The new guy

 What the Blob knows about Ryan Walters you could put in a thimble and it would wind up on the floor, because it's so microscopic it would just leak through the holes in the thimble.

But here's what I do know: The man knows how to make an entrance.

First thing Purdue's new football coach did when he met his new players was point at running back Devin Mockobee  and declare he was pulling rank. As of that minute, Walters said, Mockobee was now a scholarship player.

That certainly would have happened anyway, given Mockobee's emergence as a premier back. But Walters' timing was impeccable, because it instantly won him the room.

I don't know how that translates to Ws. I do know Purdue didn't need a whole lot of time to decide Walters was their guy -- a week, to be exact.

To be sure, he's only 36 years old, and he's never been a head coach before, and he's not an offensive guy. The last time Purdue hired someone who wasn't an offensive guy, it was Leon Burtnett 40 years ago. Burtnett won just 21 games in five seasons.

Even though he had Jim Everett playing quarterback during that time.

Even though he had Rod Woodson, perhaps the greatest athlete ever to play football at Purdue.

So here comes this defensive phenom, and, frankly, you have a right to look at this hire with a raised eyebrow, if you're Boiler Nation. He's young, he's new to the job, he's ...  young.

But here's the thing: He's really, really good at what he does. Really good.

He came in with Bret Bielema to run the defense at Illinois, and in two seasons transformed it from one of the worst defenses in the nation into one of the best. When he arrived with Beilema in 2021, Illinois was coming off a season in which it had ranked 97th in scoring and 114th in yards given up. It was so sieve-like it gave sieves a bad name.

Less than two years later?

No. 1 in scoring. No. 2 in yards per game. No. 3 in yards per play.

Look. I get it. College football is all about scoring now -- baroque offensive schemes, stratospheric numbers. Offense sells. Offense moves the needle. And offense absolves a multitude of sins.

The high-gloss programs win because they outscore people. That's what everyone sees.

Now here comes Ryan Walters, who says you can't win consistently merely by  outscoring people.

You know what?

He's right.

Think about the Georgia team that won the national title last year, and what you remember first is its defense. Alabama and Clemson, who traded the national title every other year for awhile there, had glitter offensively but grounded it by suffocating people defensively when they had to. 

As for Purdue, a lot depends on who Walters picks as his offensive coordinator. I'm guessing he'll get someone good, because it's Purdue. You have the sort of lineage Purdue does on that side of the ball -- particularly at quarterback and wide receiver -- good people are going to show up on your doorstep.

I mean, who wouldn't want to coach the next Bob Griese? Or Drew Brees? Or Rondale Moore or David Bell?

So even with Walters running the show, it's unlikely Purdue will suddenly go from Quarterback U. to Linebacker U. There'll still be quarterbacks, but the linebackers will be a lot better.

This is an exceedingly sunny outlook, of course, and probably naive. There are a dozen ways this could go sideways, after all. Not the least of which is the fact we could sit here all day naming hotshot coordinators who've washed out as head coaches.

But for now?

The Blob chooses not to be its usual dour self. Guilty of sunshine, your honor.