Bobby Petrino

Lore & Background

Petrino has directed his college teams to nine bowl games, including the first Bowl Championship Series (BCS) bowl games for both Louisville and Arkansas in their programs' histories. His teams have achieved four 10-win seasons and six AP Top 25 finishes. Born in Lewistown, Montana, Robert Patrick Petrino grew up in Helena and graduated from Capital High in 1979. He attended hometown Carroll College and graduated with a physical education and a math minor in 1983. While at Carroll, he played quarterback for the Fighting Saints and began his coaching career there as a graduate assistant during the 1983 season. At the time, his father Bob Petrino Sr. was the head coach of Carroll, a position he held from 1971 to 1999.

Reader's Guide

The Atlanta Falcons hired Petrino to a five-year, $24 million contract. A major reason Petrino was brought in was to develop star quarterback Michael Vick into a more complete quarterback, Vick being known more for his ability to run than as a pocket passer. However, before Petrino's first training camp, it emerged that Vick had bankrolled an illegal dog fighting operation near his hometown in Newport News, Virginia. The terms of Vick's bail barred him from leaving Virginia before the November 26 trial, ending any realistic chance of him playing a meaningful down in 2007.

In a case of exceptionally bad timing, the Falcons had traded Vick's backup, Matt Schaub, to the Houston Texans in the offseason. Thus, Petrino was forced to begin the season with back-ups Joey Harrington, Byron Leftwich, and Chris Redman as his quarterbacks. With their franchise quarterback effectively sidelined for the season, the Falcons appeared to be a rudderless team. On December 10, 2007, with the Falcons at the bottom of the NFC South with a 3–10 record after suffering a home loss to the division rival New Orleans Saints, Petrino resigned to become head coach at Arkansas, less than 24 hours after personally promising owner Arthur Blank that he was staying in Atlanta.

Petrino informed his players of his departure via a four-sentence laminated note left at the locker of each player, a move that many in the organization and in the NFL harshly criticized. Even before resigning, Petrino had rankled the Falcons players with his aloof manner. He was known to walk through the locker room without speaking to the players. He was also reluctant to share personnel decisions with the players; Harrington learned through the media that Petrino considered Leftwich the starter even though Harrington had engineered two straight wins in Leftwich's absence.

According to a 2022 article in The Athletic about Petrino's tenure at Arkansas, Petrino told Jeff Long, who was due to formally succeed Frank Broyles as athletic director at Arkansas after the 2007 season, that he was interested in coming to Fayetteville. Long was not willing to wait until after the end of the NFL season, and asked Dallas Cowboys owner and Arkansas alumnus Jerry Jones to ask Blank for permission to negotiate with Petrino.

Did You Know?

• Petrino's 13-game tenure is tied for the second shortest non-interim coaching tenure in NFL history.
• Petrino's 13-game tenure is tied with Lou Holtz in 1976 and Urban Meyer in 2021 for the third shortest non-interim coaching tenure in NFL history.