Interesting that as I look around and listen to different sports talk that...

[maroonmania]

even though the MSU-Auburn spread is a TD or less I really can't find ANYONE outside the MSU fanbase that believes MSU has a shot at winning Saturday. I really thought there would be more of a split opinion than there is. Apparently, per the supposed impartial opinions that I am hearing, Auburn is on its way back and our OSU showing just shows that well, MSU is still MSU. Very little respect out there for our program right now. Amazing how far we have fallen in the respect category with college football talking heads since our 7-0 start last year.

[Political Hack]

I blame Strick scheduling OSU... just in case y'all haven't figured that out yet.

[HancockCountyDog]

I blame Strick scheduling OSU... just in case y'all haven't figured that out yet.

Do you not blame Mullen for having a piss poor offensive game plan?

Looking back, do you not think that the game was winnable?

Our defense held them to 21 points. We couldn't score 21+ points against a Big XII team? I mean, its year five, and Mullen should get a decent bit of the blame for not being able to score like HD6 on prom night.

[Political Hack]

definitely. CDM deserves a lot of blame for the performance, but I would've much rather played Alcorn and then Okie State.

We put together the dumbest schedule in the history of modern day SEC football.

[msstate7]

definitely. CDM deserves a lot of blame for the performance, but I would've much rather played Alcorn and then Okie State.

We put together the dumbest schedule in the history of modern day SEC football.

I don't agree. Sure we lost to Oklahoma st but that lost will have us better prepared this week for auburn. We've seen a team better than auburn this year. Auburn hasn't seen a team better than us esp on defense. Marshall is gonna feel heat like he never has in his career sat night

[Barking 13]

Ovie on SEC Gridiron Live picked MSU to win... he's in the lead with his picks between him, Bates, and Couch... I hope that has a good omen..

[HancockCountyDog]

I don't agree. Sure we lost to Oklahoma st but that lost will have us better prepared this week for auburn. We've seen a team better than auburn this year. Auburn hasn't seen a team better than us esp on defense. Marshall is gonna feel heat like he never has in his career sat night

Totally agree.

Also, lets stop acting like scheduling OSU was like scheduling Clemson. That was not a great football team.

[deltadawg99]

It's easy to pick against us because of the OSU game and AU has played 2 sub par teams.

[FISHDAWG]

Couch sucks ... he picks against us just for spite ... last year he picked Jackson State to upset us

[smootness]

We put together the dumbest schedule in the history of modern day SEC football.

Holy crap, you need to get over it. If we win 2 games in 2018, you'll still be blaming the scheduling of Oklahoma St. If we're not good enough to be a bowl team with one good team on our OOC schedule, then who cares about making one anyway.

[FlabLoser]

1) I don't give a shit what outsiders think

2) I'm in "show me" mode. That OL performance was so awful against OSU, I'm not a big believer until they show me they can play. Another lingering question is strategy adjustments to counter whatever 1st Q adjustments the opponent makes.

[FlabLoser]

I blame Strick scheduling OSU... just in case y'all haven't figured that out yet.

Give it a rest. We didn't lose that game because we were overpowered by an elite opponent. We lost that game because the OL sucked and we couldn't or wouldn't counter OSU's defensive adjustments. Choking the redzone was also a factor.

[tcdog70]

Dan does a great job as a head Coach until Game Day. He cannot make adjustments during the game. If His pre-game plan suxs, then we lose. He might be the worst red-zone Coach in the SEC. Has he ever ran a trick play that worked? His refusal to run a simple QB sneak when needing less than a yard pisses me off to no end. He said when we hired Him , that we really didn't need a dominate OL because of His spread offense. All our linemen had to do was screen the defense until he got the ball to the Man with a mismatch which would occur because of His brilliant scheme. I am still waiting to witness this scheme.

[bocfarm]

Holy crap, you need to get over it. If we win 2 games in 2018, you'll still be blaming the scheduling of Oklahoma St. If we're not good enough to be a bowl team with one good team on our OOC schedule, then who cares about making one anyway.


