Texas A&M Football: How Petrino Firing Affects A&M and SEC

Arkansas head coach Bobby Petrino was fired tonight following the revelation that he was having an "inappropriate relationship" with an athletic department staffer. His termination weakens what many consider a top five preseason football team and should ease the transition of the Aggies into the league.

Petrino has built up the Hogs into a top 10 football team. Despite losing three starting receivers to graduation, Arkansas was expected to compete for the Southeastern Conference title and possibly make a national title run in 2012. Arkansas quarterback Tyler Wilson passed on the NFL draft for a shot at leading the Hogs to a championship during his senior season.

Sledgehammer running back Knile Davis has recovered from a knee injury and was going to give the Arkansas offense a prolific ground attack to match up with Wilson's aerial assault.

Davis rushed for 1,322 yards and 13 touchdowns as a sophomore. He was expected to be one of the top running backs in the nation in 2011 before a preseason injury ended knocked him out for the year.

Petrino was an offensive mastermind who built up Arkansas and Louisville into legitimate national contenders. His termination will be a huge loss to an Arkansas program he has led to double-digit wins in 2010 and 2011.

Petrino is one of the best playcallers in the nation who has led prolific offenses at each stop during his coaching career. It remains to be seen whether the Hogs will hire an interim head coach or perform a national search for a new head coach for the 2012 season. Arkansas has already removed Petrino's bio from the athletic department's web page. 

The loss of Petrino will likely result in Arkansas moving from a 11-13 win team into a seven-to-eight win team. Even with the talent they have returning on offense, they will not be as successful without Petrino calling the plays.

This is good news for a Texas A&M team that has lost three in a row to the Razorbacks. The Aggies play Arkansas at Kyle Field on Sept. 29. The Hogs do not look anywhere near as formidable without their head coach.

Arkansas was at worst the third best team in the SEC heading into the 2012 season with Petrino. It is a mystery who will replace him and call the plays on offense. Tyler Wilson is a great quarterback in that system, but will the new head coach retain the same system?

The termination of Petrino is a body blow to an Arkansas program that was just beginning to assert their place as an elite program in the SEC. In the Hogs' 16 previous seasons in the SEC before Petrino arrived, they achieved double-digit wins only one time going 10-4 in 2006.

In the four years that Petrino has been in Fayetteville, the Hogs have put up double-digit wins twice, in the past two seasons. The Razorbacks were expected to extend that streak to three seasons in a row in 2012.

Petrino's decision to have an "inappropriate relationship" has hurt the Arkansas program and will hurt the SEC. The SEC West was going to be incredibly strong in 2012 with Arkansas, LSU and Alabama all as probably top five teams.

Without Petrino it remains to be seen how effective Arkansas will be. This is good news for the Aggies who are facing a murderer's row of a schedule in their first year in the conference. A&M likely needs to go 3-5 in the SEC in order to win enough games to qualify for a bowl in Kevin Sumlin's inaugural year as head coach. An Arkansas program that is struggling to rebound from the loss of their leader should help A&M in this endeavor.

If Arkansas falters on the field it will also help the Ags in recruiting. Arkansas has increased their presence in the Lone Star State in the past few years signing six recruits from Texas in their 2012 class. They have two verbal commitments for 2013 with one of them from Texas. Having one less top 10 team to compete with for recruits in the state will be a positive for A&M.

The selfishness of Petrino in pursuing this "relationship" has hurt the Arkansas program and the SEC as a whole. However, it should help A&M to remain a viable candidate for a bowl game in their first year in the league. Even though Petrino's actions should end up helping A&M on the field, they should be frowned upon by Aggies everywhere.

A&M is joining the best athletic conference in the nation in 2012. Anything that is bad for the conference is ultimately bad for A&M. Petrino's termination makes Arkansas and the SEC weaker as a whole. That is not good for A&M even if it does mean an extra win on the field in 2012.