Brian Hadad is in a heated Twitter debate....

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Making MSU a consistent 8 game winner would be a stupendous achievement. It?s amazing how everyone on most MSU boards always harps on being realistic, yet can never bring themselves to accept this FACT.

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Originally Posted by Liverpooldawg

Making MSU a consistent 8 game winner would be a stupendous achievement. It?s amazing how everyone on most MSU boards always harps on being realistic, yet can never bring themselves to accept this FACT.

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We're a consistent 8 game winner right now. If you average out our wins and assuming we win 8 this year the average comes out to 8 since 2014. And I think someone the other day said if we win 8 this year Dan would average 8 wins for his career which sounds about right to me.

That's also why it makes no sense to me to say that we can't improve above what we are now when essentially all we have to do is recruit a couple of position groups slightly better than we are now. Position groups that we have recruited reasonably well in the past before Dan and in some cases during Dan's time here.

It would be like Cann not recruiting any pitching and me saying that a SR is the best we could do when logically if we improved pitching we could go to Omaha more consistently.

We have to stop using our history as a crutch to define our ceiling and excuse issues that the coaching staff may have or had in the past. We need to start looking instead at the current situation and the framework of what we are now at this point in the present rather than what we were 30 years ago. The SEC has changed, college football has changed and MSU has changed. Things favor us more now than any other time in our program's history. And it's only going to take some small improvements to make it that much better.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

We're a consistent 8 game winner right now. If you average out our wins and assuming we win 8 this year the average comes out to 8 since 2014. And I think someone the other day said if we win 8 this year Dan would average 8 wins for his career which sounds about right to me.

That's also why it makes no sense to me to say that we can't improve above what we are now when essentially all we have to do is recruit a couple of position groups slightly better than we are now. Position groups that we have recruited reasonably well in the past before Dan and in some cases during Dan's time here.

It would be like Cann not recruiting any pitching and me saying that a SR is the best we could do when logically if we improved pitching we could go to Omaha more consistently.

We have to stop using our history as a crutch to define our ceiling and excuse issues that the coaching staff may have or had in the past. We need to start looking instead at the current situation and the framework of what we are now at this point in the present rather than what we were 30 years ago. The SEC has changed, college football has changed and MSU has changed. Things favor us more now than any other time in our program's history. And it's only going to take some small improvements to make it that much better.

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No we aren’t. We have averaged that since 2014 but that doesn't make you a consistant 8 game winner. Do over a couple of decades and then you are getting there. Who in the heck is using history as a crutch? If you don’t know where you have been you don’t know where you are. That’s the problem a lot of MSU people have, they won’t recognize where we have been so they don’t know where we are. What they are doing is trying to measure us by other people's History. That’s a recipe for frustration and eventual disaster. It’s what has killed MSU for 70 years.

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Originally Posted by Hasu Dackds

Not much we can do in our current state to produce a program any better than that.

Like I've said many times, we need serious population growth in MS. We need more fans. We need more money. We need whatever the secret sauce is that makes your program most attractive to good football players. We've done it in baseball. The only thing I can think of is that it takes a much bigger commitment to succeed in football.

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Dan is 99% of the reason Starkville has grown as much as it has in the last 7-8 years. It makes me laugh when people talk about how much he is paid. He has brought tenfold the amount of money we pay him a year to Starkville and I assure you it isn't because of the academics(not a knock on our school just truth).

At this point we are not a consistent 8 win team but we are on the cusp of having an unimaginable run for the next five years.

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Originally Posted by CadaverDawg

Saying MSU has hit its ceiling by becoming a pretty regular 8 game winner. That we'll never consistently become a 9-10 win team.

Agree? Disagree?

Should MSU fans be happy and content? Is it wrong for MSU fans to want to take another step?

Thoughts?

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Georgia has probably been the closest. Not Auburn. Not LSU. Not Tennessee. Not A&M. Not Florida. Certainly not Arkansas, Ole Miss, Missouri, and South Carolina.

I think the advantage MSU has is the JUCOs in the State. We need to really utilize that advantage. I see nothing wrong with bringing in a JUCO and red-shirting Him if He is not ready. Hell , we red-shirt HS players--what's the difference. The OL and Wrs are 2 areas that JUCO players can really help us. We have had great success with corner back recruiting from JUCO. I watch Scooba play every game and I have to believe there has been WRs the past few years that are better than what we have now. ICC has one I think is better than Guidry. When Gray played at CO_LIN they were several that were better than Him. i would like to see 6-7 JUCOs every year.

