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After the disappointing first 3/4 of last year, Mullen strung together some amazing coaching performances and just when people were calling for his head, his team rallied around him and supported him, ostensibly, more than ever. So, coming into this 2014 year, loaded with a returning talent and everything seemingly aligning for a big year -- what would Dan Mullen have to do to win SEC Coach of the Year?
I think he'd have to win the West to get it.
if he wins 10 games, he gets it going away I think.
Depends on what others do. For instance, had we won 10 last year, Malzahn or Pinkel would have still won it.
If no one else sees a big spike in wins, and no team just thoroughly dominates everyone, then if we won 10 he would almost assuredly get it.
Fixed that for you.Quote:
Originally Posted by hacker
The only way he's ever going to win the SEC COY is if he beats LSU and goes 10-2 in the same season & even that's a stretch. So, yeah he basically has to win the West to get it. I could see a spin scenario where Bama wins 10 this year and they give it to Saban b/c he "overcame" so much with a new qb, etc. Then, I could see them giving it to OM if they win 9 b/c of that dynamite recruiting class from two years ago. I could also see them giving it to Malzahn if Auburn beats Bama again. All of those would get it before Mullen with 10 wins. Fair or unfair, the media (especially the SEC media of Brando, Asschaps, Finebaum, Cross, countless local idgits, even our own fans, etc) has held him to a different standard than his peers....his "wins" vs UGA, UF, OM, Ark, Aub, are all when those teams were "down", etc, right? And he's had more close / heartbreaking losses than any other coach that comes to mind. He HAS to beat LSU this year to take the next step. Period. End of story. Win that game & everything changes including our entire fanbase's mentality & end of the sister thread to this one. There are no more excuses....he asked for a temple to be built & he got it, he's had 5+ years to have a full roster of his "own" type of players, he has completely morphed the physical nature of our kids (when I look @ our players, you can tell the weight program is successful and they just look the part now unlike..say OM whose guys just look little and unconditioned), he has a full complement of assistant coaches that align with his approach & style and has weeded through several DCs to get his "guy" in place.
The only thing he has left to "figure out" to become an elite SEC coach is personnel usage to complement his QB. I still don't think he fully understands the talent @ RB that he will forever get @ MSU. MSU will ALWAYS have elite level RBs and he's just never had that luxury before..not @ UF, not @ Utah, etc. End of the day, he could've won big with Tyler had he supported properly with the surrounding talent in backfield. I don't think anyone will argue with that. Same deal Dak & any other of the future QBs that'll play for him in that for the first time from inception to 2011, the QB will always be a "net" positive to the offense. To me, Relf's senior was the last year of the MSU qb "detrimental" factor. For the most part, all of the games won throughout history up until 2012 was more or less in spite of poor QB play. That's why Mullen is so valuable & that's why there was no way in hell that I would ever him fired despite the chatter from last year. Chris Relf will forever go down as QB that transitioned MSU from historic QB futility to QB as a "net" positive. Thank you OM Killer. Then, Tyler basically introduced the forward pass to Starkville & now Dak through Elijah, Fitz, etc will really make the offense pop b/c they can complete passes first & then can run around a lil bit if they need to.
But as for the 2014 SEC COY, my vote is going to go to Butch Jones as I think he'll win 8 games this year. Butch should've gone to Dobbs by game 2 at a minimum as those other QBs he played reminded me of MSU QB play before Mullen's arrival. They were awful. Had Dobbs played the entire season last year, they probably win the Vandy, UF, and Georgia games b/c the SEC east is so weak. When I look @ UT's 2014 schedule, I see 4-5 sure wins, 2 sure losses in Bama/Ok, & the remaining toss up games vs OM, Missou, USC, UGA, and UF as all very winnable with Dobbs at the helm. Plus, he has some pretty big WRs & their OL attrition shouldn't be as bad in the East like it would be in the West.
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Originally Posted by hacker
People's perception matters in COY voting. Getting 10 wins at MSU is considered a miracle so I think that would easily get the job done barring Arkansas or Kentucky going 9-3. And even if OM and MSU went 9-3 or something and it was between him and Freeze I think Mullen would get it because he is perceived to be winning with lesser talent.
