Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany addresses assembled media in Chicago.

PennLive/Joe Hermitt

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Distasteful as it may be to some, a large part of being a major-college football coach is the sales job -- to fans, to media, to alumni and especially to recruits. Big Ten media days are the one venue where all the conference coaches are seen individually and get their 10 minutes at the lectern.

How did they do? Here are my annual rankings, written as would an earnest marketing/public-relations consultant. It's all about the message.

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Illinois NCAA college football head coach Lovie Smith speaks at Big Ten Media Day in Chicago on Monday.

PennLive/Joe Hermitt

14. Lovie Smith (Illinois)

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Smith comes off like he's cruising. I don't know that that's a good thing to project as a second-year head college football coach. But, the fact is, he packed a resumé full of great NFL work -- a winning record and Super Bowl appearance in a dozen years as a head coach, two decades altogether in The League as a defensive mastermind.

Everything he said on Monday was with the blasé tone that is his trademark. It connotes: All is well. Even when his very words and the evidence at hand say otherwise. “Reality says we need to catch up," Smith told reporters. "We need to do our share. We weren’t one of the teams people were talking about.”

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Some guys can get away with observations such as, "On offense, we haven't scored enough points." Right now, Smith is one of those guys because of his background.

Still, at 59, being the head coach at a lower-level Big Ten school can't really impress him much. And that's exactly the way he looks. Like, if this works out, fine; if it doesn't, that's fine, too. For a house as neglected as Illinois', I don't think you can abide a head contractor who looks like all he wants to do is the finish carpentry when the walls need to be torn out first.

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Rutgers head football coach Chris Ash speaks at Big Ten Media Days in Chicago on Tuesday morning.

13. Chris Ash (Rutgers)

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It's hard not to feel sorry for Chris Ash. But man, when the guy was standing there, gripping the lectern like he needed it for an anchor, it reminded me of a police lieutenant doing a murder investigation press conference. He looks like a witness to the aftermath of a grisly event, one who must do his job in detailing it. Perfect fit for Rutgers football.

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When you've accepted a part amid the sort of ongoing disaster that is Rutgers athletics, you must try to memorize some talking points. Unfortunately, Ash repeated one of his, that his team has "set the reset button" after last season's Terry Shea-like 2-10, 0-9 debacle. Then again, they might've hit the rewind button by mistake.

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Wisconsin NCAA college football head coach Paul Chryst speaks at Big Ten Media Day in Chicago on Monday.

12. Paul Chryst (Wisconsin)

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Every time I see Paul Chryst, I expect him to say, "You gotta have a good breakfast, Margie. I'll make ya some eggs." Remember, the female cop's husband in Fargo who was all disappointed that his duck painting was only chosen for a 3-cent U.S. Postage stamp? Chryst does not belong behind a mic and you sense he knows that. The really great part is, it doesn't matter a damn. His Badgers are great in spite of his lack of sales panache. It gives you hope for our society.

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He was actually smoother this year. In 2016, he looked like a kid presenting his first project to the middle school science fair. This year, he graduated to a PowerPoint presenter before a table of middle managers in a Radisson conference room. Sleepy, yes. But not in a way that made you nervous for him.

Quick, can you name any other coach of a championship-level college football team that needs a moderator to beg for questions: "We have time for two more. ... Are there any? ..." There were none and I think Chryst was very OK with that.

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Minnesota NCAA college football head coach P.J. Fleck speaks at Big Ten Media Day in Chicago on Tuesday.

11. P.J. Fleck (Minnesota)

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I’m pretty sure I bought 25 super-absorbent towels from this guy. He was wearing a head mic at the York Fair and he targeted me walking by and wouldn't leave me alone. So, I just eventually bought his product so he'd stop talking. Who knew he'd become the Minnesota head football coach?

Look, I love enthusiasm. It's enthusiastic duplicity I can't stand. You know it as "BS." And this guy deals in it. He's a slicker version of Tim Beckman who can also coach a little, so there's no telling how far he can go in this biz.

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My favorite part of Fleck's spiel as the opening act on Tuesday morning (yes, the audience was accosted with this at 8 a.m. CDT) wasn't his pretending to tell one of his four kids not to hit his sister through the TV screen (cute) or his honoring of Jim Tressel as his role model (perfect) or the detailing of legal acquisition of his "Row The Boat" mantra from his prior stop at Western Michigan (it was an honor to bring it to Minnesota) or his explanation of why he's having ESPNU do a reality show on the season (it was their idea).

