Is it time for a radical solution for college football in Mississippi?

[QuaoarsKing]

This idea is not new. People have talked about it for decades. But I think its time has come.

A few facts to keep in mind:

• College students take a lot of online classes these days.
• Football players in particular take a lot of online classes.
• The NCAA allows players from other campuses of the same college to play on the main campus's team. For example, someone who took classes at the MSU campus in Meridian could play on our teams.
• Mississippi is the poorest state in the country, and it's one of smallest in population to have a Power 4 school (and unlike Nebraska and West Virginia, we don't have just 1)
  • Ole Miss is doing well in the NIL right now (top 20), but probably can't sustain it indefinitely. We are not doing as well, but combined we would be a top 10 NIL program.
• The state government has been talking for years about building a nice new football stadium in Jackson
• The rivalry between Ole Miss and Mississippi State is toxic (though arguably not as much as it was last decade). However, most all of us here have friends who like Ole Miss, and vice versa. It doesn't need to be toxic.
• Depending on the year, Mississippi is #1 or close to #1 in NFL players per capita. There's plenty of talent here.

So you can see where this going -- we should consider dropping down to 1 college athletic program in the state, and get everyone unified behind it.

• The state would have to reorganize the university administration. We have 8 separate institutions, not 8 branches of the same institution. This would not be unprecedented - for example in North Carolina, there is the UNC system, and the main campus (Chapel Hill), NC State, Charlotte, Appalachian State, Wilmington, etc., are part of it.
• The football team would all need to live in Jackson and take online classes at whichever university they want to. This wouldn't be a huge change from their student lives for most of them though.
• I think it's safe to say the majority of fans in Starkville or Oxford most Saturdays would have a shorter drive to go to Jackson than to either campus.
• You can't call the team the Rebels or Bulldogs - you'd need a new color scheme that doesn't match any of the current universities. You'd need a new nickname too. But you could keep Bully, the Shark, etc., as the costumed mascots. Why not have a bunch of them? And the team would have to be just known as "Mississippi"
• The stadium could seat 100,000 and be near the top of the FBS in attendance.
• Instead of sniping at each other for players, we would be a unified state taking on the world.
• With the streamlining of expenses, there would be leftover money to add more sports, like men's soccer, lacrosse, etc.
• You'd probably want to do the same with basketball and everything else. Maybe keep the baseball programs separate so that Starkville and Oxford don't lose out completely.
• A lot of people wouldn't be happy when this was announced, but after a couple of years, we'd all love it.
• The SEC would be happy to go down to 1 SEC school but still keep the whole state engaged.

These are the cons I can think of:

• Both universities have spent a lot of money on stadiums that would no longer host games. Maybe they could play 1 non-conference game a year away from Jackson, rotating between Oxford, Starkville, and Hattiesburg or something. And maybe you could play state championships or even NCAA soccer games there.
• The student sections may not be as lively since they'd mostly be coming in from 2+ hours way. The campuses could probably pay to bus students in though.
• There's no guarantee we'll be a great program if we do this. Arkansas, Minnesota, and West Virginia aren't great programs. Nebraska is a shadow of what it once was. On the other hand, all of those programs would almost certainly be in a worse situation if they had to share their states with another power conference school.
• A lot of people nationwide would probably still informally call the new team "Ole Miss" and see it as a continuation of that program rather than a merger of all programs. We would need to make it clear that that's not the case.

Should we do this? Yes. I said we should do this 20 years ago. I said we should 10 years ago when we were both top 10 teams. But given the modern unregulated NIL landscape, we need the entire state to unite around the same program.

This is NOT a surrender. This is just recognizing the realities of the world we live in. Companies merge all the time. Sports teams in other countries merge. Mississippi would have the chance to be a national power.

 

[preacher_dawg]

Oh, like they would ever combine with us now.

 

[Dawg1976]

You wasted a lot of time typing this. Will never happen that way. But hang on long enough and OM will effectively be the only major college program in the state as we're headed to the Sunbelt.....one day. I'm a geezer so may not happen in my lifetime but could happen.

