Firing Barry Odom shows that Mizzou is done settling for mediocrity
Barry Odom is out, and so is any belief that mediocrity is acceptable at Mizzou.
That news came out Saturday morning, and fittingly so. It was less than 24 hours removed from Odom’s team finishing the season 6-6. Perhaps even more fittingly, Saturday improved his overall record to 25-25.
If not for the NCAA’s incompetence to overturn an all-too-harsh bowl ban from academic fraud that predated the Odom era, Mizzou would be preparing for its 3rd consecutive bowl game. But the hay was already in the barn, regardless of that ruling. At least it should have been. Some bowl win in Shreveport wasn’t going to change Mizzou’s reality of what the program was.
Average. Nothing more, nothing less.
That’s what Mizzou has been during the 4 years of the Odom era. For some, that was enough.
It was enough because Odom didn’t inherit a program built to win. The fallout of the Gary Pinkel era — player protests and a divided university defined a messy 2015 season in Columbia — put Mizzou in a hole that set the program back far from the place it entered the SEC. That is, as a sneaky SEC East contender who surprised people by making it to Atlanta. Twice.
That was all the more reason Mizzou wasn’t about to accept mediocrity. Not now. Not after watching the likes of Vanderbilt, Kentucky and Tennessee play a part in Mizzou’s 5-game losing streak. That was the 3rd time in Odom’s 4 years in which he suffered such a streak during the regular season. The only season that didn’t happen? That was 2018, which was also the only year in which Mizzou beat a ranked team under Odom.
Consider that. Even Vandy beat a ranked team in 2 of the past 3 years … and one of those was Mizzou. That, of course, was the only time in the Odom era that the Tigers played a regular season game as an Associated Press Top 25 team.
That felt like a fork in the road for the Odom era. Had he been able to stay in the hunt in the East, we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now. Instead, Mizzou couldn’t even be average. It was a bottom-feeder SEC team in the second half of 2019. That was mentioned in Sterk’s statement about Odom’s firing:
“As a program, we had tremendous momentum coming into the 2019 season with the opening of the new south end zone facility as well as other strategic investments in our football program,” Sterk said. “However, we lost a great deal of that energy during the last half of the season. This decision was difficult to make but was necessary.”
Sure, a season-ending injury to Cale Garrett and lingering injuries to Kelly Bryant played a part in that. But in Year 4, why did Jim Sterk need to keep accepting mediocrity?
Odom had a $2.85 million buyout, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. In 4 years of having the likes of Bryant and Drew Lock, who set the single-season SEC touchdown pass record, what did Odom really have to show for it? The Florida wins were great. Where were the signature wins?
In 4 years, Odom beat 6 teams who played in a bowl game. Florida was the only Power 5 team of that group who won more than 7 regular season games.
Mediocrity, that is.
And look, while this is a results-based business, Odom’s attitude probably made Sterk’s decision that much more difficult. The way he kept Mizzou from having a single player enter the transfer portal following the news of the bowl ban was commendable. The passion that he spoke about his alma mater with certainly made the Mizzou faithful believe that he was the right man for the job. A tremendous coordinator, he was. A tremendous face of the program, he was.
But Odom did a mediocre job as a head coach, and mediocrity doesn’t cut it in this conference. It doesn’t cut it at Mizzou, which has a $98 million stadium renovation that it would like to get a nice return on. A fanbase who believes its program has a ceiling is an awfully dangerous place to be.
It’s dangerous when you look around the conference and see that Georgia with Kirby Smart is on a completely different level. Florida with Dan Mullen avenged that 2-year skid in a big way in Columbia. Tennessee with Jeremy Pruitt turned the corner and looks like it’s on the rise. Shoot, Kentucky with Mark Stoops dodged a major bullet by keeping him from leaving for Florida State … shortly after a receiver played quarterback and ran all over Mizzou’s defense.
This was a make or break year for Odom. His team broke, and as a result, someone else is going to take over a program that’s in better shape than it was when he took over. That’s the good news. That’s surely what Sterk is banking on.
There’s going to be a solid market for the Mizzou opening. It’ll be a much different situation than 2015, when Odom made a lot of sense given the sudden Pinkel news and the turmoil from the player protests. For the first time in nearly 2 decades, it’ll be a completely open search for the next head coach.
The aforementioned facilities upgrade will certainly help, as will the likely scenario that Sterk is going to pony up for whoever gets the job. Whether that’s an up-and-coming Group of 5 coach like Mike Norvell or Luke Fickell, or perhaps a Power 5 coach curious about a potential change of scenery like Mike Leach or Dino Babers, Mizzou is an attractive opening.
