Giving Croom credit

Not sure why we are discussing this but....

Croom was a good running backs coach. One of the best in the NFL at it and maybe the best at it.


Croom was not a good head coach. I don't think anyone disagrees here.


He gave us something positive when our program was the lowest I have ever seen it in my fan lifetime- 2-10 after 2003 and on probation. One of those wins was a sloppy win over Vanderbilt and a win where Sherrill acted like a complete ass after we beat Memphis.


The 2007 team should get more credit than it does. Yes, they had some timely turnovers and special teams play but THEY did that. They should get credit for that. I have often wondered what that team would have been like if Jackie had redshirted Omarr Conner in 2003 like he should have instead of play him at WR for a few snaps in some what were essentially meaningless games for us because we weren't even going to be bowl eligible.

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Originally Posted by THE Bruce Dickinson

Dixon got a DUI within the first month that Mullen was here. Guess it took a little more time than we thought

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DUI, while being bad and stupid thing to do, is not forgery of US Dollars, shooting, multiple players beating up a cop...etc... But I'm not going to argue with you about.

Croom did a great job with discipline and a great job towards building back up the team. Mullen extended that to higher expectations.

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Originally Posted by drunkernhelldawg

I was there. The negativity toward Croom was unrelenting after the La Tech loss. I'll always believe it was over then. And it's interesting that this loss followed our only winning season of the entire decade, yet the reaction was still what it was. I'll always wonder why that is.

I do think that that the athletic department started Croom off on the wrong foot with that "the only color that matters" bullshit. It was a mistake for us to feed the racial aspect. The proper response is to ignore that as much as possible, history or not. We're a living institution, not a textbook.

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You wonder why the reaction was what it was? We lost to La friggen Tech. The reaction was the same when Dan lost to USA. Stop trying to make something out of nothing. We all know what you?re doing.

Here are the facts:

1. Croom had twice as many players arrested in 5 years as Jackie Wayne did in 13.
2. Croom fell asleep on a recruit's couch
3. Croom lost his job because he would not fire his OC who ran exactly what Croom wanted him to run on offense
4. Croom said he would retire before changing to a Spread Offense (but instead made The Ninja fire him)
5. Croom said he saw on film Maine had as good or better talent than we had
6. Croom said the reason we were losing in 2008 was because the D wasnt scoring as much as they did in 2007
7. Croom said he didnt care if we didnt gain a yard- he was going to line-up and run right at LSU (Nick Saban)
8. Croom rejected Jackie's offer to help him transition at State
9. Croom made Omar Conner- who was built for the Spread- make a thousand reads at QB
10. Croom was a terrible HC period. Some of his former assts still laugh at him and the shit he did. Hearing one of them tell the falling asleep on the couch story while laughing so hard they can barely finish it tells you everything you need to know his time in Sville.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Not sure why we are discussing this but....

Croom was a good running backs coach. One of the best in the NFL at it and maybe the best at it.


Croom was not a good head coach. I don't think anyone disagrees here.


He gave us something positive when our program was the lowest I have ever seen it in my fan lifetime- 2-10 after 2003 and on probation. One of those wins was a sloppy win over Vanderbilt and a win where Sherrill acted like a complete ass after we beat Memphis.


The 2007 team should get more credit than it does. Yes, they had some timely turnovers and special teams play but THEY did that. They should get credit for that. I have often wondered what that team would have been like if Jackie had redshirted Omarr Conner in 2003 like he should have instead of play him at WR for a few snaps in some what were essentially meaningless games for us because we weren't even going to be bowl eligible.

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That's all anybody is saying. Some people it's just either or.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Not sure why we are discussing this but....

Croom was a good running backs coach. One of the best in the NFL at it and maybe the best at it.


Croom was not a good head coach. I don't think anyone disagrees here.


He gave us something positive when our program was the lowest I have ever seen it in my fan lifetime- 2-10 after 2003 and on probation. One of those wins was a sloppy win over Vanderbilt and a win where Sherrill acted like a complete ass after we beat Memphis.


The 2007 team should get more credit than it does. Yes, they had some timely turnovers and special teams play but THEY did that. They should get credit for that. I have often wondered what that team would have been like if Jackie had redshirted Omarr Conner in 2003 like he should have instead of play him at WR for a few snaps in some what were essentially meaningless games for us because we weren't even going to be bowl eligible.

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Except for Dixon and Derek Peguess, I don’t recall a single player from that ‘07 team. Odd.

