Yah. I never played football. I dunno if there's any truth to the bulletin board material thing. I think there's gotta be some truth to it. But also, no real practical effect. Also, it seems rare to me. At least rare enough that it rises to the point where it's discussed outside the locker room or that a marginally invested fan like me is aware of. I basically come here. Most of the stuff I click on outside of here is usually about recruits or injury news. I don't get into the weeds on week to week game stuff. It doesn't often burble up to the point of me being aware of it.
But I did see it. And thought "Gee, that seems a weirdly specific shot across the bow and aimed at Ferentz and his staff."
Some rather ephemeral things we fans have wondered about (strength, conditioning, recruiting of real athletes) for awhile now. I mean, you don't have to reach far for criticism of Iowa football. All you have to do is say "offense/passing game" and the only rational response from Iowa would be "well, yeah, but we're always good on defense and special teams....complimentary football!!!"
I clicked on a followup (so algorithm comes in to play if I was aware of Fickell's comments in the first place)....allegedly Kirk's response was "We've heard that before, Luke." 100% sure it was fake/clickbait. But my thought is, such an oddly specific shot that Fickell took struck enough nerve to generate some clickbait/ragebait.