Bret Bielema Steve Spurrier

Arkansas coach Bret Bielema and South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier almost always have something to say. What did the Big Ten coaches say on Monday?

(Associated Press)

CHICAGO -- It's OK to still miss former Wisconsin coach Bret Bielema. Now entering his second season at Arkansas, Bielema has always been a coach who isn't afraid to ruffle some feathers. In fact, in the SEC, there are more than a few coaches like that, including South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier.

The Big Ten is often not quite so interesting.

Bielema usually gave it a boost. Remember when he said he was sad that Terrelle Pryor was gone because he wanted to play him again after Pryor had said the Badgers' win over the Buckeyes in 2010 was, as Bielema put it, something of a fluke?

We gave each of the 14 Big Ten coaches a rating on the Bielema-Spurrier scale on Monday on how much they could poke or prod their conference brethren in 15 minutes. Honestly, as expected, there wasn't a lot of action.

Here are the final ratings, in order, led by Penn State coach James Franklin, who at least had a joke ready.

• James Franklin, Penn State

The former Vanderbilt coach certainly brought some life to the Big Ten in his first time at the event. That included a little joke at the start of his speech that said he will not use technology bearing the logo of your schools, Urban Meyer and Brady Hoke and Mark Dantonio and everyone else.

"The only critique I would have is -- I don't know if everybody has seen the elevators ... well, there's one with a Penn State logo on it and there's a logo for each school. Well, the Penn State logo elevator was not in alignment with my

room. And I refuse to ride any other elevator up there, so I had to end up walking up the floors. If there's any way we can coordinate and make sure the elevator's coordinated with the floor I'm on in the future, that would be the only critique I would have."

Translation: When I tweeted out a photo of the Rutgers elevator on Sunday night, about 10 people responded with a joke about it only going to the basement. This is Franklin's version of that, but better. At the Big Ten, this was as good as it got.

BS rating: 8 (I can hear an SEC coach making a joke like this. You think Steve Spurrier wants to ride in Nick Saban's elevator? No.)

• Kevin Wilson, Indiana

Kevin Wilson! Stepping to the podium after Franklin, he came out with his own jokes.

"Are we still awake here? Got the warm-up bands out of the way. Everybody

good to go?"

He is 5-19 in the Big Ten in three years and called the 12 coaches who went before him warmup bands. Good stuff.

Translation: He's selling a program with offensive potential - and huge defensive problems - that people are thinking might be ready to put something together, so ... yes, go ahead and consider everyone else warmups bands.

BS rating: 7.5 (Franklin's bit was more fully developed, but don't you be afraid, Kevin Wilson, don't you be afraid.)

• Pat Fitzgerald, Northwestern

Fitzgerald listed of a bunch of places Northwestern players had internships this summer, clearly trying to make a point in light of the union issue at Northwestern that it isn't just football. Like, really tried to make that point. He also dropped a lot of GPA talk. As for the union issue itself ...

"I believe there's no more unified football program in the country. We've been through more than most and it's been nothing but unifying."

Translation: All you other guys got to think about just football. You try to deal with this other stuff and see what happens.

BS rating: 7 (He only got one union question, but brought a lot of backhanded union talk to the table.)

• Gary Andersen, Wisconsin

Schedule questions are almost always valid in the Big Ten. But Andersen didn't much care for one about Wisconsin's schedule.

"I think the schedule is very challenging. People can say whatever they want to say about this or that. LSU is LSU. ... This is no easy Big Ten game and anyone who thinks there is is sadly mistaken, and I'll debate that with you as much as you want."

Translation: Can't wait for the Big Ten Network reality show where people debate whether the Big Ten schedule is easy or not. But the guy who is playing LSU to open the season in a month may not be the guy to ask about schedules.



BS rating: 4 (Andersen is not much for podium antics. But it's always nice when someone gets riled up defending a schedule that after LSU for the next eight games is Western Illinois, Bowling Green, South Florida, Northwestern, Illinois, Maryland, Rutgers and Purdue.)

• Mark Dantonio, Michigan State

Dantonio has a little pep in his step these days. And why not? His Spartans are coming off the most successful season he's had there, finishing with a Big Ten title and a Rose Bowl victory. His mantra has been about moving forward and making that a norm in East Lansing, but he started off his press conference with this.

"I want to congratulate last year's staff, our players, all the players who have come to Michigan State since 2007 and everyone involved (in our run to) the Big Ten championship and the Rose Bowl. But now I want to move past that."

Dantonio was later added how the team will handle the new attention in 2014, as the Spartans, along with Ohio State, are one of the favorites to win the conference.

"I think in the Big Ten Conference you always have attention coming your way and its way you do with that. How do you handle success? That's going to be one of the biggest things we have to do this year. We're a little bit more of the hunted. That's a good place to be but a precarious place to be as well."

Translation: Michigan State is headed in the right direction and I really do want to focus on the future, but before we do that I wanted to take one more opportunity to remind everyone who's on top right now.

BS rating: 4 (Michigan State is on top of the Big Ten and is close to officially arriving. When they do, there won't be a need for a reminder.)

• Urban Meyer, Ohio State

Meyer is always tough on his team - he talked about needing to blow up the pass defense - but he wasn't really tough on anyone else. He was asked a couple times about how hard the East Division would be, and he did go along with that.

"I think it's one of the toughest divisions in college football. Once again, you just have to look at the recruiting that takes place at the schools and then the style of defense and offense. It's a rugged conference."

Translation: Sure, Michigan State and Ohio State are good, but really are we sure that the next best team in the East is any better than the presumed four best teams in the West - Iowa, Wisconsin, Nebraska and Northwestern?