Agreed, you play that game all day long...it's not like we were poised for a national championship run this yr...what exactly are we risking? A trip to Memphis, Nashville or Birmingham? Again, if we can't pull out 6 wins with you we have left on the schedule we don't deserve to go to a shit bowl anyway.

I blame Mullen all day long for a shitty game plan/execution against OSU we could easily won that game if he and Koenning weren't such big ******s and sitting on that huge 3-0 lead

[slickdawg]

It's not that hard to figure out. Talking heads assume that since Gus is back at Auburn, they will be awesome again immediately. What they fail to recognize is that Auburn was left a train wreck from Chizik. Major problems with discipline and several areas thin in talent. Remember, Gene Chizik had to bring in a 3rd party security firm last year to try and help keep players in check. I've got people from Auburn telling me their best DL players are true freshmen, that's not a good thing. 5* stud can't miss QB Frazier is now a safety because a) he's not a good QB and b) they desperately needed athletes in the secondary.

If you look at what each team has an returns, we stand a good chance to win. Our defense is dramatically improved, and if the offense is managed like last week, we will win the game.

[Political Hack]

Give it a rest. We didn't lose that game because we were overpowered by an elite opponent. We lost that game because the OL sucked and we couldn't or wouldn't counter OSU's defensive adjustments. Choking the redzone was also a factor.

I believe I'm the one that said red zone success will determine the game. There's no doubt the game was played on the field... W's and L's all happen on the field. We could've won. We didn't.

Gravedigger has convinced me to quit complaining until we lose again. Hopefully we'll get a few weeks of W's.

[bocfarm]

Its simple, everyone outside of MSU fans, including the media knows DM's record as an underdog, we simply don't win when we're not favored to, specifically on the road

3-21

2 of 3 were OM

[HancockCountyDog]

Its simple, everyone outside of MSU fans, including the media knows DM's record as an underdog, we simply don't win when we're not favored to, specifically on the road

3-21

2 of 3 were OM

Were we really the underdog in 2010 or 2011? I can't imagine we were. I guess it's possible, but somehow I missed that one.

[bocfarm]

Were we really the underdog in 2010 or 2011? I can't imagine we were. I guess it's possible, but somehow I missed that one.

09 & 10...favored in 011

[CooterDavenport]

what exactly are we risking? A trip to Memphis, Nashville or Birmingham?

And about a month of extra practice.

[Barking 13]

It's not that hard to figure out. Talking heads assume that since Gus is back at Auburn, they will be awesome again immediately. What they fail to recognize is that Auburn was left a train wreck from Chizik. Major problems with discipline and several areas thin in talent. Remember, Gene Chizik had to bring in a 3rd party security firm last year to try and help keep players in check. I've got people from Auburn telling me their best DL players are true freshmen, that's not a good thing. 5* stud can't miss QB Frazier is now a safety because a) he's not a good QB and b) they desperately needed athletes in the secondary.

If you look at what each team has an returns, we stand a good chance to win. Our defense is dramatically improved, and if the offense is managed like last week, we will win the game.

and don't forget, they have a bunch of our cull coaches...

[Jack Lambert]

definitely. CDM deserves a lot of blame for the performance, but I would've much rather played Alcorn and then Okie State.

We put together the dumbest schedule in the history of modern day SEC football.

In a way I didn't mind playing them. I just wish it was at home. This going to Houston to play a game was just silly to me. Schedule them on a home and home if you are going to play them. I think schools put themselves out on a limb playing these kick off classic games for no reason. They think it's going to bring reconition to the school but what you get is not worth the risk. I can see USM playing someone like OSU to start or Nebraska in the second game. There is no one in thier conference where MSU has way too many hard games in the SEC to play a school like OSU in Houston. Play that game at home and have eight home games.

