Hypothetical: Let's assume we go 10-2 and Mullen jumps ship......

[Goat Holder]

....and it's possible, with Florida, Michigan and other openings possibly being available this off-season.

The question is, who's on our short list and who do we ultimately hire? All signs point to Hudspeth, and yes he's the MS guy with the recrootin ties to Louisiana. Seems like a slam dunk. Especially if he wins 10 games himself this year.

But I'm a big believer in promoting from within if you've got a good thing going. It doesn't always work, but it also helps to choose the right guy. Shaw at Stanford was the right guy, Joker at Kentucky wasn't. Wouldn't it be a good idea to give Geoff Collins a shot at it? He may be able to keep some of our current staff, plus keep the momentum going. I've also wanted to see if having a defensive minded coach, who hands over the offense to an OC, would be the key to long-term success here. We've never really tried that. Perhaps that's what makes our team the best over the long haul. We're always going to have elite defensive players at MSU, so the way I see it, let's maximize our strengths and at least make our historical weakness average. I mean really, that's all Mullen has really done. Our offense isn't special, it's ground and pound spread. Our defense is what's going to make our team, and Mullen has always handed that off completely to the DC.

[GreenheadDawg]

Why would we even discuss Mullen leaving before the season even starts. Sorry I don't get it

[JOHNHEVESYMADE]

While I like Collins, I think you have to go with Hudspeth. Collins has no head coaching experience. Hudspeth has been a head coach at every level not to mention he has won at a very high level. If you can win at Winston Academy, you can win anywhere. I would feel very comfortable with our recruiting class if Mullen left and Hudspeth took over. Bring in Ed O as defensive coordinator (assuming Collins went with Mullen), keep Tony Hughes, and bring in Reed Stringer and we would get everybody in the state.

[JOHNHEVESYMADE]

Why would we even discuss Mullen leaving before the season even starts. Sorry I don't get it

Because this is the longest 10 day stretch till football starts and there is nothing else to talk about.

[EAVdog]

Tony Dungy.

[TrapGame]

We go 11-1, butt rape 'em in Oxford, Mullen hauls in a top 10 recruiting class and he goes nowhere. I like this hypothetical much better.

[Lloyd Christmas]

Why would we even discuss Mullen leaving before the season even starts. Sorry I don't get it

Because we are 9 days away from kickoff and hypotheticals like this keep us football crackheads from going nuts.

I'll play. I think Hud would be the best choice but people around here always say that he and our current admin (not sure if it's Stricklin or Keenum) don't get along. One of the great things in this hypothetical scenario is we would be in an AWESOME position to hire a new coach. Think about it:

1. We have more revenue than ever and it will keep growing..possibly $100M by 2016
2. In this scenario we will just have come off a 10-2 regular season and have our star QB coming back
3. We just proved that MSU is NOT a place where coaches go to die, since Mullen will have left for a more high profile job.
4. Facilities are better than ever and on par with the conference.
5. Head Coach pay is higher than ever before.

I'm sure I left some stuff out. The point is that we could really hire some bigger names if we wanted to. If our D is still rock solid then I wouldn't mind hiring Collins and have him hand the OC duties to a proven spread guy or an up and coming spread guy. Having said that, Hud would be my number 1 pick if Dan left.

[Coach34]

Mullen wants a statue built of him somewhere- he ain't leaving now that he has finally gotten things the way he wants them. He loves the job security and being "the guy" that is the best State coach we have had

[preachermatt83]

Mullen wants a statue built of him somewhere- he ain't leaving now that he has finally gotten things the way he wants them. He loves the job security and being "the guy" that is the best State coach we have had

this^

[Johnson85]

....and it's possible, with Florida, Michigan and other openings possibly being available this off-season.

The question is, who's on our short list and who do we ultimately hire? All signs point to Hudspeth, and yes he's the MS guy with the recrootin ties to Louisiana. Seems like a slam dunk. Especially if he wins 10 games himself this year.

