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Posted

I don't see any "tell me about MSU" type of threads, but I have some unpleasant thoughts to put out into the ether. I've also spoilered some content that gets more voluminous on the banality of Mississippi State as an institution for tl;dr imbeciles.

Mississippi State is perhaps the most boring brand in the entirety of major college athletics. 

Someone lamented on the game week thread that "no one is excited for this game". I doubt I'm the only person who read that and thought, "who in the fuck gets excited to play Mississippi State?" Even if they were good, who would be excited to play MSU? "Dude, we've got Mississippi State this week!" Right.

Does Ole Miss get excited to play them? Alabama? I guess, having watched 20+ Egg Bowls, I can agree that Ole Miss actually gives a shit but that's about it. 

This is a brand and school that is as plain as grits and as competitive as a hippie commune. Starkville is as appealing as a destination as visiting a tire-making factory. I've tried thinking about who else rivals the Mississippi State melancholy as an opponent for anyone out there. Who can do it? 

-Baylor? They are in Waco. But they've managed to institutionalize rape and murder cover-up. They have better colors, also. They're not completely boring. 

-Indiana? Bloomington is supposed to be a great place to visit and they used to be a blue blood in men's basketball. Way better academically as well.

-Iowa State? A case can be made here. They're marginally better academically. Their colors and uniforms are better and they've had some hot meme girls. I don't know anything about Ames. I don't know, maybe ISU is an analog. 

-Wake Forest? They've been good before in other sports and Winston-Salem is a great town with some history. Way better academically as well. 

-The best candidate is probably Texas Tech. The only thing saving Lubbock from being as shitty as Starkville is the fact that Lubbock is at least inside the state of Texas. Tech's academic ranking is just 10 rungs up above MSU's, coming in at 198 in the US News & World Report rankings. Also, Tech is about as futile as MSU when it comes to athletic performance. Maybe Tech really is an analog, and Texas just traded one shitty conference affiliate for another. 

P4-wise, I am not sure who else could objectively be considered on par with being as moribund as Mississippi State, but I'm interested in other suggestions. This is a really boring, uninspiring pack of mouthbreathing gypsies with whom Texas has moored itself. It's grim. 

Mississippi State's academics are on par with a third world country's.

Spoiler

The MSU US News & World Report ranking is 208th, nationally. That's currently 98 spots behind the University of Oklahoma, who is our standard bearer for academic futility. Originally Mississippi A&M when founded, the mission for the school hasn't apparently changed as much as the name. In short, this dumpster fire exists in order to educate, to some meager degree, farmers and their offspring.

The acceptance rate hovers around 80% and that's with most applicants being from Mississippi high schools. My daughter taught in the Teach For America program in Mississippi for 2 years and then a 3rd mentor year within their public school program. When she applied, they asked her where she'd like to teach, anywhere in the country. She opted for "place of highest need", no doubt thinking she'd wind up in East Los Angeles, becoming the female version of Jaime Escalante.

Nope. Welcome to the Mississippi delta, young lady! She was once stabbed in class; witnessed one student's dad murder another student's dad in front of the school pick-up line; broke up fights in the classroom daily; and taught 2-3 13 year olds each year, in the 3rd grade. You can't move on to 4th grade without being able to pass state standard reading and math tests. Mississippi State is taking roughly 80% of these erudite scholars.

I'm sure Texas is benefitting in numerous ways from the research side of things in their deep collaborations with Mississippi State now that the two are affiliated. 

I've been a part of employing and working with 1000s of college grads over the years, and I can recall working with only one MSU grad. We hired him as an analyst out of their business school at a growing start-up. I will never figure out what we were thinking when we did it, because the guy basically showed up underwater and was gasping for air before the end of week 1.

Shit got worse from there. By the end of month 2, he'd been removed from all projects, was in a PIP, and an uncomfortable exit was coming. Problem was, we liked the guy and he meant well. Those are bosskillers, of course, but we figured out a role that made sense and it saved his career. We needed a receptionist. Dude took to it like a duck to water. Last I heard, he'd made his way to executive assistant several decades later. 

I've made the argument that LSU is a shithole institution that is doing more harm than good to this country by handing out degrees and sending clowns into the workforce. I'd make the same argument for Mississippi State, but I'm thinking that maybe whatever farming their doing in that state could be benefitting from the reality that a lot of MSU grads can probably read and write better than when they landed in Starkville in the first place. 

