Our #1 Recruiting Problem
- Thread starter ArcherSPS
- Start date
Agreed. Ever seen the Bears stadium? Most Texas hi-school stadiums looks better
Was there recently. Good grief that stadium looks like *** (maroon and white glasses off). Agreed on there being good and bad areas at most universities.
Was there recently. Good grief that stadium looks like *** (maroon and white glasses off). Agreed on there being good and bad areas at most universities.
Last edited:
I pretty much agree with what you said. There's nothing wrong with agriculture ... we couldn't live without it ... and it's really somewhat technical (soil science has a lot of chemistry, studying all the different diseases, etc.), but the negative perception is still there regardless of the truth. Agriculture just doesn't have the same positive connotation that engineering, medicine, and law have.
I suppose Starkville has grown a lot percentage-wise ... but it's still a small town, so it can't be expected to have a lot of the things that larger cities have. There are about as many students as there are permanent residents. Not sure if the students are counted as residents of Starkville/Oktibbeha or not ... probably depends on how they fill out their Census forms.
Starkville isn't the problem itself... At least not to a huge extent. Personally I was just brainstorming on how to do it a little better -- and every inch counts on that.
But presentation does matter on this stuff. When I was taking baseball OVs, I didn't take a scholly to a better baseball school partially because of location compared to the one I actually attended... And a big part of that was in the presentation on the way in. And over the years, I've realized that place wasn't nearly as bad as I perceived it. Could have been happy there. The presentation was the problem. Hence why I'm overly sensitive to it. You don't get the total picture on an official visit or even 20% of the picture at a place you are previously unfamiliar with...
Not possible, Starkville cannot accommodate an air carrier aircraft..
At least not until they extend the runway and get Part 139 Certification, or somehow hook up an unscheduled small aircraft that doesn't break NCAA rules
At least not until they extend the runway and get Part 139 Certification, or somehow hook up an unscheduled small aircraft that doesn't break NCAA rules
Last edited:
Unfortunately, the previous name was Boardtown, which, when spoken, sounds like "Bored town." Even worse than "Stark-ville"
Howland & Cohen need to share their recruiting secrets with Mullen. Our Basketball and Baseball recruiting have been awesome recently, in spite of the lack of sizzle in Starkville, yet our Football hasn't followed suit.
I know that Starkville doesn't have a Ruth Chris Steakhouse, Red Lobster, Cracker Barrel, Whole Foods, or even a Mall---but the Coaches from 2 of our Big 3 Sports have overcome this stumbling block.
I know that Starkville doesn't have a Ruth Chris Steakhouse, Red Lobster, Cracker Barrel, Whole Foods, or even a Mall---but the Coaches from 2 of our Big 3 Sports have overcome this stumbling block.
It's the absence of a Hobby Lobby that's killing it....that and sidewalks.**
Aesthetics have nothing to do with our recruiting failures compared to Ole Miss
The main reason we can't be like Ole Miss in recruiting is the differences in the cultures of both schools' students.
When current athletes go out in Oxford, they are showered with affection. Treated like rock stars. None of them pay for drinks and the girls are all over them. They are celebrities out on the town every Thursday-Saturday night. From walkons to 5 stars, the red carpet is rolled out every weekend. It's not just on recruiting weekends. It's year round, even in the summer.
When current athletes go out in Starkville, they are treated like crap. I have personally witnessed some of our best players get cussed out by guys who thought they were trying squeeze in front of them in line at the bar. I know Dak was booed out of bar sometime last year. I don't care what you think he did, you never boo your best player. Instead of praising our players, our students feel at competition with the athletes every time they go out. This goes for girls, drinks, and anything else.
I think it's a upper and middle class thing. Most Ole Miss students come from money or put on that they come from money. Love portraying the image of being able to party with athletes. Mississippi State students, who are majority middle class, don't waste their money, attention, or anything else on anyone. They're selfish and feel threatened that the athletes may be perceived as better than them, so they treat them like crap. Now there are exceptions to this on both sides. I've seen Mississippi State students turn in to super fans at the bar when an athlete walks in, but Ole Miss and Mississippi State students are complete opposites when it comes to how we treat our current players. And that's the draw to Ole Miss by recruits. Everyone's getting payed in every program. What pulls Ole Miss above the rest is the rock star treatment every player/recruit receives at their incredible bar scene they have every weekend. I don't think it's something we can replicate, and we will always be behind them in recruiting because of it. We have to rely on player development. That's just who we are.
