Sunday Morning Thoughts-Hello Darkness My Old Friend

[StarkVegasSteve]

There are a lot of things wrong with our athletics department but the overwhelming #1 thing that holds us back overall as an athletics department is the major boosters and school’s obsession with baseball. The best thing for our school would be for that program to completely shut down so our people would be forced to give a sh*t about the sport that actually pays the bills. The fact that our baseball stadium looks like it does and our football stadium looks like it does is an embarrassment to anyone with a fully functional brain. Bragging about having a major league level baseball park while our football stadium is rotting is embarrassing and other people in our league laugh at how damn stupid we are for doing that. We built a 70 MILLION DOLLAR baseball stadium and can’t even afford to put functional lights and speakers in the football stadium.

ALL OF THIS.

[gtowndawg]

There are a lot of things wrong with our athletics department but the overwhelming #1 thing that holds us back overall as an athletics department is the major boosters and school?s obsession with baseball. The best thing for our school would be for that program to completely shut down so our people would be forced to give a sh*t about the sport that actually pays the bills. The fact that our baseball stadium looks like it does and our football stadium looks like it does is an embarrassment to anyone with a fully functional brain. Bragging about having a major league level baseball park while our football stadium is rotting is embarrassing and other people in our league laugh at how damn stupid we are for doing that. We built a 70 MILLION DOLLAR baseball stadium and can?t even afford to put functional lights and speakers in the football stadium.

I hate to say it, but I agree with this 1,000%

[gtowndawg]

Because they have this weird new concept called Alumni Outreach. A lot of schools are trying it out. Mississippi State is in a wait and see approach. I wish I was kidding. Ole Miss keeps up with their alumni and makes it a big deal to come back to campus for a few weekends in the fall and spring.

Mississippi State doesn't care. They could care less if young alumni came back. I mean I'm lucky enough that we have a condo in Starkville and have season tickets to everything or it would be almost impossible to come to games and enjoy them. Tickets aren't a problem, at least right now, but I mean where the hell are you supposed to stay in Starkville? There's 6 hotels and the team takes one of them and then there's a couple of fleabag motels, but I mean that's just not enough for a college town on a gameday weekend. I mean if I'm the University, I'm running gameday shuttles to hotels in Columbus and West Point. Hell, I'd be running charter buses to hotels in Meridian, Grenada, and even Jackson. Make it accessible for people to get there and they may be more willing to come. And that goes past just young alumni, that goes to out of state fans or even in state fans that may not live close to Starkville. I mean Mississippi State could EASILY afford to do that. Hell, Everett would probably cut them a deal on the buses.

We certainly need a new approach to this and many other things.

[Coach34]

We have more boosters willing to support baseball and love it for one reason- its the only sport we were ever really good at.

You are talking about a school that sold their home game to LSU to them and Baton Rouge about 40 times. A school that was the last SEC team to get a wood floor in basketball and their HC basically recruited by phone in 1985. A school unfortunately has to consider Larry Templeton one of their top AD's in history.

Yeah- they choose that because its our best chance to compete for a title

[Todd4State]

There are a lot of things wrong with our athletics department but the overwhelming #1 thing that holds us back overall as an athletics department is the major boosters and school?s obsession with baseball. The best thing for our school would be for that program to completely shut down so our people would be forced to give a sh*t about the sport that actually pays the bills. The fact that our baseball stadium looks like it does and our football stadium looks like it does is an embarrassment to anyone with a fully functional brain. Bragging about having a major league level baseball park while our football stadium is rotting is embarrassing and other people in our league laugh at how damn stupid we are for doing that. We built a 70 MILLION DOLLAR baseball stadium and can?t even afford to put functional lights and speakers in the football stadium.

No the biggest thing that holds MSU football back is mind numbingly STUPID ideas like "shutting down the baseball program so fans will have to focus on football."

This is the EXACT SAME SHIT that ruined our football program. "Let's get rid of Leach." "Let's hire Arnett." All were fan ideas that came to fruition and how did ANY of them work out? NONE OF THEM HAVE!

You complain about football facilities- well Cohen has been gone for over TWO years! Why hasn't Selmon fixed any of it? He has had 22 months to put some lights in. This isn't a new problem.

Here's the thing about baseball. Do you ever see baseball hiring a first year hitting coach to be the head coach? OK we did it with Cann and how did it work? Do you ever see baseball going all in on JUCO players and then have people try to sell it off as depth? NO! Do you ever see baseball just promoting the pitching coach to try to maintain continuity only to have him fire the hitting coach and lie to players about what we are going to do? Again- NO! Do you see baseball trying to keep a failed assistant because of reasons that make no logical sense like we are rumored to be doing with Hutzler? NO!

