re: 2023 Football Discussion Thread General Thoughts & Comments

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Lane - he really wants the job bad
Bell - one of ours.
Frost- kick the tires

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I like Bell because the ties, but no. We complain about Napier coming from the sun belt, I think Western Carolina is like an fcs team.

Frost, eh he seems like damaged goods. Give me Mullen/Chip Kelly vibes now. Back in 2017 he had promise, but now, I don't know. I wouldn't mind him being on a list for the "if we fire Napier after failing in 2024" category, but I don't think I'd be willing to fire Napier for him in 2023.

Lane was actually my #1 choice to replace Mullen. He has his issues too, so I don't know if I'd fire Napier now just to hire him. But I agree, he's cheap and wants this job bad. I think he'd do pretty well tbh. I think a lot of the bad rep he has is more true about Mullen and Freeze than him tbh:

- Hates recruiting (definitely true about Mullen, I think Lane has recruited well at big programs before)

- Always looking for a new job (definitely true about Mullen, I guess somewhat true about Lane too but he's at Ole frickin Miss so who can blame him)

- Has baggage/dirty cheater (Freeze)

- Can't win big games (Definitely true about Mullen and I guess true to a degree about Lane. He didn't beat Bama or Georgia this year, but not a lot of teams did either , he was able to beat LSU and I think has won games that he shouldn't have won before, but not an elite win against Bama/UGA type programs)

- Loses headscratchers every year (Definitely Mullen and Freeze. Maybe somewhat true about Lane, last year at least that was the case. He does seem to play down to competition at times too, but has seemed to been able to pull away)

Honestly, I was big on Lane because he'd be cheap, wants the job bad, and would produce a fun offense. He can be a bit immature but he's matured a lot and I think could give a boost to the program. He'd be realistic and easy to hire if we wanted him.

lol

I’d take Lane at this point

Why y'all doing this to yourselves? I get the frustration, but we aren't hiring an HC this year.

The most logical chain of events I've read is that Stricklin would go before Napier, and that probably won't happen until February at the earliest if it were to happen. Stricklin has tied himself to Napier, and Sasse isn't going to circumvent the AD to fire a coach before getting rid of an AD he doesn't trust.

There's no time to do an AD search and have that person ready to go by February 7, and everyone is afraid to rock the recruiting boat by making the program look any less stable than it already does.

Sticklin could get the ax after that, but who knows. My guess is that 2024 is all your favorite coaches and admins from 2023 with their jobs on the line.

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He doesn't need to, as he's divorced.

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Weirdly enough, his Layla either moved here or bought a second home here. Their daughter is in school at Ole Miss. Monte Kiffin lives here too.

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Napier has been terrible so far

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I can't disagree for the most part.

At least he worked with the boosters to get our NIL in order and has us in the recruiting mix of the NIL landscape.

Before that, we literally had nothing good happening with this program on or off the field.

Now, we need to start doing well on the field. I don't have lots of faith that Napier will be the guy to do that though.

I'm curious to see if Stricklin makes it to summer as AD. I just don't see moving on from Billy if it means Stricklin is hiring yet another coach. Once you get into fall, the window to get a new AD to hire a new coach gets smaller and smaller.

I suppose it's possible the other powers that be in the UAA and Sasse could have someone picked, a lá Manchen and Meyer (depending on the version of that story you believe), but I think that is a less likely scenario.

I've heard everything from Sasse and Stricklin having developed a solid relationship to Sasse being the ultimate pragmatist who isn't afraid to prune any branch once it quits being productive, which leads me to be pretty agnostic on what Sasse may or may not do over the spring.

I don't have a problem with a third year. We're post-Kiffin Tennessee at the moment, and I've accepted it. There are no slam dunks out there to hire, unless you seriously believe all coaches care about is who can pay the most, and even then, seems like most "slam dunks" don't end up that way. Lincoln Riley and Brian Kelly have put together better seasons that we have, but they haven't won anything. It's yet to be determined if they will. Harbaugh seems like a slam dunk now, but he sure as hell didn't two years ago, after losing to Ohio State five times in a row.

So I'm fine keeping it as is for now, but if there isn't some remarkable improvement next year, damn the torpedos and blow it up from the AD down. I also don't give a damn about the schedule. Two of those teams next year have new head coaches. It's about damn time he finally beat Brian Kelly, and I can't abide losing to UCF and Miami in the same season.

A .500 season is the absolute minimum, and honestly, it needs to be more like seven or eight. I see two teams on that schedule who should be flat out better than us next year. After three years, we should be in every other fricking game on that schedule. We should look better at the end of the year than the beginning. We should look like we can actually make adjustments at the half and keep playing a whole four quarters of football.

If that ain't happening next year, it ain't ever happening with this staff.

I can't stand Sasse for other reasons but he does come off as someone who would rather not let things linger. My guess is if Billy doesn't make it him and the AD would be canned after the 5th loss in 2024.