It’s an interesting time in the program’s history. It would have been easy to sit back and let Odom continue to have these peaks and valleys that became synonymous with his tenure. Ultimately, though, the peaks weren’t high enough to justify him staying in Columbia for half a decade.
Mizzou knows it has the ability to compete in this division. We saw it in the 2010s. It just needs the right coach. Odom might’ve been the right guy at the time, but as the new decade begins, a change needed to be made.
Sterk made a tough decision. It was the right decision. Why? Mizzou doesn’t have to settle for mediocrity.
Sterk’s decision confirmed that it won’t anymore.
I liked Odom but results speak for themselves.
I like Odom too, he’s a relatively good guy that mostly takes responsibility for the bad coaching he has done. He never should have been given a HC job let alone an SEC HC job.
exactly
When some programs fire their coaches, they immediately get lambasted for doing so… When Missouri does it they’re just refusing to settle for mediocrity.
THIS is the SEC program Mike Leach should join. It’s in a relatively easier division. It’s friendlier to the idea of an Air Raid offense as they once had an Air Raid-adjacent offense in the Chase Daniels years. They have more patience.
If I were Mizzou, I’d throw $5.5M a year or more at Leach.
The same Leach that hasn’t been able to beat crappy Washington in 7 years? If you’re known as an offensive guru and you can’t even win the PAC10 with it’s complete hatred of playing defense, you may not be cracked up to be everything people seem to think you are.
Not here to bust on him or whatever, but how is Leach an upgrade from Barry Odom? Missouri entered the SEC east and won the East 2 times and why? Not because they were a team that could dominate the East, its’ because they came into the conference when the SEC East’s traditional powers were in utter disarray. Florida is finishing off the worst decade in it’s history since the 1940’s and looks to be climbing out of it slowly but steadily. Georgia was going nowhere until it committed to recruiting across all sports by the university spending 200 million a few years ago in that regard, and then firing Mark Richt of course. Tennessee is STILL a flaming dumpster fire but it wasn’t any competition to MU. So I don’t know where this concept comes from that Missouri thinks it should be winning the East and not doing so isn’t good enough. Do we see Texas A&M winning the west every year? They did when they struck lightning in a bottle with Johnny Football. Since then they can’t even crack the top 3 in that league.
Sure they can have aspirations, but sit back and face reality of the conference that each of these 2 teams joined voluntarily.
So when Mizzou has done well its all about luck and the misfortune of other programs. What BS.
In 2013 they hung with Auburn until the final minutes in Atlanta and 2014 they were down by 8 going into the 4th quarter against Bama in the title game.
It was Coach Pinkel’s sudden departure for health reasons and the idiotic phony student protests/team boycott in 2015 that set this program back 5-7 years. Why they had to settle for Odom in the first place. Once you’re falsely labeled racist, it’s a bit hard to recruit.
Couple that with the fans leaving in droves over all that crap and here we are.
A half empty stadium for every game and contributions down.
Then you get the money grubbing tutor who was hired by Mizzou even though she had a criminal record. Who in turn concocted the scheme to cheat for athletes and then attempt to blackmail the University. We all know now what the NCAA did when Mizzou reported it.
So enough of your rants about how unlucky the rest of the SEC was. I see 3-4 top notch programs and the rest pretty much on Mizzou’s level.
We can and will compete once we get through this latest setback. Without widespread cheating and paying to get 4-5 star recruits.
Get over yourself.
Sorry, nobody takes your comments seriously given the way you talk about other programs. Save yourself some time and just stick to the uga headlines. I would continue and start the name calling but I’m not going to stoop down to your level.
Awww… cry your little baby tears. 43-14, little baby.
The best thing is? There’s absolutely no end in sight to our continued ownage of Nothing Sucks Like A Big Orange, a trend started by Richt and continued under Kirby.
24-23-2. That’s the history. What is your definition of dominance? UGA has had 3 years of good ball and you act like it’s been decades of dominance. Grow up. Nobody crying here except you.
Your a joke. Everybody agrees. No hiding this.
What does the UT UGA score have to do with anything he said Corch? You can tell when someone is a moron when instead of refuting or debating what someone said you just use the score of a game you had no impact on. You can name the score of the UF UGA game if you want but you notice that’s all the moron UGA fans can do like Corch, TDOW ect
LOL. And everyone lacks at your hillbilly horrible grammar, just like your ignorant redneck coach.
Also, your reading comprehension is s–t. I said dominance started under Richt and continued under Kirby. Since 2000, Georgia is 14-6 against the Vawls, dumb little cry baby. I know it’s difficult to read words and understand them when your parents were blood relatives and produced an idiot child like you, but you could at least try.
So now your only choosing a certain part of history between the teams? What are you even trying to argue at this point? You are just confirming my previous statement. You’re a joke and all you do is call others names like a 3rd grader. Nice just job. You represent the uga fanbase well.