Try this on for size -
The only SEC school with 100 wins over the past 10 years is Alabama.

So, a coach averaging 8 wins a year - who twice has won 9 and had a 10 win season puts us right on the cusp of being as good as any other team in the conference other than the perpetual machine of Saban.

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Originally Posted by BrunswickDawg

Try this on for size -
The only SEC school with 100 wins over the past 10 years is Alabama.

So, a coach averaging 8 wins a year - who twice has won 9 and had a 10 win season puts us right on the cusp of being as good as any other team in the conference other than the perpetual machine of Saban.

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Perspective! Great post!

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Originally Posted by BrunswickDawg

Try this on for size -
The only SEC school with 100 wins over the past 10 years is Alabama.

So, a coach averaging 8 wins a year - who twice has won 9 and had a 10 win season puts us right on the cusp of being as good as any other team in the conference other than the perpetual machine of Saban.

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This.

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Originally Posted by BrunswickDawg

Try this on for size -
The only SEC school with 100 wins over the past 10 years is Alabama.

So, a coach averaging 8 wins a year - who twice has won 9 and had a 10 win season puts us right on the cusp of being as good as any other team in the conference other than the perpetual machine of Saban.

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This is what I'm talking about. Some are trying to judge us by Alabama under Saban. That is a recipe for frustration and disaster.

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Originally Posted by Liverpooldawg

No we aren’t. We have averaged that since 2014 but that doesn't make you a consistant 8 game winner. Do over a couple of decades and then you are getting there. Who in the heck is using history as a crutch? If you don’t know where you have been you don’t know where you are. That’s the problem a lot of MSU people have, they won’t recognize where we have been so they don’t know where we are. What they are doing is trying to measure us by other people's History. That’s a recipe for frustration and eventual disaster. It’s what has killed MSU for 70 years.

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Since 2009 we have averaged 7.6 wins a year. Add in Croom's last two years and it drops to 7.3. So yeah- we're a consistent 8 win team right now.

You use history as a reason for why we can't do something. Instead of looking at the mistakes and correcting them.

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Originally Posted by BrunswickDawg

Try this on for size -
The only SEC school with 100 wins over the past 10 years is Alabama.

So, a coach averaging 8 wins a year - who twice has won 9 and had a 10 win season puts us right on the cusp of being as good as any other team in the conference other than the perpetual machine of Saban.

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Exactly. And if we improve our recruiting just a little bit we can take that next step. Exciting to think about. And again why people who say that we won't ever be anything more than an 8 win team sound ridiculous to me.

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Originally Posted by Liverpooldawg

This is what I'm talking about. Some are trying to judge us by Alabama under Saban. That is a recipe for frustration and disaster.

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Not really. 10 wins a year might get you fired at Alabama.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Since 2009 we have averaged 7.6 wins a year. Add in Croom's last two years and it drops to 7.3. So yeah- we're a consistent 8 win team right now.

You use history as a reason for why we can't do something. Instead of looking at the mistakes and correcting them.

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That not even a decade.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Exactly. And if we improve our recruiting just a little bit we can take that next step. Exciting to think about. And again why people who say that we won't ever be anything more than an 8 win team sound ridiculous to me.

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You missed his point, entirely.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Not really. 10 wins a year might get you fired at Alabama.

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Again, you missed the point. We aren't Bama.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Not really. 10 wins a year might get you fired at Alabama.

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Yeah its the reason Saban has said a win now is more of a relief than a joy, because if you lose 1 game people think you suck.

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Originally Posted by confucius say

No, he said never be a 10-11 game winner a year consistently. From listening to Brian every day, I think he would tell you 9 a year average is possible though not likely, but 8 is good. I agree.

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My apologies, He did say 10-11, not 9-10, which makes a difference. I thought he said 9-10.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Not really. 10 wins a year might get you fired at Alabama.

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Alabama's next coach will be filling shoes the size of the Grand Canyon.

Speaking of Saban, I heard him say during an interview that when he accepted the Alabama job, he told Mal Moore (AD), flying back on the plane from Miami to Tuscaloosa, that he may not have hired the greatest football coach, but he assured him that nobody would out-recruit him.
I think that is Mullen's primary problem. He does not emphasize recruiting enough, except for his QB signees. He keeps an OL coach out of friendship who is clearly not getting the job done, and he is content with lazy recruiting by his other coaches.
I've heard a lot of people say you can't recruit top talent to Starkville. I don't think Tuscaloosa is any better town than Starkville, so how does Saban do it? Answer-he works his butt off.

