Report: Former Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino emerging as top candidate for Texas A&M OC opening

Texas A&M is in search of a new offensive coordinator following a very disappointing 2022 campaign on that side of the ball. According to college football insider Chris Hummer, one candidate to be the new OC: Bobby Petrino. That’s right, the former Falcons, Louisville, Arkansas and Western Kentucky coach who is now at Missouri State. Here was Hummer’s scoop on the situation:

“Missouri State HC Bobby Petrino has emerged as a candidate in Texas A&M’s offensive coordinator search, sources tell @247Sports. He’s expected to interview with the Aggies in the coming days.”

So the 61-year-old Petrino could be heading back to the SEC for the first time since he crashed and burned at Arkansas in 2011. Don’t doubt him, though. Petrino has been able to put up points at seemingly every stop through his career.

Not too long ago he developed Lamar Jackson into a Heisman winner. Could he do similar things with access to Jimbo Fisher’s recent recruiting hauls? We’ll see.

Bobby Petrino background

He’s at Missouri State now, and nearly pulled an upset this season over his former home of Arkansas. What a triumph that would’ve been. Anyway, before taking the job at Missouri State, Petrino was at Louisville, where he flamed out in his first year without Lamar Jackson, finishing 2-10 while getting canned.

Of course, that wasn’t his first stop with the Cards. In 2003, Petrino took his first head coaching job with Louisville. He led the team within moments of a likely national title appearance in 2006 but ultimately fell to Rutgers in the final game to wipe that possibility away.

After that, he took off for Atlanta to coach the Falcons. An experiment that failed tremendously with Michael Vick getting injured before the year, followed by Petrino going 3-10 before he just quit and took the Arkansas job.

He had great success in Fayetteville for a few seasons, but personal misadventures off of the football field derailed his time there. Eventually, he landed at Western Kentucky, which he used as a launching pad back to his first stop at UL.

Fired there, hired at Missouri State a few years later. Now, he’s eying a leap back into the spotlight at Texas A&M.