I'll grant you that Dak did play a quarter against Ole Miss but please tell me the plays Dak made against Arkansas?
Disagree. Story/perception goes a long way in the coach of the year voting. How do you think Crooms got the award?Quote:
Originally Posted by justwin
Mullen will have two things going for him: 10-2 at MSU is perceived to be a bigger accomplishment at any school other than Vandy, UK, and UM. He will have a 'body of work' argument going for him where even though it's coach of the year, turning around a shitastic program, building consistency, and finally breaking through will be considered if there's not another compelling storyline. If he goes 10-2 with losses to LSU and Bama, with his most impressive wins being against mediocre Auburn, A&M, and UM teams, that may not be enough, but as long as one of the wins is against a good team, he'll have a shot with 10-2.
The biggest problem Mullen will have this year is that there are a lot of teams from the east with potentially good story lines. With the east being easier, it would be very easy for a team like UT to blow through expectations like Mizzou did last year.
I agree with the original poster that he needs to win the west. This is the season that this need needs to be fulfilled.
Good point. I think 100% without a doubt losses vs LSU/Bama to get 10-2 and no way. I do think he'll have a shot with 10-2 with an LSU win, but a small one at that mainly b/c the story/perception has evolved (as it should) going into year 6. 10-2 in years 2 or 3, then no brainer COY, but not in year 6. The story that I see being pushed by the media out the last two years since the 7-0 start is meeting the "raised" expectations and beating the big boys of LSU/Bama.
I would rank the following 2014 storylines that would trump MSU being 10-2 with an LSU win in this order:
1. Tennessee getting 8 wins
2. Kentucky getting 8 wins..maybe even 7 if there's a big win mixed in there.
3. Arkansas getting 9 wins. lower on the list b/c they've been to the SEC title game before but a 6 game swing is legit.
4. Bama with 10 wins despite a shit QB. We still don't really know what they have at QB. A lot of guys can't handle the pressure of being the Bama QB so we'll see how that shakes out. Whoever wins will have to be able to make plays in at least 1 or 2 games like AJ & McElroy did.
5. Gus winning 11 including another Bama win.
6. If Spurrier wins the SEC @ USC. He's been to the 'chip now just needs to win it.
7. Mullen getting 10 & an LSU win. If you think about it, we've held our own with LSU 4 of 5 years and have come close to winning so it wouldn't be a complete media shock, but will change the media discussion. We'll have the talent this year to win & we've actually HAD enough talent to win the last few years as well.
8. No drop off @ Mizzou w new QB. I just think the sticker shock has probably worn off just enough.
I think Croom got the award due to a blind squirrel finding a nut.....and Anthony Dixon. That one winning season was like getting shot multiple times while being pushed out of a flying airplane falling in the middle of the ocean and living to tell about it.luckiest string of events I've seen to get 8 wins. It's blasphemy to ever compare Croom to Mullen in any way shape or form. As bad as Croom was, he knew one thing...Give the dam Running Back the football and that's about the only thing I'll always give him credit for.
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Originally Posted by Johnson85
I like this post so much that I wanted to see it twice. Give the damn Running Back the football.Quote:
Originally Posted by justwin
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Originally Posted by hacker
Let me get this straight. You consider 2 OT wins over the 2 teams that finished in the bottom of our division, one of whom ended the year 3-9 were, "amazing coaching performances"? Really??
Dan would have to learn how to manage a clock. Dan would have to make smarter personnel decisions, and stop doing things like running a small, scat-back-style RB who is easily arm-tackled, between the tackles time-and-again for little-to-no-gain. Dan would have to stop doing things like keeping a guy on the bench after he's gotten 2 carries for 24 yards in favor of a guy who gets 10 times the carries and averages far, far less. Dan would have to stop taking his foot off the gas when he has too slim a lead to hold up against his ill-advised down-shift into conservative, predictable play-calling. Dan would have to put together a decent ST unit. Dan would have to learn when & how to challenge obvious blown calls, and not let them become a key factor in another loss. Dan would have to actually show several actual "amazing coaching performances" and not rely on his defense to keep the game close enough to eek out an OT win against unranked opponents. Dan would have to stop making games versus over-matched opponents too close for comfort.