And don't sell me this bullshit that these same boosters who are apparently batting a thousand in baseball moves are all of a sudden clueless idiots on every single football move "because they care about baseball more." Well apparently they DO care about football because they're overinvolved in that sport.

So my humble advice as someone who has been AGAINST literally every stupid ass football move which I have been correct about being a stupid move so far is to:

1. Stop trying to drag the baseball program into the football programs failures. It's petty and it's ****ing stupid. COHEN ISN'T HERE ANYMORE!

2. LOOK at what makes baseball successful. And then actually try to imitate it. Baseball didn't tell MSU to hire inexperienced coaches. Baseball didn't tell football to recruit a bunch of JUCOs. Baseball isn't telling football to keep Hutzler.

3. You want to look stupid? Try shutting down baseball right as there are talks about MLB contracting minor league baseball and right at a time when college baseball is one of the fastest growing sports in the country DUMBASS!!!!!!! Doing shit like shutting down the baseball program is why people laugh at us and it's dumbasses like you who come up with this shit!!!!

[Todd4State]

We certainly need a new approach to this and many other things.

The "new approach" needs to be to do things that are high percentage and to stop cutting corners.

Hire coaches with experience.

Build up the recruiting department.

Listen to the fans and give them what they want.

[Cooterpoot]

Baseball is pretty well self-sufficient on the NIL side. I doubt you see much big investment in baseball stuff outside of normal things. If they start dropping big money on baseball again, 17 MSU!

[Todd4State]

I honestly don't understand the mindset of wanting access and some control over a program that's literally embarrassing. I mean who wants to brag about that?

I don't think they want to lose. They want to win AND have access. The problem is guys that win and are good coaches like Dan and Leach don't have time for hangers on because they're focused on winning. They assume that guys like Will Friend that kiss ass are just as good as Leach and well they're not.

[SPMT]

I don't think they want to lose. They want to win AND have access. The problem is guys that win and are good coaches like Dan and Leach don't have time for hangers on because they're focused on winning. They assume that guys like Will Friend that kiss ass are just as good as Leach and well they're not.

They don?t want to lose but if you are hanging out with college baseball players and their girlfriends you have serious issues.

Caveat being you happen to become friendly with one and are talking to them about your kid and baseball or something friends really talk about.

[RockyDog]

We have more boosters willing to support baseball and love it for one reason- its the only sport we were ever really good at.

You are talking about a school that sold their home game to LSU to them and Baton Rouge about 40 times. A school that was the last SEC team to get a wood floor in basketball and their HC basically recruited by phone in 1985. A school unfortunately has to consider Larry Templeton one of their top AD's in history.

Yeah- they choose that because its our best chance to compete for a title

And what did that title get? A bunch of fat old men get to take pics of themselves jerking off with a natty trophy. After that, nothing. We had people LAST YEAR trying to discredit a 17 win SEC season in an attempt to go ahead and fire Lemons. The club sport fanaticism is dumb.

[Todd4State]

They don?t want to lose but if you are hanging out with college baseball players and their girlfriends you have serious issues.

Caveat being you happen to become friendly with one and are talking to them about your kid and baseball or something friends really talk about.

I don't disagree that if you are hanging out with the baseball players and their girlfriends that you are a weird person.

But that doesn't have anything to do with bad football decisions.

In fact I'll say this. If you are an elite football coach like a Saban- those people are so 24/7 OCD about football that they don't really have time to hang out with boosters.

It wouldn't surprise me if Kiffin is like that to a degree. Ole Miss is probably/maybe better about getting their access from people like a Barney Farrar and being OK with that whereas at MSU it seems like it maybe is a you scratch my back I'll scratch yours thing. If you give us access we'll make you the offensive coordinator at MSU or something.

[Todd4State]

And what did that title get? A bunch of fat old men get to take pics of themselves jerking off with a natty trophy. After that, nothing. We had people LAST YEAR trying to discredit a 17 win SEC season in an attempt to go ahead and fire Lemons. The club sport fanaticism is dumb.

Ironically the 2022 and 2023 seasons happened in part because of bad decisions by Cohen and the boosters we're talking about.

Lemonis was never really in any trouble.

If we won the NC in women's basketball or women's soccer you would have fans "jerking off" with that trophy too. Not sure why anyone would have a problem with fans celebrating a championship but here you are.

And oh by the way in case you forgot- before baseball won a NC we were one of only a handful of schools to not have a NC in ANY sport. So yeah- it was a big deal. Deal with it.

[SPMT]

I don't disagree that if you are hanging out with the baseball players and their girlfriends that you are a weird person.

But that doesn't have anything to do with bad football decisions.

In fact I'll say this. If you are an elite football coach like a Saban- those people are so 24/7 OCD about football that they don't really have time to hang out with boosters.

