There is wayyy too much talk of Mullen leaving and Hud coming in

[Coach34]

We would have to just implode ala Stands for Mullen to be out anytime soon. And we arent going to fire a football coach at State that is going to bowl games- just not going to happen.

Then you have recent quotes by Strick in an ESPN article:

"?Well, that is silly because he?s not on the hot seat,? Stricklin told ESPN.com Sunday night.

"Mullen isn?t even in a hot room"

There will be more stumbles along the way, but Stricklin truly sees a program built for long-term success under Mullen.

?You don?t see a lot of Johnny-come-latelys having great success at a high level in this league,? he said. ?It?s the schools that are there year after year after year, and that?s what we want to be.?


I personally think we have Mullen another 5 years or so....Hud will already have left ULL and moved to a better job, making it dicey as to where he would return to S'ville or not.

[Coach34]

Not only that, Mullen's contract is rolling over every year- his buyout after 2013 would be about 8MM- we aint paying that....

[BeastMan]

I agree on this. Mullen is in no danger unless he goes out and wins 4 games next year and I don't think that happens. It's like all of Hud guys want Mullen to lose so Hud can move in. I look at it like this: I'm a State fan, not a ULL fan. I'm behind Mullen because he is our coach, not Hud. Hud being an MSU guy, I wish him the best. I never understand why fans root for this coach or that coach. We've been through this with Polk to Cohen and Stans to Ray. I support MSU and our laches get my full backing until they show that I shouldn't.

[Bo Darville]

I think Mullen is having too much success at MSU for us to fire him. No way that happens any time soon.

I think Mullen is having too little success at MSU for him to be the hot commodity that other teams are salivating after. He is not the golden boy that everybody wants right now.

I agree that he is probably at MSU a good while longer. However, if he does ever leave for whatever reason, I would think Hud would be on our short list. Any good Athletic Director always has a short list of candidates where he would start a search. That is because you never know what can happen (see Bobby Petrino at Arkansas, Pat Summitt at Tennesse, Urban Meyer at Florida, etc.).

[Bo Darville]

Another thing is there aren't just tons of jobs out there that are better than MSU. We are expanding our stadium, the football complex just opened, our enrollment continues to grow, and the SEC TV contract means big money pumped into the budget. Maybe years ago there were 60-70 jobs better than MSU. That is not the case anymore. There might be 20-30 at the most.

Edited to say that according to coacheshotseat.com, Mullen is 24th in the country in salary.

[FlabLoser]

Are national writers calling for Mullen being on the hot seat? I know Barrett Sallee has Mullen on the hot seat every time he has a chance to bring up the topic.

[Coach34]

Are national writers calling for Mullen being on the hot seat? I know Barrett Sallee has Mullen on the hot seat every time he has a chance to bring up the topic.

Well, you had Edward Asschaps ask Strick about it in this article:

http://espn.go.com/blog/ncfnation/po...r-expectations

[engie]

I personally think we have Mullen another 5 years or so....Hud will already have left ULL and moved to a better job, making it dicey as to where he would return to S'ville or not.

I know this could potentially be all window dressing, but Hud has told many people of us that he would come home to MSU no matter where he was at the time we came calling. Seems possible that it's a John Cohen type of situation to me...

People don't realize that UK offered to make Cohen the highest paid college baseball coach in history at the time -- as well as piggybacking a $30 mil stadium into his contract -- in attempt to get him to stay, and he still came home to a smaller contract, a dumpster fire program requiring a full rebuild, and a split fanbase with a very vocal, prominent percentage of that would never, ever back him -- with his former coach sabotaging his efforts.

[Spider-Man]

I think Mullen will be here as long as he wants. Which is a good thing for MSU.

[quickstrike2]

There shouldn't even be any talk of Mullen on the hot seat. Unless we start having multiple losing seasons.

[Political Hack]

$2.6 at State for Mullen is probably worth around at least $3.2 anywhere else. They were pretty smart when they set his contract up.

[msu4ever]

I have heard lots of talk that the long-term "plan" was to bring him back when/if Mullen does leave....heard we even had someone turn down a recent position in hopes to join Hud here some day.....

[engie]

I'd think we'd see Hud reunited with Kenny Edenfield(Troy OC) here(was previously Hud's OC at North Alabama). He is one of the best pass-first spread offense guys in the country IMO...

[PendingTransaction]

As long as we win 6-7 games (win 3 real games) a year Mullen will coach MSU as long as we fill the seats. Half of the D-1 teams make a bowl game each year. Being in the SECW, we have set a bowl game as our mark of success. I truly feel that Mullen can get us there consistently. He will leave MSU on his own terms.

[Pollodawg]

As long as we win 6-7 games (win 3 real games) a year Mullen will coach MSU as long as we fill the seats. Half of the D-1 teams make a bowl game each year. Being in the SECW, we have set a bowl game as our mark of success. I truly feel that Mullen can get us there consistently. He will leave MSU on his own terms.

It would be stupidity of the highest order to fire Mullen right now. If you had told me five years ago that we would be a consistent winning team under a new coach with consistent top 25 recruiting and be 3-1 against our arch rivals, I would have shaken your hand and taken that all day every day and twice on Sundays.

We don't fire successful coaches after one setback. We are not the bears....

[taylor]

If Mullen is gone after next season, its not because he gets fired, its because we had a great season and he got an offer he couldnt refuse..

[ComradeDawg]

I think Mullen will be here as long as he wants. Which is a good thing for MSU.

Yep.

[WeWillScrewItUp]

I like what Mullen has done since he got here but I have to say I am not happy with just making a bowl game. That being said 6-7 wins just isn't good enough. That needs to be a bad year. 8+ win seasons year in and year out is what I want to see. Mullen has taken a huge step in the right direction. Now he just needs to keep building.

[FlabLoser]

I'm with WeWillScrewItUp. Not just for his excellent avatar, but for his opinion.

So far Mullen has raised the floor, but not the ceiling. Crootin has gotten better the last few years. So maybe we are just about to see some real improvement.

Overall, the program is headed in the right direction. Its just the slope of it requires some patience.

[Coach34]

Our ceiling cant be raised...8-9 wins is our ceiling year in and year out

Now, as we did from 1998-2000- we have to have a group put together that is capable of going on a good run for a couple of years. We may get to 10 wins that way and bust thru the ceiling a time or two. But as long as the SEC has 5 top 10 teams- Miss State, OM, Missouri, Kentucky, Vandy, and for the most part Tennessee have no chance to win the SEC