Football Withdrawal

If you, like me, are in football withdrawal, I'm attempting to ease some of your pain with a little bit of news. These are all from "sources", but the sources are generally pretty good.

Bolden to Fullback
Word "on da streetz" is that Bolden is going to get a strong look at fullback this offseason. It's doubtful that he would make a full-time move to that position, but the coaches are going to look at using him as a fullback in certain packages. I love this move. Putting another player on the field that defenses need to worry about is a great idea, and this will give us even more options for imaginative plays. I have visions of a triple option with Jevan, Cordera and Bolden out of the shotgun.

12th Game - We're not in Kansas anymore. Heck, we're not even in the FBS.
I'm hearing more and more that the 12th game will be against some directional school from 1AA. This is not good news, since I was looking forward to another legitimate opponent on the schedule, but it speaks a lot about where our program stands right now. The apparent hold up on slotting this game with a worthwhile team is that no one wants to play us. The demands were apparently outrageous monetarily from some of the other BCS conference teams who viewed the game as a "sure loss". Still, it's repulsive that we'll play two 1AA opponents next season.

2010 Class looking good in-state
It's really early to start talking about next signing class, but I'd be remiss not to mention the fact that this staff has started very strong in the state of Mississippi. Many of the top players in the state have named us their leader. Those players include WR Vincent Sanders, RB Matthew Wells, DE/DT Devin Clark, Carlos Thompsonand (Memphis is basically part of our state) O.C. Brown. If you have a rivals account, watch Brown's video. It's out of this world as far as pulling guards go.

Ok... so is this the "mystery recruit"?

I don't believe that there is a mystery recruit. I think it's something that Yancy made up to later look good if a commitment came out of nowhere.

However, read this. Ok. Now sure. That doesn't mean anything to us. I mean, LSU is his favorite, and why wouldn't they sign him?

But wait, apparently, Reuben Randle's father has recently stated that if Benton signs with LSU, Randle will not. He apparently wants to be the indisputably best WR in his class. So, that brings up two scenarios:

1. Benton's offer is revoked, and he is forced to look elsewhere (see: us). He signs with us. We have gotten a commitment from the former #7 WR in the country.

2. Benton signs with LSU. Randle does not. Randle signs with Alabama. This causes Patterson to sign with Ole Miss. In this circumstance, we have a LOI from the #5 WR in the country (Patterson).

Sure, maybe Benton signs with LSU along with Randle, but hey... it's the day before signing day. How can crazy rumors not start coming out of the woodwork?

Ok. This is ridiculous. Can signing day just come already. I'm going to convince myself that all of USC's class is going to sign with us.

RSCumor

A little bird told me that one of Bobby Massie's close relatives had a recent falling out with a certain smooth talking coach one state east from us and that things got a lot better for us with Massie this weekend.

I'm not going so far as to proclaim him a private commitment or anything, but things are going better than I thought.

Please, post ANY rumors you've heard. I hope there will be several that you feel silly even writing. I've had several come my way that are like that ("What if I told you that Marlon Brown, Patrick Patterson and Bobby Massie are private commitments?")

Rebel Roundup - Sr. Bowl and 2009 Schedule talk

Draft Stock Rising for Jerry, Palmer; Falling for Oher - Click here, here, and here for some Senior Bowl coverage. As one would expect, Ashlee Palmer and Peria Jerry are ruining whatever poor sons-of-bitches they're up against in the Senior Bowl practices. Unfortunately, Michael Oher hasn't been as impressive. Hopefully Oher will get out of whatever slump he appears to be in.

The Kansas Jayhawks to Highlight the Rebel OOC Schedule in 2009? - We're hearing rumors which would lead us to believe that the Rebels will be playing the Kansas Jayhawks in 2009. If this is indeed true, the matchup will be held in Dallas at the New Cowboys Stadium (is that really what they're calling it?) with a guaranteed payout of $6 million for each team. I know a lot of folks have been hearing that such a matchup would be held against Texas A&M or Colorado, but this matchup makes the most sense. Both teams will be looking to beef up their OOC slate in order to impress the BCS computers and both programs would draw just enough to attract a good TV deal and some serious cash. Bring it on, Big XII.

Nice shoes, bird.

RSCumor, and it's a BIG one

According to a source of ours who is very well connected to the football program, Greg Hardy is going to stay in Oxford for his senior season. Please, please, please let this be true, sports Gods. You absolutely owe us.

Is Greg Hardy out?

There are all kinds of rumors floating around concerning the status of Greg Hardy as an Ole Miss Rebel. We all know he is a major primadonna, but if the rumors of the team voting him off Survivor style are true then this has gotten way outta hand. Check out NAFOOM if you would like to read the thread concerning this.

We're likely not going to post something until it becomes made factually clear to us.

"What's that," you ask. "Integrity?"

No, not really. We're just lazy.

A note to our beloved baseball coach....

Hey Mike Bianco, here's an idea! Hire Ron Polk! I know that sounds silly, but Polk has mentioned that he would like to return to baseball as a volunteer coach (which is the position Matt Mossberg currently holds). I think he is qualified:

1) There is probably not anyone who hates Mississippi State more right now than Ron Polk.

2) More CWS appearances as head coach than Mike Bianco can dream of. Also, he has taken 3 different teams to Omaha!

3) Has forgotten more about baseball than Mike Bianco knows.

4) Can get even the worst of teams to Omaha (read: 2007)

If you don't think this qualifies Ron to be our assistant, you are either lying or stupid.



Note: I didn't want to put a picture up of him in
his Mistake uniform. I actually kind of like UGA.

New Coach at MSU

The Mittittippi Tate Bulldogs are holding press conferences tomorrow to announce a new head coach for Bulldog Baseball. This comes from a very reliable source: the Clarion-Ledger Blog

"Press conference parade points to Cohen being the man (updated, 2:33 p.m.)
Posted 6/6/2008 2:25 PM CDT on clarionledger.com
Here's what The Blog can confirm right now, per MSU spokesman Mike Nemeth:

Mississippi State will hold a press conference at 1 p.m. tomorrow at the Bryan Building in Starkville "to name the next head baseball coach at Mississippi State," he said. MSU will hold another press conference at 5 p.m. tomorrow at the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame and Museum in Jackson for the same purpose.

Now, we turn to the blog of Brett Dawson, who covers Kentucky for The (Louisville, Ky.) Courier-Journal.

Brett reports that UK has called a press conference at 3:30 p.m. CT, and the school is expected to name a new baseball coach at that time.

Can we now safely say that all signs point to John Cohen being named Mississippi State's next head coach?"

The Powe Tron: Probably not gonna suck afterall!

I don't have any sort of definite source to verify this, but the recent scuttlebutt surrounding the Powe-Tron is that Daktronics, the company responsible for scoreboards at Georgia, Texas, and numerous other places, has won the bid to construct our new scoreboard. This means that our new board will most likely not at all be shitty, as many of us had predicted. It will be a high definition board and it is rumored that the designs will have it built 80ft wide by 50ft tall. Furthermore, rumors also tell of an agreement between the athletic department and Daktronics which stipulates that Daktronics would be required to pay $25k for every single day the screen doesn't work if it malfunctions during football season.

While nice, such a clause is really unnecessary. I think we all know how to keep stadium electronics functioning during football season: no daytime fireworks.

All things considered, we may need to find a new name for this bad boy. Personally, I like the Powe-Tron (I kinda coined the term, y'know) but that name was based on this Jerrell Powe...

...not this mythical, racially-tolerant Jerrell Powe.

As far as I can tell, these are all just rumors. If anybody has any definitive information surrounding this please let us know.