And, yes, I absolutely blame Jackie for 2001-2003, and I blame Dan for 2016. Jackie had mailed it in by then, and Dan handled the locker room about as poorly as he could’ve to start that season. I don’t just blame Croom for his mistakes.

Croom always saw himself as too good for MSU. He started his tenure mad that Bama didn’t want him and never got over it.

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1. Croom had twice as many players arrested in 5 years as Jackie Wayne did in 13.

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That's what happens when the head coach allows discipline to tank. That's a fact too. JWS did that. We were on probation for what JWS did. Not Croom.

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2. Croom fell asleep on a recruit's couch

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Has zero to do with the topic.

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3. Croom lost his job because he would not fire his OC who ran exactly what Croom wanted him to run on offense
4. Croom said he would retire before changing to a Spread Offense (but instead made The Ninja fire him)

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Has nothing to do with the topic.

In fact, #s 5,6,7,8(which would be stupid of him to allow), 9, 10 have zero to do with the topic. The credit being given to him is from the lack of discipline he inherited along with probation and how he restored that for the next coach.

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Originally Posted by Pollodawg

Croom always saw himself as too good for MSU. He started his tenure mad that Bama didn’t want him and never got over it.

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This and why didn't bama hire him?

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Originally Posted by Coach007

That's what happens when the head coach allows discipline to tank. That's a fact too. JWS did that. We were on probation for what JWS did. Not Croom.



Has zero to do with the topic.



Has nothing to do with the topic.

In fact, #s 5,6,7,8(which would be stupid of him to allow), 9, 10 have zero to do with the topic. The credit being given to him is from the lack of discipline he inherited along with probation and how he restored that for the next coach.

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What you seem to be missing is that kicking players off a team is not a sign of discipline. A disciplined team doesn't have players getting in trouble to begin with. They are in shape. They are motivated to play. Croom had none of those things. He had players counterfeiting $ and shooting up the school. His holdover players talk about how difficult Mullen's training was and they had never worked like that and been in that kind of shape. And Maine, La Tech, 45-0 all show how unmotivated they were. A disciplined team don't have those things happen.

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Originally Posted by BrunswickDawg

What you seem to be missing is that kicking players off a team is not a sign of discipline. A disciplined team doesn't have players getting in trouble to begin with. They are in shape. They are motivated to play. Croom had none of those things. He had players counterfeiting $ and shooting up the school. His holdover players talk about how difficult Mullen's training was and they had never worked like that and been in that kind of shape. And Maine, La Tech, 45-0 all show how unmotivated they were. A disciplined team don't have those things happen.

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I remember watching the 45-0 disaster to UM on TV. I think Chris Relf was 3rd team and was nearly "killed" by the rush when he was put in. TV cut to him on the sideline and some players seemed to be laughing about it. This, in what, year 5. BTW, how hard is it to be a career NFL running back coach. How many of them can you name?

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Originally Posted by Coach007

No. He wasn't lazy. He wasn't ignorant. Yes.. He was stubborn.

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Clueless

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Originally Posted by Coach007

That's what happens when the head coach allows discipline to tank. That's a fact too. JWS did that. We were on probation for what JWS did. Not Croom.



Has zero to do with the topic.



Has nothing to do with the topic.

In fact, #s 5,6,7,8(which would be stupid of him to allow), 9, 10 have zero to do with the topic. The credit being given to him is from the lack of discipline he inherited along with probation and how he restored that for the next coach.

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Just stop. Nothing to do with the topic?? So what does then??? My heavens. Those have everything to do with it!! Everything!!

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Originally Posted by BrunswickDawg

What you seem to be missing is that kicking players off a team is not a sign of discipline. A disciplined team doesn't have players getting in trouble to begin with.

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What you seem to be missing is that we had players getting in trouble and discipline had to start somewhere. That culture, unless you boot everybody off, had built up over 5 years and had to change over time.

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He had players counterfeiting $

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No sir.. That was JWS. Croom just did the dirty work. That happened under JWS. Croom gave him the opportunity to fix the situation and the player failed to do so. So Croom booted him.

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and shooting up the school.

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again, it took time to reverse the culture.

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His holdover players talk about how difficult Mullen's training was and they had never worked like that and been in that kind of shape.

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Awesome.

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And Maine, La Tech, 45-0 all show how unmotivated they were.

