4-4, on track for 6-5 in the regular season.
Now
Career arc
Bowls and playoffs: 3-0
2023First Responder BowlW 45-21
2024First Responder BowlW 30-28
2025Armed Forces BowlW 41-10This week Wed Nov 4
- Last gameL 45-46 at Boise State Sat Oct 31
- This season4-4
- On track for6-5 regular season
- Nextat Oregon State Sat Nov 7
- Stature92nd of 138 FBS programs
What the result changed
- Playoff odds 2% → 0.9% CFB Zeitgeist forecast, before and after
Saturday: at Oregon State
Sat Nov 7, 10:30 pm ET 
· Oregon State is 5-3 · First meeting between Kinne and JaMarcus Shephard as head coaches · Texas State’s chance to win: 50% (the site’s model)
No headlines named him in the last 7 days
Offense: 22nd of 138 per play. Defense: 85th.
3 games left
- Sat Nov 7at Oregon State (5-3)50%
- Sat Nov 14vs. Fresno State (5-3)62%
- Sat Nov 21vs. Washington State (1-8)
88%
Percent: Texas State’s chance to win, from the site’s model. Records are through today. Networks as announced; the rest are set closer to kickoff.
How the season got here
Where Texas State stood among 138 FBS programs by stature after each game (1st is the highest; the CFB Zeitgeist ledger).
- Oct 26–Nov 1L 45-46 at Boise State1 headline · 87th of 138
- Oct 19–25W 20-17 vs. Utah State0 headlines
- Oct 12–18W 66-27 vs. Colorado State1 headline · 82nd of 138
- Oct 5–11No game0 headlines
- Sep 28–Oct 4L 29-31 at San Diego State0 headlines
- Sep 21–27 · rebuiltW 63-10 vs. Incarnate Word0 headlines
Each week as this page showed it at the time. Weeks marked rebuilt came before this page existed: they were built afterward from only what was known by the end of that week.
Watch the biggest plays from Texas State’s games, ranked by how much each moved the chance to win.
Report card
Offense carries it: 91st percentile offense, bottom-quarter defense at 23rd.
Texas State, every completed season graded against the whole field, then averaged.
Offense
Defense
Each season is his team’s percentile among every team with that stat (the share it beat), averaged over his completed seasons here; a mid-season takeover year and the season in progress aren’t graded. Letters: A+ 90th percentile and up, A 80, B+ 70, B 60, B− 50, C+ 45, C 40, C− 30, D 15, F below.
Poach watch
This winter
Our poach model, on his record so far, the win chances for every game he has left, his program, his pay and his background. Ranked against the 132 FBS head coaches this season. The zone words describe the market’s interest; none of them says he is leaving.
What drives his number
The biggest factors in his profile, each against the typical FBS head coach today. The games he has left are priced into the number, not listed here.
- ▲ HigherHis 4th season at Texas State
- ▲ HigherA Group of Five program · 28th percentile of FBS in program stature last season
- ▲ HigherHis team is 4-4, outscoring opponents by 6.1 points a game
How good is this number? It ranks a head coach who leaves for another head-coaching job ahead of one who stays 78 to 82% of the time, and its average came within a point of the share who actually left. What it can’t do
Tested on every FBS head coach from 2012 through 2025, each season scored by a model fit only on the seasons before it. From three games on, given one coach who left for a head-coaching job elsewhere or an NFL coordinator job and one who stayed, it ranked the one who left ahead 79 to 82% of the time; in a season’s first two games, 78%. Its average chance came within a point of the share who actually left. It counts a move a coach makes while he still holds the job; when his school ends it, that doesn’t count, even if another school then hires him.
- The live number prices the games he has left with the power model’s ratings from this season. The test priced them with each team’s rating from the season before, because ratings made during past seasons were not kept, so this live version could not be replayed.
- Programs new to FBS have no FBS record before this season in the data it reads, so their coaches are scored without one.
- It is frozen: it learns nothing from 2026 until a deliberate refit.
- A coach hired in December needs his background (age, alma mater, the state he was born in) added before his first game, or he shows as not rated.
Fans
Fan chatter
- Oct 31L 45-46 at Boise State
Wouldn't be surprised if Kinne accepted the Baylor job and is checked out the rest of the season.
