Why Biff Poggi wants to slap himself and what will change about these Charlotte 49ers

Charlotte 49ers head coach Biff Poggi will do a few things the same way as he enters his second year. The offense will still be built around running the ball. The bluntness that makes him one of the best interviews in college football isn’t going anywhere. And the sleeveless T-shirts are staying.

“They’re not a statement,” Poggi said of his signature look, which you can buy in the Charlotte student bookstore. “It’s just what I’m most comfortable in, because it’s so damn hot during football season.”

But the unfettered optimism?

Poggi is dialing that back. Wa-a-a-ay back.

I sat in Poggi’s office Tuesday and read him what he had told me before the 2023 season. “If we’re not in the hunt,” Poggi said at the time, “I’ve failed as a coach.”

There were other statements that were similar. Poggi said publicly when he was hired in November 2022: “Our goal is very simple. We want to win the (conference). And we want to win it repeatedly. And we want to get to the College Football Playoff…. And you should be asking, ‘What’s your timetable?’ My timetable is now.”

Instead, the 49ers went 3-9 in 2023 with team chemistry issues and an inept offense that played in front of a lot of half-full stadiums. It was the exact same record the 49ers had posted in 2022.

Reminded of those quotes Tuesday, Poggi winced.

“I wish I could go back and slap myself,” he said. “By nature I’m an optimistic person, but that was way out over my skis.”

‘A process that takes time’

There will be no predictions this year. Poggi and his staff have remade the roster again and set designs on simply getting better. The coach still doesn’t sugarcoat things as he prepares his team for the season opener — at home Aug. 31 vs. James Madison, where the 49ers are an 8.5-point underdog. But these days he’s less apt to bring up the CFP and more apt to bring up real estate.

“There are only (134) Division I football programs,” Poggi said, “so we’re living in a very good neighborhood. A lot of beautiful houses in the neighborhood. This one when I got here last year — it was not such a beautiful house. And so we spent a year learning on the job, and we — really this was more a teardown — spent some time planning on how we’re going to build a foundation. And then methodically build a structure that will last, and withstand the winds and the rains and all the things that come, so your family can live in a safe place. That is a process that takes time.”

Charlotte 49ers athletic director Mike Hill made an out-of-the-box hire in 2022 when he hired Poggi rather than the latest 35-year-old hotshot offensive coordinator. Poggi — rumpled, whip-smart and independently wealthy — came by way of Michigan, where he had been Jim Harbaugh’s consigliere and top assistant.

Incidentally, Poggi told me Tuesday: “I don’t think Jim will ever be coming back to college football.” The former Michigan head coach, now back in the NFL, was hit with a substantial penalty by the NCAA last week that effectively banned him from college athletics until August 2028.

The divide of 2023

One of the errors Poggi said he made in 2023 with the 49ers: He brought in too many players from his old high school state championship teams at St. Frances Academy of Baltimore. When I asked about his mistakes, the first thing Poggi said was: “I wouldn’t bring in so many kids from one high school program. It just creates a divide that is really hard to bridge.”

Most of those players are gone now, some replaced with other transfers who Poggi said are happier to be at Charlotte.

Poggi also believes that his second team is more talented, although Charlotte will have to prove it: The 49ers were picked by the media to finish 13th in the 14-team American Athletic Conference. Florida transfer Max Brown brings athleticism and hope at quarterback, however, after the 49ers often struggled at the game’s most important position in 2023.

At 64, Poggi is exactly the age that Paul McCartney wrote about when Sir Paul penned the classic Beatles song about growing old.

But while “When I’m 64” imagines the joys of grandchildren, vacations in the Isle of Wight, occasional gardening and Sunday morning rides, Poggi said he doesn’t want any of that. Well, he would like to see more of his grandchildren.

As for the rest of it, though, it can wait. Poggi said he hopes to be coaching at Charlotte for “many years” and building a foundation that will last after he’s gone, although he’s got plenty of money and could have left football long ago.

“It’s a ministry for me,” Poggi said. “I believe God used football in my life to save me. I was a messed-up kid. And so I feel like I owe. This is the way I know how to — not to save the world, but save a kid here and there.

“And look, there are many days that I would love to just go to Italy. But I feel like it would be very selfish of me to take a lifetime of blessings and go spend them on myself.”

Instead, it’s time for Biff Ball, the sequel. I do hope it works. Because if it does, it’s going to be tremendously entertaining.