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Are we about to go into losses of all our coaches to see who has had an unexpected loss? Like to south Alabama... ETC? At least Croom beat bama. Talk about motivation. Saban lost at bama to ULM.

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Originally Posted by Homedawg

Just stop. Nothing to do with the topic?? So what does then??? My heavens. Those have everything to do with it!! Everything!!

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No.. it doesn't. We are not talking about his overall coaching. We are talking what he, as a HC contributed to the current success. That's cleaning up the program and and install some discipline.

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Originally Posted by Pollodawg

Except for Dixon and Derek Peguess, I don’t recall a single player from that ‘07 team. Odd.

And, yes, I absolutely blame Jackie for 2001-2003, and I blame Dan for 2016. Jackie had mailed it in by then, and Dan handled the locker room about as poorly as he could’ve to start that season. I don’t just blame Croom for his mistakes.

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Originally Posted by Pollodawg

Croom always saw himself as too good for MSU. He started his tenure mad that Bama didn’t want him and never got over it.

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Anthony Johnson, Jamar Cheney, Keith Fitzhugh, KJ Wright, Lance Long among others...

The funny thing is Dan also saw himself as too good for MSU if we're honest with ourselves here.

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Originally Posted by Todd4State

Anthony Johnson, Jamar Cheney, Keith Fitzhugh, KJ Wright, Lance Long among others...

The funny thing is Dan also saw himself as too good for MSU if we're honest with ourselves here.

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Didn't Anthony Johnson get kicked off the team over the gunfight on campus and go to Jackson State? Correct me if I am wrong. Jackie's last couple of years were a total disaster, but I don't remember a gunfight by players on campus.

Croom beat a 6-6 Bama teams. He never beat one that was worth a shit. The Saban team he beat finished 6-6 and didnt have a player drafted that April- the only time that has happened in what- the last 40 years?

Still waiting for an analysis on why bama didn't hire him as their head coach. In the ESPN piece, Croom stated that he was mistreated by them in no uncertain terms.

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Originally Posted by Coach34

Croom beat a 6-6 Bama teams. He never beat one that was worth a shit. The Saban team he beat finished 6-6 and didnt have a player drafted that April- the only time that has happened in what- the last 40 years?

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Croom beat bama 2 times. Back to back.

No it wasn't the only time we beat bama in 40 years. We beat them in 96,97,98, and 2000

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Originally Posted by Coach007

Croom beat bama 2 times. Back to back.

No it wasn't the only time we beat bama in 40 years. We beat them in 96,97,98, and 2000

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Re-read. He stated that the bama team we beat did not have a single player drafted that year in what may have been the 1st time in what 40 years? Those two bama teams were terrible by their standards.

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Originally Posted by Coach007

Croom beat bama 2 times. Back to back.

No it wasn't the only time we beat bama in 40 years. We beat them in 96,97,98, and 2000

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You misunderstand. Both Bama teams Croom beat finished 6-6. They were awful. He never beat a good Bama team. He was extremely fortunate to play Bama in a state of flux

The Nick Saban Bama team he beat didnt have a player drafted that April. I think that may be the only draft in the last 40 years Bama didnt have a player drafted into the NFL. Thats how little talent it had.

Croom is one of the worst HC's in SEC history. He was ******* awful

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Originally Posted by Coach007

What you seem to be missing is that we had players getting in trouble and discipline had to start somewhere. That culture, unless you boot everybody off, had built up over 5 years and had to change over time.



No sir.. That was JWS. Croom just did the dirty work. That happened under JWS. Croom gave him the opportunity to fix the situation and the player failed to do so. So Croom booted him.



again, it took time to reverse the culture.



Awesome.



Are we about to go into losses of all our coaches to see who has had an unexpected loss? Like to south Alabama... ETC? At least Croom beat bama. Talk about motivation. Saban lost at bama to ULM.

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It's weird how much you defend him. Jackie lost control of the program, but Croom should have had a handle on it by year 2- he didn't

Everything C34 is correct. He set us back years.

Sure Mullen had a bad loss against USA, but Croom had an absolutely stunning resume of getting his ass kicked by awful teams.

Tulane pummeled State in Starkville in 2005, one year after Katrina. They maybe had 55 scholarship players and still managed to be leading us by 30 going into 4th quarter.

I could have thrown people off the team. Croom was a disaster.

