The Man Who Gave Me My Diploma is Coming to CoMo..........

Congrats to Mizzou. Sad to see him leave Aggieland. He gave me my diploma as well and he's one of the nicest people I've ever met. You're getting a good one!

Exciting hire for Mizzou!

Deaton was good, but he chose to leave. Support for his replacement idoes not mean I did not like or respect Deaton.. Dr Loftin certainly has academic credentials and seems to embrace athletics.

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great sense of humor and likes to have fun. Very good at connecting with people.

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Yeah, I sense that.. which is why I said he's probably very good with the boosters.

He's a shyster.

But good at working the room, which is usually a trait of most educated shysters, which makes him good for this position.

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I'm confused..

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Did not mean to cause confusion.

I was just clarifying that my thinking Loftin will be a great replacement for Deaton, by no means signifies I wanted him to step down from Chancellor position.

But you seem to have a differing reaction from what appears to be generally well received in Mizzou Nation. Is there some concrete reason or just a subjective feeling?

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Sorry I didn't check

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No worries! I love the hire! Here is my post:

While there is no official release rumblings have been heard on campus, on twitter and on Power Mizzou that R Bowen Loftin to be named new Mizzou Chancellor

Bowen has been credited to spearheading aTm's move to the SEC and also for the fundraising successes they have had this year. Here are some things aTm has accomplished under his time there, they recently joined the AAU, which is a tough thing to get invited to. The only schools to join the AAU in the last 30 years are: Boston University, Brendeis University, Emory University, Georgia Tech, Rice University, SUNY-Stony Brook, Texas A&M, UC-Davis, UC-Irvine, and the University of Florida. A&M is top 20 in research dollars, endowment, etc. Also a huge school of over 53k students and yet they still have an average ACT score of 27. They've been high growth while steadily improving in quality as well. Also their athletic department has been growing in leaps and bounds, and they'll soon have one of the top 5 biggest football stadiums in America. This Loftin guy was their CEO for the past few years. Hiring this guy means we want to keep climbing the ladder and moving up in the world.

If you look at research dollars, Missouri has moved up from around 95th place 20 years ago to 69th place as of the last time they released those numbers (a 2-3 years ago). Enrollment has gone up by around 10k since I enrolled at Mizzou 15 years ago. The athletic budget has more than doubled since then. We've got $200M in improvements on the way, but with us winning division titles and with SEC Network money on the way, we could aim a lot higher than that. Really we need to spend about $500M to catch up to the Auburns and Georgias and Tennessees of the SEC. And at least that much on the academic side to catch up to the Iowas, Michigan States, Indianas that we rightfully should be on par with academically.

For too long we've been looking at schools like Iowa State and Colorado as our peer institutions. Hiring away A&M's president shows me we have bigger ambitions.

If true I am encouraged by this hire. While I am excited of this hire it has no effect on my thoughts of Deaton I thought he was great but I think Loftin will be great as well. I just don't know how long he will want to stay as a chancellor because unless I'm mistaken he is only like 7-8 years younger than Deaton.

Time for CoMo to stock up on bowties!

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I'd love to hear his conversations about Texas, Texas A&M, and Mizzou in the realignment drama.

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That will be one of his enduring legacies from his time here. He negotiated us out of the Big 12 and into the SEC through the back channels with both middle fingers extended