to this point he has shown little to no interest in other opportunities. It would be fun to see what he could do at a more high level college program.
 

I would take Fitz 100 out of 100 times if he was interested in the gophers job. Dood has Northwestern more relevant in recent memory than the gophers.. with that said... I'm all aboard the p.j. train... Love where we are going...
 

MNVCGUY said:
Fitz is an interesting one, if he ever went on the open market he would be highly sought after by lots of NFL and college jobs. When you consider the limitations Northwestern faces in terms of recruiting he has done an amazing job there. Yes they tend to be up and down but he has finished in first or 2nd in the west in 4 of the last 7 seasons. At a school like Northwestern that is super impressive.

He seems perfectly content to stay at Northwestern. He is young enough that he could still make the jump to the NFL or some other team at some point but at least up to this point he has shown little to no interest in other opportunities. It would be fun to see what he could do at a more high level college program.
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Yean I'm convinced Fitz would be on most high profile team's "list" if they thought he was available. He's just not available so he doesn't get the attention.
 

Off-GridTNgopher said:
I would take Fitz 100 out of 100 times if he was interested in the gophers job. Dood has Northwestern more relevant in recent memory than the gophers.. with that said... I'm all aboard the p.j. train... Love where we are going...
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We have a better record since 2017 than Northwestern. Fitz is a good coach, but I don't think he's the coaching god some make him out to be. 109-90 is a good record considering the hurdles NW deals with, but I wouldn't drop PJ for him in a million years.
 

Gophers1992 said:
We have a better record since 2017 than Northwestern. Fitz is a good coach, but I don't think he's the coaching god some make him out to be. 109-90 is a good record considering the hurdles NW deals with, but I wouldn't drop PJ for him in a million years.
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He is a good fit for his program and environment, I may be misinformed but he seems to have a player first mentality. He is happy where he is and that translates to a happy team. PJ is doing the best that he can do.
 

I am happy to have PJ. I think we should have kept Mason, but PJ is a loud Mason and I can live with that.
 

At 3-4 we probably would have gone to a bowl in 2020 had we decided to not decline, we've certainly gone with a 2-6 record in 2012 and a 3-6 in 2018. Honestly Fleck's big ten record is 21-22 in five seasons, that's by far the best in conference record any gopher coach has had after five years in the modern era. I have very little doubt Fleck would be successful if a helmet school was willing to let him spray row the boat all over their campus
 

BigGopher69 said:
This guy is a jackass, were not a blue blood program. I will take 3 bowl wins in 4 years with an 11 and 9 win season. I don't count the Covid year and the first year probably shouldnt count either.
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First year counts. 2020 is a nothing other than part of official record. But the writer did not say "three bowl wins". They were only bowl "appearances".
 


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