Texas State fan - Oct 15W 66-27 vs. Colorado State
We have the opportunity to blow the biggest halftime lead in our history. If any team can do that, it’s the Kinne lead Bobcats. Hold on to your butt’s.
Texas State fan - Oct 3L 29-31 at San Diego State
It’s a GJ Kinne staple. About the only thing that stays consistent with his teams are 2nd half collapses.
Texas State fan
Earlier weeks
- Sep 19W 49-35 vs. North Texas
I guess so! Has anyone told Kinne?
Texas State fan - Sep 12L 26-31 vs. UTSA
That one is entirely on Kinne.
Texas State fan - Sep 5L 7-59 at Texas
We still have yet to field a good defense since Kinne has been here.
Texas State fan
Several stories about him in the last 30 days
Sat Nov 7: Oregon State
from several outlets
Jim Mora on what he sees from G.J. Kinne, Texas State football
The Coloradoan +1 Oct 12 · a few outlets
All 2 articles
What they’re talking about
The headlines for each topic are on the News tab.
Many stories about him this season
from several outlets
Jim Mora on what he sees from G.J. Kinne, Texas State football
The Coloradoan +1 Oct 12 · a few outlets
All 2 articles
What they’re talking about
The headlines for each topic are on the News tab.
Could another school hire him? What has he said?
Across his career
13 stories about him across 4 seasons
Stories are headlines grouped by what they are about, counted through Nov 4.
Stats
Big games
The big-game ledger
How he does in the games that matter most — rivalry record, performance broken out by real opponent tier, one-score games, and his toughest historical matchup.
2-2 against his rivals. Winless in 3 tries against Michael Desormeaux.
ATS is his record against the spread: did his team beat the closing betting line, winning by more than it or losing by less? Lines start in 2013; a dash means fewer than 6 of those games had one. One-score games carry no spread record: a big favorite that wins a close game has almost always failed to cover, so that number would say nothing about the coach.
Signature games
Tags describe each game; they aren’t scores. The weighting that picks these games is still being tested.
How he plays
Run/pass mix, by field position
Ran more than the situation called for under Keopple.
2,799 run and pass snaps at Texas State, 2023–2025, his own games, one row per offensive coordinator. Each cell is how much more often he passed than the rest of FBS did in the same situation (field zone, down, distance, score, quarter, same season), in percentage points.
Pass rate, stint by stint
Where each stint’s offense sat between run-first and pass-first, and how far it moved from one season to the next, against the FBS-wide average of 41% pass. The band is that stint’s real season-to-season range, not a fixed-width box.
Season-to-season pass-rate range for all 449 FBS coaching stints with at least three covered seasons, 2004–2025.
Building the roster
Four numbers on how he actually stocks a roster, from signing day to draft day.
His recruiting, really
His 4 ranked Texas State classes of his own have averaged #92 nationally — best #74, worst #101.
His class — he had the full signing cycle
Rank is each signing class’s national recruiting rank (#1 is best). Only a class he had a full signing cycle to build counts as his.
Roster ownership
Roster ownership
of his 2026 roster arrived on his watch — 108 of 109 players. The other 1 is a holdover from before he was hired.
Of his own players on this roster, 27% came through the transfer portal; the rest are non-portal arrivals (high-school signees, JUCO transfers, walk-ons).
35% of his 256 new players since 2023 came through the portal (FBS programs, same seasons: 26%). His share was 31% in 2023 and 28% in 2026.
Graded on the players who arrived and the players who left together, his portal seasons came out better than most FBS programs’ in 2 of the 4 seasons graded. our read
Each player counts once, in the season he arrived. 2021, the first season of portal tracking here, is left off because its arrival records look incomplete (about 31 new players per FBS team, against 52 in 2022). Portal grade: the site’s position-value-weighted scoring (the same engine as the Portal Heat feed and the “Who won the portal” grade): the value of the players who came in minus the value of the ones who left, ranked against every FBS program’s grade that same season. A season with fewer than 4 transfers in and out is not graded.
“His own” means the player arrived while he was head coach; “inherited” means a predecessor brought him in.
Size up front
Size up front
Offensive linemen on his Texas State rosters have averaged 9 lb heavier than the FBS average (2023–2026) — heavier than 94% of FBS coaching runs since 2010. In the three seasons before he arrived, Texas State’s line averaged within a few pounds of the FBS average.