 

[QuaoarsKing]

You wasted a lot of time typing this. Will never happen that way. But hang on long enough and OM will effectively be the only major college program in the state as we're headed to the Sunbelt.....one day. I'm a geezer so may not happen in my lifetime but could happen.

The question is not "will this ever happen" but "should it happen"

 

[POTUS]

Why would OM do this? They’ll just hang on until our self-immolation is complete. Then there will be only one P4 team. We are gonna be rivals with Southern Miss before I die. Depressing. But likely.

 

[QuaoarsKing]

Why would OM do this? They’ll just hang on until our self-immolation is complete. Then there will be only one P4 team. We are gonna be rivals with Southern Miss before I die. Depressing. But likely.

Because our hundreds of thousands of fans are never going to switch over to being Ole Miss fans, but would switch over to being fans of the combined super-team.

We need the whole state to pull together and unite behind a single team. All of us against the world.

 

[Maroon13]

Why would OM do this? They’ll just hang on until our self-immolation is complete. Then there will be only one P4 team. We are gonna be rivals with Southern Miss before I die. Depressing. But likely.

This. No way OM would agree to this now.

 

[POTUS]

Because our hundreds of thousands of fans are never going to switch over to being Ole Miss fans, but would switch over to being fans of the combined super-team.

We need the whole state to pull together and unite behind a single team. All of us against the world.

This is so dumb. One, a huge % of our fans root for Bama too. Or OM. They have to in order to get to see wins. Two, our fan number will dwindle once we get relegated. It may take a decade, but look at USM. They only got 11 now.

 

[QuaoarsKing]

This is so dumb. One, a huge % of our fans root for Bama too. Or OM. They have to in order to get to see wins. Two, our fan number will dwindle once we get relegated. It may take a decade, but look at USM. They only got 11 now.

Well if "a huge %" of our fans are secretly cheering for Ole Miss on the side, we're completely fuсked anyway. I've never seen any evidence of that though.

 

[QuaoarsKing]

This. No way OM would agree to this now.

College football in this state is a pendulum. One school is good and thinks it can bury the other, and then it swings back to the other. It's been that way for decades, and while their NIL advantage is going to help them, it's not so far apart that they'll bury us forever. Ole Miss could easily collapse if Kiffin leaves them, for example.

This proposal ends that constant back and forth and puts everyone united on the same page.

 

[OopsICroomedmypants]

I think we would be a power team. Let’s just don’t do anything dumb like putting a magnolia on our helmets.

 

[BIGDAWG44]

They can’t even agree to combine the W and Mississippi state and you think ole miss and state will merge?

 

[OG Goat Holder]

Mississippi is thr least unified state in the entire country, on anything. Something like this is so unlikely to happen, may as well not even discuss it.

 

[Bulldog45]

I think we would be a power team. Let’s just don’t do anything dumb like putting a magnolia on our helmets.

More likely a guitar on the helmet with beaded uniforms made out of polyester

 

[leeinator]

Combining the 2 universities was already tried back in the day. It failed miserably. The Commoners and Gentry simply did not get along. The idea was shelved forever.

 

[The Peeper]

No way I can read that much about MSU football

 

[ronpolk]

 

[greenbean.sixpack]

It maybe could have been done in the 70s/80s when both programs were down biggly and before tens of millions were spend on campus stadiums.

 

[DesotoCountyDawg]

 

[QuaoarsKing]

It maybe could have been done in the 70s/80s when both programs were down biggly and before tens of millions were spend on campus stadiums.

This idea wasn't really practical until 10 years or so ago when online classes became so ubiquitous.

Now we could base the super team in Jackson and each player could take online classes from Starkville, Oxford, Hattiesburg, or wherever.

 

[We Men]

I think you left out the main Con- Most people will not attend a game in Jackson because of the crime and gang problem. It would be millions wasted on a new stadium. Nuff said.

 

[Perd Hapley]

Because our hundreds of thousands of fans are never going to switch over to being Ole Miss fans, but would switch over to being fans of the combined super-team.