As pathetic as Mississippi State's academics are, their historical athletic performance might be worse than the academics.

Spoiler

MSU has an overall losing record, for their history, in football. It staggers me a bit when I think about how hard that is to pull off. These guys schedule 4 non-conference teams every year, always with 3 cupcakes. They're a founding member of the SEC. They've gotten to play Kentucky and Vanderbilt regularly, with Arkansas and South Carolina as well in recent decades. Ole Miss has mostly been equally shitty. How the hell do you wind up with a losing record for life with those cushions? 

Mississippi State has won one SEC conference title in football, in 1941. They've had 3 consensus All-Americans. I looked up "backwater program in college football" and the first result from Google was "Mississippi State is often considered the best example of backwater college football programs". They think ringing cowbells is a competitive advantage and a unique and endearing facet for their football brand. 

Across the span of the MSU athletic department, they've won one national title in college baseball, and nothing else in any sport. That's it. One. Within several years of that outcome, they fired the dude that brought that home for them. They're historically a top 15 baseball program and that is the apex of all of their sports. They're usually little more than a speed bump in every other sport besides occasionally being good in men's basketball and women's basketball (much of the WBB success is a direct result of Vic Shaeffer). 

I guess there's some legitimacy to the notion that cupcakes are necessary in every sport, so we need the MSU's of the world in athletics. 

 

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Posted

I called them the Bullbitches this morning and as lame as that is, it's totally fitting. 

I looked at flights in and they are still sub 1k this late I thought about going for a hot second and then realized what the fuck would I do in Starkville? What is there to do there? I searched and it is fucking wild how they can even call that a college town. 

Posted

I have given this some thought and whew, boy, you have posed a difficult question.  All I can come up with for matching academic and athletic futility is Rhode Island. But it's in a suburb of Providence so that's already better than Starkville.  Fresno St?

Posted
34 minutes ago, closetojumping said:

I don't see any "tell me about MSU" type of threads, but I have some unpleasant thoughts to put out into the ether. I've also spoilered some content that gets more voluminous on the banality of Mississippi State as an institution for tl;dr imbeciles.

Mississippi State is perhaps the most boring brand in the entirety of major college athletics. 

Someone lamented on the game week thread that "no one is excited for this game". I doubt I'm the only person who read that and thought, "who in the fuck gets excited to play Mississippi State?" Even if they were good, who would be excited to play MSU? "Dude, we've got Mississippi State this week!" Right.

Does Ole Miss get excited to play them? Alabama? I guess, having watched 20+ Egg Bowls, I can agree that Ole Miss actually gives a shit but that's about it. 

This is a brand and school that is as plain as grits and as competitive as a hippie commune. Starkville is as appealing as a destination as visiting a tire-making factory. I've tried thinking about who else rivals the Mississippi State melancholy as an opponent for anyone out there. Who can do it? 

-Baylor? They are in Waco. But they've managed to institutionalize rape and murder cover-up. They have better colors, also. They're not completely boring. 

-Indiana? Bloomington is supposed to be a great place to visit and they used to be a blue blood in men's basketball. Way better academically as well.

-Iowa State? A case can be made here. They're marginally better academically. Their colors and uniforms are better and they've had some hot meme girls. I don't know anything about Ames. I don't know, maybe ISU is an analog. 

-Wake Forest? They've been good before in other sports and Winston-Salem is a great town with some history. Way better academically as well. 

-The best candidate is probably Texas Tech. The only thing saving Lubbock from being as shitty as Starkville is the fact that Lubbock is at least inside the state of Texas. Tech's academic ranking is just 10 rungs up above MSU's, coming in at 198 in the US News & World Report rankings. Also, Tech is about as futile as MSU when it comes to athletic performance. Maybe Tech really is an analog, and Texas just traded one shitty conference affiliate for another. 

P4-wise, I am not sure who else could objectively be considered on par with being as moribund as Mississippi State, but I'm interested in other suggestions. This is a really boring, uninspiring pack of mouthbreathing gypsies with whom Texas has moored itself. It's grim. 

Mississippi State's academics are on par with a third world country's.

  Reveal hidden contents

The MSU US News & World Report ranking is 208th, nationally. That's currently 98 spots behind the University of Oklahoma, who is our standard bearer for academic futility. Originally Mississippi A&M when founded, the mission for the school hasn't apparently changed as much as the name. In short, this dumpster fire exists in order to educate, to some meager degree, farmers and their offspring.