[maroonmania]

In a way I didn't mind playing them. I just wish it was at home. This going to Houston to play a game was just silly to me. Schedule them on a home and home if you are going to play them. I think schools put themselves out on a limb playing these kick off classic games for no reason. They think it's going to bring reconition to the school but what you get is not worth the risk. I can see USM playing someone like OSU to start or Nebraska in the second game. There is no one in thier conference where MSU has way too many hard games in the SEC to play a school like OSU in Houston. Play that game at home and have eight home games.

I guess the biggest thing I'm pissed about at the moment is we lost 2 starters for the year in that unnecessary game. I don't know if it was the stadium's artificial turf or just bad luck but we lost our smartest player in the secondary and we all know we don't have enough SEC quality OL to be losing one for the year. I don't know who in the heck we plan to play at RG this Saturday.

[bocfarm]

I guess the biggest thing I'm pissed about at the moment is we lost 2 starters for the year in that unnecessary game. I don't know if it was the stadium's artificial turf or just bad luck but we lost our smartest player in the secondary and we all know we don't have enough SEC quality OL to be losing one for the year. I don't know who in the heck we plan to play at RG this Saturday.

Beckwith

[RougeDawg]

I don't agree. Sure we lost to Oklahoma st but that lost will have us better prepared this week for auburn. We've seen a team better than auburn this year. Auburn hasn't seen a team better than us esp on defense. Marshall is gonna feel heat like he never has in his career sat night

Ding ding ding. We have a winner. The national media shits on us any time the get a chance because nobody on our side fires back. We take it and stay quiet. I say **** them. We can and will win Saturday if our coaches have half a brain. This point is debatable though.

[maroonmania]

Ding ding ding. We have a winner. The national media shits on us any time the get a chance because nobody on our side fires back. We take it and stay quiet. I say **** them. We can and will win Saturday if our coaches have half a brain. This point is debatable though.

Well its always easier to fire back when you actually have ammunition. Right now we don't have much, beating Auburn would finally give us a little.

[Pollodawg]

It's name recognition too, boys. Everybody knows Auburn. It's in Auburn, at night. Their a team that is traditionally mediocre to good. We are a team that's.......not so much. However, that has nothing to do with Saturday. It is all just perception, and perception isn't always reality.

[chef dixon]

As a fan of MSU football, I thought the game against OSU was pretty cool. Why is there more to it than that? Dig deeper and you frustrate yourself = unhealthy

[RougeDawg]

Well its always easier to fire back when you actually have ammunition. Right now we don't have much, beating Auburn would finally give us a little.

I don't recall much positive attention the year we went 9-4 and won Gator Bowl. The media was stuck in the rut of "all the teams we beat must have sucked". You see where I'm going with this?

[smootness]

And about a month of extra practice.

A month of extra practice so we can hopefully beat up on some crap teams and squeak into a bowl the next year again?

Again, if we're good enough that one good OOC game won't be the difference between bowling vs. not bowling, then who cares. And if we need the easy win to get to 6-6 instead of 5-7, who cares.

[smootness]

I don't recall much positive attention the year we went 9-4 and won Gator Bowl. The media was stuck in the rut of "all the teams we beat must have sucked". You see where I'm going with this?

We got plenty of positive press at that time. You must be equating message boards douches with the media. I don't recall much of anybody in the media publicly saying, 'Yeah, but they didn't play anybody'. They may have mentioned that we lost to a bunch of elite teams, but if anything, that was a good thing for us.

Mullen and State were media darlings at one point.

[bluelightstar]

I don't recall much positive attention the year we went 9-4 and won Gator Bowl. The media was stuck in the rut of "all the teams we beat must have sucked". You see where I'm going with this?

Revisionist history. Mullen was the toast of the town, and the media line was State's an awesome team. (Media was even saying State would be playing Oregon if we'd gotten Newton.) That's why we were ranked going into the 2011 season. Mullen was the media's darling. They feel that he's embarrassed them twice since - 2011 and 2012. They aren't biting again.