But I'm a big believer in promoting from within if you've got a good thing going. It doesn't always work, but it also helps to choose the right guy. Shaw at Stanford was the right guy, Joker at Kentucky wasn't. Wouldn't it be a good idea to give Geoff Collins a shot at it? He may be able to keep some of our current staff, plus keep the momentum going. I've also wanted to see if having a defensive minded coach, who hands over the offense to an OC, would be the key to long-term success here. We've never really tried that. Perhaps that's what makes our team the best over the long haul. We're always going to have elite defensive players at MSU, so the way I see it, let's maximize our strengths and at least make our historical weakness average. I mean really, that's all Mullen has really done. Our offense isn't special, it's ground and pound spread. Our defense is what's going to make our team, and Mullen has always handed that off completely to the DC.

I think you've got your conclusion completely backwards. We're always going to have it easier recruiting elite defensive players, so we can afford to deal with the semi-regular losses of DC's to head coaching jobs. We'll always be a desirable job and will generally have the personnel to let a DC implement his own scheme, although we may not always have a NT to allow a 3-4. Still, if the best guy for the job runs a different scheme from us, it probably won't cost us a season trying to adjust to a new scheme.

On offense, unless we have a guy establish himself as an offensive/qb coach, QB will be the position taht is the hardest for us to consistently recruit, which then impacts WR recruiting also. We finally have a good QB situation because we have an offensive coach that has been here long enough to establish you will get better as a qb here. None of our QB's on the roster or verbally committed are from in state. I would say that Dak and Williams are the only ones within our natural recruiting sphere, and even then, the only reason we got Dak is because we found him early and he's the kind of guy to stick with a commitment. If an OC was responsible for offense, the good scenario is that he's good enough we lose him to a HC job somewhere else, which means we'd have a lot of uncertainty for our QB recruits to deal with. We'd likely be asking out of state qb's to come here knowing there is a better than good chance their main coach won't even be here when they start playing, and there's a decent chance they won't even have the same scheme.

And then I think it'd be harder to maintain consistency on offense. I'd much rather have a team dealing with changing the scheme on defense than on offense. Our players seem pretty smart now, but that's not always going to be the case and I don't want to spend an entire season without having a full playbook installed on offense.

[Goat Holder]

I think you've got your conclusion completely backwards. We're always going to have it easier recruiting elite defensive players, so we can afford to deal with the semi-regular losses of DC's to head coaching jobs. We'll always be a desirable job and will generally have the personnel to let a DC implement his own scheme, although we may not always have a NT to allow a 3-4. Still, if the best guy for the job runs a different scheme from us, it probably won't cost us a season trying to adjust to a new scheme.

I used to think this way, until I thought a little bit more about it. If you go back and look at our history, all of our best teams were built on defense. Now take someone like Florida.....all their success was built on offense. Therefore, their location and talent lends itself to offensive coaches. Ours is defense. That's just history. I understand your POV and as I said, I used to think this way. But when I looked at it in the macro sense, I'm leaning toward defense.


On offense, unless we have a guy establish himself as an offensive/qb coach, QB will be the position taht is the hardest for us to consistently recruit, which then impacts WR recruiting also. We finally have a good QB situation because we have an offensive coach that has been here long enough to establish you will get better as a qb here. None of our QB's on the roster or verbally committed are from in state. I would say that Dak and Williams are the only ones within our natural recruiting sphere, and even then, the only reason we got Dak is because we found him early and he's the kind of guy to stick with a commitment. If an OC was responsible for offense, the good scenario is that he's good enough we lose him to a HC job somewhere else, which means we'd have a lot of uncertainty for our QB recruits to deal with. We'd likely be asking out of state qb's to come here knowing there is a better than good chance their main coach won't even be here when they start playing, and there's a decent chance they won't even have the same scheme.

This would seem to be true, but is it really? All I'm saying is that I'm open to the possibility.


And then I think it'd be harder to maintain consistency on offense. I'd much rather have a team dealing with changing the scheme on defense than on offense. Our players seem pretty smart now, but that's not always going to be the case and I don't want to spend an entire season without having a full playbook installed on offense.

Eh, I think that's overrated. Obviously you don't want to change coordinators every year though, I get that.

[War Machine Dawg]

....and it's possible, with Florida, Michigan and other openings possibly being available this off-season.

The question is, who's on our short list and who do we ultimately hire? All signs point to Hudspeth, and yes he's the MS guy with the recrootin ties to Louisiana. Seems like a slam dunk. Especially if he wins 10 games himself this year.

