Kirby Smart weighs in on Dan Mullen's firing at Florda

Kirby Smart and the Georgia Bulldogs are on a fundamentally different trajectory than the Florida Gators, which just fired Dan Mullen after four years at the helm.

While No. 1 Georgia is the favorite to win the national title, Florida would be lucky to pick up a win against Florida State this weekend, securing bowl eligibility, just one week after firing Mullen.

“I hate it for Dan,” Smart said of Mullen’s firing on Monday. “Because I think Dan’s a good person. It’s a tough situation. But it’s the profession we chose to be in, but I think Dan will be fine.”

Mullen amassed a 34-15 record in his time at Gainesville, but he finished just 13-10 in the last two seasons. Regardless, his firing came just one year after Florida made it to the SEC Championship game, begging the question of whether off-field factors played a role in the decision. One of the many queries surrounded recruiting; Mullen struggled in the recruiting realm and even lost several commitments in his last few weeks, and he was often compared to Smart, a head coach who has one of the best recruiting reputations. Smart even managed to pick up one of Florida’s decommits.

Finebaum compares Mullen’s recruiting to Smart

According to ESPN analyst Paul Finebaum, one particular off-field topic, recruiting, was the single-largest concern for Florida in firing Mullen. He compared Mullen’s recruiting success — or lack thereof — as well as his mantra to that of Smart, which has been far more successful to date.

“It’s not that simple from a Florida standpoint,” Finebaum said, when asked if one bad year in modern-day college football can result in a firing. “What concerned Florida people more than anything else was the trajectory of recruiting. Mullen had top-10 classes, but you know what? When Alabama, Georgia, Texas A&M and LSU most years are locked into the top five or six, a top 10 doesn’t do you very good. You’re still fifth in the SEC or sixth. And this year, recruiting fell apart. So, that’s where it hurt. On top of that, Mullen never looked like he liked recruiting.”

Finebaum went on to make reference to one specific moment, drawing a parallel between Mullen’s subpar recruiting tactics and Smart’s.

Just when Mullen’s 2021 season began skidding to a mediocre finish, he made a strange comment about recruiting that sparked further questions regarding his job security, saying ““We’re in the season now. We’ll do (talk about) recruiting after the season — when it gets to recruiting time we can talk about recruiting.” Shortly thereafter, Florida cancelled its weekly press conference and did not make any players or coaches available to the media.

Finebaum compared that moment to how Smart handles recruiting at Georgia, arguing that recruiting was Mullen’s downfall.

“That question that came up a couple weeks ago, remember the press conference right after the Florida-Georgia game? Kirby Smart had said after the game that he takes time away from his family as much as he hates to do it, but he has to recruit,” Finebaum said. “And Dan Mullen basically said, ‘We’ll talk about recruiting in the offseason.’ Well, there is no offseason. The national signing day is, I think, December 15. And that answer rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. And I will say that Mullen was a good coach for them. He was Steve Spurrier Jr. in many respects; he had the visor, he had the offense, he had the quirky personality, but he couldn’t recruit well enough.”