How Auburn boosters are reportedly undermining Gus Malzahn’s attempts to hire top assistants
By Adam Spencer
Published:
The Auburn football program is a bit of a mess at the moment. After going 7-5 during the regular season, the Tigers are off to the Music City Bowl — a big disappointment after high preseason expectations.
Making matters worse is all the turmoil around coach Gus Malzahn, who many in the fanbase — boosters included — want fired.
On Wednesday, Alabama reporter Josh Moon, who mostly covers politics but interacts with some big boosters on his beat, tweeted about some strong new restrictions on Malzahn.
As you can see below, Moon is reporting that Auburn isn’t letting Malzahn offer deals to assistants that are longer than one year. Moon says that’s hindering Malzahn from hiring Hugh Freeze as his offensive coordinator:
This is the situation at Auburn now: top donors and university officials are so unhappy with the head football coach that they are seeking to undercut him by limiting assistants' contracts to single year deals. This is currently preventing AU from hiring Hugh Freeze as OC. /1
— Josh Moon ?? (@Josh_Moon) December 5, 2018
Freeze is reportedly seeking a multi-year deal from future employers. Sources said Malzahn has asked AU to wave the recent restriction on multi-year contracts in order to hire Freeze. AU response: Nah. /2
— Josh Moon ?? (@Josh_Moon) December 5, 2018
To be clear, I have no source that can say AU is Freeze's top choice. Only that Malzahn, in putting together an offer for Freeze, asked for the waiver. There seems to be better ways to run a football program. /F
— Josh Moon ?? (@Josh_Moon) December 5, 2018
If this is indeed the situation, it’s worth wondering why Auburn didn’t just bite the bullet and fire Malzahn after the regular season.
This seems to be hindering the program, so we’ll see what develops over the coming weeks.
Adam is a daily fantasy sports (DFS) and sports betting expert. A 2012 graduate of the University of Missouri, Adam now covers all 16 SEC football teams. He is the director of DFS, evergreen and newsletter content across all Saturday Football brands.
