Nutt: 10 Years 75-48 Avg: 7.5/4.8 - so lets just say he averaged an 8-5 season while at Arky. They finished first or tied for first in the West 3 times, and finished last NOT once. 8 Bowl Invites in 10 seasons. Rivals Class Ranks (Back to 2002): #36, #31, #27, #24, #22, #28, #26 - Avg #27
Petrino: 2 years 13-12 Avg: 6.5/6 - so lets say this is a 6-6 avg season so far at Arky. Two 4th place finishes in the SEC West. 1 bowl game in 2 seasons. Rivals Class Ranks: #49, #16 - Avg #33
So Nutt sustained an 8 win avg, finished 1st in the West 30% of the time, 80% bowl appearance rate, Rivals Class Avg of 27th (About the same as Va Tech meaning the talent was NOT void, no excuse).
Petrino is sitting at a 6 win avg, with 2 4th place finishes, 50% bowl appearance rate, Rivals Class Avg of 33rd.
SO FAR....why exactly all the bashing of Nutt and praising of Petrino? I don't see the huge hype surrounding Petrino here. On paper, Nutt has every advantage.
It may be a bit of a small sample to compare Petrino's 2 years to Nutt's 10. But you hit on something I was researching with Nutt's avg. crootin' class rank which tends to prove my theory about Ark being Ark, and what their potential is.
Ark's avg class rank under Nutt 27. Ark's lifetime winning percentage .591, which puts them at 29th.
http://football.stassen.com/cgi-bin/records/calc-wp.pl?start=1869&end=2009&rpct=30&min=5&se=on&by=Win+PctBy comparison...
Auburn's is #16 on that all time winning % list at .627, and from 2002-2010, our crootin' class avg rank was 12.3.
Obviously you can find schools that break the rules, or are currently or have in the past broken the trends...but on the whole the avg is the avg, and the crootin' class avg will basically lead you to the final ranking avg.
Another "avg" to look at. Composite ranking avg. of all the polls since 1993. (That's generally considered "modern" times since that's when the 85 scholarship limit started)
http://www.collegefootballpoll.com/historical_composite_rank.htmlAuburn #18, Ark #39.
Those that pimp Ark. as having all this potential...I'd love to see some evidence to support that other than your opinion, because history doesn't bear it out. Like Nutt or hate him, you can't argue with the fact that he kept Ark at or near it's historical high end average in both recruiting, winning %, and rankings.
If you go here, and plug in the years you want to see, by era, or on the whole, you'll see where Ark ranks historically.
http://football.stassen.com/records/compute-request.html