Before he rocked things as Zeek Braverman on NBC’s revival of Parenthood, Craig T. Nelson starred in a sitcom called Coach. As the title would have you assume, the series followed the adventures of Hayden Fox, the head coach of a fictional Division I-A college football team at Minnesota State University, named the Screaming Eagles. The show went from 1989-1997 with a solid run under its belt.
However, no one would say the show has any real “legacy” when it comes to modern day fandom, which is why today’s news is rather perplexing.
From THR:
NBC has handed out a 13-episode straight-to-series order for a Coach follow-up comedy, The Hollywood Reporter has learned.
NBC’s sequel picks up 18 years after Coach went off the air in 1997 following a nearly 200-episod run. Nelson’s beleaguered football coach is now retired and is called back to become the assistant coach to his own grown son, who is now the new head coach at an Ivy League school in Pennsylvania that is just starting up a new team.
It makes sense that NBC wants to keep Nelson in the family following the conclusion of Parenthood, but this seems like a really wrong way to do it. Coach isn’t The X-Files. No one is clamoring for a follow-up. Why not devote that time into developing a new sitcom Nelson could star in?
These are questions that are asked all too often when it comes to TV development, but while sometimes revivals and sequels make sense, this isn’t one of those times. A Coach renewal is simply too random to ignore, even if the show’s original creator is attached to the project. But, in truth, given the current debates of college athletics, it’s hard to argue with the idea of the show being timelier now than it was in the ’90s.
Source the Hollywood Reporter
