Photo credit: University of Michigan Athletics
If you are like myself, and most every other Charlotte fan, you are asking: WHO?
Honestly, immediate reaction of mine echoes the hiring of Will Healy. The “who the hell is this?”, and then you dive into the Google machine to learn more.
Quick info on Biff Poggi
He’s currently the Michigan Wolverines Associate Head Coach. Before heading to Michigan he was one of the most successful high school coaches in the country at St. Frances Academy in Baltimore, where he happened to fund pretty much everything. Poggi gained his riches as a hedge fund manager in the 1980’s, but there’s not much info out to what his net-worth is at the moment.
Poggi led Gilman High School to 13 titles in 19 years, left to join Michigan in 2016 for a season, then lead the St. Frances program to national relevancy.
Bruce Feldman of The Athletic broke the news on Twitter today, and recently had a piece on Biff Pogg, you can read it here.
Initial thoughts
It’s an out-of-the-box type of hire, though he does have more head coaching experience than you realize at first glance, just at the high school level. That was a relief to see, and he’s been exposed to how college football programs are supposed to look at Michigan under Jim Harbaugh.
Besides the obvious of wanting to see what the coaching staff will look like, I’m really curious to see how he feels about NIL, and in turn how Charlotte Athletics are going to approach it. To this point in time the NIL engagement has been minimal for the department and the student-athletes.
Hurry up and wait?
Bruce Feldman has also reported that Poggi is expected to remain with Michigan for the rest of their season. With the transfer portal and all of its fury set to unleash soon, not having him in place here to run operations is fascinating and terrifying at the same time. I guess we’ll see how quickly he can build his staff out and how well he can delegate key responsibilities around roster management.
What it feels like?
Feels like the Joe Moglia and Coastal Carolina situation, but Poggi has more football acumen and seemingly less net-worth. At 62, perhaps he’s wanting a shot to lead/build something here and we eventually see a head coach in waiting behind him?
Fascinating stuff, but truly a huge risk of a hire when I felt Charlotte, and Mike Hill, needed an experienced option to help steer the program into the American Athletic Conference.