COMMENTARY: KIRK BOHLS
Brad Wright is right man for Bobcats' football job
Texas State needs to hang onto third-year coach.
Wednesday, November 04, 2009
SAN MARCOS — Brad Wright's the perfect guy for the job.
A Texas native from Pearsall, where he played every sport offered, he is now coaching here at his alma mater, Texas State, where he was a player and then a student coach on Jim Wacker's first national championship team in 1981.
He's intense, determined and has the kind of unyielding work ethic needed to run a football program with some dreamy — perhaps even unrealistic — goals.
He's perfect for the job, but is the job perfect for him?
"All I know," he said Tuesday, "is I'm in the last year of a three-year contract."
Texas State needs Brad Wright, a Les Miles lookalike who values loyalty and preparation, and who is laying a foundation for success at the Division I-AA level and perhaps later in Division I.
His efforts on the field should be pairing up nicely with the efforts of the boosters and administration off the field. Millions of dollars have been donated, and the entire football complex has been renovated. In addition, Wright has raised $25,000 so the team can stay in hotels before games to avoid distraction, just like some Division I teams do.
But the marriage between coach and school is no longer in the honeymoon stage. TSU has not offered Wright a long-term extension of his contract and has not offered him or his staff more than 5 percent raises. By college football coaching standards, Wright's $170,000 a year salary is modest.
Athletic director Larry Teis couldn't be reached for comment Tuesday. And Wright, who can be brash, wasn't saying anything about dissatisfaction.
"I'm happy to be here," he said, "and I'm glad to see the university stepping up in academics and starting to put money into some facilities."
Today his record is speaking for him. Last year, TSU won its first Southland Conference title. This year, Wright and his staff have put together a team that's on the verge of the school's second straight winning season, the first time that has happened since 1990-91.
And he's doing this in the deep shadows of the Texas and Texas A&M programs, which sweep up state talent.
"He's old school," said 27-year-old quarterback Bradley George, a 6-foot-6-inch specimen who's been watched by every NFL team, especially the Jets. "He wants us to become better men."
"I'd call it a work in progress," George said of the team. "We've got to win at this level before we can move into Division I-A."
The Bobcats need Wright to maintain that momentum.
Wright is a 50-year-old, no-nonsense fellow who relishes Stephen Ambrose books, a good Pinot Noir and a trip to the Vatican City or Paris. He's a disciplinarian who ran off 23 players during his first year to serve notice that a slacker's approach to the game would not be tolerated.
And he's a goals-oriented guy. A large sign in the locker room lists four: 1) Earn a degree, 2) Beat SFA and Sam Houston, 3) Win the SLC, and 4) Win the national championship.
He's been checking them off. During Wright's six-year tenure, TSU has graduated 75 percent of its football players, more than any Texas school other than Rice.
The Bobcats have done well (4-1) against their two in-state rivals, and they are now in a four-way tie for first place in the conference.
That business about a national title may be a stretch, but Wright won't abandon the dream.
His team scored 21 points on the road against Top 10 club TCU this year and would be 4-0 in league play, if not for a fourth-quarter meltdown and two missed extra points in a 51-50 overtime loss to Southeastern Louisiana.
"We're focusing on playing for four quarters," linebacker Marcus Clark said. "We're a young team. The perfect player plays hard every play and does everything that he's asked to do."
Now if the Bobcats can just hang on to the perfect coach.
Texas State needs Brad Wright.
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