Willie Fritz is Already Winning Me Over

Full disclosure, I wanted Jeff Traylor. He’s young, he’s successful, and he’s built a successful program in Texas in the last few years. This is a slight lie. I actually wanted Urban Meyer. I don’t care if he would have destroyed the program, or had players committing felonies, he would’ve won a national championship. But I would’ve settled for Traylor. That’s why I was a tad disappointed when Fritz was the locked on guy.

We all knew who it was going to be right before the AAC Championship game when all UH news went quiet. And I felt underwhelmed. Fritz isn’t a guy who has the national name recognition. He’s not a guy you look at and his name just jumps off a page. He doesn’t seem like the second coming of Tom Herman (which probably is a good thing).

Sure, he won the Cotton Bowl, but flukes happen, right? I wasn’t onboard the Fritz Express, and I’m still not fully (because I have trust issues and will need to use Jonah Hill-speak to express my feelings to Fritz). But he’s doing a great job convincing me otherwise

Fritz and the Trantrums

Someone at UH Athletics needs a talking to, because the last time I saw a band play in a new coach, that coach got something like $75 million for mediocrity.

My Willie Fritz knowledge was a tad lacking going into the hire. The most exposure I’d really had to him was the Tulane-UH game, and the Cotton Bowl. He also had my favorite UDFA receiver – Duece Watts. But, he was on my radar like Bigfoot is on my radar; he’s probably out there, but I have better things to do than search for him. I knew he coached at Sam Houston, but just like all of Texas, Sam Houston is something you think about when you see large statutes or a slightly wrong orange.

So, to me, the introductory press conference was my first big exposure to Willie Fritz. Again, I’d seen him beat UH. But last season beating UH was similar to beating a Bill O’Brien-led team; it’s similar to asking a human lasagna to run a team. I felt like a dad, shotgun weirdly loaded, and waiting for my daughter’s new boyfriend (she tells me he is a nice guy, but I’ve seen her choice of parents). Good for Willie, he delivered, else I would have gone back to jail.

And then dude ends it by shouting out basketball. Call him a football siren, because that man is seducing me with his song.

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The Fritz Tour

I don’t want to spend too much time on the other guy. The bad man is gone and his lackluster play calling can’t hurt me anymore. I do want to use him in reference to Fritz, and how he’s been acting this first week. He’s like that guy at a new job who’s going a little too hard, and you question where he’s going to be week 6.

Nonetheless, one of my main criticisms of Dana was his seeming inability to connect with the players and recruit well. He had a black hole of a personality, and turns out 18 year-olds aren’t thrilled with getting yelled at by a guy who, and I say this for the thousandth time, got drunkenly kicked out of a casino. Dana was the guy who read “How to Influence People” and decided that the best course of action was to do the opposite.

This is week 1, and Fritz is already out there recruiting like a Pope ready to crusade. His Holy Land is the high school football holy land.

And I’ve seen like 3 tweets from today where a high schooler has received an offer from UH this week, probably today. You’d assume Fritz is the special third person in the Houston runoff, coming out with Stone Cold’s music.

And I’ve seen a multitude of these today. Even one had Fritz in the picture, which tells me he actually met the kid. This is Qui-Gon on tour. This is recruiting for that one last job, except that one last job will only end when the NCAA falls apart due to ESPN putting all its money into the LeBron family reality series which is definitely coming.

Basketball School

This next part is purely anecdotal and may mean absolutely nothing. I also mentioned Houston Cougar basketball, and have really neglected writing about the team this far. To be fair to me, it’s currently cupcake season (including Xavier).

When I went to basketball games for the last couple years, Dana would also be there. He’d basically stalk the aisles the entire game, like one of those 50/50 vendors who you can just smell someone on their fourth Miller Lite, ready to spend $200 more. I’m not sure I ever saw him go up to players. Even more truthfully, I’m not sure I ever saw anyone actually say hello to him. And this was last year, when UH hadn’t looked like it belonged back in the AAC.

So call me pleasantly surprised when I see this tweet

[I can’t find the Tweet because as I went to save it, my boss walked by, but it was something like Fritz was sitting with his players joking around].

Randomly stalking the aisles and scaring children is out, engaging with players is in.

And then Willie went back on the floor. After praising Kelvin and basketball program at his opening press conference, he then praises the basketball players at the game.

Fritz seems like the kind of coach who will loudly yell “we got guys” during a halftime speech. No pee charts.

I’m still vaguely skeptical, because I have been broken before. But I’m willing to Fall4Fritz if it keeps trending this way. I also don’t expect a great first season. I just expect him to care more.

I’ll leave this fun fact: Tulane still has him listed as their head coach.

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