Kyle Whittingham hire: Why 'bridge coach' question doesn't matter at Michigan considering resources

Some pundits have criticized Michigan‘s decision to hire Kyle Whittingham to be its next head coach. They claim Whittingham—who is 66 years old—is too old to build sustained success for the Wolverines. On Friday, On3’s Andy Staples and Ari Wasserman explained why they believe the length of Whittingham’s tenure isn’t a cause for concern.

“The Kyle Whittingham who built Utah into a team that won back-to-back Pac-12 titles when the Pac-12 was pretty good, when the Pac-12 had Oregon, had a Lincoln Riley-led USC with a Heisman Trophy winner at quarterback—let’s not forget that,” Staples said. “Kyle Whittingham won the Pac-12 in a year where Lincoln Riley coached USC and Dan Lanning coached Oregon.

“He was beating teams like that at Utah, without the kind of resources that Michigan has. Now, he’s got the resources that Michigan has. And I wonder, will this kind of invigorate him? … Is Whittingham just a bridge coach? Is there such a thing now? He’s a coach that you hired to win football games for you. That’s it. That’s the whole point there is. You don’t hire somebody thinking they’re gonna last 20 years.”

Whittingham was Utah’s head coach from 2005-25. During his tenure, he led the Utes to a 177-88 overall record and three conference titles. Whittingham won his pair of Pac-12 championships in the 2021 and 2022 seasons.

While Whittingham is older than the average hire this coaching carousel, there have been no shortage of veteran head coaches who continued to find success late in their career. Nick Saban was 72 when he retired. Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz is 70.

The game hasn’t passed Whittingham by. Utah posted a 10-2 overall record this season and finished 15th in the College Football Playoff rankings. Staples and Wasserman believe Michigan was wise to hire Whittingham.

“People often conflate tenure length with success,” Wasserman said. “If a coach is there for a long time, that means that obviously he’s doing something right.

“But, I think that tenure length means less than it ever has before. Even if Whittingham is successful for four years, and they win a Big Ten title with him in Year 2 or 3, and then he decides, ‘I’m getting too old for this. I don’t want to do this anymore,’ in 2028 2029 or 2030, then you can go get somebody during a time in which you’re not behind the eight ball in terms of who’s available.”