Purdue Hires Ryan Walters

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I think a good hire but a complete 180 from an offensive minded coach to a defensive one.
 

Played for Colorado. Was most recently DC at Illinois.
 






Not a name I was familiar with. Will be interesting to see what he does with the offense and if he decides to keep the more wide open pass first style Purdue has had for a long time under guys like Tiller and Brohm.
 

Interesting. He had a great year 2022 with the Illini defense with mediocre results the prior year. His defenses were mid-pack in the SEC. Regardless, we're probably looking at another strong defense in the BG10 West (for however long that lasts).
 



Word said:
Played for Colorado. Was most recently DC at Illinois.
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MNVCGUY said:
Not a name I was familiar with. Will be interesting to see what he does with the offense and if he decides to keep the more wide open pass first style Purdue has had for a long time under guys like Tiller and Brohm.
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Receiving a lot of credit for the success of Bert's defense at Illinois. His name was mentioned on a lot of the early target lists for Colorado before they hired Brew (and Coach Prime).
 


Illinois had one of the best defenses among power 5 schools. Based on this, it seems like a good hire.

Purdue on the other hand had a middle of the road defense. He'll have his hands full with a culture built around a passing offense.

Being a head coach is a whole lot different that a coach on one side of the ball, but perhaps they caught lightning in bottle. We shall see.
 

Not a midwest guy, only 2 years of DC experience, etc.

Seems like a bright young coach but kind of a weird hire. Especially since Purdue has long had that offensive identity.
 



I think it is a good hire… for Purdue.

Purdue hires are going to be highly speculative type hires, more proven head coaches will have other options that aren’t Purdue.

Not a bad choice.
 


A_Slab_of_Bacon said:
I think it is a good hire… for Purdue.

Purdue hires are going to be highly speculative type hires, more proven head coaches will have other options that aren’t Purdue.

Not a bad choice.
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Huge step down from Brohm (on paper) though.
 

Word said:
Huge step down from Brohm (on paper) though.
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Yep, on paper. Though he's a native of Louisville and spent 6-7 years down there as an assistant coach. Add in getting to the playoffs thru the ACC rather then the Big Ten and it may be a step-up for him.

"A native of Louisville, Brohm (born April 24, 1971) earned his bachelor’s degree in business administration in 1994. He and his wife, Jennifer, have a son, Brady, and a daughter, Brooke. Jeff is one of four family members to be a football letterwinner at Louisville, along with his father, Oscar (quarterback 1966-69), and brothers, Greg (wide receiver 1989-92) and Brian (quarterback 2004-07). The Brohm family, including mother, Donna, and sister, Kim, was inducted into the Louisville Catholic Sports Hall of Fame in 2013."
 


Eerily similar to the Marcus Freeman hire at Notre Dame.

Both are 36, both played defense in P5, and both worked their way up to multiple DC stops before landing their first HC job with no prior HC experience.
 

Zeppelin Gopher said:
Not a midwest guy, only 2 years of DC experience, etc.

Seems like a bright young coach but kind of a weird hire. Especially since Purdue has long had that offensive identity.
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He's a defensive guy, so will be interesting to see who he hires as the OC.
 

Weird hire. Good for Walters. Good for the Big Ten West.
 

UpAndUnder43 said:
Weird hire. Good for Walters. Good for the Big Ten West.
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Agreed. Hard not to see a lot of Purdue folks, especially offensive talent, hitting the road in the portal, unless they can bring in an OC to convince them to stay.
 

Ogee Oglethorpe said:
Agreed. Hard not to see a lot of Purdue folks, especially offensive talent, hitting the road in the portal, unless they can bring in an OC to convince them to stay.
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I just think compared to the recent Big Ten West hires its underwhelming. Rhule, Fickell, Big Boy Bret B and Walters. On paper its not comparable. Maybe he's the best of the bunch but just seems like an odd, unproven choice.
 

It's an interesting hire, could be great, could be bad will see, but he was great for Bielema at Illinois so this definitely hurts them for next year. Be interesting to see what they do for offense
 

MaxyJR1 said:
en.wikipedia.org

Ryan Walters (American football) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

No HC experience and 36 years old. Will be interesting to see how he does and what his staff looks like.
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Hopefully much leadership skills to justify hiring him with no experience as a HC. I'm in the camp that the hire of a coach is a hit and miss type situation. The coach is only as good as the players on the field for the most part. If he can recruit solid players, then they will win some football games and his status as a head coach will look good for the athletic director. Providing of course he has a good foundation as to staff etc.
 

UpAndUnder43 said:
I just think compared to the recent Big Ten West hires its underwhelming. Rhule, Fickell, Big Boy Bret B and Walters. On paper its not comparable. Maybe he's the best of the bunch but just seems like an odd, unproven choice.
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Just think about all the Big 10 hires over the past 15 years; most with strong head coaching experience and none with less than several years of coordinator experience....then consider Minnesota hired Tim Brewster, a TE coach. Wow.
 

Zeppelin Gopher said:
Not a midwest guy, only 2 years of DC experience, etc.

Seems like a bright young coach but kind of a weird hire. Especially since Purdue has long had that offensive identity.
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Purdue was much better on defense this year with him and won the West. Seems they want to keep that streak alive after failing for 20 years.
 


Zeppelin Gopher said:
Not a midwest guy, only 2 years of DC experience, etc.

Seems like a bright young coach but kind of a weird hire. Especially since Purdue has long had that offensive identity.
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I believe he had DC experience from Missouri before his head coach got canned.
 

Panthadad2 said:
Just think about all the Big 10 hires over the past 15 years; most with strong head coaching experience and none with less than several years of coordinator experience....then consider Minnesota hired Tim Brewster, a TE coach. Wow.
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Inexcusable hire. My uncle called me shortly after that and told me he couldn't imagine a worse hire. He knew Tim. Was not impressed.
 

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