Early reactions are in.
Question posed to the staff: So it’s Odom, what do we think? Give me your initial takes!
Ledman:
I’ve said before that I take the Tom Fornelli approach to all new hires for both college and professional sports; X is great hire for Y. I have no idea if it will work out. That’s basically the only way to look at these things. I think Odom can do a great job here at Purdue, he seems like a no-nonsense, hard nosed, disciplined kind of guy. That’s what Purdue needs right now. Odom will push this team to be better and that’s what they need. It will be interesting to see who he brings in to complete his staff. He’s got a deep bench of people he’s worked with throughout his career to include at Arkansa, Mizzou, and of course UNLV. He’s shown an ability to work with both the transfer portal and NIL which are both incredibly important in the modern game of college football. To me, one of his first jobs needs to be to get a few of Purdue’s big names to stay around. That includes Thieneman, Klare, Mockobee, Heldt just to name a few. If he can do that I think he’s got a solid base to build around. There’s a lot of work to do and it’s time to get to it.
Ryan:
Barry Odom definitely looks to be a good leader. Yes, he’s a defensive minded guy but he has hired good coordinators in the past which is encouraging. He’s had success at multiple FBS programs so I am cautiously optimistic. Let’s get to work.
Kyle:
Homerun hire. Disciplined, hard nosed, high character. He has built a program with limited NIL at UNLV and now he will have the revenue sharing money to truly build the Purdue roster, that needs totally retooled.
He has experience of ups and downs, and he is only 48 years old. I believe he will turn Purdue back into what we were during the Brohm Era. An exciting brand of football.
Jed:
For where Purdue currently stands as a program following a disastrous two-year stretch, Barry Odom is probably the absolute most ideal hire Bobinski could have made. A man with previous head coaching experience in the SEC at a program of similar standing and constraints that Purdue has along with being incredibly well connected in the business. He’ll put together a staff that is competent and able to develop the players in the program to be successful.
The fact that it appears Marian may not be joining him on staff as OC is a little disappointing but not worrisome as Marian hasn’t spent a lot of time in one place and would be a flight risk after one season. It is also good to see Odom holding Marian accountable for the bad press that was afforded to Odom and UNLV through the NIL issue with their QB.
The best thing a new hire can do is win the interview and I think it is safe to say Odom has traversed these first several days as well as he possibly could. The key is now assembling his staff to ensure that Purdue has a viable roster for spring football with 23 players now in the portal and many of the key players that would be returning there already. Odom seems to have an understanding of how to navigate that and how he does that over the next several weeks may determine the success of his first spring at Purdue.
Overall, this is a major step forward for a program that desperately needs a foundation of expectations and results to be built in the near future. Odom can do that with his vast amount of experience and knowledge he has gained.