When James Franklin began his coaching career as a graduate assistant at Kutztown University in 1995, college football – and athletics in general – looked very different.
Players who chose to transfer had to sit out one season. Recruiting was more seasonal than a year-round endeavor. No one had heard of Name, Image and Likeness. If college athletes were paid, it was against the rules and done secretively.
Twenty-nine years later, many athletes change schools. Some wind up playing at four schools, something that once was never imagined. Recruiting is non-stop. NIL collectives pay athletes. Revenue-sharing is on the horizon.
Now as he prepares for his 11th season as the head coach at Penn State, Franklin deals with all those external factors just like coaches across the country.
He and the Nittany Lions again hope to contend for a championship in the first season of the 18-team Big Ten and for a berth in the College Football Playoff, expanded to 12 teams for the first time.
Franklin discussed the state of college football, new offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki, new defensive coordinator Tom Allen, the Beaver Stadium renovation plan and other topics in a one-on-one interview earlier this week.
Q: You said several years ago that you compared your job to being a CEO. With the transfer portal and roster management, NIL collectives and recruiting, how much of your time do you get to spend on actually coaching football?
Franklin: Typically, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., I block my schedule. If not, it’s an interview, it’s fund-raising. Recruiting will go on throughout the day. That’s kind of a mix. Now with all of the other things you’re talking about, if you don’t (block off time), you’re constantly getting pulled out. All my non-football specific responsibilities will happen before 8 o’clock or after 5 o’clock. If it’s in season, because we have a staff meeting at 7 a.m., then it would be before 7 o’clock. If not, it just gets filled.
Q: Do you have any time for yourself?
Franklin: No, but you never really did. Is it more now? Yes. But you never really did.
Q: With revenue-sharing in college athletics on the horizon, will Penn State need an NFL type of negotiator or GM or that type of position?
Franklin: I don’t know if it’s necessarily a GM because (general manager of personnel and recruitment) Andy Frank already does a lot of those things. But I do think for contract negotiations and things like that, there’s got to be somebody who has experience in that world, for sure. Everybody’s going to look at it differently in what they need and what they feel like they’re lacking. Yeah, there’s going to have to be some part of that. The question is: Does that happen separately from the football building? Does that happen under the compliance umbrella so that there’s a little bit of division or separation there? Just like the head coach in the NFL is not dealing with that if it gets challenging.
Q: Will the collectives operate within athletic departments?
Franklin: I think that’s still to be determined. There are still things that probably will have to function outside the athletic department, but not as much. I would say the majority of it will come in house.
Q: You and Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin talked about the lack of guardrails in your sport at the Peach Bowl. Have you seen any progress regarding guardrails or rules since then? Have you seen a shift in attitudes?
Franklin: No. You may see more of this come from the conferences and the commissioners. At this stage you can’t rely on the NCAA to do that. It’s going to be (Big Ten commissioner) Tony Petitti and (Southeastern Conference commissioner) Greg Sankey that are essentially running college football right now. As we get through some of the stuff, the NCAA may get back in or there may be a total divide with football and maybe basketball. Right now, I think most of it is going to come from the commissioners, especially the Big Ten and the SEC.
Q: As you get older, do you believe that your skin has gotten thicker? Were you a lot more thin-skinned when you were younger?
Franklin: Yes. My skin has gotten a lot thicker. Things that in the old days would have really hung heavily on my heart, my mind and my shoulders for a number of days, I now get over much quicker. I don’t know if that’s necessarily a good thing or a bad thing. I think that thin skin allowed me at a place like Vanderbilt to fight a ton of battles that I needed to fight. They were probably emotionally driven. It was probably the same way when I first got here to Penn State. I don’t think people realize that our best years (as a coaching staff) were probably those first two years because of what we walked into (after the massive NCAA sanctions). I think that same thin skin was needed earlier in my career because it creates energy. There were so many battles that needed to be fought.
Q: How would you describe these last 10 years in two or three words?
Franklin: I would say very rewarding, very challenging and complex.
Q: Are you happy here?
Franklin: I am very happy here. There are times when we make it much harder than it needs to be here when we should be spending all of our time and energy fighting West Virginia, Ohio State, Michigan. And we’re not. I don’t think a lot of people understand that.
Q: With the College Football Playoff expanding to 12 teams this year, are the stakes and pressure increased for you and Penn State?
Franklin: I don’t think so. I think the opportunities are greater. There’s a bigger window. Somebody pointed out that we would have been a team most affected by a 12-team playoff. I look at it as a bigger window and a bigger opportunity probably like some teams in the SEC West used to feel.
Q: What specific challenges does an 18-team Big Ten present to your program?
Franklin: We’re one of two programs from the Northeast (along with Rutgers). Our travel is more significant than anybody and even more so here because of the size of our airport. That’s going to create a ton of challenges for us that other schools don’t have. It’s a very similar challenge to what we have in recruiting and getting in and out of this place. It’s not easy. If you try to build the Big Ten the same way you built the SEC in terms of conference rules, teams, most of their games are driveable. We could play an 8 o’clock (Pacific time) game on the West Coast every three years the way the rules are now. We won’t get back to State College until 10 in the morning. Not only does it affect how you play in that game and playing at that time of night, which we’re not used to, but it has a huge impact on the following week. It’s no different than when we played in Ireland. We didn’t really recover from that game for three weeks. It’s very different being at Penn State and Rutgers than being at, say, Nebraska.