The main reason we can't be like Ole Miss in recruiting is the differences in the cultures of both schools' students.
When current athletes go out in Oxford, they are showered with affection. Treated like rock stars. None of them pay for drinks and the girls are all over them. They are celebrities out on the town every Thursday-Saturday night. From walkons to 5 stars, the red carpet is rolled out every weekend. It's not just on recruiting weekends. It's year round, even in the summer.
When current athletes go out in Starkville, they are treated like crap. I have personally witnessed some of our best players get cussed out by guys who thought they were trying squeeze in front of them in line at the bar. I know Dak was booed out of bar sometime last year. I don't care what you think he did, you never boo your best player. Instead of praising our players, our students feel at competition with the athletes every time they go out. This goes for girls, drinks, and anything else.
I think it's a upper and middle class thing. Most Ole Miss students come from money or put on that they come from money. Love portraying the image of being able to party with athletes. Mississippi State students, who are majority middle class, don't waste their money, attention, or anything else on anyone. They're selfish and feel threatened that the athletes may be perceived as better than them, so they treat them like crap. Now there are exceptions to this on both sides. I've seen Mississippi State students turn in to super fans at the bar when an athlete walks in, but Ole Miss and Mississippi State students are complete opposites when it comes to how we treat our current players. And that's the draw to Ole Miss by recruits. Everyone's getting payed in every program. What pulls Ole Miss above the rest is the rock star treatment every player/recruit receives at their incredible bar scene they have every weekend. I don't think it's something we can replicate, and we will always be behind them in recruiting because of it. We have to rely on player development. That's just who we are.
Who says this is a good thing? Breeds entitlement and every other problem under the sun!
There is a middle ground here, and I think MSU does a good job of hovering near it! We are not as bad as you say!
You are dead on. This is mostly a red herring. Big time recruiters recruit successfully whereever they are. Did Starkville somehow change from the time that Rick Ray couldn't recruit anybody of note to Ben Howland arriving and promptly putting together at Top 10 recruiting class? Cohen is getting by as well. Mullen has a lot of strong points, recruiting is probably not his strongest though.
Our football program is cursed! Always has been.. You need big money to compete, and we've never had it, that is what it is.. in basketball and baseball however, we CAN compete..
Sometimes I wish we would just throw ALL our SEC money behind basketball and baseball and compete for championships there, rather than waste a bunch on a sport in which we will likely always be average (football).. just be the SEC's whipping boy who cares.. but we've gone too far in the other direction now, with the brand new stadium and all!
The question is, is football REALLY the engine that pays for everything else?
Sometimes I wish we would just throw ALL our SEC money behind basketball and baseball and compete for championships there, rather than waste a bunch on a sport in which we will likely always be average (football).. just be the SEC's whipping boy who cares.. but we've gone too far in the other direction now, with the brand new stadium and all!
The question is, is football REALLY the engine that pays for everything else?
Jackie didn't get it done either, explain that!! No MSU coach has been able to clean up on the recruiting trail, throughout history!
Great post!** How old are you........7?
This is one of the most ludicrous post Ive ever read on this board. Would you prefer Red Stick? Good grief some people just don't get it. The only thing STARK might be in reference to, is our version of the "network".
This is one of the most ludicrous post Ive ever read on this board. Would you prefer Red Stick? Good grief some people just don't get it. The only thing STARK might be in reference to, is our version of the "network".
One, I'm not sure that Jackie was a great recruiter. At Pittsburgh and Texas A&M there was talent all around so you didn't really have to be but he certainly did alright at MSU given the situation at the time he had to deal with. But the biggest point is our history is not the biggest factor here. No coach before Mullen has had all of the advantages of competitive facilities, great crowds and fan support and now a legacy of winning (6 bowls in a row) plus the attraction of playing in the modern SEC with money flowing in like never before. Being realistic, OM has never recruited on the level they are recruiting at now before Freeze either. The profile of both schools has greatly increased over the last 10 years mostly because of new streams of SEC money we never had before.
Last edited:
YES. Do you REALLY not think it is?
Baseball/Basketball may be in the black, but they sure as hell aren't paying for anything else.