The acceptance rate hovers around 80% and that's with most applicants being from Mississippi high schools. My daughter taught in the Teach For America program in Mississippi for 2 years and then a 3rd mentor year within their public school program. When she applied, they asked her where she'd like to teach, anywhere in the country. She opted for "place of highest need", no doubt thinking she'd wind up in East Los Angeles, becoming the female version of Jaime Escalante.

Nope. Welcome to the Mississippi delta, young lady! She was once stabbed in class; witnessed one student's dad murder another student's dad in front of the school pick-up line; broke up fights in the classroom daily; and taught 2-3 13 year olds each year, in the 3rd grade. You can't move on to 4th grade without being able to pass state standard reading and math tests. Mississippi State is taking roughly 80% of these erudite scholars.

I'm sure Texas is benefitting in numerous ways from the research side of things in their deep collaborations with Mississippi State now that the two are affiliated. 

I've been a part of employing and working with 1000s of college grads over the years, and I can recall working with only one MSU grad. We hired him as an analyst out of their business school at a growing start-up. I will never figure out what we were thinking when we did it, because the guy basically showed up underwater and was gasping for air before the end of week 1.

Shit got worse from there. By the end of month 2, he'd been removed from all projects, was in a PIP, and an uncomfortable exit was coming. Problem was, we liked the guy and he meant well. Those are bosskillers, of course, but we figured out a role that made sense and it saved his career. We needed a receptionist. Dude took to it like a duck to water. Last I heard, he'd made his way to executive assistant several decades later. 

I've made the argument that LSU is a shithole institution that is doing more harm than good to this country by handing out degrees and sending clowns into the workforce. I'd make the same argument for Mississippi State, but I'm thinking that maybe whatever farming their doing in that state could be benefitting from the reality that a lot of MSU grads can probably read and write better than when they landed in Starkville in the first place. 

As pathetic as Mississippi State's academics are, their historical athletic performance might be worse than the academics.

  Reveal hidden contents

MSU has an overall losing record, for their history, in football. It staggers me a bit when I think about how hard that is to pull off. These guys schedule 4 non-conference teams every year, always with 3 cupcakes. They're a founding member of the SEC. They've gotten to play Kentucky and Vanderbilt regularly, with Arkansas and South Carolina as well in recent decades. Ole Miss has mostly been equally shitty. How the hell do you wind up with a losing record for life with those cushions? 

Mississippi State has won one SEC conference title in football, in 1941. They've had 3 consensus All-Americans. I looked up "backwater program in college football" and the first result from Google was "Mississippi State is often considered the best example of backwater college football programs". They think ringing cowbells is a competitive advantage and a unique and endearing facet for their football brand. 

Across the span of the MSU athletic department, they've won one national title in college baseball, and nothing else in any sport. That's it. One. Within several years of that outcome, they fired the dude that brought that home for them. They're historically a top 15 baseball program and that is the apex of all of their sports. They're usually little more than a speed bump in every other sport besides occasionally being good in men's basketball and women's basketball (much of the WBB success is a direct result of Vic Shaeffer). 

I guess there's some legitimacy to the notion that cupcakes are necessary in every sport, so we need the MSU's of the world in athletics. 

 

So you're saying my kid has a shot at going to college?

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Posted

There is a whole lot of boring in the Big 10, half the league is a snooze fest. Illinois, Syracuse, Minnesota, Maryland, Rutgers, Purdue, Northwestern, Michigan st

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Posted
1 minute ago, RGBIII said:

There is a whole lot of boring in the Big 10, half the league is a snooze fest. Illinois, Syracuse, Minnesota, Maryland, Rutgers, Purdue, Northwestern, Michigan st

Those are incredible schools and really fucking cool college towns. 

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Posted
3 minutes ago, immamac said:

Those are incredible schools and really fucking cool college towns. 

Fair enough but none of those move the needle for me at all in terms of wanting Texas to play them. Maybe Mich St if they are good like they used to be. 

Posted

Not sure if real but apparently Skip Bertman had some funny Starkville quotes

 

Starkville is an Indian word for 'trailer park'" 

"Coach Polk invited me to his house for a Bar B Que. He told me he had split level housing. Turns out it was just a double wide on the side of a hill." 

"A tornado once went through Starkville and did a million dollars of improvements"

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Posted
6 minutes ago, immamac said:

Those are incredible schools and really fucking cool college towns. 

