James Franklin, Virginia Tech's new head football coach, smiles after he was presented with a team jersey during an NCAA college football news conference, Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2025, in Blacksburg, Va. (AP Photo/Robert Simmons)

Oh, man, I could probably fill up half the sports section by fully analyzing all the areas where James Franklin needs to improve as a coach.

Neil said I only have 650 words, so I’ll cut to the chase with two of the most important ones.

Loyalty and stubbornness.

Franklin was loyal to a fault at Penn State. And he was stubborn to a fault, as well. When you combine those two factors, it made it nearly impossible for him to take the next step and turn the Lions into an elite program.

Loyalty is usually a great trait. We all want people in life who will be loyal to us. But in this regard, let’s consider Sean Clifford. And Nicholas Singleton. And Drew Allar.

Clifford was an average college quarterback for all four years he was the starter at Penn State. And yet, he was still the starter for ALL four years! That’s insanity when you’re trying to compete at the absolute highest level of the sport.

As I’ve said for years, there’s no way Clifford would have been the starting quarterback at Ohio State for four years. He might have gotten one full season, but even that’s debatable. The Buckeyes would have cut bait very, very quickly when they saw Clifford’s limitations.

But Franklin stayed with the QB. He chose him over Will Levis, who obviously had more overall natural talent. He failed to bring in a replacement, when you know that’s what Ohio State or Alabama or Georgia or LSU would have done in an effort to win a national title.

You see, Franklin excels at building relationships with players. That’s a good thing. But when you’re too afraid to spoil that personal relationship by cutting bait and turning to a better player, then you as the coach have failed your team overall.

Franklin did the same thing, for whatever reason, with Singleton. It was clear since the middle of their freshman season that Kaytron Allen is a better running back than Singleton, and pretty much every rushing metric since then would prove it.

And yet, Franklin continued to go with Singleton over Allen a slightly higher percentage of time (51 to 49 percent, according to a recent report). Since Franklin was fired, interim coach Terry Smith has gone with Allen roughly 68 percent of the time.

Franklin’s misguided loyalty and/or stubbornness just wouldn’t allow him to take a step back and understand that he was the problem in some of these situations. He always talked about how they track every single stat in practice, but yet, it’s impossible to believe he could still go with Singleton over Allen when it was clear which one was statistically better.

Lastly, on Allar, Franklin had to know all this time that the heavily hyped QB prospect was never as good as initially believed. Allar also didn’t fit the offense that Penn State runs. Regardless, Allar kept playing, while Beau Pribula — a better fit for PSU’s scheme — transferred to Missouri.

Would Penn State have been better off with Levis over Clifford? Or Pribula over Allar? Who knows? But going the route he did ended up getting Franklin fired, so clearly his decisions backfired.

These are just a few examples of the failures Franklin had when it came to having the right players on the field at all times. He was just too stubborn when it came to making the tough decisions.

Franklin was also bad at having his team ready to play in the first half. It took him too long to make adjustments. He meddled too much in the offense. And of course, Penn State’s failure to develop a competent passing game in recent years was downright embarrassing.

I don’t have many words left out of my 650 total, so I’ll end on this: Franklin will need to reinvent himself as a coach in so many ways in order to turn Virginia Tech into a consistent threat.

Giger hosts the Blue & White Wrapup show following each game this season on WTRN-FM 96.9 and 100.7