FAYETTEVILLE A few years ago following an Arkansas football game, I sat in the first row of Razorback Stadium and patiently waited for my postgame video to finish uploading. A handful of Hog fans were still hanging out in the box suites behind me with their window open, and based on their noise level it was easy to assume they had been drinking for several hours.
Suddenly, I heard one of them yell, “Hey Danny, my wife said you’re hot! Can I get a thumbs up?”
I looked over my shoulder and gave the guy a thumbs up while thinking, “He’s got to be messing with me. How does he know who I am? Wait … someone thinks I’m hot?”
As I turned back around to face my computer, I saw former Razorback David Bazzel standing 5 yards in front of me on the field, smiling at the same guy and proudly holding not one, but both of his thumbs in the air.
That’s when it hit me. The guy had yelled “Hey David,” not “Hey Danny.”
Shame set in as my thumb – and ego – slowly came back down to earth.
That level of embarrassment is difficult to achieve, but somehow the Arkansas Razorbacks managed to reach it again this past Saturday.
In the latest chapter of pathetic things to happen in Arkansas’ football program, the Hogs threw five interceptions and had no answer for a team that had been dominated by Tulsa just two weeks prior.
And like clockwork, the Razorbacks are once again the butt of all jokes across college football.
When it happened last year against North Texas and Colorado State, sure, it was a tough pill for Hog fans to swallow, but the silver lining was that it happened in Year 1 under new head coach Chad Morris, who had been – and still is – recruiting at a high clip.
Last year, Morris could easily point to those losses and tell his top recruiting targets that he needed them to come in and play immediately. He can still do that now, but at some point that message will no longer carry the same weight and prospects will only see what’s happening on the field.
On the field, the Hogs have gone 4-12 overall and 0-9 in SEC play under Morris.
As a program, the Razorbacks have now lost 22 of their last 30 games while going 1-16 in SEC contests. Sure, this year’s team is relying heavily on several young but talented players who were brought in by Morris’ staff.
Of course no one expects a bunch of freshmen and sophomores to take the Hogs from 2-10 last year to competing in the ridiculously tough SEC West this year. That was never the expectation for this year’s team, not by anyone who has really been paying attention.
This year’s team was only asked to show small yet visible signs of moving in the right direction.
That included taking care of the four easy non-conference games, and at least being respectable in losses to conference opponents who are simply a step or two ahead from a talent and experience standpoint.
Stealing a pair of toss-up victories in SEC play to reach bowl eligibility would have just been icing on the cake, but more than anything fans just wanted Arkansas to be seen as somewhat competitive and avoid being humiliated again on national television.
Most SEC programs would laugh at such modest expectations, but evidently it was way too much to ask of Arkansas.