Ok cool well then in the last 30 years UF has dominated UGA. Funny when I do that all the UGA fans like to point to the all time record. Oh the hypocrisy
They might be done settling for mediocrity but it’s who they are…not just the school but the whole state.
Exactly. My previous long statement on this subject says just that. Their first seasons where they won the East were anomalies due to the teams in the East sucking. For crying out loud the East has sucked so bad this past 10 years. Jim Freaking McElwain won the East twice in a row at Florida that’s how bad it’s been.
Don’t expect the East to be down forever. Florida still owns more SEC championship game victories than anyone short of Alabama. The East will be competitive again.
Don’t you just love listening to the little sissy white southern boys in Florida, Georgia, and Tennessee hiding behind the black athletes playing in SEC?
You need to take that racist bullish!t somewhere else.
What a strange statement
Great, Mike5675, don’t even try to hide your racism or anything…
You can always tell when someone is racist when they bring race into a conversation that has nothing to do with race
Mike5675…This is a site devoted to SEC football, not your racist-agenda…period.
Missouri is an AAU accredited institution which Tennessee will never be. By the way, they’re still 5 wins to 3 losses against Tennessee.
I wouldn’t say Missouri is mediocre. They have had some pretty darn good teams especially when pinkle was there. At least I think that was his name.
Must be really embarrassing to realize that in the time Missouri has been in the SEC they have played in the SEC Championship Game twice…which is two more times than Tennessee has played in the championship game in that time frame.
Says the ut troll with the worst coach, AD, and football program in the sec.
You have Dollywood, we have Silver Dollar City.
You have grand ole opy, we have ozark opry.
We have 13 World Series pennants, you have ZERO
We even have Superbowl and Stanley Cup wins.
You, well you had that Manning kid once. lol
The only reason Odom finished 500 at Mizzou is because Drew Lock decided to remain “In-state” to play football.
Arguably Odom faced tougher competition than Pinkel did for his first 4, and Pinkel was finished, the best Odom could ever hope for was to be another wannabe like Pinkel. Best to be rid of them both.
I think Connor is confusing awful with mediocre. 8-4 is mediocre, and Missouri would take that in a heartbeat.
You reporters need to get off of the NCAA here already. MISSOURI cheated and they got caught. They got a slap on the wrist as a result but you people somehow are placing the blame on the NCAA here simply because missouri appealed and lost.
You don’t go around blaming the police and the prosecution when they catch a mass murderer and he gets convicted and sentenced. Stop trying to shift blame off of the wrongdoers. Missouri got off freaking LIGHT in comparison to other teams pulling the same crap.
Jesus, where on the doll did the state of Missouri touch you?
Lol!
You really are clueless, aren’t you? Why don’t you do everyone a favor and do a little research before opening your mouth. Every time you post something you reveal complete and total ignorance on whatever the subject.
Dig a little below the surface. Do you really think the Indian female tutor suddenly felt remorseful and did the right thing by turning Mizzou in. Think again.
It was a blackmail job from the beginning. Missouri refused to pay her and she went public. A complete piece of trash.
Meanwhile the widespread cheating continues everywhere else.
I hope the truth comes out about this story. Hint hint Athletic or Stl post dispatch.
Talk about gut punching a program when its down.
I cant defend Odom recruiting the last couple of years but his overall record has been about what Mizzou has been even with Pinkle, Missouri says it wants better and deserve better but I dont think they are going to want to spend what is needed to get the kind of coach the fans want, when the State keeps cutting their budget you got to remember that new addition was built with money from Alumni and not that much from the school,in fact when they built the addiction it actually cut seating, and I can see why we cant fill the seats unless Alabama or Georgia comes to CoMo I think the Fans will not be any happier with our next coach who probably spend a tall tale but unable to recruit or win at Mizzou
I’m thinking you are correct sir. Everybody thinks their team should be competing every year but the reality is very few teams manage that. Mizz is middle of the pack in the SEC and will fluctuate with a few really bad years and a few surprisingly good ones. Odom is likely par for the course
I don’t expect to win every year at my school. But I expect to win big twice a decade. And compete to over.500 more than under
And Barry did
I feel like I would have wanted to hang on to him if I was a Mizzou fan
Well said. Someone here is living in reality, not the past
Have you been drinking? I was trying to make sense of what you wrote then it became obvious.
