On paper, today is supposed to be one of those exciting days as a sports fan. A day when you’re supposed to feel hope for the future. A day when you’re supposed to be excited about what could, can, and in your mind, will happen next.
It’s the reward for a fan after impatiently waiting, flight tracking and weeding through message board rumors as your organization finds its new leader, the same one you’re now eagerly awaiting to lead the team out of the tunnel in his first game as head coach.
I truly think we’re supposed to be excited about Mike Rhoades right now.
But I’m not there yet. And I don’t think a lot of other people are.
In the college sports world where you have to get your guy and get him fast, Penn State fans are finding out that time doesn’t leave a lot of time to reset after what just happened, especially when it just happened to you.
When Micah Shrewsberry left for Notre Dame, it wasn’t that Penn State fans were stunned by the decision. Even the most optimistic thought that there was a decent chance Shrewsberry would head back home.
Rather it was the way it played out that felt a bit numbing.
There was a “36-hour” waiting period while Shrewsberry made his choice. There was a rather transparent, borderline public negotiation as insiders were saying that Pat Kraft was counter-offering to keep Shrewsberry. At Penn State, those types of things usually play out privately. There was even the admission that the lack of NIL success was the key factor in all of this.
And publicly even after Shrewsberry darted for South Bend, there was the brief but nasty Twitter feud between Michael Mauti and Jay Paterno – two cornerstone Penn Staters, for better or worse with one of them at least.
Fact of the matter is it’s been a weird time to be someone passionate about Penn State sports.
Maybe this is what happens at schools where sports aren’t the key thread to the larger community. However, excuse the arrogance, but these types of things shouldn’t happen at Penn State.
The last week or so has generally, for a lack of a better term, sucked.
Other Power 5 schools shouldn’t come in and steal the coaches of revenue producing sports at Penn State. The resources should, and do, exist at a school like Penn State to prevent this type of thing from happening. Yet we’re finding out how not just that it can happen but it did happen.
And well before anyone has had time to reset from all of that, it was roughly 4 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon when we found out that Mike Rhoades was indeed coming to Penn State.
It felt like there was no pomp and circumstance, even if the press conference isn’t taking place until Thursday afternoon. Maybe that’s part of it too but it very much felt like it happened, and we’ll move on and get excited about it later.
That’s probably not fair to Rhoades. His resume shows success.
He went to the tournament three times over six years at VCU. He’s got a .664 winning percentage all-time. And even if he didn’t tutoring NBA players like Shrewsberry did with the Boston Celtics, Rhoades helped produce a number of NBA draft picks over his time with the Rams. There was even an NFL tight end in there along the way.
And it would be a mistake not to mention the man is from the state that he’s going to coach in. You want to fire up an alumni base? Get a guy from your state to coach at one of those state’s schools.
We even got to see the contract already, which appears to be structured in a way to prevent all of this from happening again.
All of that should equate to true excitement for the future of Penn State basketball, but right now, it hasn’t.
We’re all just looking around trying to figure out what just happened.
So much so in NIL collective Success With Honor’s welcome email to Rhoades, they admitted they “dropped the ball” over the last few weeks. A moment of looking back at a time when you could be looking forward. The apology, while appreciated, does nothing now.
Everyone is sitting around, dazed and confused on what just happened. And while maybe in the future, there will be something to be excited about, there’s just not a lot to be excited about.
So welcome to Penn State, Mike Rhoades. Please forgive the nothingness.
If you’ve enjoyed this content, please consider supporting StuffSomersSays.com.