Agreed.Lemonis coached IU to three regionals in four seasons— which ain’t a small feat for a B1G school.
Cannizzaro was seen at the time as a pretty savvy late hire of an assistant coach on the rise. I seem to recall that the LSU coach was pissed off ar the time.
Cannizarro had only been any sort of coach, ever, for 2 years. Had not ever even coached travel or rec ball in all likelihood. Had never had anything close to the level of responsibility required to run an SEC program. It was a joke of a hire from the experience level to the character issues. Unfortunately, the list of coaches who would have taken the job at that point on the calendar was pretty short. So, we took a calculated risk that failed horribly, but fortunately were able to cut bait soon enough to prevent long term damage. Should have just hired Henderson as Interim for 2017 and then made the long term hire after, if we’re Monday morning QB-ing that decision alone.
Agreed, but only because we had an in with him, which is the whole point of the post.Best hire State could have made at the time.
But still coached State to a CWS in his second tenure.
And finished with a losing SEC record and only 1 super regional appearance in 7 years. Was a lazy hire with suboptimal results in what turned out to be a critical juncture in our program with OM, Ark, USC, and Vandy all starting an ascent to another tier.
And then turned 4 years of middling performance into dipping out for a league rival, where he was fired within 5-6 years. Horrible hire due largely to his loyalty to Polk / MSU not matching theirs to him. Never had much going for him outside of Florida recruiting connections. How different would things have been if we hired Bianco or Corbin instead of McMahon? But no, we made the nepotism hire and continued to stroke Polk’s ego even after he was gone.A bit more than that — Mac came back to State as head coach in waiting. Smart hire by LT & RP.
Considering our only competition for him was an assistant job at Miami, I’d say that it wasn’t some major hire of a known commodity. He also missed the postseason in 2 of 4 years at GA Southern. Still turned out great obviously, but at the time his resume would be about the same as what Lemonis’ was.1970s college baseball was seen as a nonentity back then.
RP coached Georgia Southern to the 1973 CWS. That District tournament was in Starkville incidentally so he was not an unknown.