That's the biggest load of ******** I have ever read. Ole Miss people don't come from any more money than State students do. I every case I can think of except for 2 doctor's kids every family I know who sends their kids to Ole Miss are NOT affluent at all. They live in 17'ing Pearl! You just took every ******** negative story you read on message boards about OM vs State and made yourself believe it.
Black kids that grew up in inner cities and are blessed with athletic talent don't give 2 17's about The Lyric or the The Library or any of that other pretentious ****. They eat their meals in the athletic facilities. They want to know what the fastest route to the NFL will be and who will give them the most **** to go to school. Starkville is 17'ing Colonial Williamsburg at Christmas to most of them compared to where they came from.
Mullen is too arrogant to wrestle with the pigs when it comes to recruiting. He doesn't want to get dirty. Beaver will wrestle the kid and all the life coaches and every other piece of **** that is riding their coat tails to get them to come to OM
That's the difference.
Black kids that grew up in inner cities and are blessed with athletic talent don't give 2 17's about The Lyric or the The Library or any of that other pretentious ****. They eat their meals in the athletic facilities. They want to know what the fastest route to the NFL will be and who will give them the most **** to go to school. Starkville is 17'ing Colonial Williamsburg at Christmas to most of them compared to where they came from.
Mullen is too arrogant to wrestle with the pigs when it comes to recruiting. He doesn't want to get dirty. Beaver will wrestle the kid and all the life coaches and every other piece of **** that is riding their coat tails to get them to come to OM
That's the difference.
Last edited:
I've never actually been to Oxford, have only been on their campus a couple of times, and that was to go to a ball game. Never been to the Grove that I know of ... if I saw it it wasn't impressive enough to make a mental mark. Last time was when Eli was there. I know the stadium certainly wasn't impressive ... just the opposite, in fact ... and they'd already bowled in the end zone at the time. Starkville is OK ... just another small town, but it's improved markedly over the past few years, and is light years better than it was when I was there in school in the late 60s.
Listen. Sterling is not wrong here.
He chose to phrase it as "#1 recruiting problem" which allowed some of you to diverge from the core truth in his criticism of Starkville. It may not be the number one problem in recruiting, but it is a problem, and not just in athlete recruitment, but student recruitment and faculty recruitment and retention. How some of you can on the one hand post things (which I agree with) about the "Mississippi State attitude" of being complacent or satisfied with "good enough" athletically, but then take a "so what" kind of approach to the current and future quality of the town we all love is baffling to me.
Starkville has a myriad of problems all of which negatively affect each other. The public school system is a shambles. How the school system could possibly get this bad in a university town is beyond me. The churches both in influence and legislation hold WAY to much sway, and own WAY too much property in critical urban areas. Business owners by and large have a "EEuhts mah prahputee, and I mown dew wut I wawnt weeth ut" ideology, and the codes, plan review and enforcement don't have enough tools, will or ability to bring them into line (the recent vote down of the Highway 12 streetscape project and the anti sidewalk sentiment among business owners are just two examples of what is an ongoing and consistent antagonism towards anything resembling regulation or code compliance). And how any business owner can be against sidewalks is beyond me. They literally bring business to your front door. The only explanation I can come up with is that they are so drowned in automobile culture, that they simply don't understand what the purposes of sidewalks are.
The town of Starkville is under-served. And I don't just mean booze, although that too. But I mean with live music and restaurants that would rate as 3 to 4 star place in a city where getting 4 stars means you are 17ing EXCELLENT. Ty Pennington and the other guy whose name I forget have their heads in the right place, but are only two people. So in a town where you can't get in the door of a so-so place in the Cotton District, it should be a turkey shoot for developers and restraunteurs to make hay.
Prime properties frequently do not get developed with the highest and best use. This problem is rampant. The new apartment complex coming in off the bypass is horrible. It is my sincere hope that Dan, Robert and Bond Camp get as many of the properties along the University Drive corridor and elsewhere as they possibly can. They have shown what just one developer that knows what the 17 is up can do. And they are just one group. There is plenty of room for like-minded developers who want to make money and do things correctly to come into Starkville and make money and a difference in the physical structure of Starkville for perpetuity. Take a look at what has been done at the Krog Street Market and the Ponce City Market in Atlanta. That is a pretty good benchmark.
