Getty Image / Michael Hickey
The changes to college football the last few years has made much of the sport unrecognizable. It’s now clear that it’s starting to take its toll on the sport’s coaches, who are fleeing college football whenever they get the chance.
Boston College Head Coach Jeff Hafley leaving his job on Wednesday for an NFL coordinator, specifically to be the defensive coordinator of the Green Bay Packers, should be a warning sign to anyone who loves college football about the future of the sport.
Ten years ago, college coaches had a much simpler job. Yes, dealing with high school kids and their families in recruiting was always interesting, and at times could be frustrating. But, a lot of your time was dealt with actually dealing with your players in positive ways, making them better football players and better people. It was, truly, being a football coach.
That is not the case anymore. For better or worse, coaches must now deal with the transfer portal and immediately-eligible transfers that require them to re-recruit their entire roster every season. Plus, players gaining Name, Image, and Likeness rights alongside the rise of collectives, whose sole missions are to raise money for their team’s players to get paid, has made them effectively have to budget a salary cap of sorts.
All of this means that there are a lot more headaches and non-football decisions being made by head coaches, and a lot less actual football coaching going on. That’s what reportedly drove Jeff Hafley to leave Boston College.
For the last 2-3 years, there's been constant speculation that college coaches fed up with NIL/portal would start trying to jump to the NFL.
Jeff Hafley giving up a P5 head coaching job to be an NFL coordinator is the most clear-cut example to date.
— Stewart Mandel (@slmandel) January 31, 2024
Things like player movement and NIL rights are good for players, and are probably the morally right things as opposed to how the system used to work. But, the way it’s set up now is probably unsustainable long term. The only way to change things may be either a law passed by Congress or collective bargaining with the players themselves. Both of those things would be incredibly complicated, and some people may not like the results of either.
Hafley, who has spent five years in the NFL as an assistant, had been the coach in Chestnut Hill for the last four years. He was 22-26 overall, and made his only bowl game, a Fenway Bowl win, this season.