I am a die-hard Mizzou fan/alum who has been living in Alabama for several years now. Can't tell you how excited I am to see us joining (hopefully) the SEC. Living here, I understand exactly why Mizzou seems so strange and unfamiliar to ya'll. SEC football is dominant in the Southeast and little else matters here.
For those of you who know little about it, I wanted to expand on Craig's thoughts and help in getting to know Mizzou Football. We are not a perennial powerhouse, our success is very recent. We did play some pretty good football through the 60's, 70's and early 80's. However, in between 1984-1996, we became a doormat of a program and it killed nearly a generation of Tiger football fans. This was in part to blame on an Administration at the time that wanted us to become the Harvard of the Midwest and did not support the athletic program and made it difficult to recruit and fund; hence we became a basketball school. That all changed briefly in 1997 and 1998 with the late HC Larry Smith who had two consecutive bowl seasons and ranked as high as #13 at one point. But just as the fan base started to wake up, Larry couldn't maintain it and we quickly fell off the map again.
Finally in 2001, the Gary Pinkel era began. It started out rocky and fans were pretty apathetic and hesitant to get their hopes up, but that all changed in 2002 when a young unknown, athletic kid named Brad Smith, exploded onto the scene against Illinois at the Dome in STL and while we only finished 5-7, you could sense some momentum. 2003 we won 8 games including a huge win over Neb at home but lost to Arkansas in the Indy bowl. 2004 was a terrible year, including a road loss to Troy and was a year that the whole thing almost came apart and sent Pinkel packing. But the Admin stuck with him and it's good thing they did. Since 2003 we have been to 7 bowls, won 10 or more games at least 3 times, spent at least part of 2007, 2008 and 2010 ranked in the top 10, including a week at #1 in 2007, which we finished #4.
Before 2007, we had very little success in getting players drafted, but since then, we have had ~20, including 5 first Rd draft picks in the past 3 yrs: DL Ziggy Hood (Steelers), WR Jeremy Maclin (Eagles), QB Blaine Gabbert (Jaguars), DE Aldon Smith (49ers), LB Sean Weatherspoon (Falcons). Other guys of note in the NFL from recent years are QB Chase Daniel, TE Chase Coffman, TE Martin Rucker, S William Moore, QB/WR Brad Smith, WR Denario Alexander, DE Justin Smith (1999).
On our current roster, we have several guys that have a future on Sundays at some point: WR/TE Michael Egnew (all american), WR Marcus Lucas, OT Dan Hoch, WR TJ Moe (Wes Welker type guy), LB Zavier Gooden, DT Dominique Hamilton, DT Sheldon Richardson, DE Kony Ealy. So I firmly believe on talent alone, we are a middle pack SEC team right now, but certainly not capable of beating LSU or Bama.
Bottom line, when I lived in Missouri in the 90's, people were very apathetic toward Mizzou football and attendance rarely broke 45k; basketball with Norm was king then. Now when I go back, even for Baylor 2 yrs ago, we draw 66k in Nov. Used to be hard to find Mizzou apparel in any department store, now it is all over the place. We ranked #18 in the most recent apparel rankings; certainly surprised me. We are program whose stock is rising and you definitely want to buy now because we are only going to get better. And being apart of the best football conference will only help to accelerate that.
Roll Tide and MIZ