We need the whole state to pull together and unite behind a single team. All of us against the world.

As far as the state as a whole is concerned, the far bigger need is both of us to collectively scrap our football programs. And by that, I mean do the bare minimum to maintain SEC membership, collect TV checks, and find a way to route all the TV and donation revenue to basketball, baseball, and academics. Both schools field teams that go somewhere between 3-9 and 0-12 every year.

There’s not a shred of doubt that if you’re looking for what’s truly best for the state as a whole, that is it. It damn sure isn’t flushing millions of dollars down the toilet to try and keep up with the Jones’ with two hopeless sports programs. For example….take some average as hell kid from Madison Central or Tupelo High that graduates high school with a 3.2 GPA….and decides to attend either MSU or Ole Miss on his parents’ dime….for no other reason besides he rooted for the sports teams growing up. That person isn’t ever going to do anything to move the state forward based on his/her college education. They are either going to go into business / law / med / engineering and either go back to his / her bum17 Mississippi hometown to practice whatever (which is what they always could have done anyway without even going to college at all), or they are going to leave the state if they are truly looking to maximize their talents.

This, of course, is an absolutely absurd thought experiment and has no chance of ever happening. But, its not any bigger of a pie-in-the-sky fantasy than what you have proposed as far as “uniting the state”, so why not throw it out there?

 

[dorndawg]

I'd as soon put the ol girl down as to combine with them.

 

[eckie1]

This idea is not new. People have talked about it for decades. But I think its time has come.

A few facts to keep in mind:

• College students take a lot of online classes these days.
• Football players in particular take a lot of online classes.
• The NCAA allows players from other campuses of the same college to play on the main campus's team. For example, someone who took classes at the MSU campus in Meridian could play on our teams.
• Mississippi is the poorest state in the country, and it's one of smallest in population to have a Power 4 school (and unlike Nebraska and West Virginia, we don't have just 1)
  • Ole Miss is doing well in the NIL right now (top 20), but probably can't sustain it indefinitely. We are not doing as well, but combined we would be a top 10 NIL program.
• The state government has been talking for years about building a nice new football stadium in Jackson
• The rivalry between Ole Miss and Mississippi State is toxic (though arguably not as much as it was last decade). However, most all of us here have friends who like Ole Miss, and vice versa. It doesn't need to be toxic.
• Depending on the year, Mississippi is #1 or close to #1 in NFL players per capita. There's plenty of talent here.

So you can see where this going -- we should consider dropping down to 1 college athletic program in the state, and get everyone unified behind it.

• The state would have to reorganize the university administration. We have 8 separate institutions, not 8 branches of the same institution. This would not be unprecedented - for example in North Carolina, there is the UNC system, and the main campus (Chapel Hill), NC State, Charlotte, Appalachian State, Wilmington, etc., are part of it.
• The football team would all need to live in Jackson and take online classes at whichever university they want to. This wouldn't be a huge change from their student lives for most of them though.
• I think it's safe to say the majority of fans in Starkville or Oxford most Saturdays would have a shorter drive to go to Jackson than to either campus.
• You can't call the team the Rebels or Bulldogs - you'd need a new color scheme that doesn't match any of the current universities. You'd need a new nickname too. But you could keep Bully, the Shark, etc., as the costumed mascots. Why not have a bunch of them? And the team would have to be just known as "Mississippi"
• The stadium could seat 100,000 and be near the top of the FBS in attendance.
• Instead of sniping at each other for players, we would be a unified state taking on the world.
• With the streamlining of expenses, there would be leftover money to add more sports, like men's soccer, lacrosse, etc.
• You'd probably want to do the same with basketball and everything else. Maybe keep the baseball programs separate so that Starkville and Oxford don't lose out completely.
• A lot of people wouldn't be happy when this was announced, but after a couple of years, we'd all love it.
• The SEC would be happy to go down to 1 SEC school but still keep the whole state engaged.

