Thank you for your post, I actually enjoy your perspectives. The biggest issues with this football program:
1. Zero consistency at an attempt to be relevant; we’re at the point where we say “hi” to the top 25 for one, maybe two, weeks per year and then it’s back to the same bullshit. This program hasn’t been relevant in over a decade, 2015 included. That was a product of a terrible schedule and Stanford revealed that.
2. If you’re already at 7-5 to 8-5 and not even sniffing a new year’s 6 bowl, you might as not care because no notices anyway.
3. We’re now at the point where 9-3 and 10-2 is what we hope for...in the WEST division. This division is such a joke where NW will represent the West in the sham “title” game after barely exceeding bowl eligibility. 9-3 or better absolutely doesn’t mean anything close to what it used to prior to the creation of these ridiculous divisions. In fact, it’s merely allowed Iowa fans to accept even more mediocrity since we rarely play anyone with a pulse. And when we do, we lose. And then the ensuing excuse is that, well, it’s UM/PSU/OSU/MSU so it’s okay, we’ll win the next couple against MD/MN/IL/IN so we can all go back to fictitiously comparing this team to 2002. That was an incredible joke and no one even seems to be talking about this. Instead, we’ve subliminally recalibrated our expectations where UW is now the target and we cannot even handle them remotely as well as we used to. Before we knew that if we didn’t go at least 2 of 3 against UM/OSU/PSU, we weren’t contending for the conference title. Now the talk is about trying to figure out how we can avoid these teams and somehow manage to slip past UW so we can claim the farce of a “West Division crown”. It’s comical when you really think about it. Divisions have hurt Iowa, and the program cannot even handle been dealt a consistently easier schedule than what they historically played. We’re sliding.
4. Iowa has a branding problem, largely cemented by KF, and BF is trying to improve that. Purdue has been a doormat forever; now Brohm shows up with equal or lesser players and beats Iowa 2 years in a row and now with an incoming top 25 recruiting class. What is that saying about what Iowa has been doing all those years while garbage programs like PU have been idle? It means we have done absolutely nothing to improve our brand or national profile. And that’s evidenced by the inability to beat even middle tier B1G teams now. We’re getting passed by and cannot seem to figure out why. We put a significant amount of players in the NFL at specific positions. That’s the only selling point right now. The style of play, recruits just don’t largely care for and that’s why the success on the field just isn’t getting it done, nor has, for the better part of the last decade. Program needs a new face, new blood. Iowa is a fantastic school and offers an awesome football environment; however, we do so little to make it an attractive place for more talented recruits to consider given the image that players witness - calculated, predictable, insert whatever adjective here. The results on the field reflect that.
