Bobby Petrino coaching rumor updates

Nearly a year after Arkansas football coach Bobby Petrino was fired for an affair and cover-up, a Razorbacks executive has provided more details on the investigation. Arkansas vice chancellor for university relations John Diamond gave his insight in a presentation to the Little Rock chapter of the Public Relations Society of America, according to sportinglifearkansas.com.

Diamond’s presentation was entitled “A Hog Tail on the Pig Trail: Jeff, Bobby, Harley and Me.” Obviously, the Razorbacks exec doesn’t lack a sense of humor, a fact he proved with some jokes during his discussion:

Clad in black warm-up suits bearing the words Western Kentucky Football, Damarcus Smith and Michael Fluellen stood emotionless in the wings of the crowd, among all the giddy fans in red sweatshirts and caps. They watched the entire event and then eased out, confident with what they’d seen and now seemingly anxious to slink out the door before the reporters could catch up with them.

Neither has yet to play a snap for their team, as both are awaiting eligibility clearance for the 2013 season. They’re both from Louisville, Kentucky, and grew up hearing the name of their new head coach.

Bobby Petrino is a risk-free investment for Western Kentucky, and that’s a great thing for them, since they did hire him as their football coach on Monday and will likely have to deal with him for at least a year or so before he moves on to another job.

A year is a long time, and long enough for some very strange thing to happen. Things like this include Petrino having to live up to the standard set by Willie Taggart, who did manage the sorcery of going 7-5 at Western Kentucky, a tiny program out of the Sun Belt with almost zero recruiting base and little in the way of facilities. Those potential strange things also include Petrino not doing as well as imagined at WKU, something any coach stands just a few key injuries and bad strokes of luck from doing.

Image via SB Nation’s Steven Godfrey

Petrino was fired by Arkansas after being caught lying about his affair with an employee, which was brought to light due to his wrecking a motorcycle with her aboard. He also has a very well-earned reputation as a job-hopper. But other than that, he’s good to go!

Bobby Petrino is interviewing with Western Kentucky on Monday, SB Nation’s Steven Godfrey confirmed. The news of Petrino on WKU’s campus was first reported by Hilltoppers beat writer Chad Bishop. Petrino could be a head coaching candidate for the Hilltoppers, who recently lost Willie Taggart to South Florida.

Western Kentucky president Gary A. Ransdell is in China until Thursday and would need to sign off on any coaching hires, Godfrey reports via a source.

Petrino last coached at Arkansas in 2011, leading the Razorbacks to an 11-2 season before being fired during the offseason. Prior to his successful tenure at Arkansas, Petrino served as the head coach at Louisville, where he led the Cardinals to two seasons with 11 or more victories. Following his stint there, he held the Atlanta Falcons’ head coaching position for 13 games in 2007 before leaving to take the Arkansas job.

The Red Wolves finished with a 9-3 record on their way to a Sun Belt conference championship in Malzahn’s first and only season at the helm.

Petrino was fired as head coach of Arkansas in April 2012. His Razorbacks were 11-2 in 2011 and he won a total of 34 games in four seasons at Arkansas. Coach John L. Smith took over for the Razorbacks, but was not hired full-time at the end of the 2012 season.

Even a Colorado football program reportedly interested in hiring Mark Mangino has lines it won’t cross. That’s not a fair appraisal of the situation here, but it sure felt neat to say. First, the report:

That was immediately denied by the man doing the hiring, and denied in about the most declarative fashion possible:

The 51-year old Petrino was 34-17 in four seasons as head coach of Arkansas. He was fired before the start of the 2012 season for his involvement in a scandal in which he used his position to procure a job for his mistress, a former Razorbacks volleyball player. Prior to joining Arkansas, Petrino was head coach of the Atlanta Falcons. He left Atlanta with three games left in the 2007 season to take the Arkansas job, leading to widespread outrage.

Petrino has ties to the Auburn program, having served as offensive coordinator for Tommy Tuberville in 2002. He left after one season on the plains to take the head coaching job at Louisville. Petrino was also considered for the Auburn job in 2003, when he secretly interviewed for the position despite the fact that Tuberville was still employed by the Tigers.

A portion of Joe Schad’s interview with fired coach Bobby Petrino aired Thursday morning on ESPN, with more set to come throughout the day. It’s the coach’s first public conversation since being ousted at Arkansas after it came out he lied about an affair with a person he hired. Petrino described himself as “very sorry” and displayed human emotion at points.

Also, Schad says Petrino has been in touch with the Tennessee Titans and Cal as he looks for a 2013 job.

Fired Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino has an image to rehab as new coaching jobs are just months away from opening. The first step, after a few months of silence, is an interview in his home state of Montana with Joe Schad, to air Thursday on SportsCenter. Schad describes him as “remorseful, apologetic and emotional,” and says the coach discusses his affair with employee Jessica Dorrell and what he was thinking after his motorcycle crash.

As for the exact time the interview will air, it’s not easy to pin it down exactly, but it’ll definitely be up throughout the afternoon and evening. Schad says it will definitely air in its entirety on the 6 p.m. ET edition of the show.

Some of disgraced former Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino’s recently jettisoned golf gear showed up at the Springdale Goodwill over the weekend, including a surprising relic from 2007:

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From the Sporting News, Petrino discusses the trickiest opportunity of his career:

Saturday, Arkansas welcomed a school-record 45,000 to its spring game as Wilson led the first team to 65 points against the backups. Scoring 65 points on your own teammates is only sort of like getting a possible promotion after your brother temporarily ruins his career, but it’s the only metaphor available.

