A look at new Texas A&M offensive coordinator Bobby Petrino's resume

Texas A&M is set to hire Bobby Petrino as the new offensive coordinator and play caller, per ESPN.

To get a better feel or look at what Jimbo Fisher and Texas A&M is bringing to College Station, I will do a quick dive into Petrino’s past jobs and how he has done. Petrino is without a doubt one of the most well known coaches in college football, but some of is due to some to off the field issues.

Bobby Petrino’s Resume (80’s – 90’s)

Like most coaches, Petrino’s career started with him moving around every 1-2 years. After starting as a graduate assistant at Caroll and Weber State, Petrino held offensive staffing positions at Idaho, Arizona State, Nevada, Utah State, Louisville, the Jacksonville Jaguars, and Auburn.

In those jobs, Petrino held the jobs of offensive coordinator, quarterbacks coach, wide receivers, and tight ends coach. His last offensive coordinator job before his upcoming time at Texas A&M came at Auburn in 2002. Every job he has held since 2002 was as the head coach.

First stint as a Head Coach

After 19 years of being an assistant coach, Petrino finally got his chance to be a head, being hired at Louisville. In his four years with the Cardinals, he turned them in a power program, finishing with 11 wins in 2004 and 12 wins in 2006, only the second and third times the program won as many as 11 games in a season.

In his first season, Louisville had the No. 15 offense in college football, averaging 34.6 points per game and was fifth best in the nation with 488.8 yards per game. 2004, Louisville was the No. 1 offense in the nation in both scoring and yards. 2005, they were once again top-10 in both statistics. 2006 was much of the same success, both stats ending in the top-4 in the nation.

His success at Louisville got him a shot in the NFL, getting hired by the Atlanta Falcons on a 5-year, $24 million. His time there did not even last a full season, resigning after going 3-10. He was then hired to be the head coach at Arkansas.

Arkansas

In his first season at Arkansas, Petrino went 5-7, finishing with the No. 91 offense in college football. The next season was better, going 8-5, now in the top-10 in offense. 2010 was a good year, going 10-1, finishing with the No. 17 overall offense. 2011 was Petrino’s best season at Arkansas, going 11-2, boasting the No. 15 offense in football.

His departure from Arkansas was an abrupt and messy one, with some off the field issues involving a motor cycle crash that led to a inappropriate relationship with a coworker being exposed. He was fired once it became public.

After taking a year off from college football, Petrino was hired by Western Kentucky in 2013.

Western Kentucky

Petrinos signed a four year contract with Western Kentucky, but only stayed one season after going 8-4. They had the No. 53 offense in college football.

He then returned to be the head coach at Louisville.

Second stint at Louisville

In his first season back at Louisville, Petrino went 9-4 and had the No. 52 offense out of 128 teams. In year two, he took a step back, going 8-5, finishing with the No. 65 scoring offense in the country. 2016 though was his year back to prominence with the breakout of Heisman winning quarterback Lamar Jackson. Going 9-4 with the No. 6 offense, Petrino found success again. 2017 saw the team go 8-5, but the offense stayed elite, finishing No. 11.

Following the departure of Lamar Jackson to the NFL, Petrino then fielded one of the worst offenses in college football. With the 128th offense, and going 2-8, Petrino was fired mid-season. In a postmortem, ESPN’s Andrea Adelson wrote that Jackson’s presence masked serious deficiencies in the Louisville program that were exposed in full in 2018.

Petrino did not coach in 2019, but was hired by Missouri State in 2020.

Missouri State

In three seasons at Missouri State, Petrino had only one winning season, going 8-4 in 2021. His overall record was 18-15. He had two FCS playoff appearances, losing twice in the first round. Some stats are unavailable but Missouri State finished with the No. 65 offense in the FCS in 2022.