Baylor coach Dave Aranda took over defensive playcalling in the Bears’ season opener on Saturday for the first time since becoming the team’s head coach. Make no mistake — Aranda is extremely serious about the job.
Reflecting on his efforts, Aranda said he was “angry a lot of times” over how things went, even though the Bears comfortably defeated Tarleton State 45-3. He went on to compare the job to being a fighter pilot in a wild comparison.
“We had a professor that came to dinner on Friday night, and he asked me what it’s like,” Aranda said, via Zach Barnett of Football Scoop. “It’s like you’re a fighter pilot and you’ve got this great fighter jet and it’s all this mach, you’ve got all these weapons and you get to fly the thing, but there’s people out there that want to kill you. You know? You get to fly it but you don’t want to die.
“So that’s how I feel about calling plays. I feel that all the time.”
Aranda was LSU’s defensive coordinator in the school’s title-winning 2019 season. He landed the Baylor job after that, and had not called plays since. After a 3-9 campaign last season, he decided to take over defensive playcalling duties again.
Aranda can definitely be ruthless when it comes to his coaching style. Maybe it is not a surprise that he would compare parts of the job to military duty.