Average listed weight of every offensive lineman on each season’s roster, holdovers included, against every FBS roster that season (2010 on; a program needs 3+ seasons under him to appear). Weights are the ones programs publish, and programs list differently. This describes size only — not scheme, and not quality.
Where he recruits
is his biggest recruiting state: 61 of 79 signees (77%) across his 2023–2026 tenure, drawn from 10 states in all. Next: FL (4).
82% of his signees come from TX and its 4 border states (LA 2, OK 2).
Off this map: 6 signees to the east (FL 4, NC, others), 3 to the west (CA 3) and 1 to the north (MN).
- median hometown distance
- 216 mi
- within 100 mi
- 11%
- within 500 mi
- 77%
- beyond 1,000 mi
- 12%
The map counts signed recruits across his tenure; the distance figures cover his current roster, transfers and walk-ons included. Two different groups, kept separate on purpose.
News
Stories about him
Headlines, grouped by what they are about. Each is the outlet’s own.
This week
Linked to another job
Austin American-StatesmanGJ Kinne dismisses coaching rumors, focusing on Bobcats vs Boise State - Austin American-StatesmanOct 27
Yahoo SportsTexas State football coach GJ Kinne dismisses Baylor job rumors, focuses on Boise StateOct 27
Sports IllustratedTexas State's G.J. Kinne addresses Baylor coaching rumors ahead of Boise State matchupOct 28
This season
Press conference and quotes
Linked to another job
- Austin American-StatesmanGJ Kinne dismisses coaching rumors, focusing on Bobcats vs Boise State - Austin American-StatesmanOct 27
- Yahoo SportsTexas State football coach GJ Kinne dismisses Baylor job rumors, focuses on Boise StateOct 27
- Sports IllustratedTexas State's G.J. Kinne addresses Baylor coaching rumors ahead of Boise State matchupOct 28
Quarterback and depth chart
- Yahoo SportsWhat does Texas State football coach GJ Kinne look for in his quarterbacks?Sep 1
- Austin American-StatesmanHow Texas State football coach GJ Kinne finds and scouts quarterbacks - Austin American-StatesmanSep 1
- Austin American-StatesmanWhat Texas State coach GJ Kinne learned from ex-Longhorns QB Colt McCoy - Austin American-StatesmanSep 2
In his own words
Every quote, back to September 2026
In his own words
Hopefully this game experience will help us moving forward because that (Texas) is a good team
Career
Coaching career
The arc of his career is on Now.
Steady no large move in either direction on our stature ladder
1st-best Texas State tenure of 5 by the numbers.
Followed Jake Spavital (2019–2022).
| Season | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | 2026 | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Record & result | |||||
| Record | 8-5 | 8-5 | 7-6 | 4-4 | |
| Postseason | W bowl | W bowl | W bowl | — | |
| Coordinators | |||||
| OC | Mack Leftwich | Mack Leftwich | Landon Keopple / Jordan Shoemaker | Landon Keopple / Jordan Shoemaker | |
| DC | Jonathan Patke | Bradley Dale Peveto / Dexter McCoil | Bradley Dale Peveto / Dexter McCoil | Will Windham / Matthew Gregg | |
| Outcome — opponent-adjusted efficiency percentile | |||||
| Offense | 67 | 85 | 96 | 89 | |
| Defense | 66 | 52 | 59 | 42 | |
| Tendencies — play-by-play, neutral script | |||||
| 1st-down pass% | 44.1 | 48.1 | 40.8 | 39.0 | |
| Red-zone pass% | 35.8 | 41.2 | 38.7 | 33.3 | |
| 4th-down go%opp. territory | 52.6 | 32.5 | 43.9 | 31.8 | |
Outperforms his recruiting talent on offense and performs about as expected for his recruiting talent on defense.
Typical size for position, once adjusted for position mix.
A typical class-year mix of incoming transfers.
1 player-season honored (All-America / national award): Ismail Mahdi (2023)
Was he good?
The data leans positive, where the data can separate from zero: every conclusive reading points the same way.
+8.5 pts at Texas State · #255 of 1290 · top quarterModel fit as of 2026-09-04.