No, my favorite part was his description of how delighted his old offensive line coach from WMU was when he learned he'd been demoted to tight ends coach -- because he'd hired Ed Warinner who was just cut loose by Urban Meyer at Ohio State. See, the holdover guy's "eyes lit up" when he learned that he could learn from the incoming vet. That's just the sort of selflessness he has on his staff.

That, my friends, is not a BS dispenser. That is a BS artist.

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Maryland NCAA college football head coach DJ Durkin speaks at Big Ten Media Day in Chicago on Monday.

10. D.J. Durkin (Maryland)

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"Genuine enthusiasm is contagious."

That's how BTN studio analyst and former Minnesota, Kansas and Kent State head coach Glen Mason introduced Maryland's D.J. Durkin, the second-year head coach who's been pulling in the top-20 classes at a place that hasn't seen such a thing since Randy White. But then, we were presented with a guy who sounded like he'd just completed a corporate communications class on how to pleasingly say nothing.

Last year, Durkin was more animated during his rookie year on the podium. He looked like a young guy ready to take on a remodeling job. Now, it's more like he's been taught message-framing by some consultant. Maybe it was that 2-7 finish after the 4-0 start. Maybe losing a Quick Lane Bowl to Steve Addazio put him in a daze.

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But when he was asked a simple question about what he learned coaching against Jim Harbaugh and Urban Meyer rather than with them (which Durkin did at Bowling Green, Stanford and Michigan), he lapsed into standard-issue pablum:

"I just think if you go to our conference from top to bottom, there's a lot of great coaches. I think one of the things that we all know, and I certainly realize, is you better be prepared every week, better have your team prepared no matter who the opponent is."

C'mon, man. Just tell the truth. You learn that Urban and Harbaugh have really good players. Still better than yours.

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Purdue NCAA college football head coach Jeff Brohm speaks at Big Ten Media Days in Chicago on Tuesday morning.

9. Jeff Brohm (Purdue)

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Certain coaches, you can just tell, might be able to ratchet up the promotional chatter at media days, but they simply don't choose to. Those are the guys you look out for when the games begin. Because they clearly don't care about the sizzle. They are all about the steak. And they know how to cook the steak.

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That's Jeff Brohm. He twice won the renegade league full of athletes known as Conference USA in three years at Western Kentucky. He knows the area, having been next door to Indiana down in neighboring Kentucky nearly his whole career. And he clearly knows how to coach an offense, having been a journeyman NFL quarterback and having led WKU's up-tempo attack to 45 points a game over his three seasons -- tops in the nation during that period.

Brohm had his hands in pockets at the lectern, apparently relaxed and confident even in his first go-round at B1G media days. Pizzazz? There was not much of that. He has the looks and demeanor of a really good plumber, the sort of guy you know will help you when your basement is under water. That's Purdue football. They called the right guy.

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With the retirement of Oklahoma's Bob Stoops, Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz is now longest continuous-tenured head coach in major-college football.

PennLive/Joe Hermitt

8. Kirk Ferentz (Iowa)

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I'm not entirely sure Kirk Ferentz wasn't the guy who OK'd the loan for our first house. He looks the part. He might've been working two jobs without telling anyone. And maybe nobody noticed. Nobody ever notices Ferentz and that's the way he clearly likes it.

The fact that he conjured that 12-0 start out of the clear blue two years ago and came within inches of making the first College Football Playoff probably bought him as long as he needs before retirement. So, he doesn't need these presentations and that clearly suits him. He looks relaxed, happy and healthy and certainly not like he's trying too hard. Security'll do that for you.

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The guy is beginning his 19th season in the same place while recruiting mostly 2- and 3-star talent. And even in a down season like last year, his guys are able to lunge up and bite one of the big boys, specifically his stylistic antithesis at Michigan. More power to him.

So, when he utters a statement such as: "This is the talk season. There’s only so long you can talk and train before getting on to the next phase," you don't take it as derogatory, merely a statement of fact from a guy playing a pat hand and doing it well. He knows what to do in that next phase.

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Nebraska football head coach Mike Riley speaks at Big Ten Media Days in Chicago on Tuesday.

