On3 Roundtable: Painting Bryan Harsin as a victim is absurd

Bryan Harsin‘s two-year tenure at Auburn was, in a word, tumultuous. After directing the Tigers to a 9-12 record, the coach was fired midway through the 2022 season and received a massive $15.3 million buyout from the university.

Now back in his hometown of Boise, Idaho, Harsin opened up on the way things ended for him at Auburn and where his current mindset is at. The former coach told Chris Low in a recent ESPN article that he is “thriving.”

AuburnLive‘s Justin Hokanson joined JD PicKell for an On3 Roundtable discussion and spoke on the story, offering some strong thoughts on the way Harsin was portrayed.

“I thought the article was a joke,” Hokanson said. “I think Bryan Harsin, the whole two years he was here at Auburn was an unfortunate series of events. But Harsin doing a story with Chris Low in which it paints him as the victim, it slants things his way, is absurd.”

The writing was on the wall for Harsin’s future at Auburn before the 2022 season even began. After the Tigers finished 6-7 in the coach’s inaugural season, athletic director Allen Greene, who hired Harsin stepped down. Rumors began to swirl that the coach could be on his way out next as the powers that be at the university already had their sights set in a new direction.

The results on the field only sped up what seemed inevitable, and Harsin was fired ahead of Week 10 in the midst of a four-game losing streak. It wasn’t just the losses that did Harsin in, however, but also an inability to build relationships within the Auburn community.

Harsin claimed in the ESPN article that the restrictions COVID-19 pandemic caused made it “difficult to meet people.” However, Hokanson isn’t buying that, pointing to examples of times the coach had the chance to “mingle with fans” but instead preferred to stay to himself.

“Bryan Harsin didn’t put in the work on the recruiting trail,” he said. “He didn’t put in the work in relationships. He tried to get out of doing the call-in show. He didn’t want to mingle with fans. He wanted to record it in the studio and go about his business and never show up to it on-site location. They got trounced at home by Penn State and Arkansas. Then he does a story talking about COVID is why he couldn’t build relationships and starts talking about how there needs to be alignment at Auburn for it to succeed. Well, no joke. Everybody at Auburn can tell you that. Any program needs alignment.

“For him to be talking about what it would take for Auburn to succeed like, ‘I tried to do something and if they just would have done it my way they would have succeeded.’ For him to start giving pointers on what it’s gonna take for Auburn football to succeed is just so arrogant that it’s mind-blowing.”

Auburn has now fired its past five coaches, paying a total of $44.2 million in buyout money to the past three. The Tigers hired Hugh Freeze as Harsin’s replacement, and he will be their third head coach in four years.

Despite the way things went for him at Auburn, Harsin has had success elsewhere in the past. He went 69-19 in seven seasons at Boise State, never finishing with a losing record.

It’s unclear whether Harsin intends to return to coaching as some point. But what is clear, at least to Hokanson, is that both he and Auburn are better off apart in the long run.

“I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt for a couple of years,” Hokanson said. “I think he talks a big game in terms of lofty rhetoric and leadership and that kind of stuff. On the hoof it sounds great, but nothing results-wise added up to back him up.

“…The gall to come out and get $15 million after you got fired and were arguably the worst coach in the history of Auburn football and to come out and do a story like, ‘we’re thriving.’ I bet you are. You duped Auburn into giving you money and they paid you $15 million to go away. I’m sure you’re doing fine and Auburn’s better off, too.”