These are the cons I can think of:

• Both universities have spent a lot of money on stadiums that would no longer host games. Maybe they could play 1 non-conference game a year away from Jackson, rotating between Oxford, Starkville, and Hattiesburg or something. And maybe you could play state championships or even NCAA soccer games there.
• The student sections may not be as lively since they'd mostly be coming in from 2+ hours way. The campuses could probably pay to bus students in though.
• There's no guarantee we'll be a great program if we do this. Arkansas, Minnesota, and West Virginia aren't great programs. Nebraska is a shadow of what it once was. On the other hand, all of those programs would almost certainly be in a worse situation if they had to share their states with another power conference school.
• A lot of people nationwide would probably still informally call the new team "Ole Miss" and see it as a continuation of that program rather than a merger of all programs. We would need to make it clear that that's not the case.

Should we do this? Yes. I said we should do this 20 years ago. I said we should 10 years ago when we were both top 10 teams. But given the modern unregulated NIL landscape, we need the entire state to unite around the same program.

This is NOT a surrender. This is just recognizing the realities of the world we live in. Companies merge all the time. Sports teams in other countries merge. Mississippi would have the chance to be a national power.

You left out “WTF” as an option.***

 

[bulldoghair]

Ha, retarded. This is stupid. Name another state that has done this. Probably just trolling

 

[QuaoarsKing]

I think you left out the main Con- Most people will not attend a game in Jackson because of the crime and gang problem. It would be millions wasted on a new stadium. Nuff said.

Meh, as long as it's in the Capitol Police district it would be fine.

Or put it in the suburbs. It's not that important to the idea.

 

[QuaoarsKing]

Ha, retarded. This is stupid. Name another state that has done this. Probably just trolling

No large public universities, but Long Island merged multiple campuses into a single athletic program recently. Also the Claremont Colleges in California.

 

[bulldoghair]

I trolled you back. Because this idea is so retarded, I click on strong yes.

 

[bulldoghair]

No large public universities, but Long Island merged multiple campuses into a single athletic program recently. Also the Claremont Colleges in California.

Never heard of them. Not going to look them up either.

 

[AttalaDawg72]

This should’ve happened 100 years ago, but it’s far too late for it now. I think Mississippi will eventually have one power 4 team though with Ole Miss. We will soon get relegated to the Sunbelt and be like USM. Ole Miss can rebrand as “Mississippi” and finally be the one team this state deserves.

 

[QuaoarsKing]

This should’ve happened 100 years ago, but it’s far too late for it now. I think Mississippi will eventually have one power 4 team though with Ole Miss. We will soon get relegated to the Sunbelt and be like USM. Ole Miss can rebrand as “Mississippi” and finally be the one team this state deserves.

So ... you prefer this merger plan to that scenario?

 

[The Cooterpoot]

This idea is not new. People have talked about it for decades. But I think its time has come.

A few facts to keep in mind:

• College students take a lot of online classes these days.
• Football players in particular take a lot of online classes.
• The NCAA allows players from other campuses of the same college to play on the main campus's team. For example, someone who took classes at the MSU campus in Meridian could play on our teams.
• Mississippi is the poorest state in the country, and it's one of smallest in population to have a Power 4 school (and unlike Nebraska and West Virginia, we don't have just 1)
  • Ole Miss is doing well in the NIL right now (top 20), but probably can't sustain it indefinitely. We are not doing as well, but combined we would be a top 10 NIL program.
• The state government has been talking for years about building a nice new football stadium in Jackson
• The rivalry between Ole Miss and Mississippi State is toxic (though arguably not as much as it was last decade). However, most all of us here have friends who like Ole Miss, and vice versa. It doesn't need to be toxic.
• Depending on the year, Mississippi is #1 or close to #1 in NFL players per capita. There's plenty of talent here.

So you can see where this going -- we should consider dropping down to 1 college athletic program in the state, and get everyone unified behind it.

