Josh Pate identifies CFB coaches on hot seat vs. those with job security

With Week 0 just under 100 days away, college football analyst Josh Pate joined TexAgs Live to throw around some names of coaches whose seats are hot and cold. Pate also spoke on the uncertainty of the quarterback position around the country.

Key notes from Josh Pate interview

• Very easily, Brian Kelly will be on the hot seat if LSU doesn't make the playoff. That’s the overwhelming favorite. There would be a weird dynamic around James Franklin if he doesn’t make it, but maybe not a hot seat. More like, it would be weird if they have already made it before, and they don’t make it with their best roster yet. That would be weird.
   
• It would be like the Ryan Day thing last year, saying that if he loses to Michigan, that would be enough to fire him. The outside world didn't get that, but I think that would be how Penn State fans would see it. On a somewhat different level, Billy Napier and Brent Venables have to show significant improvement, but they don’t have to make the playoff because of their schedule.
   
• Hugh Freeze is also that because of the cover that Oklahoma and Florida are giving Auburn. He’s kind of flying under the radar of external criticism. The Auburn fanbase is criticizing him, but external criticism seems to be hinging on going 8-5 in 2025. I think Lane Kiffin can do no wrong.
   
• Kiffin is safer this year because they did not make the playoff last year. Had he made the playoff, that would create a new level of expectation, but they didn’t make it last year and have a workable schedule this year. Austin Simmons could be a star at quarterback. If they are knocking on the door of the playoff, which I think they could be, more of the same is a good thing. Kiffin has been strategic about making sure his name is in coaching search conversations, so Ole Miss has to fight to keep him. You don’t fight for a guy just to bail on him after an eight-win season. I think he’s very entrenched.
   
• Here is the funny aspect of going 2-10. You can triple your wins and barely make a bowl game. What is the level of acceptability with them? If they won seven games, there would be a lot of positive momentum, but if I’m a Florida State fan, I won’t forget last year and suddenly be OK with seven to eight wins on average. If I were at Florida State 40 years ago, I’d be OK with that. I’d be looking at the fact that we were on the brink of the playoff two years ago. I don’t think Mike Norvell is gone if they win eight or nine games, but I don’t know what the tenor would be from the fan base. I think they would view it as starting over, wiping the slate clean. Whatever they do this year is their starting point.
   
• Kiffin is the one who would survive going 2-10. You have to have a combination of maximum equity built up and having a heavy portal team built up. If you’re playing portal roulette, you can explain that it just went bust this particular year, and that’s the risk. Texas has used the portal, but the majority of the roster is homegrown. Alabama and Georgia are the same. So if they went 2-10, it would be way more disastrous since it’s their own hand-picked guys. 
   
• I don’t think Mario Cristobal has to make the playoff to keep his job. I think a 9-3 season, though not satisfying to fans, wouldn’t warrant hot-seat consideration. Say you’re a Miami fan and you tell me Cristobal has to make the playoff this year. If he goes 9-3 with all losses by under ten points. What happens? You would probably say he wouldn’t necessarily get fired. So he doesn’t have to make the playoff. It’s not do-or-die in this scenario to me, but at the same time, if they are not there, all bets are off in terms of avoiding the criticism. Even after last year, he told me on our show that his sentiment was that they kind of wasted the team because they had a generational offense, but couldn’t stop anything defensively. “We lost our way,” were his words. If they made defensive hires and Carson Beck is full-go by fall camp, they should be a playoff-caliber team. This year’s schedule is much tougher than last year's. Miami has a bye in Week 4, plays Florida State then has another bye. They play seven games in a row to end the season with two road games in Pittsburgh and Blacksburg to end the year. If they make the conference title game, it will be three road games in three weeks to end a seven-game stretch.
   
• If the SEC has a quarterback problem, then college football has one. I don’t see certainty at the position almost anywhere. I don’t know what Oregon or Ohio State have. Arch Manning could be a star. I don’t know. If you were to look at Alabama and Georgia at their best, I don’t think they have star-caliber talent at the position. In the future, Alabama has Keelon Russell and Georgia has Ryan Puglisi and a new five-star wide receiver, but that’s unproven. We saw flashes of stardom from LaNorris Sellers and DJ Lagway last year. We could have the two best quarterbacks in the SEC, or they could just have a lot of really good teams, and in November, we might be saying it’s the same as last year. They might not be able to beat whoever is waiting in the playoff. Maybe it’s just an anomaly, but I’m not ready to label it as a “problem” yet.
   
• We’re doing an evaluation of Mike Elko on the next show. I do a 1 through 90 percentage approval among the fanbase. I’d say Elko’s approval is above 75 percent right now. That would be a “clickbaitable” statement to blame Elko for the failure of A&M’s softball team.
   
• I gave Steve Sarkisian 85 percent, and someone asked why he wouldn’t be maxed out if Kirby Smart is maxed out. Why? There is a small vocal portion of a fan base that wants you to win a national title within three years if you have all the resources available. That minority would not be OK with Texas losing to Georgia twice last year. That person would also erroneously say that it’s not a big deal if Sarkisian acquired talent, since they have always had talent. With Elko, someone might complain that the defense faded last year, but I still think that person would be undecided on their opinion.
   
• With Elko or anyone else, I’ve found it fascinating when a head coach has an obvious problem, and he doesn’t address it himself. People chase you the most when you run the most. If you stand still and take something that’s going to be pointed out anyway, be brutally honest about that. Elko is like that. Smart has been like that, apart from off-the-field stuff. As far as football, you don’t have to wait for the media to point it out. They probably already pointed it out.
   
• I think Nick Saban did that to an extent, but he won all the time, so he got away with it. You convince yourself that what you’re doing is more important than it is, but in the grand scheme of things, you’re coaching a game, and your salary is as big as it is because of the fanbase. You’re not guarding state secrets, so it’s not the worst thing in the world to build equity. It endears you to people and goes to show that you understand your place in the world. Mike Leach was the best at that. He was successful, but he took himself only as serious as needed to.
   
• I’m not a legal expert, but I went out to lunch with one of them, and I said about ten words to him. I wanted him to explain this to me like a child, and he did. What we arrived at is that there is a lot of grey area and room for legal interpretation. That’s life. With what we read yesterday, if it's true, that is loaded. I encourage people to read that article if they don’t know what we’re talking about. If they are circumventing anti-trust laws by making laws for themselves that you can opt into or essentially not get in, you’ll have structure at least, but you’ll have legal experts saying it's illegal. What I want to know is if this holds water.