Certainly but would you be excited for a home and home with any of them? Maybe a road visit once but imagine looking at the non-con schedule and its fucking Syracuse

Posted

The coolest photo ever taken at Mississippi State.

How the hell did MSU ever pull these two from N'Awlins and Miami when they could've gone to LSU and The U? One of life's great mysteries.

No photo description available.

Posted
22 minutes ago, RGBIII said:

There is a whole lot of boring in the Big 10, half the league is a snooze fest. Illinois, Syracuse, Minnesota, Maryland, Rutgers, Purdue, Northwestern, Michigan st

Syracuse is in the ACC. Honest mistake, though, with Rutgers and Maryland in the B1G

Posted
27 minutes ago, immamac said:

Those are incredible schools and really fucking cool college towns. 

Yeah, I've had the good fortune of being in most of those for work or actually attending a game. There aren't many I would choose to go back to, but if forced to do so I'd gladly select all of them prior to returning to Starkville. I mean, it would be a choice with zero hesitation or regret.

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Posted (edited)
3 minutes ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

Closest I can come up with is Rutgers.  I figure Whothefuckknows, NJ has to be better than Starkvegas, but that would be about it.

I really dislike New Jersey and have had to be there more than I care to admit. 

It's a utopian paradise in comparison. 

Edited by BurntEyes
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Posted
2 minutes ago, BurntEyes said:

Yeah, I've had the good fortune of being in most of those for work or actually attending a game. There aren't many I would choose to go back to, but if forced to do so I'd gladly select all of them prior to returning to Starkville. I mean, it would be a choice with zero hesitation or regret.

 

25 minutes ago, RGBIII said:

Certainly but would you be excited for a home and home with any of them? Maybe a road visit once but imagine looking at the non-con schedule and its fucking Syracuse

Well... I mean. I don't want to go to game Syracuse, mostly cause the ACC is a shit conference but the football and the city are far better options. 

Posted (edited)
1 hour ago, immamac said:

I called them the Bullbitches this morning and as lame as that is, it's totally fitting. 

I looked at flights in and they are still sub 1k this late I thought about going for a hot second and then realized what the fuck would I do in Starkville? What is there to do there? I searched and it is fucking wild how they can even call that a college town. 

This shit blows my mind....

image.thumb.png.fe0e379fed15029f98672556f11622a2.png

that includes fees, btw

Edited by Blotto
Posted

Ye of little or no adventurous spirit….

Spent last night enjoying North Shore Pontchartrain now halfway to Starkville.  

Sunday night dinner at Galatoire’s and spend night at The Ritz to re-acclimate.

Reports will be filed 

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Posted
4 minutes ago, MirrOlure said:

Ye of little or no adventurous spirit….

Spent last night enjoying North Shore Pontchartrain now halfway to Starkville.  

Sunday night dinner at Galatoire’s and spend night at The Ritz to re-acclimate.

Reports will be filed 

We talked about this already. 

I truly hope you enjoy yourself. 

I've no desire to relive the experience. 

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Posted
3 minutes ago, DaysOff said:

Solid CTJ rant, but it's still 50/50 the Armenian loses this game.

I said it in a different thread but when I reach the point where I think, "We'll this will force some changes" regarding winning or losing against a specific team (Kansas cough cough) it's not a good thing. 

Posted
2 minutes ago, TexasEd said:

Utah State?

I have heard that they have skiing though. 
 

 

southern Mississippi?

I wouldn't suggest putting Hattiesburg on any must see tourist list, but it's substantially better. 

Posted
56 minutes ago, immamac said:

Those are incredible schools and really fucking cool college towns. 

So what you're saying is the south, outside of a few exceptions, fucking sucks. 

And, outside of winter weather, the north is far better. 

Yep, makes sense

Posted
1 minute ago, locodos said:

Cowbells are the redneck version of the Vuvuzela.  Why anyone would want to sit through that environment is beyond me.

This is amazingly accurate. Good call!

Posted

Did a wireless project for the Mississippi Highway Patrol around 13 years ago, I spent way too much time in that fucking state but Starkville is definitely one of the "cooler" places. Also, lol at academic smack talk when discussing athletics, that shit does not matter anymore

Posted
5 minutes ago, 'stache said:

Oklahoma Panhandle State

Are they soon to join the SEC? 

