Former Troy, AU offensive coordinator Tony Franklin remains close to Trojans’ staff

TROY — Plenty of people are excited about Troy’s home game against Middle Tennessee on ESPN2 next Tuesday.
Tony Franklin isn’t one of them.

The first-year Middle Tennessee offensive coordinator held the same position at Troy in 2006 and 2007, the start of Troy’s three conference championships, before leaving for Auburn before last season. That lasted half a season before he was fired there, but he was hired at MTSU in February and has helped MTSU to a 3-1 start, 1-0 in league play. Troy is 2-2, 1-0.

“It’s a big game for Middle Tennessee,” Franklin said. “For me, to be honest, I’m not real fired up about it. I don’t like going against people I care about.

“I’ll coach hard and do the best job I can, but it makes me sick to my stomach to compete against those guys. I love (Troy head coach) Larry Blakeney and think a lot of those assistant coaches. They’re lifetime friends.”

Franklin was at Kentucky from 1997-2000 as an assistant under Hal Mumme, where he coached current Troy assistants Neal Brown, John Schlarman and Chad Scott. When an NCAA investigation forced Mumme out, Franklin wrote a book called “Fourth Down and Life to Go” detailing the experience, and was out of college coaching until after the 2005 season, when he was hired by Troy.

In the meantime, he ran a consulting business for his offensive system. But when he came to Troy, the Trojans were coming off a 4-7 season and the future wasn’t looking bright.

“The team we had, it was a bad time for Troy,” linebacker Bear Woods said. “It could have been a time where Troy didn’t rebound for years, but he came in and brought confidence.”

They believed, and shared the league title with MTSU in 2006 but beat the Blue Raiders in a memorable, come-from-behind 21-20 win to advance to the New Orleans Bowl. In 2007, Troy was 8-4, but was left out of the bowl picture though the team shared a league title with Florida Atlantic.

Ranked near the bottom of the nation in total offense for three years before Franklin arrived, the Trojans have been one of the country’s best offenses since then.

Still, coaches downplay the notion of next Tuesday’s game being about Tony Franklin against his former fellow coaches and players he recruited. Both Troy and MTSU are off to hot starts, and the winner of this game could end up being the league champion.

Brown has known Franklin for most of his life, but has been close with him for the past 10 years. Franklin helped Brown transfer to Massachusetts after three years at UK and hired him at Troy not long after he himself was hired. After Franklin left, Brown was promoted to offensive coordinator and, at age 29, is the youngest FBS coordinator in the country.

“If it’s just he and I playing, I feel pretty good,” Brown joked. “I’m in better shape. If we play 1-on-1, I can win.”

Franklin recruited former starting quarterback Omar Haugabook, a two-time SBC Offensive Player of the Year, to kickstart the offense. He found starting running back DuJuan Harris in 2007 and convinced him to visit after he had committed to Florida A&M, which was his only offer, and was a big reason current starting quarterback Levi Brown transferred to Troy from Richmond.

Levi Brown wanted to go to MTSU from Richmond since he’s from nearby Mount Juliet.

“I sent a tape here so hopefully they would like it and I could tell MTSU, Your conference rival Troy’s recruiting me, what are you going to do about that?’ It ended up working out because Coach Franklin liked my tape, recruited me to Troy and it’s history from there,” Levi Brown said.

Neal Brown and Franklin talk every few days, but haven’t talked about football in a few weeks. Franklin said he talks to the Troy coaches and that he always keeps a relationship with players he personally recruited.

One of his three daughters graduated from Troy and the other two attend Troy. He was in contact with quarterbacks Jamie Hampton and Tanner Jones after their knee injuries last year to lift their spirits up.

He saw Troy players Zack Marcum and Tyler Clark while attending one of his daughters’ plays last year and visited with them. He and Troy coaches text each other good luck on game days. He’s happy that Levi Brown has found success.

“The best thing about him is that he persevered,” Franklin said. “He didn’t win the job originally, but kept fighting and didn’t quit or leave. He’s a good kid with great parents.”

Franklin has found success at MTSU, as the Blue Raiders lead the league in total offense at 407 yards per game. He had no such success at Auburn, where he was fired after six games thanks in large part to dissension on the AU coaching staff.

“The best thing is that (MTSU head coach) Rick (Stockstill) lets me do my job like Larry did,” Franklin said. “He made it very clear to the other assistants that we were going to do it my way or else and everybody bought in. It’s so much fun to come to work every day. We all like each other. There’s no agendas and no one walking into the head coach’s office trying to sabotage anything I do.”