Smith’s performance? He lost the effing recruiting class, largely because he allowed himself to be distracted by his continued mentoring relationship with Franklin.
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Smith’s hire would reflect super short term thinking IMO. I’ll support anyone not named Matt Rhule but I don’t believe he’s the best the program can do. Nor has he shown anything performance-wise to convince anyone who has a clue that he is the best option.
With Daboll being a Dark Horse so far imo Smith to date is the best they have been able to do.
Kingsbury was extremely mediocre at Texas Tech. Having said that with his NFL experience, NIL and portal he may do better.
Firing Franklin isn't about winning a title in 2026...no sane person expects a great class. Nor does that matter with the portal
That’s fine, reasonable people can agree to disagree.
I don’t think he’s a better option than Chesney, and if we’re hiring assistant coaches, he’s not a better option than a lot of guys out there.
If he were not a psu assistant coach and alum, he wouldn’t be in the top 10,000 candidates.
My problem with his Smith is the huge number or decommits that happened under his watch. To me it is a major red flag.
Fair but he can at least develop QBs and our offense won't be an issue. Dont want him but there's worse options. Starting with Terry
It’s the truth. It is what happened. He also currently has a losing record, and that is largely because he made one of the worst coaching decisions I’ve seen in my life by not spiking the ball in the Indiana game. He deserves a lot of credit for re-motivating the team, but he is completely unqualified to be the head coach of this program.
There literally no pressure to hire an assistant. If there was that would have been announced. Recruits would also know.
Guessing your Paterno bias is blinding you here
Look unless it comes out that PSU was trying to hire on the cheap which based on everything I’ve heard is not the case, if Kraft hires Smith it is at first look a huge fail. If as AD Kraft couldn’t sell the job to a more established candidate with in excess of 10 mil a year to offer he need to go and is not good at his job.
4th and 3 punt at Ohio State.
The record is all there. He’s a good man who isn’t qualified to be the Head Coach at Penn State.
But I’ll say this he’ll never leave!
Aside from this and all the other obvious **** that people have mentioned, has he ever even had head coaching aspirations until this whole situation unfolded?
truthfully I might prefer Bobby Engram to Terry. He has a much better resume as a coach and player!
It certainly happened under his watch, but I'm not totally sure it's his fault.
Keep in mind Franklin convinced Allar, Singleton, Allen to stick around to make a run at a national championship. He's evidently persuasive enough to get his way. I'm sure he's selling the dream of Va Tech being a contender......
Kraft being honest? I'll take the under on that.When Kraft announces Terry Smith as our next coach, perhaps he will be honest and tell us that there was no one else left.
Terry Smith's reputation at Gateway was he couldn't win the big game...at the HS level. I'd ask people to remember that but no one cares about his coaching sbility
Is not his fault at all. But it still happened and the best justification anyone ever had for Terry was keeping the class together and guys from leaving. That was the ticket to not being bad next year.
Clear now that it’s mostly happening anyway and so now the best way to not have to punt the entire 2026 is bring a guy in with recruits he can bring and players he can bring in.
Keeping Terry in that case becomes the worst of both worlds: a guy with very little experience plus a guy with no recruiting class.
Is Kraft at the Egg Blow today to escort lane to Happy Valley after the game?
A Smith hire would be an unmitigated disaster for Penn State. Point blank.
It would show the rudderless nature of the athletic dept hiring a guy who went 3-3 (at best), failed to beat a team of moderate ability, and lost every recruit of note.
It would tell us what many have feared: that the PSU program is in serious decline and despite having big $ and resources, Pat Kraft got bluffed into settling for the status quo that 2 months ago wasn’t good enough.
I mean, liars typically get their way
He's selling loyalty to these kids and they'll regret following him
I think that’s overstating things just a bit. If Kraft wants to create an unmitigated disaster, he could do a lot
Bob, I stand behind that statement. Smith would be an insane hire for Kraft to make.I think that’s overstating things just a bit. If Kraft wants to create an unmitigated disaster, he could do a lotmoreless. Let’s see if he’s up to the challenge.
| Coach | Years | W | L | T | # Games | |
Tom Nola | 2014- | - | - | - | - | - |
Donnie Militzer | 2013 | 8 | 3 | 0 | 11 | 72.7273% |
| 2002-2012 | 101 | 30 | 0 | 131 | 77.0992% | |
Tom Organ | 1997-2001 | 20 | 30 | 1 | 51 | 39.2157% |
Russ Gratton | 1990-1996 | 19 | 51 | 0 | 70 | 27.1429% |
| 1958-1989 | 236 | 80 | 12 | 328 | 71.9512% |
We’ve already seen unmitigated disaster. It’s losing to an 0-4 team without their head coach then losing to the literal bottom dweller of the conference on our senior day. Terry Smith isn’t in my top 3 of who’s left but he has the team playing a lot better than they were with the last guy.I think that’s overstating things just a bit. If Kraft wants to create an unmitigated disaster, he could do a lotmoreless. Let’s see if he’s up to the challenge.
We fired Franklin for not living up to the expectations he created and now we need to lower our expectations. Interesting.
Correct--he couldn't win "BIG" games
Very Franklin-esque
What did you think this shows about big games?
Ask him what his record was in WPIAL title games...
So I also think we have to keep in mind how low that had gotten.
He’s no doubt got them playing better. But that’s from about the lowest baseline I think I could ever imagine.
Plus, he’s going to be a different coach. He gets to be the cleaner upper of the problem from that low baseline with zero pressure. Gets to be the Truth Teller with zero pressure and no one can really transfer or anything.
He can’t be the same as the full time guy. The baseline expectation is massively higher, and he’ll need to ease egos to keep everyone happy. He’ll have to hire assistants that he’ll need to give a ton of freedom to as the full time guy.
It’s not the same job at all.
Hilarious considering no one advocating for Terry Smith has mentioned his vision on recruiting, NIL or the transfer portal. They just know “he’s got the boys playing tough”. When I say playing tough I mean winning games against inferior opponents with a very expensive roster with 14 returning starters while simultaneously losing to the actual two ranked opponents you’ve played.
