By Rock Westfall
When interacting with much of the Texas Longhorns fanbase, one quickly notices a sense of self-importance, oversized arrogance, and perhaps a general lack of college football awareness. Their sense of entitlement and privilege is matched only by Michigan, which finally won the national championship last year after decades of underachieving.
Yet, when you examine Texas as a football brand, it is a lot of ten-gallon hats without much cattle. The record reveals a program that is desperate for relevance that was lost 15 years ago.
Since losing to the Alabama Crimson Tide 37-21 in the 2009 season national championship game, the Longhorns have never been that close to the prize. Of course, the Bevo Bros will talk about that loss to the Tide with the alibi that if QB Colt McCoy were not injured, it would have been different. Judging by Alabama’s dynasty starting that night, that lament is doubtful.
But the one parlay Texas often hits is whining, excuse-making, and Shouldas, Couldas, and Wouldas. In that, they are the reigning, repeat national champions.
https://twitter.com/DiehardsAlabama/status/1698724328143982869
Mired in Mediocrity
Since that fateful night against Alabama at the Rose Bowl, Texas has put together only two double-digit win seasons in the past 14 years. Certainly, the 2023 campaign was tremendously encouraging and assumed to be a breakout. The Longhorns went 12-2, beat Alabama on the road, and made the College Football Playoff, where they were defeated 37-31 by Washington.
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Now comes the question of whether or not Texas is here to stay. In 2018, we had a false alarm when coach Tom Herman led the Horns to a 10-4 record and a win over Georgia in the Sugar Bowl. “Texas is Back!” was the cry. But it was a mirage. Herman was fired two years later in favor of Steve Sarkisian, who has gone 5-7 and 8-5 before last year’s epic ride.
In 2024 Texas should have its best team since Sark arrived. And they are going to need it. Texas is leaving the relatively weaker Big 12 Conference and its seven-on-seven football culture for the man-eating SEC, where it just means more.
In Bevo’s mind, Texas is ready to take over the SEC. But despite the win over Alabama and a playoff season, they could also be labeled as limping in after being discredited as a program that failed to take advantage of unlimited wealth, its own TV network, and a league that it ran as its own personal country club.
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Sippin’ Tea at the Country Club Estates
The first thing to know about Texas and its culture is that it prints money. And the Longhorns are not shy about telling everyone all about it. Texas has used its money to buy players, influence, and God knows what else. Yet, for all its advantages, Texas has little in the way of accomplishments.
Despite its oversized ego and vault, the Longhorns have only four national championships. The legendary Darrell Royal won three of them (1963, 1969, and 1970), with Mack Brown winning the last Texas natty in 2005. For all of the bluster and bloviating of its superiority, Texas has one national championship in 53 years. That’s almost as bad as Michigan before last season.
In the 28 seasons it competed in the Big 12 Conference, Texas won four championships. While this is not bad, it is nowhere near what it should have been. After all, Texas was the de facto boss of the league.
Texas athletic director DeLoss Dodds, who ruled with an iron fist from 1981 to 2013, was the real power of the Southwest Conference and Big 12 until his retirement. Everything went through Dodds both in Austin and with the league offices. The actual league commissioners were nothing but frontmen.
What makes this lack of return on the investment so stunning is the sizeable investment itself. Texas was able to buy anything and anyone it wanted, including a hostile takeover of the Big 12 after it limped in as a refugee from a disgraced, renegade outlaw league forced to fold (The Southwest Conference). Yet Texas was unable to sustain success with all that it had going for it. Why?
A argument can be made that Texas has long been consumed by self-entitlement and privilege. Its arrogance and infinite wealth consumed it. Texas’ wealth and power made them underachievers in the eyes of many and lazy and soft to some. This attitude trickled down to the players and coach Mack Brown. The entire program became full of itself, comfortable, and reading its own headlines. Indeed, Texas was a legend in its own mind—but not anyone else’s.
But they remain steadfast in their feeling of superiority it seems and those traits have ultimately proven to be a liability.
https://twitter.com/PistolRick/status/1755989755345424620
Longhorn Network Failure is the Ultimate Tell of Texas’s Faux Brand
In 2011, the Longhorn Network launched in partnership with ESPN. Subsequently, Nebraska, Texas A&M, and Missouri defected from the Big 12 as the LHN was the final straw of Texas’s overbearing ways. The separation was a long time coming, but LHN was feared to give Texas an advantage unlike that of any other college football program.
ESPN pushed the Longhorn Network to an obnoxious degree, interrupting actual in-game broadcasts to do so. It was assumed that the Texas brand would make the network into a national success story from coast to coast. Instead, it never caught on, not even in Texas. There was never any popular demand for the Longhorn Network. The reality was that nobody cared about watching a 24/7 Texas infomercial.
The failure of the Longhorn Network should have been a sobering humility check for Texas. Bevo discovered it was not and could never be Notre Dame. Despite some occasional saber rattling about going independent, Texas realized that few care about the Longhorns outside of their intrastate fans and alumni base. That is very unlike a true national brand like the Fighting Irish.
Texas learned that, in America’s eyes, it is just another run-of-the-mill college football program. Texas lacked the cache to pull off its own TV network and be a true national brand. At best, the University of Texas is a Texas thing. Yet millions of Texas residents pull for two schools—their own and the one that plays Texas.
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The Ultimate Reality Check
After its LHN failure and a mediocre body of work in the Big 12, Texas found a life raft in the SEC. And while the SEC will enhance the financial success of Texas it will be much tougher on its football program.
Based on its advantages, the Big 12 was a league Texas should have won almost every year. Instead, its arch-rival Oklahoma dominated with 14 league titles. Baylor and Kansas State, with none of Texas’ wealth and influence, won three titles each.
Based on its prospectus of unlimited promise and return on investment, Texas would be found guilty and shut down by the Securities and Exchange Commission for fraud.
If Texas was all that, the Longhorn Network would be thriving, and Texas would have snagged a natty or two in the Big 12 era with the cache to become an independent like Notre Dame. Instead, they have the richest house in the neighborhood but one that lacks actual power.
For millions of college football fans, it’s been fun to watch Texas be humbled. Sadly, the Longhorns themselves did not accumulate humility in the process. In fact, the more Texas fails, the more we hear from them.
When it comes to college football, only Alabama has the justification to boast like Texas. Yet they have the historical awareness not to do so.
Bevo is about to get his. Or perhaps Texas finally breaks through in the NIL era and becomes what we all expected. Either way it’s going to be beautiful.