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Originally Posted by CadaverDawg

My apologies, He did say 10-11, not 9-10, which makes a difference. I thought he said 9-10.

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Dang it, man, you let us down! Off with your head*********

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Originally Posted by NCDawg

Speaking of Saban, I heard him say during an interview that when he accepted the Alabama job, he told Mal Moore (AD), flying back on the plane from Miami to Tuscaloosa, that he may not hired the greatest football coach, but he assured him that nobody would our-recruit him.
I think that is Mullen's primary problem. He does not emphasize recruiting enough, except for his QB signees. He keeps an OL coach out of friendship and who is obviously is not getting the job done, and he is content with lazy recruiting by his other coaches.
I've heard a lot of people say you can't recruit top talent to Starkville. I don't think Tuscaloosa is any better town than Starkville, so how does Saban do it? Answer-he works his butt off.

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Agree he does, however, he wasn't this great recruiter until he left east Lansing. The job one has does make a difference. 34-24-1 at mich st. In 5 years.

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Originally Posted by Homedawg

Agree he does, however, he wasn't this great recruiter until he left east Lansing. The job one has does make a difference. 34-24-1 at mich st. In 5 years.

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Yep. Good point. The resources Saban has is just a tad more than Dan has. Doesn't Saban have about 100 analysts and consultant types that do a lot of the leg work for him?

ETA Not saying Dan can't do better but it's not quite the apples to apples as it appears.

So let's say some MSU grad is a billionaire, and tells Keenum here is a check for $100M, I want MSU to compete. Where does that money need to go immediately to bump us up? Because if it is just to pay the same assistant coaches more money, we would not get better results. Where does the money go?

I don't have a problem with winning 8 regular season games a year with the occasional 10+. I mean, if you put our team into the SEC East over the last 5 years, we would probably have an average of 9 to 10 regular season wins per year. When you play Bama, Auburn, LSU, A&M, and cheating Ole Miss, it's very difficult to go 3-2 in those games. That's assuming that we have easier competition from the East and no top 20 OOC games. If you add in Georgia from the East, you have to go 4-2 against teams that are probably in the top 20. That's just to get to 10-2. We can do that, but to think that we have the reputation and street cred now to pull in the recruits year after year to pull off that 10-2 record with our completion in the West is just wrong. We can get there and I think that we are heading in the right direction.

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Originally Posted by IMissJack

So let's say some MSU grad is a billionaire, and tells Keenum here is a check for $100M, I want MSU to compete. Where does that money need to go immediately to bump us up? Because if it is just to pay the same assistant coaches more money, we would not get better results. Where does the money go?

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It would go to the recruiting budget. We would hire a bunch of extra analysts and recruiting type coaches like Alabama. Other than that the money is not going to help all that much in the W/L column. Lots of factors to include hires/fires would determine that. Just look around at our league at the teams with twice the money of us that we beat regularly.

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Originally Posted by IMissJack

So let's say some MSU grad is a billionaire, and tells Keenum here is a check for $100M, I want MSU to compete. Where does that money need to go immediately to bump us up? Because if it is just to pay the same assistant coaches more money, we would not get better results. Where does the money go?

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A state of the art recruiting war room staffed by as many people as we can twist the NCAA rules to get. They recruit 24/7. They would be in essence PR and marketing for the team.

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Originally Posted by Liverpooldawg

That not even a decade.

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Yeah- it's only 9 years. Enough to get a good idea of where we are and what the results will likely be short term. Want to bet v-cash that we don't win 8 or more this year and next? I also included a couple of Croom's years which take it out to 10- actually 11 to be precise. We're an eight win team now period.

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Originally Posted by Liverpooldawg

Again, you missed the point. We aren't Bama.

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No but they are the gold standard for the SEC. And no one is saying that we should be a 10-12 win type of program that should win National Championships. So none of our fans are comparing us to Alabama.

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Originally Posted by Jarius

It would go to the recruiting budget. We would hire a bunch of extra analysts and recruiting type coaches like Alabama. Other than that the money is not going to help all that much in the W/L column. Lots of factors to include hires/fires would determine that. Just look around at our league at the teams with twice the money of us that we beat regularly.