Quite a bit of new information was released in the notes compiled by Long and assistant athletic director Jon Fagg. The documents -- containing what the two had talked to Petrino, Jessica Dorrell and others about relating to Petrino’s eventual firing -- were released to the Associated Press as part of a Freedom of Information Act request.

There’s quite a bit of information uncovered, ranging from random (Petrino apparently liked to buy Dorrell Hot Tamales) to reckless (Petrino’s $20,000 gift to Dorrell could possibly have led to sexual harassment charges, according to Long).

If Arkansas had not taken any action, Slive would not comment on whether he would have suspended Petrino himself, enacting a power he has as the head of the conference. He would not address the hypothetical, according to Jon Solomon of The Birmingham News:

Arkansas will play its spring game on Saturday with Taver Johnson as interim head coach. Long has said he will make an update announcement on the school’s search to replace Petrino early next week.

If you were hoping to tee it up for a good cause with the disgraced former coach of the University of Arkansas football team, you have Bobby Petrino’s indiscretions to blame for your disappointment.

The Arkansas Children’s Hospital Foundation said Tuesday it would cancel the annual Bobby Petrino Charity Golf Classic originally scheduled to kick off in two months.

Jessica Dorrell, Bobby Petrino’s former mistress, has officially resigned from her position as the University of Arkansas’ student-athlete development coordinator, the school announced Tuesday. From the Associated Press:

Dorrell was hired by Petrino on March 28. Four days later, she was riding with Petrino on his motorcycle when he lost control and wrecked. It was during the investigation into that accident that the university learned Petrino and Dorrell were involved in an extramarital affair -- and that Petrino had pushed through the hiring of Dorrell from a pool of 159 applicants despite the obvious conflict of interest.

When it came out that Bobby Petrino was partially done in by using his work phone to conduct illicit romantic activity, we all had the same reaction at the same time: Remember when Houston Nutt was state public enemy No. 1 for doing way, way less than that on his work phone? Though the irony was certainly not lost on Nutt himself, he didn’t make an outward show of enjoying the news during a Hogs-centric appearance with Tim Brando.

Even beyond schadenfreude, it’s worthwhile to watch Nutt talk about the Arkansas situation, especially when it comes to the future. Nutt praises potential interim coach Tim Horton for the job he did holding together recruiting when Nutt himself was fired by the Razorbacks.

“Obviously it’s been tough on everybody,” senior quarterback Tyler Wilson told the Associated Press. “It’s a unique situation. It’s tough for everybody, but I think it’s unique that our team has been very coherent through all of it.”

Even assistant coach Paul Petrino, Bobby Petrino’s brother, seemed shocked by the news. “I had no idea. I did not know anything about it,” Petrino told the Associated Press. “Bobby’s my brother. I love him. I will always love him. He made a mistake. He’s paying deeply for it.” Petrino will remain on board with the current staff through spring practices, but his situation is unknown beyond that point.

University of Arkansas affirmative action policy requires jobs be listed for 30 days before candidates can be interviewed, but Petrino filed a waiver, citing the fact that he needed an assistant to look into eligibility of high schoolers during the spring recruiting period. Instead of 30 days, Dorrell interviewed for the job after eight days, and was hired after only 16 - barely half of the amount of time that should have passed before interviews even started.

In addition, the documents reveal that Dorrell was the only of three finalists with no football experience and the only one without a master’s degree in a related field - two of the supposed requirements for the position.

It was bad enough that Bobby Petrino circumvented the hiring process at Arkansas to bring on Jessica Dorrell. He made a mockery of the affirmative action process, closed the job offering early, and gave courtesy interviews to two others while hiring his mistress. No matter how you slice it, that’s bad -- most certainly a fireable offense.

↵Did we mention he turned down a rocket scientist, too?

The latest set of revelations from Chris Bahn includes a note on that $20,000 Petrino gave Jessica Dorrell, his mistress of many months whom he eventually employed in the athletic department. She used it to buy a black Acura. This could’ve all been avoided if they’d simply ridden in the car he bought her instead of on his motorbike. Cars are super safe.

This comes from the termination letter AD Jeff Long wrote to Petrino. Also from Bahn’s article, a quote from the letter:

Dorrell was hired over 158 other applicants and paid $20,000 by Petrino. Her salary remains $55,735. Since September, she and Petrino exchanged thousands of text messages and several hours worth of phone calls. Their inappropriate relationship was uncovered after Petrino was found to have lied about her presence in his motorcycle wreck two weeks ago.

She’s a former Razorbacks volleyball player and fundraiser.

Finally, the college football offseason offers up some news worthy of devoting nearly an entire episode to. “Shutdown Fullback” digs deep into the story of Charlie Weis suspending a running back for th- ... actually, that’s not true. This week’s episode is pretty much all about Bobby Petrino and Arkansas.

Injuries are sustained, motorcycles are lit aflame, cowboy shootouts occur, unnecessary assistants are hired and Sid Bream receives a major promotion. It’s been a long time coming for that guy.

Though Petrino said in his goodbye letter that he doesn’t quite agree with athletic director Jeff Long’s characterization of how the whole episode went down, it sounds like we won’t have to watch the two squabble in court over what actually did happen.

Such a process could have been disastrous for Petrino, as both sides would’ve had to show all their cards. As we’re seeing with merely the release of Petrino’s phone records, there are quite a few cars the coach would prefer to keep hidden.