Q: Now that you’ve worked with Andy Kotelnicki for five months, what do you believe he can do for the offense?
Franklin: Philosophically, if you combine what Mike (Yurcich) did and what Joe Moorhead did and what Ricky Rahne did, we won’t be a whole lot different in terms of the plays we’ll be running. There are a few wrinkles that you saw at Kansas (Kotelnicki’s most recent stop) that we did not do under Mike but that we did do under Joe that I think will come back. The biggest thing is that we’re a relationship-based program. We always have been. I’m a relational leader. He’s a relational leader. He loves people. He loves the staff. He loves the players. He’s charismatic. He’s fun. So I think there’s a lot more esprit de corps. We’re all in this thing together. We’re all pulling the rope in the same direction. Here is how we’re going to operate. This is the reason why we’re going to do things. To me that’s the biggest thing. It also helps that he’s been a play-caller for 19 years. Experience counts. Experience matters.
Q: What have you learned about Tom Allen that you didn’t know about him before you hired him? How can he continue the defense’s momentum?
Franklin: He is who I thought he was. A lot of times you interact with people at Big Ten Media Days or at head coaches meetings, and you’re getting small doses of people. Then you spend 15 hours a day with him and you find out whether they are who you thought they were. He is. He’s a really good person who’s passionate about football. He’s a relational guy as well. I’ve already seen a really strong connection between him and the linebackers. I also think there’s been more of an adjustment for him than Andy because Andy’s still doing the same job. Tom is now doing a different job but one he did for a long time. He’s back doing it full time. I do think the head coaching experience helps him. There’s still getting back into the rhythm of being a full-time defensive guy. In terms of defense – knock on wood – we’ve been fortunate really since I’ve been here. We’ve been really good on defense. Manny (former Penn State defensive coordinator Manny Diaz) gets a lot of credit and deservedly so. But Bob Shoop had a top 10 defense. Brent Pry had a top 10 defense. Manny had a top 10 defense. Like Joe Moorhead, Manny was fortunate to walk into a defense that was pretty loaded athletically. Tom has the ability to do the same thing. The fact that we’re not starting over allows us to keep this ship rolling and play to our strengths. You hope that defensively we can be similar. And offensively you hope you have an improvement. The reality for both sides of the ball is that we have to be at our best when it matters most, in the biggest games.
Q: What are your thoughts on the Beaver Stadium renovation plan? What can it do for your program and your fans?
Franklin: Actually for the football program, we needed to take care of Lasch. That’s been my belief because we’re in this building 365 days a year. The reality is that we’re only in that building seven days a year. That stadium is more impactful on the athletic department and the other sports and more impactful on the community and the state than it is specifically for football. We’ve had great environments and great games, all that stuff. But it makes no sense to have a building of that magnitude be used seven days a year. To have a Flyers-Penguins game there makes a ton of sense. To have more concerts there makes a ton of sense. For us to continue where we want to go as an athletic department, these things had to be resolved. Does it impact football and are we excited about it? Yes. Is it going to be an awesome venue? Yes. Every recruit for every other sport is at our games. It’s their selling point. Up to this point, Penn State football has essentially created revenue to support every other sport. That has to continue. When Penn State football is healthy, everybody wins.
Q: What do you still love about coaching?
Franklin: There are certain times of the year with the transfer portal and with NIL – I don’t want this to come off the wrong way that I’m against NIL because I’m not – but you’re wearing a hat you never thought you would have to wear. There are certain times of the year you have to get through when it’s … challenging and very different from the job that I signed up for. But just like I tell the donors, the alumni and the lettermen, when the job changes and when the industry changes, you better change and you better change with it. And you better be bold and aggressive. Once you get out of those times, they’re still kids. That’s why I got into this profession. That’s why I’m still in this profession. That’s why I didn’t go to the NFL except for that one year (as an assistant coach with the Green Bay Packers). I genuinely still love challenging the players, kidding around with them, holding them accountable, having great conversations with them, having tough conversations with them, watching them grow, watching a kid who comes here as a total knucklehead and you feel comfortable that he leaves prepared for life. They think this is hard, but there’s a whole real world out there. I’m probably more worried about that with the NIL aspect than ever before. If you look at the guys whose NFL careers come to an end earlier than they think – which is all of them – they struggle with that change. We take a lot of pride in preparing our guys for that. I worry now with NIL about guys who never make it to the NFL and they have to go out and get a real job. And they’re like, “What do you mean I have to work all these hours for $50,000 a year?” That reality is going to smack some guys in the face if you’re not preparing and educating them.
Q: You mentioned several years ago that your goal is to become the first African-American college football coach to win a national championship. Does that drive you? Is it in the front or back of your mind?
Franklin: I’ve maybe said it once to two or three different people. Is it in the back of my mind? No doubt. Is my staff aware of that? Yes. But it’s not like a daily thing. I want to win a national championship for our players, our lettermen, the staff, (Penn State president) Neeli Bendapudi, (Board of Trustees chairman) Matt Schuyler and (director of athletics) Pat Kraft, our fans, our alumni, the state of Pennsylvania. That’s what I want to win it for.