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That would be the best place to put it. We already have upgraded facilities and are starting to compete better with assistant coaches salaries.

As has been stated, since Dan's arrival at State (09), there has been 3 teams that win 9+ in the SEC on average-Bama, Georgia, and LSU. In the last 5 years since the addition of A&M, same teams average 9+ wins/year. So, yes it is inconceivable that State could ever be more than an 8 win program over the course of an extended period. As currently constructed we will jump up and have a 10 or more win season (I think it's coming in 2018), but then there's always going to be a backdown similar to 2016 where we are at 6/7 wins to average things out. It's just not feasible for State to be a 9+ win program. We don't have the natural resources to do such. Our supporters and talent pool are too poor (relative to rest of league) for us to be at that level. The only thing that can change that is major industry and population booms within the state. That's literally all that could change that. But Mullen is doing awesome work and it's ok to complain and wish utopian thoughts about the program, just setting up the reality.

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Originally Posted by Pipedream

As has been stated, since Dan's arrival at State (09), there has been 3 teams that win 9+ in the SEC on average-Bama, Georgia, and LSU. In the last 5 years since the addition of A&M, same teams average 9+ wins/year. So, yes it is inconceivable that State could ever be more than an 8 win program over the course of an extended period. As currently constructed we will jump up and have a 10 or more win season (I think it's coming in 2018), but then there's always going to be a backdown similar to 2016 where we are at 6/7 wins to average things out. It's just not feasible for State to be a 9+ win program. We don't have the natural resources to do such. Our supporters and talent pool are too poor (relative to rest of league) for us to be at that level. The only thing that can change that is major industry and population booms within the state. That's literally all that could change that. But Mullen is doing awesome work and it's ok to complain and wish utopian thoughts about the program, just setting up the reality.

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Yeah, guess you're probably right. We can wish "utopian thoughts about the program", but in reality we should be satisfied with about 7 or 8 wins and going to some mediocre bowl game. Our supporters and talent pool are too poor, compared to a prosperous state like Alabama, and the rest of the states in the SEC.

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Originally Posted by NCDawg

Speaking of Saban, I heard him say during an interview that when he accepted the Alabama job, he told Mal Moore (AD), flying back on the plane from Miami to Tuscaloosa, that he may not have hired the greatest football coach, but he assured him that nobody would out-recruit him.
I think that is Mullen's primary problem. He does not emphasize recruiting enough, except for his QB signees. He keeps an OL coach out of friendship who is clearly not getting the job done, and he is content with lazy recruiting by his other coaches.
I've heard a lot of people say you can't recruit top talent to Starkville. I don't think Tuscaloosa is any better town than Starkville, so how does Saban do it? Answer-he works his butt off.

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Tuscaloosa is a nicer town than Starkville. Hell, just the simple fact they have all the normal stuff you see in actually well populated places, best buy, target, etc. And not to mention the multiple national championships 9-15 however you count them.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

I bet if you asked MSU fans in 2003 if they thought that MSU could ever become a consistent 8 win team a lot of State fans at that time would have said no and would have been happy to be a 6-7 win team consistently. But here we are pretty much an 8 win program. So, it seems to me I do think it's possible and I think the next logical thing for us to do is become a consistent 8-10 win team. That's the next step for us. Whether we get there or not- I don't know but I think we definitely should try to do everything we can do to get there.

So, how do we do that? I think we have to make recruiting a high priority and make sure that every position is covered. I'll be honest here's what frustrates me right now with Dan- AND NO I DO NOT THINK DAN SHOULD BE FIRED SO NO ONE GO THERE- right now we're basically to me about 2-3 WR's away from maybe being a 5-1 or even 6-0 team. And yes- certainly we could be 4-2 anyway. But there is no question in my mind that if we had filled that one position group we would have at the very least not have been blown out in those two losses. That tells me that we're pretty close from a personnel standpoint. And that's also very encouraging to me. And yes- absolutely if our o-line recruiting was better we would do better in big games as well.

I look at us sort of like the Oakland A's in Moneyball. We can compete and I think we can get to that 10 win level- but we have to do it differently. We have to be on point in recruiting and can't have obvious blunders like no receivers taller than 5'10" for two or three cycles or signing one high school o-lineman in a class. We also have to be on point or ahead of the curve in strength and conditioning as well because it's going to be more difficult for us to build the depth that the bluebloods can. I think we can get a starting group that can compete with them though. I think Dan and Chris Boniol give us an advantage because Dan is an elite QB coach and Boniol is a NFL caliber kicking coach. Those help us level the playing field. We have to also continue to schedule wisely like we are for the most part.