[bocfarm]

Revisionist history. Mullen was the toast of the town, and the media line was State's an awesome team. (Media was even saying State would be playing Oregon if we'd gotten Newton.) That's why we were ranked going into the 2011 season. Mullen was the media's darling. They feel that he's embarrassed them twice since - 2011 and 2012. They aren't biting again.

Spot on

[Political Hack]

A month of extra practice so we can hopefully beat up on some crap teams and squeak into a bowl the next year again?

Again, if we're good enough that one good OOC game won't be the difference between bowling vs. not bowling, then who cares. And if we need the easy win to get to 6-6 instead of 5-7, who cares.

me. the season being over at Thanksgiving sucks. The extra month of practice to help our team get better, the money, the exposure, the recruiting benefits, the lack of a losing season, attractiveness to coaches, etc...

[smootness]

me. the season being over at Thanksgiving sucks. The extra month of practice to help our team get better, the money, the exposure, the recruiting benefits, the lack of a losing season, attractiveness to coaches, etc...

And my point is, if all it continues to lead to is seasons in which we barely get ourselves bowl-eligible, and only by scheduling complete crap, what good is all this?

It's year 5 of the Mullen era, nigh time we scheduled somebody who could challenge us in the OOC. We didn't play well, maybe that means some things needs to change.

[maroonmania]

me. the season being over at Thanksgiving sucks. The extra month of practice to help our team get better, the money, the exposure, the recruiting benefits, the lack of a losing season, attractiveness to coaches, etc...

I will agree with you on this one. Nothing more depressing than sitting home during bowl season when 6-6 is all that's needed to keep playing especially when you are use to going like we are now. I personally don't in any way shape or form believe the OSU game was worth it if we end up 5-7 and missing a bowl because of it.

[MarketingBully01]

If it makes you feel any better, no one gave us much of a chance last year as well. They had just played Clemson close and their fans and talking heads still thought Auburn would win. The point is at this point in the season nobody knows crap about their team.

[Hypnodawg]

If we suck, the problem isn't that we scheduled too hard. I'd rather stay home than watch us play Alcorn December 19th in the Who Cares bowl.

[bocfarm]

me. the season being over at Thanksgiving sucks. The extra month of practice to help our team get better, the money, the exposure, the recruiting benefits, the lack of a losing season, attractiveness to coaches, etc...

I agree the season being over sucks but just going bowling by beating shit teams also masks a bigger issue ...we are foreced to keep an inadequate coach that can't continue to move the program in the right direction. Plus by playing in the kickoff classic is more than what we would get for playing in a lower tier bowl so the money is a non issue...its shared revenue for all teams in the conference...bowling or not.

[Dawg61]

Scheduling Bowling Green is worse. They are LEGIT. Atleast with OSU we got national exposure, 2.5 million and the ability to see what we suck at so we can fix it. MSU is PAYING a very dangerous team with BGSU. Don't overlook this one fellas.

[bocfarm]

Scheduling Bowling Green is worse. They are LEGIT. Atleast with OSU we got national exposure, 2.5 million and the ability to see what we suck at so we can fix it. MSU is PAYING a very dangerous team with BGSU. Don't overlook this one fellas.

totally agree

[chef dixon]

Scheduling Bowling Green is worse. They are LEGIT. Atleast with OSU we got national exposure, 2.5 million and the ability to see what we suck at so we can fix it. MSU is PAYING a very dangerous team with BGSU. Don't overlook this one fellas.

Come on though. If we are worried about losing to them and stunting our growth as a program, the reality is we aren't gonna get much better. Scheduling ain't your problem if you can't beat Bowling Green.... we better clown them

[Todd4State]

I agree the season being over sucks but just going bowling by beating shit teams also masks a bigger issue ...we are foreced to keep an inadequate coach that can't continue to move the program in the right direction. Plus by playing in the kickoff classic is more than what we would get for playing in a lower tier bowl so the money is a non issue...its shared revenue for all teams in the conference...bowling or not.

