What I'm Hearing: Re: MSU job

First, with all of my posts where I give what I’m hearing, I want to say that I don’t have any direct info from the MSU side. But this is what I’ve heard from several people in the industry.

I want to touch on Dantonio himself. The problem with coaches who coach at one place for a long time and have great success is that they’re often deified by fans and even the administration. He was a great coach but was a prickly man. He’s a super Catholic guy so he often used that as a mask, but from everyone that’s come out of the program that I’ve talked to described him as intense, cold, and distant unless you were in his inner-circle. He was a great motivator and a great coach, but towards the end let a lot of things slide in order to keep the good times rolling. He ran his program like his bestie, Tressel, all he cared about was the results no matter the cost.

Almost every coach has some type of skeletons in their closet, and if you’ve heard some of the stories of how crappy most of these coaches treated their staff you’d be horrified. Because at the end of the day this is a results business. The only two coaches I’ve heard unanimous praise from on how well they treat all their staff is Chris Peterson and Dabo. The coaching profession is filled with broken families, multiple divorces, substance abuse, and anger issues and that’s why I get jaded sometimes when people treat these coaches as gods. They are flawed like everyone else and the amount of money in this profession has caused skewed perceptions and expectations. I’m happy to answer questions about this below, but I’ll move on.

Dantonio surprised the hell out of the higher-ups. He told them that he wanted to coach at least one more year and was angling for Tressel to be named head coach in waiting officially or unofficially. He absolutely timed this to get one of his best friends’ nephew the gig. I think that the cloud from everything pushed him over the edge and he just decided to take his money and run.

This search is going to be a wild one. Beekman has little to no power. He was a figurehead appointed by Engler and backed by Dantonio and Izzo so they could operate with impunity. I think the BOT and/or the new President will have a lot of power in this choice. Glenn Sugiyama, a leading headhunter is involved and he is a MSU alum and tight with Izzo. This leads me to believe it's going to be someone he's familiar with, but who knows if they even listen to his recommendations. He's notoriously tight-lipped and runs his searches as such. Dude has sent decoy planes and flight logs to throw people off his scent. 

This Blackwell lawsuit is not going away and I think will scare off enough coaches, especially since I think Dantonio is still going to be lurking around the program. I heard Izzo possibly being involved in the search, which is laughable. Can you imagine Beilein being involved when he was here? Everything is pointing to this being a “national search” that ends with Mike Tressel being named the interim or permanent head coach.

Candidates:

Fickell: I do think this is who MSU would love to hire. But I really don’t think he would take the job in its current state. If they came at him in December, I think the odds would’ve been 50-50. His goal is to be the head coach at ND or OSU flat out. I think ND is a bigger dream because he is huge Catholic and that matches him perfectly. He’s got like 7 kids (Philip Rivers style). I think deep down he knows OSU is much harder to attain, especially with Day there. If he keeps Cinci rolling around 9-11 wins for the next few years, he’s at the top of ND’s board. If he goes to MSU and takes 3-4 years to get ramped up he misses his window. I think with all of that swirling it makes it too risky.

Narduzzi: Money is the key here. He makes about the same as Dantonio. If MSU is willing to pay him $5+ million they can probably get him. But why would they pay him like a top-10 coach in the country if he’s averaging 7 wins a year at Pitt in a super soft ACC Coastal?

Shurmur: He’s my wildcard here. I really think that there will be an old-guard faction that’s going to push for a favored son to come home. If the BOT really gets involved, he’s a guy that I think would get pushed to the top of the list.

I need to caveat that this is just what I am hearing now, this will change, and I hate to give odds to things, because I will probably be wrong. I’m not hearing this with direct inside info, just what I’m hearing from people in the industry. As of now I would predict Tressel due to Dantonio and Izzo being involved. This was done by Dantonio to prop Tressel up into the main chair.