PennLive/Joe Hermitt

7. Mike Riley (Nebraska)

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At 64, Mike Riley is way beyond trying to impress anyone. He has always embraced the horseshoe pate and never felt it necessary to go trendily all bald. And his default demeanor has always been the nice guy, anyway. "There's not a nicer guy in our game than Mike Riley," said BTN studio analyst Glen Mason after his little chat, which is what Riley's press conferences always feel like. You end up wondering: How is this guy a head coach in a sport in which the objective is, like war, ground acquisition and the means are almost any violent method necessary?

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Frankly, I never understood how he ended up at Nebraska which is one of those places that takes its football extremely seriously and will have no use for a nice guy who doesn't win in his third year. Especially when he finally has a pro-style QB in Tulane transfer Tanner Lee who fits his acumen. If Riley doesn't get it done in 2017, he might be forced to transition into directing 12-step programs back in Oregon. Hell, I'd sign up.

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Penn State head football coach James Franklin speaks at Big Ten Media Days in Chicago on Tuesday morning.

PennLive/Joe Hermitt

6. James Franklin (Penn State)

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I don't know if it was the juxtaposition of being just 15 minutes after the end of the P.J. Fleck Experience or maybe James Franklin is getting a little older. But he actually looked like a normal human with a metabolism in need of coffee at 8:30 a.m. -- just a little bleary. I find that endearing. I don't understand "morning people."

Oh, the affirmative bromides were still there:

"The more days you put together where you have maximized from the time you've got up to the time you've gone to bed, as an individual and as a group and as an organization, then you have a chance to be successful."

But the manic energy was just clicked down a couple of notches. Compare the 2017 Franklin with the 2014 Franklin and there's quite a bit of difference. That's not a bad thing.

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Of course, when you've won a Big Ten championship and aren't simply known as the guy who won nine games two different years at Vanderbilt, your words hold a certain gravitas they didn't before. Franklin can afford to be a little more sedate and dignified in his presentation with a resumé to back it up. Maybe he wasn’t sleepy. Maybe he’s just calmer from success and security.

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Northwestern head football coach Pat Fitzgerald speaks at Big Ten Media Days in Chicago on Tuesday morning.

PennLive/Joe Hermitt

5. Pat Fitzgerald (Northwestern)

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Fitz is another version of Franklin, just a little farther along in his career. When he first appeared as the late Randy Walker's impromptu successor 11 years ago, he wasn't all that different from the Penn State coach his first season -- lots of slogans and promotion and hard-sell juice. But the years have worn well on him and he now cuts the iconic college coach figure -- erect posture, commanding presence, all about the job at hand.

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He's also relaxed enough now to venture a little off script and allow that the unprecedented success of Chris Collins' NU basketball program gave the football team some school spirit "we've never had before." And he's literate enough to correctly use a word like anomaly, which he employed to describe a clean player who gets called for targeting in a bang-bang play. You probably wouldn't hear a lot of SEC coaches use that word. Although, one time I heard Vince Dooley say, "Anomaly wouldn't run the bawl so much cept we got this youngstah Herschel."

If I allowed my kid to play college football, which I hypothetically would discourage, I'd send him to play for this guy. Fitzgerald was part of NU’s amazing turnaround in the mid-'90s as a player. He knows the school, loves the school and is from Chicago. I didn’t like the company stance he took on the NU players' union thrust a few years ago. But I understood why he took it. As suddenly the second-longest tenured coach in Big Ten football, he embodies a lot of the best the league has to offer. The B1G should showcase this guy every chance it gets.

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Ohio State coach Urban Meyer, knowing he's Urban Meyer and we're not.

PennLive/Joe Hermitt

4. Urban Meyer (Ohio State)

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I can't know how it feels to be someone so completely comfortable in his own skin as to seem leisurely and vaguely bored in any circumstance. For instance, imagine Urban Meyer looking at you with that indifferent expression he wears, the lower lip jutted out slightly as if he's about to decline an offer of some thing or service he doesn't need. Then, imagine him wearing the same expression after being told live alien beings had contacted SETI and were visiting Earth tomorrow. See, you can imagine that, can't you?

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When you've won three national championships and the only living coach you might be chasing (Nick Saban) is one you've beaten the last two times you've played him, well, you're the Godfather. As such, you can say whatever you want and people tilt heads as if you've just given them an insider trading tip.