Our schedule isn't forcing us to do anything as far as keeping any coaches. We fired Croom one year after taking us to the Liberty Bowl. We just fired our DC after an eight win season. If Dan keeps going 6-6 we certainly can fire him. Unless there's some SEC by law that states that our program has to be a flaming pile of dung before we can make a coaching change.

We can fire Dan for any or no reason if we wanted to.

[Todd4State]

Come on though. If we are worried about losing to them and stunting our growth as a program, the reality is we aren't gonna get much better. Scheduling ain't your problem if you can't beat Bowling Green.... we better clown them

If we're worried about losing to Bowling Green, we probably shouldn't play Oklahoma State.

[cheewgumm]

That ok state loss is gonna be the best thing to happen to us come Saturday.

Thank god we didn't just have the Alcorn game as our barometer before going on the road on the sec.


If we're worried about losing to Bowling Green, we probably shouldn't play Oklahoma State.

[Dawg61]

That ok state loss is gonna be the best thing to happen to us come Saturday.

Thank god we didn't just have the Alcorn game as our barometer before going on the road on the sec.

Exactly! I am starting to think even though we lost to OSU it is going to end up helping this team better in the long run. I expect to see a much improved MSU when we play Auburn. Oh and you guys are seriously under estimating BGSU. They will win the MAC this year and are better than Boise St. This is a more difficult game than Kentucky and Troy maybe Arkansas.

[Todd4State]

That ok state loss is gonna be the best thing to happen to us come Saturday.

Thank god we didn't just have the Alcorn game as our barometer before going on the road on the sec.

You mean like last year where we played Jackson State before whipping Auburn?

[cheewgumm]

Auburn sucked royal ass last year. If they do again we'll beat them regardless.


Are you saying that no previous game helps prepare you far any game later in your schedule?

So playing tough teams does nothing for you? And that no game or experience has any bearing on any future game?


QUOTE=Todd4State;49712]You mean like last year where we played Jackson State before whipping Auburn?[/QUOTE]

[Todd4State]

Auburn sucked royal ass last year. If they do again we'll beat them regardless.


Are you saying that no previous game helps prepare you far any game later in your schedule?

So playing tough teams does nothing for you? And that no game or experience has any bearing on any future game?


QUOTE=Todd4State;49712]You mean like last year where we played Jackson State before whipping Auburn?[/QUOTE]

Auburn didn't know that they sucked until we beat them down. In fact, ironically enough Auburn had just lost a Kickoff Classic Game to a Clemson team that would go on to finish 11-2 by one touchdown the week before playing us. Based upon your theory, they should have beaten us and been more prepared for us since we had played lowly Jackson State the week before. We destroyed them.

It depends on who you are. If you are Alabama, it makes sense. If you are trying to build a program and you are in the SEC and already playing Alabama, LSU, South Carolina, Texas A&M, and have a rivalry game with Ole Miss it doesn't make sense at all.

Actually, we gain more by playing easier opponents because then we can play more players and rest starters- thus again helping us prepare for more difficult opponents. See the fact that Russell, Malone, and Hughes all got hurt playing our tough opponent so our coaches could "see how bad we are" paraphrased. Let's not act like our guys have never played at Alabama or LSU before. The question should be what do we get more out of - playing Oklahoma State or North Texas at home? The answer is North Texas.

In fact, if you notice there were plenty of people on here complaining about our o-line after the Alcorn game. Again, if the coaches can't see the problems that we have no matter who the opponent is, then there is nothing we can do about that other than terminate them. That is incompetence on their part, and to suggest that playing Oklahoma State is going to somehow make them "see it" is absurd. It's also absurd to suggest that we have to somehow sabotage the coaches so that we can fire them. Most coaches even in high school would have used our schedule wisely, much less college- but Dan did not, and that is water under the bridge at this point.

But you know what? That's probably part of why Dan is on the hot seat with some fans. Because he doesn't take advantage of the situation all the time. But we didn't have to play Notre Dame to figure that out.

