Former Oakland Head Coach candidate signs with Louisville

Here sits Bobby Petrino, raw.

He has his tie loosened below the Adam's apple. He's leaning forward as he speaks, making excited hand gestures. He's nodding as you speak. He's funny -- and Petrino doesn't do funny. He's candid -- and Petrino doesn't do candid. He's introspective -- and Petrino doesn't do introspective.

Or so we assumed.

Twenty-five million dollars sure can change a man. Or perhaps it's just that his 10-year, seemingly full-hearted commitment has freed him. Whatever the cause, the University of Louisville football coach opened up like never before after signing his fat new contract yesterday, and in the process, he might have done enough to make his skeptics skeptical about their own skepticism.

Myself included.

Could Petrino's flirtatious days really be over? Can you really trust his latest pledge of love?

I'll believe it when I … no, I saw it. You should've been there. Something is different this time. It's not all about U of L's bold and shrewd contract, which prices out 95 percent of all potential suitors. It's about a young, 45-year-old coach who's evolving, maturing.

Sure, I could've been scammed. But what if I wasn't?

"I don't think you're ever going to eliminate the skepticism," Petrino said of his self-inflicted burden. "It bothers me, yeah. One of the things I've never enjoyed the last couple of years was when you'd walk up and meet someone, and they'd be nice, a good booster, a good fan, and they would say, 'We're sure glad you're here. Hope you stay.' That's the thing I want to end.

"But like I tell my players all the time, 'It's a show-me world.' They have to show what they are going to do, not just talk about it. And that's what we've done today, and that's what we're planning on doing."

Petrino understands how he riled his cynics. The secret Auburn deal. The Louisiana State interview, which came just after he'd signed his previous contract with U of L. He knows dallying with the Oakland Raiders this past off-season, a third straight off-season of unrest, didn't help things, either.

But, hey, he's still here. He turned down a four-year, $20 million deal with the Raiders to continue building this program. If he remains at Louisville and the program continues to grow, that Oakland rebuff should be viewed as a turning point.

"I think, when the Oakland deal came up, it was the greatest thing that happened because we were able to really have time as a family to sit down and talk about everything," Petrino said. "This is the right place for us. This is the right job for me."

Petrino even allowed a glimpse of the family meeting. It was late January when he sat down with his wife, Becky, and four children -- Kelsey, Nick, Bobby and Katie. Kelsey made a particularly profound statement.

"The bottom line is, Dad, you don't want to go to Oakland," she said, according to Petrino.

"What are you talking about?" he recalled asking her.

"We're all sitting here discussing it," she replied. "Before, you always made the decision, and you'd go."

Petrino grinned over the memory yesterday. He always has mentioned his family in his I'm-staying-here statements, but now he was adding some color to those words.

"It's just the idea of how much everybody has grown since we've been here, and the relationships that my family has," Petrino said. "I've always said to my kids I want to have a place where you say, 'I'm from …" when they're asked, 'Where are you from?' I want them to be able to say, 'I'm from Louisville.' "

As a hot young coach, Petrino has been faced with the toughest of decisions: the pursuit of professional greatness versus the joy of stabilizing his family.

When provided with some intriguing professional opportunities, he's made terrible choices, and he's been appropriately torched for them. But you sense growth within him. He's learning to appreciate what Louisville has to offer.

It's the perfect family setup. And now U of L is a place where he can make Urban Meyer money (actually more) and create his own legacy at a fledgling football school.

"There's a great thing about being the first Bobby Petrino," U of L athletic director Tom Jurich said.

Jurich wouldn't have offered Petrino this megadeal if he felt the coach would embarrass him and pursue another job next week. They've been talking about this contract since spring practice ended in April, and over the course of the negotiations, Petrino's sincerity impressed the AD.

Petrino's insistence on putting a $1 million buyout in the contract stayed with Jurich, who has never included buyouts in contracts.

"I told him, 'You don't need to do this,' " Jurich said. "He said, 'This is something I want to do. I want to prove it to the fans. I know I've said it before, but this time I want everybody to know I'm putting my money where my mouth is.' "

Of course, it's pretty easy to put money in your mouth when somebody else is putting even more in your bank account. But I respect the symbolism of the gesture.

"When I first took the job, you wouldn't say, 'Our goal is to be in a BCS bowl game and win a national championship,' " Petrino said. "But now we can say that, and we can legitimately have an opportunity to get it done."

He sounds like he means it. He legitimately sounds like he means it.