RandBall: P.J. Fleck is trying to love the moment, but is that a tough sell for fans?

BleedGopher

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Per RandBall:

P.J. Fleck is an OK gameday coach, a good program builder and a great motivator.

That makes him decidedly above-average at his job as the Gophers football coach, and Fleck deserves credit for Minnesota's accomplishments during what is now the third-longest tenure in the Big Ten.

This is also a transformational time in college football — and particularly the Big Ten — as conference realignment, the portal and, most importantly, the amount and manner in which players are paid makes even five years ago feel like the distant past.

With so much change creating an unsettled feeling, Fleck's message speaking to Big Ten media members on Thursday in Indianapolis felt particularly resonant for the times: "In 2024, it's OK to love where you're at."

And I really liked this from Fleck in explaining that he still believes in the root mission of college sports: "Our world has changed in this transactional world with the NIL, with the portal, with salary caps, with obviously conference expansions, new TV deals, but really the university experience is still there."

But gifted speakers like Fleck also tend to want to control the narrative. His remembering of 2023 was a good bit of revisionist history, and it can't land well with fans.

"The narrative around our place right now is, 'What are you gonna do after the disappointing year?'" Fleck said. "We just won a bowl game. There are people here just trying to get to a bowl game [for the first time] in decades, and we won our fifth in a row.

"It's disappointing, but that's what we said at the beginning," Fleck added. "When [winning a bowl] becomes disappointing, we're doing our job even better, because there's going to be ebbs and flows."

They won a bowl game after a 5-7 season, and they were only invited because good grades (which shouldn't be ignored) helped fill an empty slot. At one point last year they controlled their own destiny in the Big Ten West before a disastrous 0-4 November had them finish in a four-way tie for last in the final year of the annually winnable West.

It's fine to just stop at "disappointing" without the spin, just as it's fine for the rest of us to remember that Fleck's Gophers won at least nine games in each of the three preceding non-COVID seasons.

But my sense is that Fleck is trying to manage expectations. It's entirely possible that the Gophers will have the same record this season even if they have improved from a year ago because the schedule is considerably harder.

That wouldn't be enough for me to say "Fleck is on the hot seat," but it would be enough for a lot of Gophers backers to consider 2025 a pivotal year for his program.

It's OK to love where you are, but you can't expect most fans to love a boatload of 5-7 seasons.


Go Gophers!!
 

Tough sell for borderline or fringe fans, but I don't think it's a tough sell for true Gopher fans. 5-7 this year will be different, but I think Fleck is pretty open and honest about what they are trying to do.
 

This year is going to be a complete question mark, and with the new adds to the conference, it's entirely possible that we have another sunk season. As usual, though, I'll hammer home on our general success being directly tied to Brosmer's ability to manage the game, not panic, and complete crucial passes where Kaliakmanis couldn't. If we've got that, we can continue to run a successful ball control offense, keep the defense off the field, and win the games we need to win and stay in games where we're dogs. Our inability to keep the defense fresh last year directly affected our win/loss column. Brosmer is the key.
 

Tough sell for borderline or fringe fans, but I don't think it's a tough sell for true Gopher fans. 5-7 this year will be different, but I think Fleck is pretty open and honest about what they are trying to do.
Agreed. I even heard Fleck admit out loud they want a more explosive return game so they made a change at ST coordinator. He's previously been silent about that unit for 7 seasons despite them being last in the conference year after year.
 



This isn't a new standard that only applies to Fleck. In 2015, we won a bowl game to get to 6-7 and that was widely considered to be a disappointing season.
 

Pretty fair and accurate take from Randball.
 

Well, it's becoming obvious that we need a coach who isn't too positive and who doesn't use too many slogans.

I wonder: Does this guy think Fleck is "spinning" the results of last season in a positive way because Fleck is in some way satisfied with the results of last season?

Hey, at least we have sports media types who will keep us abreast of when a coach's job security is fading. Thank heaven for that type of hard-hitting journalism.
 

Aim for mediocre and you just might make it. Getting harder and harder to believe in the university experience.
 




It's fine to just stop at "disappointing" without the spin, just as it's fine for the rest of us to remember that Fleck's Gophers won at least nine games in each of the three preceding non-COVID seasons.
I dunno, I don't mind the "spin" here. Fleck acknowledges that it was a disappointing season and a step back from 21 and 22. However, it's fair to give credit where credit is do. They had an opportunity to play another game, took it, and won the thing. Wasn't their biggest accomplishment, but showed they were able to rebound and end the season with something positive.
 

I dunno, I don't mind the "spin" here. Fleck acknowledges that it was a disappointing season and a step back from 21 and 22. However, it's fair to give credit where credit is do. They had an opportunity to play another game, took it, and won the thing. Wasn't their biggest accomplishment, but showed they were able to rebound and end the season with something positive.

Well said.

No one is "settling" here, least of all P.J. Fleck.

Critics and analysts constantly point out the negative. That's their job.

In contrast, the people who are actually in the arena know all too well that there will inevitably be failures mixed in with successes. A coach of a major college program simply can't afford to sulk and pout when things go sideways. Focusing too much on setbacks is counterproductive and self-defeating.
 

There is a big, lurking danger that comes with the massive consolidation in college sports.

What are the new goalposts for the middling programs? It's considerably harder to win the conference with more teams, even if you ignore the haves and the have nots. A team like Minnesota might never win a conference title again.

So, then do we look to beating our rivals? Well, they took most of our rivals away. We do still get to play Iowa and Wisconsin (for now).

With these bigger, tougher conferences, it'll be hard to qualify for bowl games.

So you're left with formerly mediocre programs going 4-8...they're playing UCLA and Maryland in October, so there's no fun little side bets with your cubicle mates because you don't know anyone that went to UCLA or Maryland.

There's no bowl game. All of your good players transfer after the season.

What's the point of being a fan?

The money HINGES on people staying interested. They have their work cut out for them.

(and all of the above is ignoring the fact that they expect you to spend an extra 10 hours this fall watching Jeep and Bud Light commercials to help pay for the obscene contracts)
 



PJ is a knucklehead but he does a good job in every facet of the job but for game day. The games can be really shitty to watch with how he coaches and his philosophy let’s hope he changes his best going forward.
 

PJ is a knucklehead but he does a good job in every facet of the job but for game day. The games can be really shitty to watch with how he coaches and his philosophy let’s hope he changes his best going forward.

Knucklehead? Maybe that is how they post on Reddit... this is GH and posting here should be considered a privilege.
 




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