West Texas State University would like a word with you. 

I mean they do have the actually cool Palo Duro Canyon close by and the riveting city of Amarillo... so maybe a bad comparison.

Posted

I’ve driven through Mississippi a couple of times, besides that I know nothing of it. As for why Miss State exists I imagine that state needed a school for all the rednecks and sharecropper/backwoods people to separate them from the plantation family old money kids at Ole Miss. 

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Posted
17 minutes ago, Guadaloopy said:

So we can enjoy the Fightin' Texum Bulldogs joke.

Fun fact: Mississippi State's mascot Bully is the original English Bulldog mascot. Georgia stole their idea when they debuted Uga twenty years later.

GEkIHyjWwAA4C47?format=jpg&name=large

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Posted
44 minutes ago, RGBIII said:

Certainly but would you be excited for a home and home with any of them? Maybe a road visit once but imagine looking at the non-con schedule and its fucking Syracuse

Part of my point* is that Mississippi State brings nothing to the table. They are in a shit location, with shit academics, with shit athletic history, with a shit brand. All of those schools you named bring at least something to the table, and many of them bring a lot to the table. 

"Illinois, Syracuse, Minnesota, Maryland, Rutgers, Purdue, Northwestern, Michigan st"

NW is a great academic school. The rest are mostly decent to good, with Syracuse ranking the lowest at 75, a full 133 spots ahead of Mississippi State. NW is in Chicago. It's an awesome away game to visit if you like a cool big city, murder rate notwithstanding. MSU, Minny, Syracuse, they all have solid to excellent football histories. Minny is in a big city too, albeit not a visit I would call "cool", but I've only visited the twin cities for business. 

I could get excited about a few of those trips, but I can extol the virtues of some or all parts of those schools and programs with a straight face compared to MSU. 

*Another part of my point was that running over an also-ran like Mississippi State also gave me the chance to take potshots at multiple other shitheel schools that I don't like or respect in the original post.

13 minutes ago, MirrOlure said:

Ye of little or no adventurous spirit….

Spent last night enjoying North Shore Pontchartrain now halfway to Starkville.  

Sunday night dinner at Galatoire’s and spend night at The Ritz to re-acclimate.

Reports will be filed 

Hey, look, I like to take CFB road trips. I was supposed to go to UK and Georgia this year but life stuff intervened. Been on 30+ visits away from Austin either way. That said, I don't have Starkville in my future plans unless I have a kid that becomes a starting QB there or something crazy. 

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Posted
1 hour ago, RGBIII said:

There is a whole lot of boring in the Big 10, half the league is a snooze fest. Illinois, Syracuse, Minnesota, Maryland, Rutgers, Purdue, Northwestern, Michigan st


Northwestern is fucking awesome. Beautiful campus right by the lake. 20 minutes to downtown Chicago. 

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Posted
13 minutes ago, ztejas said:

Cal ranks extremely highly on the boring P4 athletics program list. 

Yea but the campus and academics are awesome.  It's not a boring school.

Posted
Just now, Helobious said:

I’ve driven through Mississippi a couple of times, besides that I know nothing of it. As for why Miss State exists I imagine that state needed a school for all the rednecks and sharecropper/backwoods people to separate them from the plantation family old money kids at Ole Miss. 

You mean the Houston/Dallas/Nola/Atlanta suburban kids who pay out-of-state tuition to live in MS because they can't get into better schools?

Posted
7 minutes ago, Zepol87 said:

Did a wireless project for the Mississippi Highway Patrol around 13 years ago, I spent way too much time in that fucking state but Starkville is definitely one of the "cooler" places. Also, lol at academic smack talk when discussing athletics, that shit does not matter anymore

The validity of your first point is called into question by the inanity of your second point. Academic talk is front and center in the original shit talking post because we are examining the entirety of the product, in this case, a shithole institution in a shithole state.

5 minutes ago, BurntEyes said:

Are they soon to join the SEC? 

West Texas State University would like a word with you. 

I mean they do have the actually cool Palo Duro Canyon close by and the riveting city of Amarillo... so maybe a bad comparison.

I was deliberate in discussing "major" or P4 schools as the comparison. There's probably 1000 small or largely unknown schools that we can discuss otherwise. 

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Posted
Just now, Zepol87 said:

Am I going crazy or weren't they ranked #1 or 2 briefly when Dak was there? What a crazy ass time that was

They got to #1 iirc

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