Why Mike Leach won’t last with the Mississippi State Bulldogs

Mississippi State head coach Mike Leach has had a comparatively unimpressive begin to his time with this system, and it’s unlikely that its situation will enhance.

When the information was introduced that former Washington State Cougars head coach Mike Leach was heading to Starkville to tackle the Mississippi State job, I used to be considered one of his greatest supporters.

I believed that Leach had the offensive IQ to craft a formidable squad in faculty soccer’s hardest division, the SEC West. However whereas I nonetheless see Leach’s promise as a coach, the power to financial institution on him seeing the quantity of success that I had initially anticipated is nearly lengthy gone.

The largest purpose for such a disappointing realization has much less to do with Mississippi State’s personal flaws and extra to do with simply how drastically the SEC has improved since Leach’s hiring (particularly within the West half).

Of MSU’s 13 convention foes, seven of them have gotten higher—to a minimum of a point—within the time between the Bulldogs bringing Leach aboard (January 2020) and now. These seven groups are Georgia, South Carolina, Kentucky, Alabama, Texas A&M, Ole Miss, and Arkansas.

The next has occurred for the reason that conclusion of the 2019-20 faculty soccer season: Georgia has received a nationwide title, South Carolina has grow to be a bowl group, Kentucky has hit a 10-win season, Alabama has gone 1-1 within the final two CFP Nationwide Championship video games, Texas A&M has locked up the best recruiting class ever, and Ole Miss/Arkansas have every seen a New 12 months’s Day bowl.

And as for the LSU Tigers (considered one of Mississippi State’s greatest rivals), simply because they’ve fallen from their dreamlike 15-0 season doesn’t imply that they’re incapable of dealing with the Bulldogs in the interim.

Again in November of 2021, LSU broke the information of buying Brian Kelly, a head coach held in even greater regard than Mike Leach.

Mike Leach received’t final at Mississippi State

And within the technique of doing so, the Tigers have continued to out-recruit MSU by a monumental margin. So to make issues worse for the Bulldogs, LSU doesn’t seem like going wherever, both.

All of that implies that the one program in Mississippi State’s division that appears prefer it might realistically find yourself worse than the Bulldogs in coming seasons is Auburn, as it’s also in a rocky place as we speak. Nonetheless, 2021 noticed them end just one sport worse than MSU by report; it’s also one more SEC energy with superior recruiting to that of Mississippi State.

Briefly, the Bulldogs are in a sticky state of affairs proper now, and it’s nearly solely as a result of threatening nature of their league play—one thing that refuses to provide Mike Leach an opportunity at constructing his group as much as what it will probably actually be. Consequently, he’ll most probably by no means see precise success at MSU.