{"id":782919,"date":"2026-02-28T20:29:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T20:29:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/782919\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T20:29:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T20:29:12","slug":"trent-dilfer-admits-pressure-to-take-uab-head-coaching-job-in-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/782919\/","title":{"rendered":"Trent Dilfer admits pressure to take UAB head coaching job in 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"

Trent Dilfer\u2019s<\/a> head coaching tenure at UAB<\/a> did not go as planned. In fact, the Lipscomb Academy<\/a> (Tennessee) coach didn\u2019t get off to a good start before even accepting the job in 2023.<\/p>\n

Dilfer admitted he felt a burden and pressure to take the Blazers\u2019 gig because of the opportunity. It wasn\u2019t something he actively searched for or wanted, though. In the end, Dilfer was fired after a 9-21 overall record after posting a 2-4 mark halfway through his third season.<\/p>\n

Now, he\u2019s back at Lipscomb<\/a>, where he coached from 2019-22 and most recently posted a 13-0 record in \u201822. Dilfer opened up about the process and why he ultimately left for college football three years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did feel a burden,\u201d Dilfer said on OutKick Hot Mic.<\/a> \u201cI did not want to do it. My wife will tell you this. I was vehemently opposed to it. I got reached out by three institutions during that last season\u2019s run. I felt so guilty that they were reaching out. I wouldn\u2019t even meet with them. Mark Ingram at UAB just kind of waterboarded me to meet with me, and came up to my office at Lipscomb, real secretive meeting during the school day, when the kids were in class. I sent all my coaches away that day so the rumors wouldn\u2019t get out. Nobody knew. We vetted it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMy wife kind of pushed me towards it, and I\u2019m not blaming her, and I\u2019m not sad I did it. But yes, there was a giant burden I felt because I knew so many people in the high school space \u2026 a bunch of these guys that are just awesome football coaches that weren\u2019t given the opportunity because they were labeled high school coaches.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Super Bowl champion quarterback with the Baltimore Ravens, Dilfer played 14 seasons in the NFL, primarily as a backup in his latter days. Still, he showed his chops as a high school coach, going 44-10 over four years before leaving for UAB.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy job at Lipscomb is exponentially better than my job at UAB. It\u2019s not even in the conversation of comparison,\u201d Dilfer said<\/a>. \u201cIf you\u2019re not chasing money \u2026 and that\u2019s unfortunately \u2026 most of these coaches, they won\u2019t say it on the show. I\u2019ll say it for them \u2026 They\u2019re all chasing the bag. 100% of them in college football are chasing a bag because you can get in as an analyst now for 75 grand, you can elevate to a senior analyst and make 300 grand. You elevate to a position coach. You\u2019re making, you know, 650 to 850, fast too. You become a coordinator. Now you\u2019re 33 and you\u2019re a coordinator, you\u2019re making ($1.5 million). And then you get interviewed for these head coaching jobs \u2026\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, if you\u2019re at a good program, you\u2019re making 4 million minimum, and you\u2019re 38 years old, or you\u2019re 42 years old \u2026 And again, I did this for 14 years. Became a free agent. Why? So I can make more money, renegotiate a contract, do an extension, get bonuses, do incentives in your contract, go to Pro Bowls, make more money. I get all that. I\u2019m not criticizing it, but that\u2019s why they\u2019re doing it. So, hence, if they\u2019re doing it that way and the kids are doing it that way, what is this? It\u2019s a transaction.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Trent Dilfer\u2019s head coaching tenure at UAB did not go as planned. In fact, the Lipscomb Academy (Tennessee)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":782920,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7,49,48,41850],"class_list":{"0":"post-782919","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-ncaa","10":"tag-ncaa-football","11":"tag-trent-dilfer-90-aptos"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116150150875818428","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782919","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=782919"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782919\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/782920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=782919"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=782919"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=782919"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}