And leads to good opportunities elsewhere. That will make it easier for BYU to attract coaching talent. Like most careers, unless you’re a head coach at Alabama, there is always something “bigger and better” out there, and most coaches will want to take a job that will look good on a resume and help them accomplish their goals.

That being said, I’m not sure the move by Grimes was just about P5, and that Grimes would have run off to any P5 school that came calling. Baylor, as a private religious institution like BYU, is probably a good fit for Grimes, who I believe is Baptist. And unlike Provo, Texas may be closer to “home base” for Grimes.

Also, based on the hefty price tag of Baylor’s new stadium, I wouldn’t be surprised if Grimes is getting a big raise from Baylor. In that way, maybe BYU is not “paying to play”—but since Baylor doesn’t have to release coaching compensation info, who really knows? And even if BYU was not willing to match Baylor’s compensation offer, I can’t really fault BYU for not joining the college football “arms race.” BYU is not the NY Yankees, especially after a year where due to Covid-19 college football has brought in much less revenue than normal. In an era of record spending despite layoffs (look at how much UT is spending for a coaching change) i can appreciate that at least one school in the universe practices fiscal responsibility.

Of course it would be even better if fiscal responsibility didn’t hurt results on the field. And as great of a coach Grimes has been, I think BYU would have come out of this change relatively unscathed if we had kept mateos. but Grimes taking Mateos was an unexpected wrinkle. Hopefully we can find someone to fill their shoes and continue building on their foundation of OL improvement. But at least let’s allow things to play out (let’s give it a year amor two) before making that judgment.

Regardless of how things play out, I wish Grimes and Mateos well and hope they have success—except when playing BYU.