Wisconsin football saw gamer, car wash attendant apply for offensive coordinator position

MADISON, Wis.

Cameron Little was in the midst of an undefeated dynasty mode run, 53-0 with Wisconsin on the Heisman difficulty setting of EA Sports College Football 25.

Frankly, he was getting a little bored.

Quarterbacks Braedyn Locke and Mabrey Mettauer had Heisman Trophy-winning seasons.

Wide receiver Vinny Anthony set the single-game program record with 478 receiving yards and won the Biletnikoff Award.

Running back Nate Whites speed had turned him into the Doak Walker Award winner and a first-round NFL draft pick.

Advertisement Fictional coach Barry Valdez eerily similar in name to Badgers Hall of Fame coach Barry Alvarez had won three consecutive national championships for Little, built a roster full of five-star recruits and signed a new six-year contract.

By late November, there wasnt anything left for Little to accomplish on his PlayStation 5.

Thats when Little, an 18-year-old freshman at Wisconsin, figured: Why not try a new challenge? Wisconsins real-life offensive coordinator job had just been posted online, with head coach Luke Fickell looking to replace Phil Longo, whose Air Raid scheme stalled.

Little quickly worked up a coaching resume, tossed in three screenshots of his achievements and wrote a one-sentence cover letter that featured a link to a YouTube video of him throwing a 43-yard touchdown pass to receiver Trech Kekahuna that secured a last-second video game win at Penn State.

You have seen my accolades on my resume, he wrote.

Now please enjoy this game-winning drive showing me successfully drive the length of the field in a hostile environment, injured, with 2 timeouts and 30 seconds to win the game.

Ive been a lifelong Badger fan, Little said in a phone conversation.

You watch the Badgers, and you have opinions on what they should and shouldnt be doing on the offensive side of the ball, and I figured I would toss my hat into the ring with all the experience I have playing College Football 25.

I do beat all my friends a lot.

So they were laughing with me.

Little was among several vastly underqualified candidates to apply for Wisconsins offensive coordinator job.

The Athletic obtained the offensive coordinator applicant list from the university via an open records request and found 26 candidates with varying degrees of experience.

The university did not include resumes or cover letters of anyone who requested confidentiality.

Advertisement Fickell hired former Kansas offensive coordinator Jeff Grimes, whose six-page resume listed his statistical accomplishments at BYU, Baylor and Kansas, as well as a U.S.

map that highlighted in blue 12 states in which he had recruiting experience.

Dan Enos, a former offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Maryland and Arkansas who was on Fickells staff at Cincinnati in 2020 as running backs coach, applied for the job.

So did former Wisconsin running back Garrett Groshek.

But many of the publicly available applications came from people whose football backgrounds were, shall we say, significantly limited.

Little is a member of AreaRED, the official student organization that promotes Badgers sports.

He touted his 3-0 interim coaching record leading the Middleton United under-9 co-ed soccer team.

One applicant was a regional sales manager for a company that sells metalworking products.

Another applicant was a supervisor of a healthcare team.

One cover letter boasted being in first place in all my fantasy leagues, while a second cover letter simply stated: Coach Fickell: Id really like this job.

Pay negotiable.

Included in that application was a diagram of an inside zone run and a screenshot of Wisconsins 2019 game against Michigan when the Badgers had seven offensive linemen and two tight ends lined up at the goal line in front of tailback Jonathan Taylor.

A third picture showed tailbacks Melvin Gordon, James White and Montee Ball running off the field after a game.

Max Sharpnack, a car wash attendant in Oklahoma, wrote: I have already coached a competitive basketball team.

I have been coaching for an exhibition game for my friends as well and have been working on my own playbook.

One cover letter that didnt include a name featured a copy of the applicants 2022 cover letter for the offensive coordinator job when Fickell initially hired Longo.

Underneath that paragraph, which promised to score a lot more TDs, was an updated letter to athletic director Chris McIntosh that noted: Time has come full circle.

Both of us may have grown into more battle-tested men, but were right back in the same stand-off we were two years ago.

Advertisement In one of the most hilarious cover letters submitted, an applicant whose name was redacted wrote to McIntosh: We both know the state of the football program right now.

Its not great.

While we have an amazing amount of great recruits coming in, the causal fans are not looking at that.

Theyre looking at the now.

And the fact of the matter is, we just lost to Nebraska.

Nebraska! They stormed the field! The people are not happy, and theyre sick already calling for Fickell to be fired, and some even want you to go with him.

Drastic times call for drastic measures.

...

The balls in your court McIntosh.

I know you see the vision.

Give Fickell the time to get his recruits developed, and let me handle this Badger offense.

Wisconsin is 12-13 overall in two seasons under Fickell, including 8-10 in the Big Ten.

Longos offense underwhelmed, ranking 92nd nationally in scoring during the first year and 108th during the second year, necessitating a coaching change.

But why would so many people take any time at all to apply for a position when the odds of actually earning the job were nonexistent? Eric Burmeister, a physical therapist in Green Bay whose dad played for the Badgers baseball team in the early 1980s, said he applied as a joke to share with his friends and family and to brighten the day of whoever might read his cover letter.

Burmeister chipped away at it during a weekend full of bottle feedings for his 2-year-old son and 6-month-old daughter.

He wrote: If I can survive negotiating nap schedules, managing tantrums and handling a meltdown over a broken cracker, Im confident I can manage a fourth-quarter drive without dropping the ball, pun intended.

Bailey Kenney, the assistant director for intramural sports at UW-Madison, applied on the off-chance someone would see his resume and be willing to find a role for him somewhere within the football department because he wants to someday be involved in coaching.

Kenney, who has experience coaching flag football, said he had compiled a digital playbook that featured variations of 150 plays in a hybrid power run and spread offensive scheme.

Ive seen what this team has done over the last couple of years, Kenney said.

Its really hard for me to show up for these games and watch the less-than-optimal offense get put on the field and then lose big games.

I didnt think I actually had a chance at getting this position.

But I think I can do a better job than what they have been doing.

Advertisement Little said he held out hope that perhaps he would receive a personalized rejection letter from a member of Wisconsins staff.

He cited Green Bay Packers CEO Mark Murphy hand-writing a rejection letter to a fan who applied for the teams defensive coordinator role last year.

Instead, Little received the same generic email as other applicants.

It showed up in his inbox on Jan.

17, 38 days after Grimes was announced as Wisconsins offensive coordinator, and read: We were fortunate to have many qualified applicants.

We regret to inform you that you were not selected to move forward in the recruitment process for this position.

It didnt take long for Little to recover from being passed over for the job.

He fired up College Football 25 again and found a new task.

He is now attempting to build a dynasty with Louisiana-Monroe.

Its been a good rebuild so far, Little said.

Ive gotten them to the Playoff once in the first five years.

I think we played at Notre Dame.

We upset them and then we lost in the Sugar Bowl.

So were building our way up.

If I can win a national championship with Louisiana-Monroe, I feel like Im qualified to be an offensive coordinator for the Badgers.

(Illustration: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic ; John Fisher / Getty Images).

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