Assessing the likelihood of Dan Mullen returning to Mississippi State

From 2009-17, Dan Mullen took Mississippi State to eight bowl games and five 8-win seasons to become the second-winningest coach in Bulldogs history. He then headed to Florida from 2017-21 and appears to have found his niche as a broadcaster with ESPN.

Mississippi State has an opening, though, after firing Zach Arnett earlier this week. Almost immediately, Mullen came up on the list of names the Bulldogs should consider, including Andy Staples’ Hot Board. After all, while he was in Starkville, Mullen took Mississippi State to a No. 1 ranking in the first-ever College Football Playoff rankings.

As far as whether Mullen, 51, would be interested in returning to Starkville, though, Maroon and White Daily’s Paul Jones doesn’t know if it’s a possibility.

“I’m not sure if it gets to serious talks with Dan,” Jones said on Andy Staples On3. “Obviously, people change their minds, especially when you’ve been out of the game. But I’ve always been under the impression — and this goes back to my talks with Dan when he was here — that he’s probably done with coaching. He told us often even on the record, off the record when he was here that he didn’t want to coach much past his early 50s. He wanted to be with his kids, follow their dreams with sports. I know his son’s a very avid golfer, and he’s very involved with that.

“Outside of getting fired from Florida, what he told us a few years ago was exactly the path that he has taken, and it’s been out of college football. I wonder if Dan has that competitive fire to be in the new NIL world because the knock against Dan was his recruiting. Evaluation and all that? Man, he was one of the best. But when it comes to the NIL era, I just wonder if he has the hunger for that.”

Why recruiting is a big part of the conversation about Dan Mullen’s coaching future

Dan Mullen’s time at Florida took a quick turn for the worse. The Gators turned in back-to-back 10-win seasons under his watch and made the SEC Championship in 2020. But the 2021 season didn’t go well at all as UF missed out on a bowl game and, eventually, made the decision to fire Mullen and bring in Billy Napier.

One of the quotes that stood out toward the end of Mullen’s tenure at Florida was about recruiting. Jones said that was one of his areas of weakness, especially with NIL such a big part of the equation. The question would then be what kind of staff Mullen would put together if he decided to leave the broadcast booth.

While there’s sure to be plenty of chatter, Jones said he doesn’t sound optimistic about a return to the sidelines.

“To me, that was the biggest hang-up,” Jones said of Mullen’s recruiting. “Along those lines, is Dan gonna bring back his normal staff that he had with him at Mississippi State and Florida, his buddies? Or is it gonna be — this is all speculation — but if he did get back into it, is he gonna go get an aggressive recruiting staff? Guys that are accustomed to NIL and fighting in the streets for these guys?

“I think there’s gonna be a lot of people talking about that. I’m sure Dan loves the attention and people wondering if he’s going to get back into coaching or not. But to me, it would be a complete shock if he does coach again.”