That said, Meyer has a mess to mop up after his team's unprecedented 31-0 flattening in the national semi at the hands of Clemson. Meyer did not dally. He snapped up offensive guru Kevin Wilson from Indiana almost before Fred Glass had thrown him out the back door. Of Wilson, he was quite frank about precedent and expectations:

"It's still going to be the Ohio State offense. However, we had some weaknesses a year ago, and I'd like to see some improvement. And I think Kevin will have a major impact."

Read: After what we went through last year, he'd better have a major impact. I wouldn't feel comfortable disappointing Meyer right now.

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Michigan State NCAA college football head coach Mark Dantonio speaks at Big Ten Media Day in Chicago on Monday.

3. Mark Dantonio (Michigan State)

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This is the last place I ever thought I'd be ranking a guy who has the perpetual countenance of a man who's just been told his insurance won't pay for his gall bladder operation. You've met more personable DMV clerks. Dantonio didn't get to where he is through selling recruits like some TV barker pitching spray rubber sealant.

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It makes sense, then, that he would exhibit his greatest public presence while backed into a corner. And that's where Michigan State is after a 3-9 season concurrent with a sexual assault scandal that saw Dantonio toss four highly ranked recruits off the team.

The veteran Michigan State coach, now entering his 11th year in East Lansing, came out not combative but exuding diligence and determination:

"Sometimes you're measured a little bit by how you handle the problems, not just in all the good times. We've had some good times and those are easy to stand up there and sing the fight song and put a hat on. Not as easy when you are going through these type of things, but at the end of the day that's why I was hired. I was hired to solve problems and that's what we're going to do."

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Michigan head football coach Jim Harbaugh speaks at Big Ten Media Days in Chicago on Tuesday morning.

PennLive/Joe Hermitt

2. Jim Harbaugh (Michigan)

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I don't have to like Jim Harbaugh to appreciate him. He's the most unique individual by far among league coaches. And he's nothing if not himself, utterly unafraid of being different. That alone is what gives him a presence behind a mic that few others can approach. He's the antithesis of the obvious promoter. Rather, you watch him as you would something you've not seen before. Harbaugh is like an alien humanoid dropped from space crossed with Michael Douglas in Falling Down. You just have no idea what's coming next.

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And then, out of nowhere, he can toss off a line like the one he did about how his sophomore DE Rashan Gary is adapting to becoming a serious star:

"He's had a lot of adulation. And there's some people that that's what they live for. They live for approval of others and to be recognized."

[Particularly topical these days, huh?]

"And then there's other people that they see that adulation and they go by it like it's an orange cone on the side of the road. There's some people that are just aspiring for greater things than just the adulation of somebody. And I think Rashan is that type of guy. You'd really like him."

Beautifully said. So, no, you don't have to like a lot of the publicity stunts Harbaugh pulls to appreciate the strange bird behind the Woody glasses and ball cap. And another plus: We don't have to work for him.

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Indiana coach Tom Allen speaks to reporters on Monday in Chicago.

PennLive/Joe Hermitt

1. Tom Allen (Indiana)

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I will be openly rooting for one team this year because of the new man at its helm. I have heard about what an effective leader Tom Allen is from some people who worked around and under him when he was defensive coordinator at South Florida. The guy can motivate his players because he really seems to care about them as people. So, there's that.

And you can see where he gets that rep when he's at the mic. Allen has a little Sunday sermon in him, the fervor of a preacher who believes the gospel he speaks.

But what I loved about his 10 minutes on Monday was his response to a question about the Big Ten's shameless invasion of Friday nights, a realm previously and traditionally reserved by college football for the high school game. Remember, now, that Indiana football is exactly the sort of place for which Jim Delany and the B1G's marketing weasels dreamed up Friday night Big Ten football -- one that can use all the visibility it can get, damn the consequences for the high schools.

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But Allen, a former longtime Indiana high school coach, wasn't kowtowing to the conference party line. He said exactly what he thought of the new initiative:

"Yes, I'm very concerned about it. I'm not going to sit here and try and make a big issue in terms of what I think. My history as a high school coach for 15 years is strong. It's who I am, it's how I started, and it's been so many years.



"I think that's a special night. I don't like playing games on Friday night. I think that's high school night. It's not always my decision. But I'm not going to just not tell you what I believe."

That took some cajones to say in your rookie season in Delany's backyard. I love that Allen wasn't afraid to stand up and say it. And not many men in his situation would have. That's a coach I'd love to see do well.

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DAVID JONES: djones@pennlive.com

Follow @djoneshoop

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