I think being content is kind of a dangerous thing. I think Polk became content- and then things fell apart gradually. That's what usually happens when you become content. I think you should always look for room to improve in whatever you do in life. If we ever win a championship in football, the next thing to do is win another one the next year. It never ends and that's kind of the fun part and challenge for me is that building process or to take on whatever the next challenge is.

I get the impression from reading his stuff on Twitter that he's kind of like- if you don't appreciate what's going on now your never going to be happy. But I think he's also assuming that he's right that it's never going to get any better than 8 wins so why try? I think that's a pretty bad attitude to have.

I don't think it's wrong to want to do better or strive to do better. I don't think it's wrong to be critical of things- that doesn't mean you are unhappy with MSU football or hate Dan or anything like that. It may mean you just want Dan to recruit bigger WR's. That seems pretty realistic, reasonable, and correctable to me. A lot of times being critical just means you are looking to make yourself even better so that you can eventually reach whatever your ceiling is.

I also get the impression that he's making it into if you aren't happy now, then you must want Dan fired. Just because one guy on Twitter thinks Dan should be gone it's not reflective of the entire fan base. Someone did a poll on Twitter about whether they think that Dan should be fired and 96% of the people that responded said no. Our fans can want things to get better and at the same time support Dan and not want to blow the entire thing up.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

True- but to Dan's credit he has changed a LOT of things too.

Better DC.
Better Special teams coach.
Has been better about not blindly playing upperclassmen over more talented underclassmen.
Has improved recruiting by hiring analysts and dumping Sallach his ex-college roommate and may or may not have even had a come to Jesus meeting with Hevesy about recruiting.
Hasn't been openly looking for a job at the end of the year since 2015.

And the few things that aren't fixed right now appear to have solutions on the way by the 2018 season if not sooner- it looks like Couch is going to be playing more the second half of the year.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

I disagree. I think we would be there if we had recruited a couple of taller WR's and developed them with what we already have on the team.

Cheating is out of the question because it's too risky for us.

We're pretty close- this group absolutely kicked a good LSU team's ass. The raw potential is there.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

I look at us right now and I see a probably 8 win team- losses to A&M and Bama probably with what we are currently. We're talking about going from 8 to 9-10 so my hope is that by patching that group up and doing what we are at the other position groups it will help put us over the top and allow us to be more balanced. Improving the WR will allow us to be able to throw the ball more and cause defenses to back out guys in the box which will allow us to run the ball more easily. A better offense will allow the defense to be better and also more aggressive- which helps them too. I guess that's why I don't understand the can't get to 9-10 win people- we're practically at 8 wins now with a glaring deficiency at WR. If we just fix that we should be able to make a jump.

Any advantage we can get is great- but the main thing is we have to patch up the holes in our current recruiting first which I think will take care of most everything else. JUCO's are getting harder to recruit- it keeps getting more and more difficult to get them eligible and Dan wants them in by January.

I think Dan has the right idea of focusing on Mississippi high school talent and building around that. Especially with 10 four star guys in 2019. That and Ole Miss being on probation will help us out a lot. And my hope is that Ole Miss's probation affects them for at least five years. That will allow Dan time to get that much better in recruiting and a good head start on them and hopefully will allow us to clean up the state. Dan's reputation as a QB guru is a place that gives us an advantage- we have two four star QB's recruited for the next two classes. And Boniol is a kicking guru- and it's helped us land an UA AA kicker and an Army AA punter. I'd go into Louisiana to fill out the rest of the gaps. Lots of population and only one SEC school. We can beat out any of the directional Louisiana schools for talent there and we aren't too terribly far from home. Dak also being from Louisiana helps as well.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

We're a consistent 8 game winner right now. If you average out our wins and assuming we win 8 this year the average comes out to 8 since 2014. And I think someone the other day said if we win 8 this year Dan would average 8 wins for his career which sounds about right to me.

That's also why it makes no sense to me to say that we can't improve above what we are now when essentially all we have to do is recruit a couple of position groups slightly better than we are now. Position groups that we have recruited reasonably well in the past before Dan and in some cases during Dan's time here.

It would be like Cann not recruiting any pitching and me saying that a SR is the best we could do when logically if we improved pitching we could go to Omaha more consistently.