Also HENIG wasn't the QB against LSU under Dan. The Croom Error was almost as awful as the Shria Error. If the Slytanic was worth a shit why has He never been more than RB coach since? Because, he hasn't not a clue how to be a head Coach. If you remember he removed Omarr and replaced Him with HENIG. He ****ing punted from the other teams 35 yard line. He lost to Maine and then said they had a better team. His clock management was a clinic for how not to manage the clock. He lost to Tulane after Katrina decimated them. He benched a great kicker and replaced with one that couldn't kick a 35 Yarder. We had 5 turn over from Ga. and still lost, because instead of kicking a winning FG, he let HENIG, TRY A STUPID PASS. AND GOT SACKED. I could go on and on, like Croom not taking all His in home visits. 007 your stance on ole Sly has stomped a mud hole in any credibility you had.

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Originally Posted by Goldendawg

Still waiting for an analysis on why bama didn't hire him as their head coach. In the ESPN piece, Croom stated that he was mistreated by them in no uncertain terms.

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The insinuation he makes is that he didn't get the Bama job is because he is black. Bit of a fall back claim, especially in hindsight after seeing his meltdown at State. I was happy that State was the first SEC team to have a black head coach, but I was equally happy when he got fired. He was a bad head coach, there's no other way to put this. There is a reason we call 2004-2008 "The Croom Years." Croom made MSU the laughing stock of the SEC. Can I say this one more time, we lost to MAINE.

Someone name the 10 best recruits in the Croom Error and look at how terrible it is.

He didn't recruit, he didn't push facilities improvement, and during his 5 years is when we missed the push the SEC made into the power position it holds today.

We are suffering in SEC mediocrity partially because of him. Problem is that we may never get out of the hole that period of time dug us into.

And yes he straight up didn't get hired at Bama because he was black. Numerous accounts of folks saying they were afraid the fan base wouldn't accept him even though he played and was groomed under Bear

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Originally Posted by Commercecomet24

The myth of croom grew because finebaum loved croom and hated jackie. That plus ol ears knew croom would keep us at the bottom of the sec, where he thought we belonged.

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Boy so true. SEC and PF hated JWS because he was a threat to make MSU a year end, year out contender. JWS started to own Bama and others and they were all upset at Jackie.

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Originally Posted by Coach34

You misunderstand. Both Bama teams Croom beat finished 6-6. They were awful. He never beat a good Bama team. He was extremely fortunate to play Bama in a state of flux

The Nick Saban Bama team he beat didnt have a player drafted that April. I think that may be the only draft in the last 40 years Bama didnt have a player drafted into the NFL. Thats how little talent it had.

Croom is one of the worst HC's in SEC history. He was ******* awful

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Also Bama lost to ULM at home like the week after MSU beat them. That is how bad Bama was that year. Saban's margin for error was dang small after that first year.

Croom was not a good coach, good man I believe but other than the feel good story, wasn't much else good came from 5 years. The Croom special still doesn't sit well with me the way ESPN and Croom as well made MSU look and it gets showed over and over reminding people how bad we were.

He fell asleep during a recruiting visit and drove a golf cart everywhere he went. I wouldn't say he wasn't lazy... he was and is a good man though. I just don't think he realized how much work running an SEC program requires in modern days. In a lot of ways it's way tougher on a coach than the pros.

He couldn't even wear his cap on straight.*** BTW, who ended up with the best overall record as a SEC head coach, Croom or Mike Schula?

I don’t know why everyone says he was a good man. How do you know? What I have seen from afar is a terrible coach that blamed his getting fired on some one besides himself. Nothing about that sounds “ good” to me. Maybe you guys saw him helping little old ladies cross the road or have first hand info on him donating his millions to charity that he took from State for worse than mediocre teams. To me, he will always be a joke and a punchline.

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Originally Posted by THE Bruce Dickinson

It's weird how much you defend him. Jackie lost control of the program, but Croom should have had a handle on it by year 2- he didn't

Everything C34 is correct. He set us back years.

Sure Mullen had a bad loss against USA, but Croom had an absolutely stunning resume of getting his ass kicked by awful teams.

Tulane pummeled State in Starkville in 2005, one year after Katrina. They maybe had 55 scholarship players and still managed to be leading us by 30 going into 4th quarter.

I could have thrown people off the team. Croom was a disaster.

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Exactly. The revisionist history going on in this thread is baffling. While we're at it, might as well start fluffin' Larry Templeton....

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Originally Posted by Hot Rock

he will always be a joke and a punchline.