Dan would need to do all these things consistently and win at least 10 games in the regular season to even be a candidate.
There is a whole lot to like and admire about what Dan has done very well for our university, but for you to come on here and act like he's proven you right and his doubters wrong because he managed to salvage games versus Arky and Ole Miss, then beat up on a Rice team that was drastically out-gunned is ludicrous.
I hope he can do it, I really do. What I do like about Mullen so far, I like a whole helluva lot. But what I haven't liked about him, I can't stand. Thankfully, this year he won't even have the chance to do some of the really stupid shit he did last year, and I'm praying he is learning and growing enough to get better so that, the next time he does have the choice, he makes the right choice.
Great post. Great to have some real football talk going on.Quote:
Originally Posted by blacklistedbully
I think you are right, but I also got the impression hacker's comments regarding Dan's coaching was coming from the angle of how we kind of came back from the dead to win the last 3, with the team not quitting and/or Mullen not "losing" the team.Quote:
Originally Posted by blacklistedbully
None of those seem far off, but I'd rank it like this:
T1. Kentucky getting 8 wins with one big win. (This is the equivalent of the Croom award. Good season at school with a shitty historical record. He needs a big win though because Brooks got to bowls consistently there and he doesn't ahve the first African American head coach thing going for him.
T1. Arkansas getting 9 wins. (That's a big turnaround and at worst requires 4-0 out of conference, beating UM, MSU, both east opponents and one of A&M, Auburn, Bama, and LSU. That's a pretty big swing).
T1. No drop off @ Mizzou w new QB. (Had he won it last year, I think they'd basically have to go undefeated this year to win it. But since he had a legit shot last year and didn't get it, repeating this year I think would get him there).
T4. If Spurrier wins the SEC @ USC. I think this would definitely beat Mullen except that Spurrier won it in 2010, so maybe it's a close decision. Had he won in the last two years, I'd think a 10-2 Mullen beats him.
T4. Mullen getting 10 & an LSU win. Again, the biggest thing Mullen will have going for him is body of work and not having won it before. Whatever criticisms you have of him, he took what looked to be a shit team and has turned them into consistent bowlers. Getting to the next level and winning 10 regular season games would be good enough that they could justify giving him the award for the work he's done over the past 5 years.
The rest: Tennessee getting 8 wins (I just can't see people getting excited about UT getting to 8 wins, even though that would be good by recent history.
Bama with 10 wins despite a shit QB. (I just can't see people getting excited about Bama winning 10 games, no matter what type of rebuild they have. People expect this whether it's realistic or not)
Gus winning 11 including another Bama win. I just don't see people giving him back to back awards unless he goes undefeated in convincing fashion.
BB, "the team not quitting and/or Mullen not "losing" the team", does not equal "amazing coaching performance", not even close. Those things are the bare minimum to keep your ass from getting fired.Quote:
Originally Posted by BulldogBear
Again, I really love a ton of things about Dan, and I really, truly want him to succeed. But I think it's short-sighted and premature-in-the-extreme to declare he somehow proved himself over the last 3 games. We should have beaten Arky. We should have beaten Ole Miss. We should have beaten a much smaller, slower Rice.
I'm not about to kiss Dan's ring for doing what we should minimally expect from a guy getting paid the amount of money he's getting, and getting the amount of support he's been getting. And I'm not just uber-focused on W/L. I'm talking about the way he coached in wins & losses, relative to the opponent and game situations. In some, he did a great job. In others he did a terrible job. While I don't think it's reasonable to expect him to be great every game, I do expect him to not ever be terrible. While I don't expect him to win every game, I do expect him to not hurt our chances by doing some of the clearly dumbass things he did at times.
To me, he's kinda like a genius who doesn't necessarily have a bunch of common sense. He can be brilliant, even one of the best in the country at some things, but some of his shortcomings have cost us games. I hope it's just a learning process and he eventually gets better in the areas he needs improvement, because it is hard to imagine us getting a better guy overall. I just don't think we should be satisfied, or not have doubts about him until he shows us he can consistently put it all together, win, lose or draw. And I certainly don't think we should be heaping praise on him for what happened in the last 3 games.