It wouldn't surprise me if Kiffin is like that to a degree. Ole Miss is probably/maybe better about getting their access from people like a Barney Farrar and being OK with that whereas at MSU it seems like it maybe is a you scratch my back I'll scratch yours thing. If you give us access we'll make you the offensive coordinator at MSU or something.

Was referring to the baseball boosters who seem to have been meddling in football.

Dear Lord I pray we are not so dumb that we allow random businesspeople to hire/highly influence the hiring of a coach in a major sport. Please tell me we are past this. Sadly, we probably still do.

Any reasonable businessperson that has gotten to a level of success to have anyone listen to them in the AD has most definitely learned the hiring process and knows to let their reports hire who they think is fit with some having a minor say times.

So, in my feeble mind, these are the middle people, enough to matter, especially as a group, but individually not super significant.

[Todd4State]

Was referring to the baseball boosters who seem to have been meddling in football.

Dear Lord I pray we are not so dumb that we allow random businesspeople to hire/highly influence the hiring of a coach in a major sport. Please tell me we are past this. Sadly, we probably still do.

Any reasonable businessperson that has gotten to a level of success to have anyone listen to them in the AD has most definitely learned the hiring process and knows to let their reports hire who they think is fit with some having a minor say times.

So, in my feeble mind, these are the middle people, enough to matter, especially as a group, but individually not super significant.

The boosters do have some degree of influence because they have money. That's the delicate balance here. As much as believe you me I would love to tell then to go off and **** themselves for what they have done to our football program I understand the reality is we do need their money. StarkvegasSteve said as much in this thread. The boosters know it too. That's why they can do some of the crap that they do.

But recently the issue we had was when Leach passed away we had on AD to be a buffer so it's not too surprising that they were able to get him and a bunch of their friends on staff.

I will say that I don't think they had as much say when we hired Lebby and to be honest with you if they did have their say I'm not sure that they would have allowed Hutzler to be the DC. In fact, if Hutzler isn't our DC next year there is a good chance it's because of the boosters withdrawing money especially with the rumors that Lebby wants to bring him back. Lebby needs their support and Selmon needs it too. If Lebby doesn't have support he is going to end up being an OC for life. We'll see how it plays out after the Egg Bowl because I really don't know what is going to happen with it.

It's not a coincidence that people like Chad Bumphis and David Turner have been around for multiple coaching regimes.

[State82]

No the biggest thing that holds MSU football back is mind numbingly STUPID ideas like "shutting down the baseball program so fans will have to focus on football."

This is the EXACT SAME SHIT that ruined our football program. "Let's get rid of Leach." "Let's hire Arnett." All were fan ideas that came to fruition and how did ANY of them work out? NONE OF THEM HAVE!

You complain about football facilities- well Cohen has been gone for over TWO years! Why hasn't Selmon fixed any of it? He has had 22 months to put some lights in. This isn't a new problem.

Here's the thing about baseball. Do you ever see baseball hiring a first year hitting coach to be the head coach? OK we did it with Cann and how did it work? Do you ever see baseball going all in on JUCO players and then have people try to sell it off as depth? NO! Do you ever see baseball just promoting the pitching coach to try to maintain continuity only to have him fire the hitting coach and lie to players about what we are going to do? Again- NO! Do you see baseball trying to keep a failed assistant because of reasons that make no logical sense like we are rumored to be doing with Hutzler? NO!

And don't sell me this bullshit that these same boosters who are apparently batting a thousand in baseball moves are all of a sudden clueless idiots on every single football move "because they care about baseball more." Well apparently they DO care about football because they're overinvolved in that sport.

So my humble advice as someone who has been AGAINST literally every stupid ass football move which I have been correct about being a stupid move so far is to:

1. Stop trying to drag the baseball program into the football programs failures. It's petty and it's ****ing stupid. COHEN ISN'T HERE ANYMORE!

2. LOOK at what makes baseball successful. And then actually try to imitate it. Baseball didn't tell MSU to hire inexperienced coaches. Baseball didn't tell football to recruit a bunch of JUCOs. Baseball isn't telling football to keep Hutzler.

3. You want to look stupid? Try shutting down baseball right as there are talks about MLB contracting minor league baseball and right at a time when college baseball is one of the fastest growing sports in the country DUMBASS!!!!!!! Doing shit like shutting down the baseball program is why people laugh at us and it's dumbasses like you who come up with this shit!!!!

Todd gets it. Why is it so difficult to understand? Mental midgets I suppose.

[Todd4State]

Todd gets it. Why is it so difficult to understand? Mental midgets I suppose.

I do not for the life of me understand why MSU fans think you have to break something good to fix something else.

