HOOVER, Ala. – There’s no mistaking the identity Arkansas football has established under third-year coach Bret Bielema.
Just take a quick look at the cover of the Razorbacks’ media guide.
While most Southeastern Conference programs have opted for clean, simple looks featuring three or four of their most recognizable players, Arkansas has its five starting offensive linemen posed rather intimidatingly on the cover.
“I think it’s awesome. I really do,” Razorbacks quarterback Brandon Allen said Wednesday at SEC Media Days. “Playing offensive line is so tough. You’ve played the dirtiest, the grittiest position, and you get no recognition for it.
“I think any little thing you can do – take them to dinner, put them in first class on our planes, put them on the cover of the media guide – I think that’s huge. I think they deserve every bit of the recognition they get, and it’s a tough job on that offensive line.”
It’s a job the quintet of Denver Kirkland, Frank Ragnow, Dan Skipper, Mitch Smothers and Sebastian Tretola – a group that averages out at 6-foot-5 and 328 pounds – have done well under Bielema, the former Wisconsin coach who brought his smashmouth, pound-the-rock offensive approach from the Big 10 to the SEC.
The Hogs were 3-9 in Bielema’s first season and started 0-6 in the league in 2014 before back-to-back shutouts of Ole Miss and LSU and a smashing of Texas in the Texas Bowl led to a 7-6 finish.
The brutal nature of the SEC West may cap some of Arkansas’s upward mobility, but Bielema and his team are hoping to use how they finished last season as a “launching point” for 2015.
“At the end of the year last year, not a lot of people would have loved to play Arkansas, and that’s just fine by me,” Bielema said. “But bottom line, we (were) 7-6. That’s kind of like pop pop, fizz fizz. It’s not a real exciting thing.”
What is exciting for the Razorbacks is the return of the foundation of a rushing offense that last season averaged 218 yards per game (26th nationally and fifth in the SEC) and produced two 1,000-yard rushers – Alex Collins (1,190 yards and 12 touchdowns) and Jonathan Williams (1,100 and 12).
And the Hogs surely will lean on the front five, a group directed by former Tennessee offensive line coach Sam Pittman, to lead the way to loftier goals.
“That’s where the offense starts,” Williams said. “That’s where the team starts. Without guys up front, our talents don’t mean a whole lot. We’re glad to give those guys a little bit of glamour.”
Arkansas players, Williams said, didn’t know the offensive linemen were going on the cover during a normal photo day earlier this offseason. But once they found out, the grief-giving began.
“They’re acting like divas now,” Williams joked.
“We had a players-ran workout that we scheduled for a Thursday, but they wanted it to be on Friday. So they came to the group and said, ‘No, we’re going to have it on Friday.’ I messed with them and told them, ‘Hey, just cause you’re on magazines now doesn’t mean you can make execute decisions.’ It’s cool to see them out there.”
It’s the brand Bielema, who was 68-24 with three Big 10 titles in seven seasons in Wisconsin, wants for his program. After Tretola threw a touchdown pass on a fake field goal against UAB last season, the coach declared afterward a recruiting pitch that offensive line prospects should come to Fayetteville and he would “make you famous.”
Putting the starting offensive line on the media guide cover appears to be another page out of that chapter.
“Selfishly, it’s because it’s the only group I feel good about taking a picture with,” Bielema joked.
“It’s easy to build depth there, and it’s easy to build a tradition, and it’s easy to build value, because running backs will tell you they love great linemen, quarterbacks will tell you they love great linemen, wide receivers will tell you they love great quarterbacks and great linemen.”
Contact Patrick Brown at pbrown@timesfreepress.com.