I want to be the next head coach of the University of Texas football team. I'm not saying I will be. I just want to be. Seriously. Start the hype-wagon. Type my name on that little breaking-news ticker at the bottom of the screen. I want to be a rumor. I need to be considered. I believe I am prepared.

OK, let me rephrase that: I am not prepared. Not even close. But I am enthusiastic. I really am. What is not to like? You get to live in Austin, one of America's greatest cities, home to some of the best food and music in the country. You get to work at a superb university, surrounded by thousands of students and supportive fans and loyal alumni.

Sure, you're succeeding a longtime leader, Mack Brown, who led the Longhorns to a national championship in 2006, but you will get paid a ton of money—or so I hear. The gossip was that Texas might have been willing to pay close to $10 million to get Nick Saban, the head coach of the SEC West runner-up Alabama. Ten million bucks a year! That's a lot of lattes.

But mostly I would like to be the next head coach of the University of Texas football team because being the head coach of a big-time college football team is one of the most important jobs in our society now. At least, that's the way society's playing it. A big-time college football coach is head-of-state big. Google alert big. Beyoncé big. The universe orbits around college-football coaches. You're assisted by student athletes, who do all the work on the field, but you're the star. The TV camera locks on you and your pout and your fabulous hair. Analysts say nice things about you on TV, talk you up reverentially, like you cured a chronic disease. You are charismatic even when you're not charismatic. Succeed, and you can leapfrog immediately. Successful football coaches get suggested for jobs they don't even want. They get raises when they don't even need raises. When they want to leave, they just leave.

Stop me when any of this sounds bad to you.