BS rating: 3 (If Meyer was willingly as hard on other teams as he was on his own, we might have something.)

• Brady Hoke, Michigan

"Why do you coach? I mean, why do you really coach?"

The fourth-year Michigan coach, coming off a 3-5 Big Ten season, got a little philosophical talking about meeting the off-field needs of players and preparing them for life when asked if he feels any job pressure entering year four.

"That's the only pressure I ever felt, making sure we were doing it for those student athletes."

Translation: Any coach coming off a season in which he didn't win as much as he was expected to win is bound to talk more about academics and life.

BS rating: 3 (Hoke also mentioned that he was sad about the Notre Dame rivalry coming to an end, but he's gone over that before.)

• Tim Beckman, Illinois

Beckman was 2-10 overall and 0-8 in the Big Ten in his first year, and 4-8 overall and 1-7 in the Big Ten in his second year. Third year is a big year, or he might not be back here next July.

"I've been around this profession my whole life. I've seen my dad go through it, I've seen family members go through it, I've seen Sam Rutigliano and Marty Schottenheimer go through it, that's the life of a football coach. If you're not going to have that life, you shouldn't be in this profession. That's just part of it.

"(AD) Mike Thomas has asked for our program to continue to get better and we did. We won more games, we have made strides to get better. It's not the number we all want, but we have gotten better."

Translation: He knows what's up - 1-15 in the Big Ten in two years is not a rousing start.

BS rating: 3 (His work is cut out for him.)

• Kyle Flood, Rutgers

Rutgers is making its debut in the Big Ten this season, but the Scarlet Knights have been the butt of a few jokes since they arrived in Chicago. Flood, entering his third year as head coach at Rutgers, built up his program's accomplishments while formally accepting the invitation at the podium.

"I have been asked this more than anything - 'What does it feel like to be in the Big ten?' It feels right. As I look at our football team and I look at the conference, I see a great marriage. I don't think there's a better choice the Big Ten could have made than Rutgers. ... That was our first choice."

Translation: Flood started as an assistant at Rutgers in 2005 before becoming the head coach of the Scarlet Knights while they were still in the American Athletic Conference. So now as he stands up on the podium at Big Ten Media Days welcoming the change and acting like Rutgers is the perfect fit, he was also saying - "Thanks for the promotion."

BS rating: 3 (Advancing to a ninth bowl game in 10 years won't be as easy in the Big Ten.)

• Jerry Kill, Minnesota

The Gophers are coming of an eight-win season, but Kill was reminded by a Wisconsin reporter that Minnesota is 0-10 in their last 10 meetings with the Badgers. That also means that Minnesota has gone 10 years without Paul Bunyan's Axe, the trophy given annually in that rivalry game.

"We understand that if you want to take the next step on the program, you have to beat the border schools. We're well aware of that situation. Wisconsin and Iowa are well-coached, but we have to step our game up. We know what we have to do, now we have to go out and do it."

Translation: Why are you asking me about the Wisconsin game right now? We are quite aware that we haven't fared well against the Badgers.

BS rating: 3 (In fairness, you do need to beat Wisconsin to "take the next step," Coach.)

• Darrell Hazell, Purdue

Entering year two, Hazell isn't going to talk about anyone else after a rough first season. So other than saying he told his players not to talk about the union issue since they don't know anything about it, he worked on putting last year in the past, saying people would be impressed by the significant strides the program made. Then he talked about a meeting he called with the players last December.

"We laid some things out that the strong has to overtake the weak, the right has to overtake the wrong."

Translation: He was emphasizing that this is fully his team in year two, everyone has bought it, and man, he really does sound like his mentor Jim Tressel sometimes.

BS rating: 2 (He's not in a position to poke anyone until Purdue wins. Even if he gets to that point, it's not Hazell's style.)

• Bo Pelini, Nebraska

The highlight of the coaches at the podium in the early going was possibly Pelini talking about his cat. It's a thing started by the parody Twitter account of Pelini, which is another thing.

"He's enjoying a nap up in the room and enjoying the Windy City," Pelini said jokingly, before talking about why he decided to really bring his cat to the spring football game as a way of acknowledging the fake Twitter account.

Pelini said fans see him get mad on the sideline and, "think that's who you are all the time. That's not who I am all the time."

Translation: Pelini had an interesting take on recruiting and National Signing Day, and then explained how as he gets older he realizes it's OK to show another side of his personality and relax a bit. So he's just a guy, just like you.

BS rating: 1 (Fake cat talk ... that's what we've come to.)

• Randy Edsall, Maryland

The other new guy just seemed really nice.

Making the move to the Big Ten, Edsall was asked if he kept an eye on the gathering of the ACC, his old conference, while it was going on.

"No. I was in St. Thomas and I was enjoying the heck out of St. Thomas," Edsall said.

Translation: Take that, old conference. You are less interesting than a tropical island.

BS rating: 1 (He was pleasant.)

• Kirk Ferentz, Iowa

No coaches really like events like this one in Chicago, based entirely on giving interview after interview for two days. So you earn some points by laying that out there, the way Ferentz did as soon as he took to the mic.

"It's great to be here, certainly. I've read a couple articles over the past couple of weeks kind of poking fun at coaches that said they're excited to get started, so I'm going to try to avoid that mistake and move on to something else.

"Truth is most of us I think really enjoy doing more than talking, and this is the talking time of year. We've got three days off campus this week in our calendars where we're off campus and talking, and the rest of the time we're going to be in the office looking at each other and talking. So it will be a good thing when we get around to practicing next Monday. That will make I think all of us happy."

Translation: Please don't make me do this.

BS rating: 1 (To be honest, it was a lot of talking.)