Ryan Mallett Makes Strong (But Unintentional) Case to Join Hogs Coaching Staff

Ryan Mallett

Ryan Mallett’s in a good place these days. 

Specifically, he’s in Mountain Home, in his first year of coaching high school football, fishing, hunting and living an all-around easy-going life after a record-setting college career and seven-year run in the NFL. 

In some ways, he’s prepared for this moment all of his life. Mallett’s dad and many of his uncles and cousins have coached the game, and he’s had the benefit of playing for some great football minds.

“It’s just something I’ve always loved,” he said on the “Hog Pod” podcast. ‘I used to like the mental part of the game, the X’s and O’s part as well as the other parts. It wasn’t just about going out there and trying to be more athletic than everybody, because I wasn’t. So I had to be a little smarter than everybody else.”

Mountain Home head coach Steve Ary agrees: Mallett’s “knowledge is off the charts,” Ary said in a recent interview with Pig Trail Nation. “He can coach any position. He does receivers. He does offensive line. He does quarterbacks. Offense.”

So far, so good. The Bombers are 2-2 this season after losing 22 games in a row, including consecutive 0-10 seasons. 

Mallett has said he’s open to one day coaching at the college ranks.

If he keeps learning under Ary, who was a great head coach in Missouri prep football circles, why shouldn’t make that jump? And it just makes sense that the possible landing spot would the University of Arkansas, where Mallett set 16 passing records in Fayetteville and threw the ball at 65 miles per hour (three mph faster than Patrick Mahomes).

Although this is the 32-year-old Mallett’s first official coaching job, he has as good a lineage as anybody that has ever coached in north central Arkansas. In college and then in the pros, Mallett played for two tactically brilliant coaches in Bobby Petrino and Bill Belichick.

“I had two of the best coaches in the game,” Mallett told the hosts of Hit That Line in the spring. “One was more of a defensive guy and one was more of an offensive guy. I learned so much from both on them on how to prepare and how to win — the detail it takes to put into a game plan for your film study, things like that.”

On the “Hog Pod,” Mallett added that Petrino trusted him enough to lean on his judgement when preparing for opponents: “He gave me different stuff to think about during the summer… and then he would ask my opinion or we would talk about it and see if one of us liked it more than the other one, or how I felt about it. So if we didn’t like it, we’d scratch it.”

But one of the best reasons for Mallett to one day return to Arkansas — this time as an assistant coach — comes from this explanation of why the Mountain Home football program attracted him.

“I definitely wouldn’t have taken a job at somewhere that’s a perennial powerhouse, or that’s used to winning,” he told Pig Trail Nation. “I kind of like to help change things. It’s kind of why I came back to Arkansas [after the NFL]. So it’s sort of a similar situation.”

If Mallett’s looking for a place that’s not used to winning, then the recent Razorbacks are a great fit. They haven’t won at a high level since 2011, just a year removed from his college playing days.

On top of that, the Hogs football program hasn’t had a successful quarterback coach since Dan Enos. Chad Morris, a supposed quarterback whisperer, turned every arm he touched into charcoal while in Fayetteville. Morris’ offensive coordinator Joe Craddock wasn’t much better. 

Now, Kendal Briles has taken over as the offensive coordinator and quarterback coach. Briles didn’t have a great debut against No. 4 Georgia, but he’ll likely get Arkansas to produce more points than they did in the Morris regime. 

Still, if Briles can’t develop Arkansas’ extremely talented stable of quarterbacks (including two four-star underclassmen in KJ Jefferson and Malik Hornsby) to a much higher level this fall, Arkansas should look into bringing on a quarterback coach specialist. 

***
See the full Pig Trail Nation interview here:

***

If Mallett’s looking for a place that’s not used to winning, then the recent Razorbacks are a great fit. They haven’t won at a high level since 2011, just a year removed from his college playing days.

On top of that, the Hogs football program hasn’t had a successful quarterback coach since Dan Enos. Chad Morris, a supposed quarterback whisperer, turned every arm he touched into charcoal while in Fayetteville. Morris’ offensive coordinator Joe Craddock wasn’t much better. 

Now, Kendal Briles has taken over as the offensive coordinator and quarterback coach. Briles didn’t have a great debut against No. 4 Georgia, but he’ll likely get Arkansas to produce more points than they did in the Morris regime. 

Still, if Briles can’t develop Arkansas’ extremely talented stable of quarterbacks (including two four-star underclassmen in KJ Jefferson and Malik Hornsby) to a much higher level this fall, Arkansas should look into bringing on a quarterback coach specialist. 

And the Hogs could do far worse than give an all-time great like Ryan Mallet a shot at the opening. 

***

Here’s the 50 minute “Hog Pod” sit-down with Mallett:

***

For our latest post, a column by Jim Harris go here:

***

Ryan Mallett On His “Loud” Coaching Style For Mountain Home

The below originally published April 28, 2020:

After a rough 2019, Ryan Mallet’s 2020 is looking a lot better.

Last year finally put in a stake in the heart of the former Hog star’s lingering dreams of a pro football career. Even though Mallett didn’t land back in the NFL, where he last played in 2017, or get drafted into the XFL pro football league, he’s off to a good start with the new decade.

By the first few months of 2020, he had moved to Mountain Home, just up the White River from his hometown of Batesville, with his new fiancee Tiffany Seeley.

He started building a new home for his family and, “needing something to do,” pondered his next step after playing football, he told the Baxter Bulletin and ESPN Arkansas. Mallett had many relatives who’d gotten into football coaching, so he decided to reach out to the new Mountain Home High coach to see if he could help out.

Steve Ary took him up on the offer. Just like that, the former All-SEC quarterback who set 16 passing records in Fayetteville and threw the ball at 65 miles per hour (three mph faster than Patrick Mahomes) had a volunteer gig.

