Nebraska's Play for Bret Bielema Indicates Cornhuskers Don't Get It

The coaching silly season is a glorious time of year that includes tracking of private airplanes, all-night stakeouts in front of million-dollar homes decked out with enough holiday lights to make Clark Griswold smile and rumors wild enough to make the hottest tabloid.

One rumor that popped up seemingly out of nowhere Wednesday involved the vacant Nebraska head coaching job.

According to FootballScoop.com, Nebraska's first choice to replace Bo Pelini was Arkansas head coach Bret Bielema. The report stated that athletics director Shawn Eichorst had a very short list and that Bielema could, in fact, be the only name on it.

Bielema took to Twitter to shoot down the rumor and then spoke with ESPN.com's Chris Low and he said he's "all Hog."

Thursday, as Nebraska announced that Oregon State head coach Mike Riley would be its new head coach, Gil Brandt of NFL.com reported that an offer to Bielema was, in fact, on the table.

The fact that this was even an option to begin with indicates that Nebraska has a very skewed view of itself in the current college football landscape.

This isn't 1997. It's 2014. In 2014, the best players, coaches and exposure come in the SEC—yes, even at Arkansas, which isn't the highest-profile program in the conference.

Bielema has spent two seasons struggling for every inch of respect within the SEC, going winless for 13 straight games in the SEC before it finally clicked. When it did, it clicked in a big way. The Razorbacks shut out then-No. 17 LSU 17-0 and then throttled then-No. 8 Ole Miss 30-0 in the month of November to become bowl-eligible for the first time since 2011.

Tony Gutierrez/Associated Press

The rebuilding effort is almost complete, and now it's time for Bielema to reap the rewards.

Arkansas has a running back tandem that's second to none in college football and an offensive line that will return four starters from the offensive line that was bigger than any other in football—pro or college—in 2014. The switch to defensive coordinator Robb Smith also paid huge dividends in the month of November.

This is no longer Bobby Petrino's Arkansas program. Bielema has built it into his own, and leaving now would be crazy.

Besides, why go to Nebraska? Pelini never won fewer than nine games in a season at Nebraska—a program that, as B/R's Erin Sorensen pointed out last offseason, shifted its focus beyond the 500-mile radius. 

Danny Johnston/Associated Press

The reason is simple: It has to.

There were no 4- or 5-star players in the state of Nebraska in the class of 2014 and none in 2015, and there are none so far in the class of 2016. The state of Arkansas has five 4-star prospects in 2015, and all of them are currently committed to the Razorbacks.

Would he have an easier path to the College Football Playoff at Nebraska than he currently has at Arkansas? Sure. But he had the same path at Wisconsin, and he left Madison to go to Fayetteville despite that path.

Bielema has momentum and a better recruiting foundation, and he doesn't have the pressure of winning more than nine games every single year in order to stay employed.

Besides, one of the primary reasons Bielema left Wisconsin for Arkansas in the first place was the lack of money for his assistant coaches, according to Chris Bahn of ArkansasBusiness.com. In 2013, four of Arkansas' assistants were among the top 150 highest-paid assistants in the country, according to the USA Today coaching salary database. Nebraska had one.

Is it harder to win at Arkansas? Yes. It's also a much better job, and—more importantly—it's much easier to stay employed there.

Arkansas is simply a better job than Nebraska.

By a mile.

Barrett Sallee is the lead SEC college football writer and video analyst for Bleacher Report as well as a co-host of the CFB Hangover on Bleacher Report Radio (Sundays, 9-11 a.m. ET) on Sirius 93, XM 208.

Quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. All stats are courtesy of cfbstats.com, and all recruiting information is courtesy of 247Sports. Follow Barrett on Twitter @BarrettSallee.