The Texas A&M football team has always been one of the among the better teams in the country. That said, there hasn’t been consistent, sustained success in College Station in a few decades. The team will knock on the door, but never walk in.
This is evident by looking at the fact that they’ve finished in the top five twice in the last decade, but only finished ranked in the top 25 in four of those ten years. This is a program that is capable of contending, they just need to stay near the top.
So far, Jimbo Fisher is on the right track as head coach.
The Texas A&M football team has built the foundation of consistency in College Station
It is way too early to jump to any conclusions about this football team, but there is something to be said about the way that they have performed in the toughest conference in college football since Jimbo Fisher has been around.
After the Aggies finished 16th in the rankings in Fisher’s first season, they’d slide back out, going 4-4 in conference play, and find themselves just outside looking in. But the ultimate bounce-back was on its way.
Texas A&M would end up having their best season since… well, the 1930s. It sounds bad seeing it written out, but this further proves the fact that this team program has been on the cusp for almost an entire century.
But that’s just the thing — this team just had one of their best seasons of all-time. Jimbo Fisher is the real deal as a head coach. It may take some time, but he’s a guy that fans should believe in. Here’s why.
Texas A&M Football has found the guy who can bring consistency to the program
Jimbo Fisher is a lot of things. You can say what you want about his attitude toward academics at Florida State, but that doesn’t impact the success that he has seen as a head coach.
As head coach at Florida State, Fisher won at least nine games in every single season that he finished out for the Seminoles. He wasn’t just consistent — he was more consistent than any other program during that time frame.
And unlike the program he is currently a part of, he didn’t just knock on the door. He knocked on the door, came into the house, and won an NCAA Championship in 2013. Other than an ugly final season in Tallahassee, he finished ranked in every single year that he resided in Tallahassee.
The knock on Fisher’s time in Florida State is the sole idea that he lost interest in the program after winning a national championship. He didn’t give the same effort toward recruiting and it showed. Even if that’s the truth, it doesn’t affect Texas A&M football in the slightest at the moment.
The Aggies are coming off of a season that saw them finish 4th in the AP and Coaches Polls, their highest finish since the aforementioned 1939 title season. His recruiting classes have been in the top ten in each of his seasons as head coach.
He is fully invested in this program and 2021 may be the year that the stars align. But that’s not the only reason that they’ll be good next year.
The Texas A&M Football team earned respect in 2020
The most important takeaway from the 2020 football season isn’t the actual results that the Aggies saw on the field. Rather, this team will reap the benefits of having earned respect throughout the year.
They’ll earn the privilege of having the benefit of the doubt when it comes time to assign them to a bowl game or pick teams for the College Football Playoff. After a handful of seasons of mediocrity, they were forced to be on the outside looking in during the 2020 playoff.
This was particularly difficult considering they had to watch Notre Dame, who got in above them, get blown out by an Alabama team that had beaten them earlier in the year.
But this wasn’t the only scenario where they got disrespected by a committee. They would feel slighted once again when assigned to play against the 13th ranked North Carolina Tarheels for their bowl game. This was risidual damage from the selection of Notre Dame into the playoff, as the highest-ranked non-playoff team in the ACC plays in the Orange Bowl.
Texas A&M would have none of this. After a close three quarters, the Aggies would shift into drive, completely dismantling the Tarheels in the fourth quarter.
This win, in many eyes, gave the Aggies the respect that they had been begging for all year. They proved that they belonged, and the committee may see things differently next season with 2020 in mind.
But there’s one more part of the puzzle.
What if Kellen Mond was holding Texas A&M Football back?
You’re probably taken aback by the bold text that you just read, as you should be. Saying that Kellen Mond was holding the Texas A&M Football program back is a ridiculous statement.
But there’s more than meets the eye to this.
Mond was a great quarterback. Any smart coach will start a guy like that in the blink of an eye. But number 11 had some very distictive limitations under center.
In Mond’s senior year and his best season as the quarterback of this team, Texas A&M’s offense finished 33rd in the country in total offense and 59th in the country in passing offense. These rankings aren’t horrible, but anything sub-30 is pedestrian for a team that wants to compete for a title in the SEC.
Rewind to when Johnny Manziel donned the Maroon and White. As an Aggie, Johnny Football led Texas A&M a 7th spot and a 3rd spot in the country in total offense during his two years as a starter. He was a superstar and one of the greatest quarterbacks of all-time.
If he was paired with 2020’s defense, there wouldn’t be a team in the game who could keep up with the Aggies. That’s the idea behind this slide. The Aggies had a good quarterback, but they could have had more explosiveness on the offensive end.
We don’t know what kind of production we’ll get from QB1 in 2021, but any one of the quarterbacks on the depth chart could be the next superstar waiting for his opportunity. Drawing comparisons between Haynes King and Johnny Manziel may be premature, but anything is possible at this stage.
A strong passer could be the difference between another season watching the College Football Playoff from a living room and competing for a national title.