Because this program is a mess, there’s no AD, the coach is on thin ice, and one of the top two upperclassmen on the team is leaving.
I want to see the program succeed as much as anyone, and the fastest route to that right now is for Collins to have success. But even the optimists have to look at things that aren’t there and pretend that all of the little pieces are just going to come together and break our way exactly as planned, and the realist in me says there’s no real way to believe that will actually happen.
Like, are we going to fill that spot with a better transfer? Maybe, but we’ve never had a true star come out of the modern transfer portal. (Audige contributed and won us a game this year, but on the whole he had a fine year.)
Are we going to fill that spot with Baldwin? Maybe, but there’s no information to believe that we’re on the precipice of landing him. And why would he walk into this situation now?
Are the freshmen going to be real difference makers? Maybe, hopefully in time. But Berry was gonna be the freshman difference maker, and Beran before him, and Nance before him, and Falzon before him, and on and on. Some have contributed as freshmen, but the last real impact freshman we had was...McIntosh? Pardon, pushed into duty for half a year ahead of schedule? We’re just not usually landing the guy who comes in at 18 and strikes gold in the Big Ten. Our guys take time to develop, which is no discredit to them. It’s just not a recipe for a quick fix.
So if you’re Gaines right now, you’ve just graduated, and you can play your last year (or two) somewhere where you can actually win, or you can do what Drew Crawford did and try to be part of the build. If you’re Nance, Beran, whoever else, same question, but giving up the degree. And the real difference is that any player who has more than one year of eligibility left can’t be confident that the current staff will be here when they exhaust their eligibility.
And the administration as it is right now might just decide this is the time to make the move, with the hottest coach in the nation 10 miles south. (I think it’s a lot to ask him to take the job with no AD and an as-yet-unknown new president, leaving us with both a rebuild and uncertainty among the superiors).
tl;dr we’ve got issues.