But I'm a big believer in promoting from within if you've got a good thing going. It doesn't always work, but it also helps to choose the right guy. Shaw at Stanford was the right guy, Joker at Kentucky wasn't. Wouldn't it be a good idea to give Geoff Collins a shot at it? He may be able to keep some of our current staff, plus keep the momentum going. I've also wanted to see if having a defensive minded coach, who hands over the offense to an OC, would be the key to long-term success here. We've never really tried that. Perhaps that's what makes our team the best over the long haul. We're always going to have elite defensive players at MSU, so the way I see it, let's maximize our strengths and at least make our historical weakness average. I mean really, that's all Mullen has really done. Our offense isn't special, it's ground and pound spread. Our defense is what's going to make our team, and Mullen has always handed that off completely to the DC.

You are a blithering idiot. What good does it do to start this thread? I don't see Mullen leaving any time soon, barring Penn State becoming available. We're about to be a $100M a year athletic department, so we can pay the man competitively with almost everyone not named Texas. And it's an SEC job, meaning there are almost none more prominent. This whole idea he'll leave for a "big boy" is counterproductive, easily used against us by BearShark readers/trolls, and a classic exercise of Poor Ol' MSU mentality. We are a ****ing Big Boy. Get that through your bi-polar skull.

[Goat Holder]

Mullen wants a statue built of him somewhere- he ain't leaving now that he has finally gotten things the way he wants them. He loves the job security and being "the guy" that is the best State coach we have had

In that case, you, Greenhead Dawg and Preachermatt could have stopped reading after, "Hypothetical: Let's assume we go 10-2 and Mullen jumps ship......"

[Goat Holder]

You are a blithering idiot. What good does it do to start this thread? I don't see Mullen leaving any time soon, barring Penn State becoming available. We're about to be a $100M a year athletic department, so we can pay the man competitively with almost everyone not named Texas. And it's an SEC job, meaning there are almost none more prominent. This whole idea he'll leave for a "big boy" is counterproductive, easily used against us by BearShark readers/trolls, and a classic exercise of Poor Ol' MSU mentality. We are a ****ing Big Boy. Get that through your bi-polar skull.

OMG lulz 111!!

[CadaverDawg]

We would have our pick of any coach outside of the power 5, including Hud. And probably several coaches that are IN the Power 5 but want in the SEC. Hud would get over his issues with Scott to be in the SEC. We're a big boy now...we are finally in a position of strength. I don't think Mullen will leave, and if he did, we would have zero issues finding a great replacement.

[Alldawg]

[QUOTE=Goat Holder;230280]I used to think this way, until I thought a little bit more about it. If you go back and look at our history, all of our best teams were built on defense. Now take someone like Florida.....all their success was built on offense. Therefore, their location and talent lends itself to offensive coaches. Ours is defense. That's just history. I understand your POV and as I said, I used to think this way. But when I looked at it in the macro sense, I'm leaning toward defense.



Florida may not have been the best example for you to use. Seeing is how they won titles with Offensive minded coaches and are "known" for being an offensive school. Zook and Muschamp are defensive coaches and it looks like they may have the same fate after this season.

[Johnson85]

I used to think this way, until I thought a little bit more about it. If you go back and look at our history, all of our best teams were built on defense. Now take someone like Florida.....all their success was built on offense. Therefore, their location and talent lends itself to offensive coaches. Ours is defense. That's just history. I understand your POV and as I said, I used to think this way. But when I looked at it in the macro sense, I'm leaning toward defense.




This would seem to be true, but is it really? All I'm saying is that I'm open to the possibility.



Eh, I think that's overrated. Obviously you don't want to change coordinators every year though, I get that.

Our best teams were built on defense, but was that due to the HC or DC? I understand focusing on your strengths, but it seems like we are going to have years with stellar defenses regardless and that if we can get a consistently solid offense, we are gonig to have some good years, with special years where our defense peaks when our SOS dips (which I hope is what is going to happen this year). Don't remember much before really the late 90's teams, but as good as our defense was at times, I'm not sure how those teams do in today's SEC West, where LSU and Bama are better versions of those teams (stout D and ball control O), Auburn is always going to put points on the board, and there aren't really any incompetent teams.