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/insert pic of him in helmet and pads here

Seriously, what legit SEC coach would do that shit?

Proof that Croom is great coach was that he was always being interviewed for other jobs and there was never an opening that didn't include him. ESPN was always speculating about his next gig.

Also, what about the Croom QBs. Probably every recruit in the nation wanted to be the next Henig or Tyson Lee. Even if the kid had no MSU ties, he probably dreamt about it. Croom era players basically own all MSU records.

Then, the nail on the coffin, is that Croom finally left us for that big glamorous job, still doing his thing as a head coach, and probably will make a big run for a NC someday soon.

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Originally Posted by The Federalist Engineer

Proof that Croom is great coach was that he was always being interviewed for other jobs and there was never an opening that didn't include him. ESPN was always speculating about his next gig.

Also, what about the Croom QBs. Probably every recruit in the nation wanted to be the next Henig or Tyson Lee. Even if the kid had no MSU ties, he probably dreamt about it. Croom era players basically own all MSU records.

Then, the nail on the coffin, is that Croom finally left us for that big glamorous job, still doing his thing as a head coach, and probably will make a big run for a NC someday soon.

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Yikes...(especially the part in bold)

https://media1.giphy.com/media/xT0Gq...3z2w/giphy.gif

But yeah, we were lucky to have him when we did.**

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Originally Posted by THE Bruce Dickinson

The guys shooting the guns on campus was between the 2007 and 2008 season. This is ultimately what Croom said made us suck in 2008 according to that propaganda that SEC network released.

He also had his fair share of other disciplinary problems in 5 years. Your diatribe about his recruiting is just further proof how awful he was. Hes recruiting top 25 classes, yet we were only winning 3 games a year. Something doesn't add up.

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To his credit, Johnson and Brown were both NFL draft picks.

He also did get Boobie, Fletcher Cox, Josh Boyd, KJ Wright, Chaney, DP, Fitzhugh, McPhee, Banks, Nickoe, Deontae Skinner, and Gabe Jackson. Most of those were in that last class when I think he started figuring out the recruiting portion just a tad bit. Credit to Mullen for holding onto those guys though.

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Originally Posted by MetEdDawg

Someone name the 10 best recruits in the Croom Error and look at how terrible it is.

He didn't recruit, he didn't push facilities improvement, and during his 5 years is when we missed the push the SEC made into the power position it holds today.

We are suffering in SEC mediocrity partially because of him. Problem is that we may never get out of the hole that period of time dug us into.

And yes he straight up didn't get hired at Bama because he was black. Numerous accounts of folks saying they were afraid the fan base wouldn't accept him even though he played and was groomed under Bear

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1) Fletcher Cox
2) Gabe Jackson
3)KJ Wright
4) Boobie
5) Johnathan Banks
6) Derek Pegues
7) Derek Sherrod
8) Pernell McPhee
9) Charles Mitchell
10) Jamar Chaney
11) Kyle Love
12) Deontae Skinner
13) Nickoe Whitley

I wouldn?t really call that list terrible when the top 3 guys are three of the highest paid players in the NFL, an additional two are still playing, and 11 of the 13 played in the NFL. As I said in the post above, Anthony Johnson and Mike Brown were sure fire NFL picks. Yes the on field results absolutely sucked and yes I was pissed when he ran off Nick Turner and Darren Williams, but you have to give him a little more credit. He is also the last coach to beat Bama for us and did it in twice.

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Originally Posted by drunkernhelldawg

That's the other thing that was odd about our fans' reaction to Croom. They didn't want to give him credit for winning. I can't think of another example of this happening, but there it is.

And for context, in Mullen's first season, he blew a chance to beat LSU with a jump pass call. Yet fans resisted blaming him, many putting it on Henig's lack of execution. Yet we had first and goal at the one and ultimately failed on a trick play.

It is what it is.

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The goal line play vs LSU at the end of the game in Mullen?s first year wasn?t a jump pass. We ran an option and Tyson (Henig wasn’t the QB) decided to keep instead of pitching to Dixon. I still believe Dixon scores easily, Tyson just made the wrong decision. The play call was there for a score and win.

I am not particularly a Croom fan. But two people I highly respect within the game that played for both jackie and Croom gush over him as a man and as a coach. And both think he deserved better than what he got in the end.

I’m sure there are guys that played for him that feel differently.

Reading this thread is reminding me of it all again. Seriously, you could use this thread to induce vomit. Those were some awful times