News item No. 1: Bruce Arians, who coached the Tom Brady-quarterbacked Tampa Bay Buccaneers to the winner’s circle in Super Bowl LV, has been recruited as a “consultant” by his alma mater, Virginia Tech. Arians is expected to play a key role in the school’s search for its next head coach.
News item No. 2: Hall of Fame point guard Steve Nash, who played most of his career with the Phoenix Suns and later coached the Brooklyn Nets for two seasons and change (the change being that Nash was fired seven games into the 2022-23 season), is returning to the Suns as a “senior adviser.”
News item No. 3: Steven Pearl, the 38-year-old son of retiring Auburn men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl, has been named as his father’s successor. Steven Pearl was introduced as head coach on Wednesday morning, just two days after the news broke that Bruce Pearl, 65, planned to retire and take on what the school is calling “an ambassador’s role in the athletic department as special assistant to the athletics director.” (To say nothing of the title breadcrumbs Pearl has dropped about seeking Tommy Tuberville’s soon-to-be-open Alabama Senate seat.)
That’s a lot of big names bouncing around in the coaching/consulting/senior advising/ambassadorship business. However, while most advisers and consultants tend to be anonymous, behind-the-scenes people, Arians and Nash arrive with star power.
Plus, each man has a strong emotional connection with their new employers. Arians was a quarterback for the Hokies from 1971 to 1974 and then stayed on campus for a couple of years as a graduate assistant.
Nash played 10 seasons with the Suns and was a two-time MVP and six-time All-Star. Their résumés being what they are, both men enter their new gigs with factory-loaded respect from their respective fan bases, and that goes a long way.
Hiring someone with this level of experience for a consulting position at a college program or professional sports team should be a no-brainer. Hiring head coaches, on the other hand, is significantly more challenging. Wanna know when it can get really difficult? It’s when you promote somebody who, either through announcement or various winks and nods, had been understood to be the “head coach in waiting.”
Steven Pearl’s emotional message to his father, Bruce Pearl, after taking the reins of Auburn’s men’s basketball program. pic.twitter.com/EIHgB8gPNV
— Auburn Tigers | AL.com (@aldotcomTigers) September 24, 2025
This is precisely what happened with the New England Patriots a couple of years ago when the iconic, Hall of Fame-bound Bill Belichick was fired and Jerod Mayo was named his successor. Now, nobody from the Patriots ever said Mayo was New England’s head coach in waiting, but so many hints had been dropped during the final two years of the Belichick era that everyone just assumed Mayo would be next man up.
Turns out everyone was right. Mayo got the job. And it turned out to be a disaster. Mayo is a good football man, but he wasn’t ready for the leap from linebackers coach to head coach. He often came across as unprepared during media availabilities, and that’s how the Patriots looked on the field. The Pats went 4-13 in 2024, and Mayo was relieved of his duties a couple of hours after the season finale.
Which brings us to Steven Pearl, the latest head coach in waiting to land the job everyone assumed would be going to him eventually. As was the case with Mayo, no one ever mentioned it. However, it was more or less understood, and to a degree that nobody should have been surprised when Auburn, after holding a nationwide search, came up with a former medical supplies salesman named Steven Pearl.
Before we continue, go back and re-read that last sentence. Considering I refer to Steven Pearl as a “former medical supplies salesman” and that Auburn held a “nationwide search,” you’re likely expecting that what comes next will be some rip job on the guy. Not necessarily. In fact, it’s a mark of distinction for Pearl that years ago, after playing for his father at Tennessee, he left basketball for a few years to pursue a career in sales. He should wear that as a badge of honor. More about that in a bit.
While I have no quarrel with Pearl in particular being named head coach at Auburn, it’s the very idea of any son automatically stepping in for the old man that invites criticism. What Auburn is saying with this decision is that it takes its vaunted SEC program very seriously, so seriously that it scoured the country in search of the best person to run the program and — ta-da! — it was the retiring coach’s son whose name was spit out of the computer.
New chapter, same family 🐅
Steven Pearl is Auburn’s new head coach 🙌 pic.twitter.com/YychKmSC9x
— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) September 22, 2025
In presenting myself as someone who spent a lot of time with the Patriots in 2024, I’m here to warn you that coaches in waiting have a way of lulling us into taking at face value the projected greatness of this coach we’re all waiting for. The story with Mayo is that Patriots owner Robert Kraft had come away impressed with the former linebacker’s leadership and administrative qualities when they traveled to Israel on a goodwill trip. People like me ate that up.
Steven Pearl supporters will point out that it wasn’t so much the father-son connection, but rather the head coach-assistant coach connection, that made him the best candidate for the job. He did, after all, rise through the ranks over the past 11 years, from assistant strength and conditioning coach to associate head coach.
And for Pearl to step away from basketball following his playing days to be a medical sales representative suggests an independent spirit, which is an essential quality to possess when you’re the former boss’s kid who’s now the boss.
“Sales obviously correlates with recruiting, and the job was cool, very competitive,” Pearl told The Athletic’s Joe Rexrode in March, referring to his off-ramp to medical supplies sales. “But you win or lose in basketball, and you have your team and staff to celebrate with or be miserable with. The camaraderie, the team aspect of things, that’s what I missed and what you really don’t get on that side of the world.”
So he went to work for Auburn, for Dad. The higher he climbed the ladder, the higher went the volume on the talk he was the head coach in waiting.
A similar scenario might be playing out with the University of North Carolina football program, where Belichick recruited two of his sons, Steve and Brian, to join his staff. With Steve a heartbeat away from the head coach’s office in his role as defensive coordinator, it’s reasonable to see him as a head coach in waiting.
The only problem here is that Papa Belichick’s behavior this season — such as making it difficult for NFL teams to scout his players and his habit of chatting up girlfriend Jordon Hudson on the sideline before games — makes me wonder if we’ll reach the point where disillusioned Tar Heels fans are going to be keen on having another Belichick kneeling on the on-deck circle.
Is defensive coordinator Steve Belichick destined to be the head coach in waiting at North Carolina? (Jared C. Tilton / Getty Images)
However, before I get too preachy, it’s important to note some instances in which father-son connections have worked just fine.
The late Bobby Bowden, the longtime Florida State coach, found room on his staff for his sons Tommy, Terry and Jeff. Tommy Bowden later ran the Tulane and Clemson programs, and Terry Bowden was the coach at Auburn.
Among the many father-son sports broadcasting families, the one that stands out is the late play-by-play legend Jack Buck, who lived long enough to see his son, Joe Buck, emerge as a national voice on multiple sports platforms. And if I may, the five-star upholstery job I just had done on a much-favored chair was performed by a man who learned the craft from his late father.
So, yes, it can work.
However, know this: Steven Pearl has won nothing and yet has been given a five-year contract at Auburn. Even if you’re a die-hard Auburn fan, and even if you approve of this arrangement, you should do so with a healthy skepticism.
I wonder where the Auburn “consultants” came down on this.
(Photo of Steven Pearl and Bruce Pearl: Andy Lyons / Getty Images)