• The state would have to reorganize the university administration. We have 8 separate institutions, not 8 branches of the same institution. This would not be unprecedented - for example in North Carolina, there is the UNC system, and the main campus (Chapel Hill), NC State, Charlotte, Appalachian State, Wilmington, etc., are part of it.
• The football team would all need to live in Jackson and take online classes at whichever university they want to. This wouldn't be a huge change from their student lives for most of them though.
• I think it's safe to say the majority of fans in Starkville or Oxford most Saturdays would have a shorter drive to go to Jackson than to either campus.
• You can't call the team the Rebels or Bulldogs - you'd need a new color scheme that doesn't match any of the current universities. You'd need a new nickname too. But you could keep Bully, the Shark, etc., as the costumed mascots. Why not have a bunch of them? And the team would have to be just known as "Mississippi"
• The stadium could seat 100,000 and be near the top of the FBS in attendance.
• Instead of sniping at each other for players, we would be a unified state taking on the world.
• With the streamlining of expenses, there would be leftover money to add more sports, like men's soccer, lacrosse, etc.
• You'd probably want to do the same with basketball and everything else. Maybe keep the baseball programs separate so that Starkville and Oxford don't lose out completely.
• A lot of people wouldn't be happy when this was announced, but after a couple of years, we'd all love it.
• The SEC would be happy to go down to 1 SEC school but still keep the whole state engaged.

These are the cons I can think of:

• Both universities have spent a lot of money on stadiums that would no longer host games. Maybe they could play 1 non-conference game a year away from Jackson, rotating between Oxford, Starkville, and Hattiesburg or something. And maybe you could play state championships or even NCAA soccer games there.
• The student sections may not be as lively since they'd mostly be coming in from 2+ hours way. The campuses could probably pay to bus students in though.
• There's no guarantee we'll be a great program if we do this. Arkansas, Minnesota, and West Virginia aren't great programs. Nebraska is a shadow of what it once was. On the other hand, all of those programs would almost certainly be in a worse situation if they had to share their states with another power conference school.
• A lot of people nationwide would probably still informally call the new team "Ole Miss" and see it as a continuation of that program rather than a merger of all programs. We would need to make it clear that that's not the case.

Should we do this? Yes. I said we should do this 20 years ago. I said we should 10 years ago when we were both top 10 teams. But given the modern unregulated NIL landscape, we need the entire state to unite around the same program.

This is NOT a surrender. This is just recognizing the realities of the world we live in. Companies merge all the time. Sports teams in other countries merge. Mississippi would have the chance to be a national power.

 

[Maroon13]

College football in this state is a pendulum. One school is good and thinks it can bury the other, and then it swings back to the other. It's been that way for decades, and while their NIL advantage is going to help them, it's not so far apart that they'll bury us forever. Ole Miss could easily collapse if Kiffin leaves them, for example.

This proposal ends that constant back and forth and puts everyone united on the same page.

I don't think OM will ever bury &tate. But... I think they've been good at buying players forever and the only thing that kept them in check was the ncaa. Well, they can buy players now, since it is within the rules.

Therefore what I'm afraid our rivalry will become is something very similar to Bedlam.

However you're right, once Kiffin goes... that will knock them down a peg or two.

 

[AttalaDawg72]

I don’t think Kiffin is going anywhere after this year.

 

[pseudonym]

The time to make that decision was sometime between 1878 and 1896. It would have been a good post 128 years ago, but SixPack had fewer readers back then.

 

[AttalaDawg72]

I imagine an alternate universe where this were the case. I think we’d be somewhere between what LSU and Alabama are.

 

[Dawgg]

Delete this and try again. I know this week was embarrassing, but Jesus.


Hey guys... have you ever thought about totally destroying the programs that you've emotionally, physically, and financially invested in for most of your lives, then creating a brand new program to which you have absolutely no connection and choosing to root for that program because it has a non-zero chance of being better at sports than the program you've got?

For 17's sake, why not just root for Alabama instead of the All-Directions University of Mississippi State Golden Rebulldogs?

 

[IBleedMaroonDawg]

Get ready for nothing to change.

 

[40 acres and a mule]

I would rather watch my pet cats and dog get slaughtered and eaten by Haitians while being beheaded by the Taliban than to have anything to do with Ole Miss and their fans.

 

[AMereMortal]

The disappearance of the dislike button continues to plague our society