Wisconsin’s Luke Fickell shares thoughts on new GM, measuring success

CHICAGO – Luke Fickell spent a couple of hours July 28 going through a series of interviews during Big Ten media day at the Hilton Hotel.

During that day-long run, Wisconsin‘s football coach provided updates on a handful of players attempting to return from injury, shared his thoughts on the upcoming season and talked about the athletic department’s increased investment in the program.

But there was plenty more that came out of media day. Here are a few more nuggets that caught our attention.

UW hired Morocco Brown as general manager at the end of May to replace Marcus Sedberry. Brown comes to UW with more than two decades of NFL front-office experience.

Fickell said Brown’s early tenure with the program has been marked by his willingness to sit back and learn about the program and climate of college football rather than make immediate changes.

The structure of football front offices have taken different shapes at the college level. Fickell wants a collaborative effort.

“The biggest thing, walking in the door whether it was Morocco or anybody else,” Fickell said, “it was like, ‘Look, this is a family business’ and I don’t want to change the way we do things, meaning, we do things together.”

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What does a successful season look like for the Badgers?

Fickell wouldn’t offer a specific win total when asked that question. Instead, he went back an answer he has mentioned in previous years: He wants the team in position to play meaningful games in November.

Another measure of success will be how much the team has to delve into the transfer portal. Fickell noted that this year the program weighed players’ ability to be starters when evaluating talent from the portal.

Next season, he hopes the program can cut down that needed significantly.

“We know what we’ve got to be able to do this year, but if done the right way, we can retain this football team,” Fickell said. “The growth is really in a good place. If we were looking for eight to 10 to 12 starters, I would hope next year, if done the right way, we’re looking for one or two starters, tops.”

A staple of Fickell’s first three seasons was to have a portion of camp at UW-Platteville. They spent a few days there before his first season and two weeks the past two seasons.

This year, the programs’ schedules didn’t allow for the arrangement

Platteville offered the Badgers a chance to get away and bond, which will be tougher to duplicate with camp on campus, but they will have use of the practice field at the Kellner Family Athletic Center. That portion of the facility opens Monday, Aug. 3.

But that is not what Fickell pointed to when noting an advantage of being at home.

“To be honest with you, if there’s one thing that I want to be able to use a lot more in fall camp, it’s the grass [field] and one thing you don’t have in Platteville anywhere is grass,” Fickell said. “There’s a little bit of give and take, but I really do believe that with the leadership, where we are and what we’ve got, that I feel like we’re going to be in fine shape with being back on campus.”

Fickell was asked about the validity of an article in The Athletic that said the team’s payroll was “north of $25 million.”

In the process of answering that question, Fickell offered an interesting recruiting anecdote that showed how challenging it was to recruit the portal early in his tenure as coach.

The situation involved a Wisconsin native, but despite the in-state connection, the Badgers couldn’t get a foot in the door because they couldn’t compete financially.

“He’s from Wisconsin and we couldn’t get him to set foot on campus,” Fickell said, “and that’s not abnormal because if you weren’t in the realm of things, you couldn’t get a kid with an agency. [They] will not set foot on campus.”

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Wisconsin’s Luke Fickell shares thoughts on new GM, measuring success