And I'll finish with this- I think the biggest thing that you need to have in football to succeed is confidence. And losing kills that. It's a LOT easier to fix and correct things after a win- no matter the level of the opponent- than a loss.

[SPMT]

Why should anyone respect our program when they looked so ****ing awful over the last 3 games before Alcorn. Awful as in some of the worst I've seen in last 10 years. Croome effort and execution.

[Bully13]

even though the MSU-Auburn spread is a TD or less I really can't find ANYONE outside the MSU fanbase that believes MSU has a shot at winning Saturday. I really thought there would be more of a split opinion than there is. Apparently, per the supposed impartial opinions that I am hearing, Auburn is on its way back and our OSU showing just shows that well, MSU is still MSU. Very little respect out there for our program right now. Amazing how far we have fallen in the respect category with college football talking heads since our 7-0 start last year.

Because we have sucked since 7-0. We have no ol. Mullen is croomin us with hevesy. The sheep will find out what 5 yrs of inept ol crootin will do to a program after au embarasses us sat. Blaming it all on play calling is wrong.

[TheRef]

Because we have sucked since 7-0. We have no ol. Mullen is croomin us with hevesy. The sheep will find out what 5 yrs of inept ol crootin will do to a program after au embarasses us sat. Blaming it all on play calling is wrong.

Someone doesn't think we have a chance against AU. I'm not saying that we should be favored. I'm not saying that it should be a toss-up. All I'm saying is that I still have a little bit of hope tucked away that we can beat Auburn. I know that the OSU game is still fresh in our minds. But we have to move on. That's football. Erase what happened last time and move on to our next opponent. I know it's cliche to say, but it's true. Now, will I be disappointed if we lose to Auburn? Of course, what fan wouldn't? Will I be ecstatic if we beat Auburn? Once again, what fan wouldn't? Now I'm quite interested to feel the pulse of the board once this game is over with. Does everyone forget the OSU game and move on? Or are we still going to drag that around with us and say "SEE! This game is why we suck!" I'm not advocating that we all put our maroon sunglasses on and drink the maroon kool-aid, but come on. An attitude like that is poison to a fanbase.

[cheewgumm]

If we schedule 7 wins we are gonna get 7 wins . It's not going to make u magically better by having 7 wins against crappy Teams. I'll grant that bowls help recruiting but damn near every sec team goes to a bowl. What would help more is having a team Capable of beating ok state... Not "not scheduling" them so we can get win number 7.

Also it makes your fan base keep a crappy coach longer than that should. I'm not saying Dan is crappy as I think he will turn things around.

There is value on putting pressure on your coach and program to win against real teams and yes we did see things against ok state that we never would have seen against Alcorn. You can say " we'll the coaching staff should see those things against Alcorn and change them or we fire them." That's true but it's not the way life works.

Coaches change because they have to because they are pressured to by fans getting fed up. If we " schedule" 7 wins every year fans are a lot less likely to get fed up. And we'll have 7 wins and be 5 th in the west.

We will have to agree to disagree on this.

[Barking 13]

but everybody seems to overlook the fact that we actually have the talent to have won that game.. we just weren't prepared. That's not scheduling, that's the coaching. What if they had come out and played like they are capable of? We'd be "Ole Missing" right now and thinking we are headed for the NC...

[cheewgumm]

I agree.

[maroonmania]

That ok state loss is gonna be the best thing to happen to us come Saturday.

Thank god we didn't just have the Alcorn game as our barometer before going on the road on the sec.

That is a big leap of faith. We have no clue what effect that OSU game will have with this team this year. I mean did the AL loss last year help any in preparing for TA&M last year? That was a big fat no. The loss to OSU could help us correct some things to make us better OR it could just mean that we go into Auburn with no confidence and get our tails kicked. Not really sure how much confidence is left with a team that has lost by double digits in the last 6 meaningful games its played. Guess we will find out Saturday night.