As a Mizzou fan I hate to say this, but the brutal truth is Missouri just doesn’t have the resources to fire coaches on a whim and pick from the plethora of great coaches waiting for the job to open. Their pick of litter consists of coaches at smaller programs happy to get a big a raise for 3 years or coaches who have bigger sights and want to move on in 3 or 4 years anyway if they’re successful. They rode the wave with Pinkel and it payed off, that’s what they should have done with Odom, or will have to do because the expectation to win 9 or 10 games/year with the resources they have within a few years just isn’t realistic. It wasn’t that long ago and being bowl eligible was a huge goal, and Odom did that 3 years in a row now. I’m afraid of reverting back to a bad cycle where we just need to get back to bowl eligible again is the goal. They should have let Odom build on what he’s done so far imo. And he’s actually been recruiting St. Louis quite nicely for those paying attention. He needed to fire Dooley, or change what they were doing offensively, other than that Odom ran a pretty good program up until this bazaar season.
I think there are some good candidates from smaller schools that would do just fine. Don’t always have to unload the bank.
Truth
Truth by brooches not Johnny knoxville
Isn’t that what Arkansas said? Look at the disaster that’s turned into. Is Mizzou next?
Probably. We just got out with pinkel
Some pretty good observations Connor, but you conclude that somehow this decision was left to the whim of AD Sterk to either bump the bar up a bit or not. It really wasn’t, it’s simply that the University has just rebuilt half it stadium and needs someone who can actually get fans into the building. Just like the decision to hire is really over Jim Sterks head, so is the decision leading up to it, ie the decision to fire Odom.
It wasn’t just that Odom didn’t fill the bill on the game field(though he clearly didn’t) he also didn’t show any signs of recruiting well, hiring assistants well or PR’ing for the program that well. You could say he was clearly not ready for the job of Head Coach, which should be obvious to everyone now. No confidence from the major donors, Board of Curators and the MU President is why Odom is gone, not because he lost one too many games for Jim Sterks satisfaction.
At the very least this move should represent the final clean out of the Pinkel era holdovers which is something the program desperately needs. Remember Pinkel is the one who submarined the program with his lunacy of supporting players striking from playing football, that bad decision has been haunting the program for long enough.
You should shut up
I think you should shut up.
You’re not known for thinking
go suck a weenie lil pinkie.
Thank you. Pinkel brought us to heights we hadn’t seen since the 60s but did us no favors on the way out. I’d like to see where any SEC program (other than Bama, Auburn, Georgia, or LSU) would be after going through the 2015 mini Ferguson debacle. These folks were out to hurt the University and football program. Despite being the losers that they are, that was definitely accomplished.
I take grommits word seriously. After all you can tell he’s not some dumb Appalachian. Or the piss that runs off into Georgia. Btw Georgia who beat you for east champ twice in the first 3 years of playing in the sec? That’s like a NC to Tennessee. Mizzou is not a blue blood it’s a proving ground. And eligible 3 out of 4 years for post season proves something to me.
Good for Missouri. Apparently Miss State IS willing to settle for mediocrity, though.
It makes no difference what fans and journalists think about this firing. It makes limited difference what players and recruits think about it.
Can we go back to the why however? I think it’s wrong to assume that firings always happen because of records. I also think it’s wrong to think that beating teams with winning records or bowl game appearances and certainly meaningless beating teams that the media likes. Remember the coach has to be able to compete in the SEC. Throw the rest of those w-l records out the window.
Here are some of the things a coach has to be able to do and if they can’t do them they should get fired. Hang on this will read boring for some of you but it is the real stuff of success in coaching:
Recruit a balanced and functional roster every year, including top kids mentally.
Plan practices that are efficient and effective
Hire assistants that are proven at their roles
Supervise a training program that controls and rehabs injuries better
Ok, you get the idea right? It’s not a good thing to get hired for a job you are not ready for. I’m not making a judgement about Odom. Hopefully Sterk is wise enough to judge these things. From where we are sitting, we just can’t know enough of this to have an opinion.
The current roster needs to say thanks to Coach Odom, then keep their mouth and attitude positive. The University needs to put a great search committee, immediately, and work round the clock on this. Needless to say, nobody should be a candidate that doesn’t have a lot of head coaching experience, or at least extensive success as both an offensive and defensive coordinator. I think the best candidates will have about 25 years experience and come from Group of Five, FCS, and Division 2/3. I wouldn’t rule out Andy Hill. I don’t think Brick Haley has wide coaching experience across all the team coaching roles, even Hill might be short on defensive assignments.
I’m sorry to see Coach Odom not make it. He might still make a good head coach, but I don’t think he would do himself any favors to go back to a HC job right away. I think he could get ready faster by getting a job coaching offense somewhere-anywhere.
Hiring Odom meant that Mizzou was O.K. with accepting mediocrity in it’s football program. As I recall…didn’t Mizzou win the SEC East the first two(2) years it was in the SEC ? but that coach’s name was Gary Pinkel, right ? Not Odom.