There are oh-so many factors that conspire to retard the positive growth of Starkville. Any one of them can be a road block to progressive growth. Starkville has way too many of them. But yet, even with the tide against it, over the past 20 years or so we have seen AMAZING and positive changes and growth to our town. All the things I wrote above may lead you to believe I don't recognize or appreciate that. I absolutely do. But that doesn't make me want to stop and say "good enough". It makes me want more and more until Starkville, appropriate for its size and position, is a vibrant 24-7 town that attracts more than just 5-star offensive linemen, but the best students, professors, administrators and private sector business people that are out there, and then makes them never want to leave.
One last thing. Let's stop comparing ourselves to Oxford. I don't want to be Oxford. I don't want to be LIKE Oxford. I want to be the best version of Starkville in what is our vision of ourselves. But if we have to have a barometer of success. Let's make it Athens.
Sorry about the novel. Go about your business.
He chose to phrase it as "#1 recruiting problem" which allowed some of you to diverge from the core truth in his criticism of Starkville. It may not be the number one problem in recruiting, but it is a problem, and not just in athlete recruitment, but student recruitment and faculty recruitment and retention. How some of you can on the one hand post things (which I agree with) about the "Mississippi State attitude" of being complacent or satisfied with "good enough" athletically, but then take a "so what" kind of approach to the current and future quality of the town we all love is baffling to me.
Starkville has a myriad of problems all of which negatively affect each other. The public school system is a shambles. How the school system could possibly get this bad in a university town is beyond me. The churches both in influence and legislation hold WAY to much sway, and own WAY too much property in critical urban areas. Business owners by and large have a "EEuhts mah prahputee, and I mown dew wut I wawnt weeth ut" ideology, and the codes, plan review and enforcement don't have enough tools, will or ability to bring them into line (the recent vote down of the Highway 12 streetscape project and the anti sidewalk sentiment among business owners are just two examples of what is an ongoing and consistent antagonism towards anything resembling regulation or code compliance). And how any business owner can be against sidewalks is beyond me. They literally bring business to your front door. The only explanation I can come up with is that they are so drowned in automobile culture, that they simply don't understand what the purposes of sidewalks are.
The town of Starkville is under-served. And I don't just mean booze, although that too. But I mean with live music and restaurants that would rate as 3 to 4 star place in a city where getting 4 stars means you are 17ing EXCELLENT. Ty Pennington and the other guy whose name I forget have their heads in the right place, but are only two people. So in a town where you can't get in the door of a so-so place in the Cotton District, it should be a turkey shoot for developers and restraunteurs to make hay.
Prime properties frequently do not get developed with the highest and best use. This problem is rampant. The new apartment complex coming in off the bypass is horrible. It is my sincere hope that Dan, Robert and Bond Camp get as many of the properties along the University Drive corridor and elsewhere as they possibly can. They have shown what just one developer that knows what the 17 is up can do. And they are just one group. There is plenty of room for like-minded developers who want to make money and do things correctly to come into Starkville and make money and a difference in the physical structure of Starkville for perpetuity. Take a look at what has been done at the Krog Street Market and the Ponce City Market in Atlanta. That is a pretty good benchmark.
There are oh-so many factors that conspire to retard the positive growth of Starkville. Any one of them can be a road block to progressive growth. Starkville has way too many of them. But yet, even with the tide against it, over the past 20 years or so we have seen AMAZING and positive changes and growth to our town. All the things I wrote above may lead you to believe I don't recognize or appreciate that. I absolutely do. But that doesn't make me want to stop and say "good enough". It makes me want more and more until Starkville, appropriate for its size and position, is a vibrant 24-7 town that attracts more than just 5-star offensive linemen, but the best students, professors, administrators and private sector business people that are out there, and then makes them never want to leave.
One last thing. Let's stop comparing ourselves to Oxford. I don't want to be Oxford. I don't want to be LIKE Oxford. I want to be the best version of Starkville in what is our vision of ourselves. But if we have to have a barometer of success. Let's make it Athens.
Sorry about the novel. Go about your business.
Our #1 recruiting problem
is not playing the game that OM is. They routinely give jobs and/or "scholarships" to relatives/siblings of 5*. Our bag men have GOT to start getting involved, and I'm not talking about some dubmass, lone-wolf who wants to think he's hot ****.
is not playing the game that OM is. They routinely give jobs and/or "scholarships" to relatives/siblings of 5*. Our bag men have GOT to start getting involved, and I'm not talking about some dubmass, lone-wolf who wants to think he's hot ****.