Arizona State head coach Kenny Dillingham grabbed headlines with a viral quote Tuesday while addressing the new era of college football.
"To me, recruiting is dead. Retention is alive," Dillingham said at Big 12 media days, according to ESPN's Pete Thamel. "It's not about recruiting. I don't care if we're ranked dead last in recruiting my entire career here."
He added, "It'd be like if the draft was for one year, then half of your draft picks leave. So it's all about retention now. That's my entire thing."
Dillingham, who helped the Sun Devils win the Big 12 and reach the College Football Playoff in their first season in the conference last year, explained that he's more focused on being honest with his players than promising things he may not be able to get done.
"Are we going to lose a lot of recruits because I'm not going to tell the kid he's going to make half-a-million dollars and put in the contract that I can change your salary at my discretion, which is happening. ... I'm not going to do that," the reigning Big 12 Coach of the Year said, according to Max Zepeda of Cronkite Sports. "We're going to miss out on a lot of kids right now, but we're going to get a lot of kids back when they realize that it's a little bit of fool's gold out there in college football."
Dillingham continued: "It's all about retaining the guys on your team. It's all about treating the guys on your team great. If you treat the guys on your team great, when you get a good player, he's gonna stay there. If you are constantly looking for the next best thing to replace the guys on your team, then your own guys on your team should leave. Why wouldn't they? If you're not loyal to them, they shouldn't be loyal to you. That's the thing I take a lot of pride in."
College football has undergone major changes recently, with NIL deals the new norm. The recent House v. NCAA settlement, which took effect July 1, only adds to the significant shift by allowing schools to share revenue and pay athletes directly for their performance.
"Our best players are going to make the most money on the team. If you have a problem with that, become our best player. If you're not the best player and you want to make more money, then yeah, I'm going to help you leave," Dillingham said.
He added: "Our best young guys deserve to make the next-most so they can grow into playing. We're all about production. We're all about doing it in our program, and I think that's why a lot of our players stay here. They know we're gonna take care of them; they deserve it. They know we're gonna treat them fairly."