Then, in mid-April, the 31-year-old Ryan Mallet officially joined the Mountain Home High faculty as an assistant football coach and social studies teacher.*

When it comes to coaching style, Mallett added: “I think I kinda got myself figured out and how I am. I’m loud, I yell a lot. A lot of it’s encouragement, but I’m loud. I’m going to do whatever the head coach asks me to do. It’s what I’m here for.”

***

YouTube video

***

Ryan Mallett joins a new Bombers being assembled by first year head coach Steve Ary. They are tasked with resurrecting a program that has lost 22 straight games and has not posted a winning record since its state runner-up season of 2006.

So far, Mallett has impressed Ary.

“He said he’d be willing to coach any position. We had got out in the mornings and worked with the kids a little bit, and he can do exactly that. Since I’ve been here, he’s been right beside me. He’s coached quarterbacks, running backs, receivers, offensive line. He’s a wealth of knowledge. He knows a lot more than just quarterbacks. He understands defenses, too. We’re lucky to have a guy with a football IQ like this.”

-Mountain Home head coach Steve Ary on Ryan Mallett

Mallett hasn’t exactly hit the road running in the coaching world since the coronavirus pandemic shut down the schools this year. He’s been taking it easy, fishing and turkey hunting.  “My dogs are tired out of taking walks,” he told host Tye Richardson. “Looks like they’re passed out on the couch over here, they’ve been so tired of taking walks.”

“I’m thrilled to be over here,” Mallett told the Baxter Bulletin. “I’ve always liked this part of Arkansas, growing up [in Batesville]. I can do a lot of hunting and fishing. It’s a great community, too. The people who support the program — hopefully we can get people fired up and excited for football.”

Mallett hasn’t had much time to follow the current Hogs football team, but he’s ready to see it roll at levels not seen the Petrino era.


“I don’t know about expectations, because I don’t know a bunch of those kids that we got, I haven’t been really following it as much because all of this stuff going on and I’ve had a lot going on. But I’m excited about Coach [Sam] Pittman and [Kendal] Briles and I just can’t wait to see what they do.”

At Mountain Home, Mallett may make 2% of the $2,000,000 he once made in a year with the Ravens, but he’ll stay close to the game he loves.

“I’ve always known I was going to coach eventually at some point,” Mallett said. “I didn’t expect it to be this early, but things happen. I’ve always wanted to be a coach at some point and do what my dad did and my uncles and cousins. We all grew up in education.”

In NWA, River Valley, Fort Smith and Branson

***

Ryan Mallett
Yes, Arkansas really was once cool enough for Snoop Dog to rep it.

*It will only be a matter of time before one of Mallett’s social studies students does enough Googling on his famous teacher to walk into class one day and asks, oh so brazenly, for a Scantron.

YouTube video

On Hit That Line, Mallett addressed this urban legend head on:


“It’s fake. It’d be very bad news, but it was fake. I mean, it’s just crazy how it’s blown up that story is… First of all, I’m pretty sure [the story] is that it was like a lecture hall class room. Well, I only had like one of those — and I never really went to that one.”

Listen to the entire interview starting at the 34:20 mark below. It includes his take on former teammate Tom Brady going to Tampa Bay (36:20) and why he initially chose Michigan over Arkansas coming out of high school (41:15):

***

Mallett bounces back after a down 2019

Mallett is bouncing back from a not-so-great first 11 months of 2019.

On September 10, 2019, Ryan Mallett was arrested in Springdale, Ark. With a blood alcohol concentration of .08, he was accused of driving while intoxicated.

He was arrested at about 7 p.m. Tuesday, near the intersection of New Hope Road and AR-112, according to Lt. Jeff Taylor with Springdale Police Department. 

Mallet cooperated with police and was booked into the Washington County Detention Center. You can see the full video here:

YouTube video

Just weeks before this, a slimmed down Mallett sat down with David Bazzel of the Little Rock Touchdown Club and said he hadn’t given up on his dream of playing again in the NFL. “I had to make a choice — am I going to keep playing, or am I done? I made that choice and I’ve been working my butt off to get back.”

***

Patriotic poster (24 X 36 in.)

***

Mallet also discussed his relationship with former Razorback coach Bobby Petrino. “We had a great relationship at times, and sometimes we’d butt heads in practice. It’s almost like he was an uncle or a dad kind of thing. I have nothing bad to say about him. He never did anything wrong by me.”

Petrino, in fact, just about ran Mallett into the ground after Mallett was arrested for public intoxication in March 2009. Mallet pleaded guilty to the charge, paid $155 in court costs, fines, and fee and was punished by Petrino with early wake up calls, extra running, and early curfews

Petrino, who talked at the same touchdown club on Monday, spent a few minutes waxing nostalgic about the good times with Ryan Mallett at the helm of the Hogs’ most explosive offense in the program’s SEC era.

One of its brightest moments came in a knockout of No. 5 LSU in Little Rock. Mallett threw an 80-yard touchdown to Cobi Hamilton at the end of the first half, then came off the field triumphantly pointing at someone on the sidelines.

Moderator David Bazzel asked Petrino if Mallett was pointing at him. “Yeah, he probably didn’t. When he pointed at me, he used a different finger,” Petrino said, chuckling.

See the play at 22:20 below:

YouTube video

In the same video, Mallett talks about the most hype college college game day experience he had. It came in the 2010 Arkansas-Alabama game in Fayetteville, which Arkansas lost after being up by two touchdowns in the second half. Still, what a start.

“That is the only game I played in where after the first play the hair on the back of my neck was standing up. It gave me chills — it was fun.”

YouTube video

Ryan Mallet’s NFL career (via wikipedia)



***
Facebook Comments