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Originally Posted by blacklistedbully
Pump your breaks there, partner. We should have beaten an OM team, that beat a top ten LSU team no less, with a true freshman QB making his first start in the freaking EB? Dan did a helluva job in that game, and no one can take that away from him. Dan did a great job not letting the team lose focus when we were down 10-zip to a bad Arkansas team too. The boys could have packed it in and said "screw it. We'll do better next year." But they didn't, and neither did he. He deserves some flak, but he needs some kudos too every now an then.
Look, I was just as hard on Mullen as anyone was, but we had a combination 120 games missed among starters last season. And we played one of the top five toughest schedules in the country, still managing to win seven.
I don't want to give Bear U any recognition either, but that was a good win over them last season. They beat LSU and a Texas team (not their best, but not their worst either) on the road, blew Texas' doors off actually. That was his best win since @UF 2010, in my opinion.
No, the winning at least 10 games is all he will have to do to be a candidate. Every fanbase can point to individual decisions by their coach and say it needs to improve. And every fanbase has far less of an idea what individual decisions opposing coaches have screwed up.Quote:
Originally Posted by blacklistedbully
They're not going to say, 'Wow, Mullen won 11 games at Mississippi State this year. But I disagree with the guy they gave the majority of the carries to, and I don't think he perfectly managed the clock every game this year. Can't be him!'
And, you know, it's not just those last three games. It's the fight and intensity that whole team played with during Bama--which our clearly best QB by that point was on the sideline--and TAMU on the road. The team never gave up. The fought until the ref called "ball game." That was what gave me faith. We could have used missing Dak for the Bama game as an excuse, and packed it in. We didn't. We could have used the fact that JFF was unstoppable at TAMU. But we didn't. We played like we wanted to match them score for score no matter how many they scored. That was what gave me hope. That was Mullen 2009-2011. The 2012 team would have quit in both of those instances.Quote:
Originally Posted by smootness
If he can build quality depth on offense like we have on D we have a shot to win 10 games otherwise 8-9 wins is our ceiling.Quote:
Originally Posted by hacker
Yes, we should have beaten an unranked, overrated Ole Miss team that really should have lost to Vandy, caught Texas when they were a hot mess, and won a rivalry game versus a brain-fart prone Les Miles in a game where LSU played like shit beyond what Ole Miss was doing to effect that. Yes, we should have beaten an Ole miss team that hasn't beaten us in Starkville since 2003, and has only done it 3 times in 12 tries, even with us on probation.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pollodawg
You want to credit Dan for "not letting his team lose focus when we were down 10-zip to a bad Arky. But you fail to blame Dan for the team being down 10-zip to a bad Arky team to begin with.
Finally, I did give him some props, so please don't accuse me of something I didn't do. It weakens your argument.
The reality is, we believe some of the same things, but appear to differ on just how much praise Dan should get for beating Ole Miss at home and a really bad Arky, both in OT. You are of the camp that thinks it showed us all how great he did. I am of the camp that thinks y'all have blown those wins way outta proportion.
Yes, we played a freshman QB, and he did a good job. Yes, I credit Dan for coaching this young man up. One of the things I really like aout Dan is his ability to work with dual-purpose QB's. But you're kidding yourself if you don't believe that win was mainly due to our defense, and the job Geoff Collins did, combined witht he gutty performance put on by Dak.
You misunderstood. I think Dan needs to do these things to even have a shot at winning 10 games. If he did all those things and won only 9, I don't think he gets COY.Quote:
Originally Posted by smootness
AuburnQuote:
Originally Posted by Pollodawg
Bowling Green
Kentucky
Auburn game is a great example. Dan did a terrific job getting is to a point where we could have and should have beat them. But he also did a terrible job of game-management and late-game play-calling that ultimately cost us the win.
Bowling Green, though decent, should not have been in a position to beat us at the end. We were a dropped pass away from losing that game. How does everybody feel about Dan today had their TE not dropped that pass?