I might woudl change my mind if I thought we had a good chance of getting comebody that was a solid OC and content to remain an OC, but I'm just not sure how likely that is. Or maybe our experience with DC's has skewed my perspective on how long you can keep coordinators generally. What is the average tenure at one school for an OC when the school is having successful seasons? If we were losing OC's every 4 or 5 years, that'd be completely different. But I'm worried we'll lose our good OC's after two years and keep the mediocre 4, and have bad ones for 2.

[Goat Holder]

Florida may not have been the best example for you to use. Seeing is how they won titles with Offensive minded coaches and are "known" for being an offensive school. Zook and Muschamp are defensive coaches and it looks like they may have the same fate after this season.
Florida is an excellent example. Their strength is offense. They have always had excellent offensive talent due to their talent pool. We are the complete opposite. We have better access to defensive types. Zook and Muschamp prove my point even further.....if you get away from your strengths, you fail.

[Goat Holder]

Our best teams were built on defense, but was that due to the HC or DC? I understand focusing on your strengths, but it seems like we are going to have years with stellar defenses regardless and that if we can get a consistently solid offense, we are gonig to have some good years, with special years where our defense peaks when our SOS dips (which I hope is what is going to happen this year). Don't remember much before really the late 90's teams, but as good as our defense was at times, I'm not sure how those teams do in today's SEC West, where LSU and Bama are better versions of those teams (stout D and ball control O), Auburn is always going to put points on the board, and there aren't really any incompetent teams.

Good point on the modern day SECW, but over time, who knows if it's just a blip or permanent change. And we've seen how crappy our DCs can be, and how many games they can cost us. Mullen's best teams were 2010 and 2013, based on defense. 2009 could have been much better had Torbush not been a dumbf*ck. Chris Wilson, need I say more.


I might woudl change my mind if I thought we had a good chance of getting comebody that was a solid OC and content to remain an OC, but I'm just not sure how likely that is. Or maybe our experience with DC's has skewed my perspective on how long you can keep coordinators generally. What is the average tenure at one school for an OC when the school is having successful seasons? If we were losing OC's every 4 or 5 years, that'd be completely different. But I'm worried we'll lose our good OC's after two years and keep the mediocre 4, and have bad ones for 2.

That would be a major concern of mine too. But like I said before, as long as we have that elite defense, all we are looking for is average on offense. I guess my point is that it would be easier to maintain an elite defense and a decent offense, than what we are doing now. However if Mullen goes 10-2, it might be HIS blueprint that works. However, I think that record would be because of our D personally.

[ShotgunDawg]

I'm ok with either an offensive or defensive head coach, so long as the head coach makes a good coordinator hire on the other side and gets the heck out of the way.

[Political Hack]

I actually, for a second, thought I missed Goat while he was gone...

[ScoobaDawg]

You are a blithering idiot. What good does it do to start this thread? I don't see Mullen leaving any time soon, barring Penn State becoming available. We're about to be a $100M a year athletic department, so we can pay the man competitively with almost everyone not named Texas. And it's an SEC job, meaning there are almost none more prominent. This whole idea he'll leave for a "big boy" is counterproductive, easily used against us by BearShark readers/trolls, and a classic exercise of Poor Ol' MSU mentality. We are a ****ing Big Boy. Get that through your bi-polar skull.

Does it really surprise you.. It s f*cking goat.. little minded MSU. Oh we have a great year mullen leaves.
Oh the sky might fall.


and goat yes they and I could of stopped reading but you could of stopped typing also.

[ScoobaDawg]

I actually, for a second, thought I missed Goat while he was gone...

he is never gone... one of his other personas is always lurking. For someone to have SO MUCH TIME and Determination to be on MSU sites to keep creating new usernames. Well.. I'll let anyone draw their own conclusions.