We have to stop using our history as a crutch to define our ceiling and excuse issues that the coaching staff may have or had in the past. We need to start looking instead at the current situation and the framework of what we are now at this point in the present rather than what we were 30 years ago. The SEC has changed, college football has changed and MSU has changed. Things favor us more now than any other time in our program's history. And it's only going to take some small improvements to make it that much better.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Since 2009 we have averaged 7.6 wins a year. Add in Croom's last two years and it drops to 7.3. So yeah- we're a consistent 8 win team right now.

You use history as a reason for why we can't do something. Instead of looking at the mistakes and correcting them.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Exactly. And if we improve our recruiting just a little bit we can take that next step. Exciting to think about. And again why people who say that we won't ever be anything more than an 8 win team sound ridiculous to me.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Not really. 10 wins a year might get you fired at Alabama.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Yeah- it's only 9 years. Enough to get a good idea of where we are and what the results will likely be short term. Want to bet v-cash that we don't win 8 or more this year and next? I also included a couple of Croom's years which take it out to 10- actually 11 to be precise. We're an eight win team now period.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

No but they are the gold standard for the SEC. And no one is saying that we should be a 10-12 win type of program that should win National Championships. So none of our fans are comparing us to Alabama.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

That would be the best place to put it. We already have upgraded facilities and are starting to compete better with assistant coaches salaries.

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https://media.cntraveler.com/photos/...rary-Alamy.jpg

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Originally Posted by NCDawg

Yeah, guess you're probably right. We can wish "utopian thoughts about the program", but in reality we should be satisfied with about 7 or 8 wins and going to some mediocre bowl game. Our supporters and talent pool are too poor, compared to a prosperous state like Alabama, and the rest of the states in the SEC.

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Averaging 8 wins/year over a 5-10 year stretch would put you in the top half of the league with the 13th largest budget, smallest populated town, poorest state in the conference. I love the school. I bleed Maroon, but these are just the facts. Check the waiting list on club seats/boxes for Bama games. The sheer number of sidewalk Bama fans could fill our stadium every Saturday. They have almost a hundred years of winning, championship football. The best we can achieve is what we are currently achieving. Win 8/year and when the opportunity presents itself, we have to strike. We almost did it in 2014 and look well positioned to give it another run in 2018. If winning 10 games once every 4 years while hanging around 8/year average doesn't satisfy you, then you're following the wrong school.

There is one other way that we can continue to build toward a more regular occurrence of us being a 9-11 win team (yes I'm going up a notch) - a continued, and long running ineptitude by the 2 other D1 programs in Mississippi. Southern Miss is a complete afterthought now because of CUSA and their facilities. They have dropped from a respectable program to a stepping stone in a very short timeframe. That has helped our in-state recruiting depth. If Ole Miss gets hit hard, makes a Croomtastic hire, and wanders in the woods for the next 5-10 years, it could set us up to close the recruiting gap some. If the Network is neutered and is no longer buying out top talent, those 3-4 players a year could make a huge difference. We may already be seeing that in our next 2 recruiting classes. This year we are dominating the top in-state talent, next year looks good. String together 5-6 straight years of that and it could change the face of our program.

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Originally Posted by Pipedream

Averaging 8 wins/year over a 5-10 year stretch would put you in the top half of the league with the 13th largest budget, smallest populated town, poorest state in the conference. I love the school. I bleed Maroon, but these are just the facts. Check the waiting list on club seats/boxes for Bama games. The sheer number of sidewalk Bama fans could fill our stadium every Saturday. They have almost a hundred years of winning, championship football. The best we can achieve is what we are currently achieving. Win 8/year and when the opportunity presents itself, we have to strike. We almost did it in 2014 and look well positioned to give it another run in 2018. If winning 10 games once every 4 years while hanging around 8/year average doesn't satisfy you, then you're following the wrong school.

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With all due respect to your defeatist opinion, I totally disagree. I realize, however, that we have a lot of fans, probably most of our fans, that think like you do.

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Originally Posted by NCDawg

With all due respect to your defeatist opinion, I totally disagree. I realize, however, that we have a lot of fans, probably most of our fans, that think like you do.

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Label it what you will, but it's realistic and factual. A&M and Florida have budgets almost twice our size with two of the best recruiting bases in the entire country and even they haven't averaged 9 wins/ year the last 5-10 years. No amount of bootstrap pulling on State fans parts is going to change the natural landscape nor demographics of the region.