UK was a bad, bad, bad football team, yet gave us all we could want.
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Originally Posted by blacklistedbully
That same Arkansas team that came one long td from beating LSU? I am not saying Dan is Saban 2.0. I am just saying that he did a better job this year than he did of having the team ready in 2012. So, Dan doesn't get any credit for the D, but gets all the blame when things don't work? You know, Dan did hire Collins and does sign off on his defensive decisions.
Pollo, what part are you not getting about me saying there are many things I love about Dan? You seem to keep insisting I'm nothing but critical, and/or want him gone. But what I am actually saying is in response to the OP that wants to laud Dan for those last 3 games and suggest that Dan silenced all his critics. That's just not true.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pollodawg
I like Dan. For the umpteenth time, I LOVE some of the things Dan has done at MSU. I will AGAIN say, I'm not sure we could find a better man to lead our program. But he absolutely, positively deserves criticism and scrutiny for the numerous mistakes he has made during his tenure here, with a particular focus on last year. IMO, one that is shared by many, he made enough big mistakes to at least question his ability to continue moving us forward.
IMO, he needs to show personal growth as a coach, to show he has learned from his mistakes, in order to deserve the kind of accolades some on here seem too willing to bestow based on that 3-game stretch.
As much as I defended him vociferously in 2009 due to the way we played well in losses, I will objectively hold-him-to-the-fire for the way we play, even in wins. This is not a question of whether or not we are overall a better program than we were when he arrived. We clearly are. It is a question of whether or not he can overcome the things he has done that have at times held us back, or kept us from taking that next step up.
The same Arky team that struggled to beat Samford at home and lost to SCar and Bama by a combined score of 104-7. See how that cherry-picking works?Quote:
Originally Posted by Pollodawg
It's hard to base things on scores of course. But that works both ways. In 2010 we beat Michigan 52-14 as we all know. We beat UAB 29-24. Now these are all for a myriad of reasons. But it doesn't mean that UAB is a 33pt favorite over Michigan that year. I know you all know this, but let's not try to make a Slippery Rock Rockets argument either way!!Quote:
Originally Posted by blacklistedbully
I should say that last year's final 3 got me back off the fence. This year will show me something.... or not. We should win 8 minimum for the exact reasoning that you are coming from. Anything less will be a huge disappointment when you consider all 4 nonSEC should be wins and there is no SEC school we play in Starkville that is better than we are. Add in a KY team that is still not ready to win 6 and the Egg Bowl and the 8 win floor starts to come into perspective. But I really don't care if we win 'em 28-22 or 62-7. The pain of scores that should've been closer or not wears off pretty quickly but an ugly performance or losing any game we should win doesn't!!! But on some of those, I agree, there really should be no doubt by the 4th quarter or something is wrong.
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Originally Posted by blacklistedbully
I agree that he doesn't deserve a raise or an extension or that ever critic has been--or should be--silenced. I am just stating that those last three games gave me some hope moving forward
Well we all know Dan can't possibly win COY this year because all media types have OM making a run at the BCS playoff.**
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Originally Posted by blacklistedbully
This. Also, in case you haven't noticed, blacklistedbully, this thread is a more positive spin on the thread with the same title asking if he should be fired. I had to have a parallel lede.Quote:
Originally Posted by BulldogBear
So, let me say, I just read this thread for the first time and I think you are reading too far into the wording of the OP and coming overaggressive because of it, but I do disagree with you. I really do think Mullen coached his ass off the last few games of the season. All coaches make mistakes, and since we view the games through Maroon-colored glasses, Mullen's mistakes are magnified. Saban's kickers sucked this past year, but we're not faulting him for that like we are Mullen. Saban made a huge game management error by kicking that field goal that led to the Chris Davis return, but we tend to just look at that as "shit happens." If Mullen did that, I guarantee we'd never hear the end of it about how it was the dumbest coaching decision ever made. You also don't give us credit for almost pulling off the big wins, and that's fair. But if you don't give us credit for that, then you shouldn't give the Bowling Greens of the world credit for almost pulling off the big wins on us. You're having it both ways when you do that.Quote:
Originally Posted by blacklistedbully