[Johnson85]

Good point on the modern day SECW, but over time, who knows if it's just a blip or permanent change. And we've seen how crappy our DCs can be, and how many games they can cost us. Mullen's best teams were 2010 and 2013, based on defense. 2009 could have been much better had Torbush not been a dumbf*ck. Chris Wilson, need I say more. Mullen's best teams were built on defense, but I'd argue we've had 3 DC's that are at best mediocre. Even with that, we went bowling every year but one, and still had a good defense with Diaz and one pretty decent defense with Wilson. And even with Wilson, although he completely shit the bed in the second half against Ole Miss, we would have been in a good position at half time if our offense had performed. In contrast, when we had a good DC and a shitty OC during Crooms tenure, we were awful most years and got to 7 wins when we had an Auburn type horseshoe up the ass season.



That would be a major concern of mine too. But like I said before, as long as we have that elite defense, all we are looking for is average on offense. I guess my point is that it would be easier to maintain an elite defense and a decent offense, than what we are doing now. However if Mullen goes 10-2, it might be HIS blueprint that works. However, I think that record would be because of our D personally.

If we go 10-2, it will definitely be because of our D, but I think that shows we can have an elite D by turning over our defense to a coordinator. Whereas to my knowledge we've only been decent on offense with an offensive head coach, and it's still taken Mullen several years to build his team, assuming we have finally turned a corner now that he has QB's and other personnel to match what he wants to do.

It doesn't really matter what the specialty of your head coach is if you hire the right coordinator opposite them, but based on the last few years, I'd be much more comfortable rolling the dice on defense every few years than offense.

[Goat Holder]

he is never gone... one of his other personas is always lurking. For someone to have SO MUCH TIME and Determination to be on MSU sites to keep creating new usernames. Well.. I'll let anyone draw their own conclusions.

I'm sorry pal, but you have some serious sand in your ******. You're a damn moderator, I'm pretty sure you spend a lot more time on the interwebs than I do. I've met one of you 'internet-cool' sports site moderator guys before in real life, you're not the all-respected deities that you attempt to portray. We all know this though, I just thought I'd remind you.

Get over it, this thread isn't hurting MSU at all. It's actually pumping up Geoff Collins.

[MarketingBully01]

Only team I could see us losing him to would be Florida that's about it. He isn't leaving the SEC. Not with the advantages coaches have in the SEC now a days.

[Goat Holder]

Only team I could see us losing him to would be Florida that's about it. He isn't leaving the SEC. Not with the advantages coaches have in the SEC now a days.

The thread is not about Mullen.

[ScoobaDawg]

T- Minus 6 hours till he is back under another name...and no I didnt ban him.

Ah IT IS almost the start of football season.

[ScoobaDawg]

The thread is not about Mullen.

It's completely about MULLEN, If he doesnt leave...which HE WON'T. then you you don't have shit to discuss here. FREAKING DOOMSDAY SCENARIO Thinker..

[Political Hack]

T- Minus 6 hours till he is back under another name...and no I didnt ban him.

Ah IT IS almost the start of football season.

I'll take credit for that one. IP ban coming soon...

[War Machine Dawg]

I'll take credit for that one. IP ban coming soon...

I was wondering why this hasn't been done already.

http://i.imgur.com/Zz5kJVY.gif

[Dawgcentral]

Here's my take:

Mullen's making 3 Million a year or more (I guess). If he takes the program where he seems to believe he can, to Atlanta and beyond, he'll have earned a raise to close to 4 to 4.5 million a year.

He's a workaholic, and he has access to an MSU plane and helicopter that can whisk him off to any tropical destination he and Megan desire to see during they're limited time away. He has a vacation home out of state that he can get away to anytime he can afford the time. Megan has said she appreciates being able to go the the local grocery on Sunday even after a loss and not receive dirty looks, (like she probably did in Florida).

How long are we going to hang our heads thinking Starkville is such a bad place to spend the rest of your life/career, when someone with the means to travel can escape at times,...just like people do when they live in godforsaken places with larger populations?

Hell, I'd love to retire in Starkville. Always something going on that I could find an interest in. And I'd have the peace and quiet when I wanted and needed it.

[preachermatt83]

I'll take credit for that one. IP ban coming soon...

nah, I wouldn't go that far. I don't care for some of Goat's stuff but don't think he has done anything worthy of total bannation. that should be reserved mainly for Bears.

[Churchill]

Anybody else remember Curley Hallman cashing in on a young QB named Favre. Kid made him look like a coaching prodigy....well at least to the geniuses at LSU. Dak has the ability to make Dan look really good...just sayin....