We can be good in both baseball and football. It has happened before. We went to Omaha AND won the SEC West in football in 1998. And more recently we went to NC Finals in Omaha in 2013 and then Dak took over and football had 2014.

[State82]

I do not for the life of me understand why MSU fans think you have to break something good to fix something else.

We can be good in both baseball and football. It has happened before. We went to Omaha AND won the SEC West in football in 1998. And more recently we went to NC Finals in Omaha in 2013 and then Dak took over and football had 2014.

No idea. It is complete ignorance. Look at UM.

[BigDawg81]

The boosters do have some degree of influence because they have money. That's the delicate balance here. As much as believe you me I would love to tell then to go off and **** themselves for what they have done to our football program I understand the reality is we do need their money. StarkvegasSteve said as much in this thread. The boosters know it too. That's why they can do some of the crap that they do.

But recently the issue we had was when Leach passed away we had on AD to be a buffer so it's not too surprising that they were able to get him and a bunch of their friends on staff.

I will say that I don't think they had as much say when we hired Lebby and to be honest with you if they did have their say I'm not sure that they would have allowed Hutzler to be the DC. In fact, if Hutzler isn't our DC next year there is a good chance it's because of the boosters withdrawing money especially with the rumors that Lebby wants to bring him back. Lebby needs their support and Selmon needs it too. If Lebby doesn't have support he is going to end up being an OC for life. We'll see how it plays out after the Egg Bowl because I really don't know what is going to happen with it.

It's not a coincidence that people like Chad Bumphis and David Turner have been around for multiple coaching regimes.

Let Ole Miss score 70 and that will move the need

[StarkVegasSteve]

The boosters do have some degree of influence because they have money. That's the delicate balance here. As much as believe you me I would love to tell then to go off and **** themselves for what they have done to our football program I understand the reality is we do need their money. StarkvegasSteve said as much in this thread. The boosters know it too. That's why they can do some of the crap that they do.

But recently the issue we had was when Leach passed away we had on AD to be a buffer so it's not too surprising that they were able to get him and a bunch of their friends on staff.

I will say that I don't think they had as much say when we hired Lebby and to be honest with you if they did have their say I'm not sure that they would have allowed Hutzler to be the DC. In fact, if Hutzler isn't our DC next year there is a good chance it's because of the boosters withdrawing money especially with the rumors that Lebby wants to bring him back. Lebby needs their support and Selmon needs it too. If Lebby doesn't have support he is going to end up being an OC for life. We'll see how it plays out after the Egg Bowl because I really don't know what is going to happen with it.

It's not a coincidence that people like Chad Bumphis and David Turner have been around for multiple coaching regimes.

This would not have been a problem if we would've had an actual AD the previous 5 years. We had a baseball coach. He did not know what to do and instead of being the IB we knew and loved as the baseball coach he became Diplomat Donny and tried to be nice to everyone. He started listening to people that only wanted to advance their agendas and careers and started taking booster input from guys that had been told by Mullen, Byrne, and Strick to cut the checks and shut the 17 up. You give guys like that power again, and they are going to manipulate the hell out of it....which they did.

You're right that it's not a coincidence that Turner and Bumphis have been here with multiple staffs. We overinflate players and former coaches like no other program in the country. Now with Bumphis I will at least say that he's pulled his own weight in terms of recruiting. Turner is living off the fact that he coached Chris Jones(did not recruit him. That was Mullen and Hev) and he helped recruit Jeff (Hughes did the heavy lifting on that one). But we had a bunch of people tell Lebby and Co. that they JUST HAD to have both Turner and Bumphis because of how great recruiters they were. Again, boosters who have no clue what the hell they are talking about trying to peddle influence because they cut a check.

[AROB44]

This would not have been a problem if we would've had an actual AD the previous 5 years. We had a baseball coach. He did not know what to do and instead of being the IB we knew and loved as the baseball coach he became Diplomat Donny and tried to be nice to everyone. He started listening to people that only wanted to advance their agendas and careers and started taking booster input from guys that had been told by Mullen, Byrne, and Strick to cut the checks and shut the 17 up. You give guys like that power again, and they are going to manipulate the hell out of it....which they did.

You're right that it's not a coincidence that Turner and Bumphis have been here with multiple staffs. We overinflate players and former coaches like no other program in the country. Now with Bumphis I will at least say that he's pulled his own weight in terms of recruiting. Turner is living off the fact that he coached Chris Jones(did not recruit him. That was Mullen and Hev) and he helped recruit Jeff (Hughes did the heavy lifting on that one). But we had a bunch of people tell Lebby and Co. that they JUST HAD to have both Turner and Bumphis because of how great recruiters they were. Again, boosters who have no clue what the hell they are talking about trying to peddle influence because they cut a check.

Sort of like message board posters?