Ten days ago, Theo Lawson of Spokane newspaper The Spokesman-Review (I see what they did there) reported that Dan Mullen had recommended Feleipe Franks consider transferring to Washington State. The idea was, according to Lawson’s unnamed source, that Franks could improve his draft stock if he could “get developed by [Mike] Leach”.
The more I think about it, the more it makes sense to me.
From a developmental standpoint, the Air Raid would probably be great for Franks. It’s a pretty simple system that runs a handful of plays from a million different formations. It generally requires its quarterbacks to read the defense early and make quick decisions.
If there’s one complaint about Franks’s game that persisted as he improved through 2018 and into 2019 is that he did not make choices fast enough. Too often he would wait for guys to get open and then try to rifle the ball to them. Watching Kyle Trask feels so different because he throws guys open and will sometimes start his motion before receivers even break.
The large amount of short, quick passing in the Air Raid requires a decisive quarterback. Franks would get plenty of chances to work on it too, as Leach runs the purest form of the scheme. He has not tacked on more running as many Air Raid disciples have done over the years.
From a self-marketing standpoint, playing well for Leach would help Franks out too given draft analysts’ compulsion for making direct player analogies. Franks is tall, possesses a rocket arm, and has deceptive speed and mobility. If he put up gaudy numbers in a college Air Raid system, it would be hard for people not to compare him to Patrick Mahomes. I don’t think Franks quite has that level of play in him, but if you can put yourself in position to be compared to a recent NFL MVP, you do it.
Of course, things with Leach have changed a little since then. If Franks wants to take Mullen’s advice about who to play for next season, he’ll have to go to Mullen’s former school.
I am still a little surprised that Mississippi State fired Joe Moorhead several days after his bowl loss to Louisville. Since SB Nation/Banner Society’s Steven Godfrey is so plugged in with the Mississippi schools, I believe him when he says that Moorhead would’ve gotten the boot had he lost the Egg Bowl. He won in large part because an Ole Miss player simulated peeing like a dog after scoring a touchdown, earning a flag that backed up the extra point to a spot where it was missed. The PAT would’ve only tied the game, so MSU easily could’ve won or lost afterward. Instead, the Bulldogs escaped with a one-point win and Moorhead was safe.
But then LB Willie Gay broke QB Garrett Shrader’s orbital bone in a bowl practice fight, and MSU lost the game to finish under .500. It seems from the reporting that MSU wanted former Nick Saban assistant and current successful Louisiana-Lafayette head coach Billy Napier, but he put an end to that speculation about as quickly as it arose. They got serious with Steve Sarkisian for a time before deciding he’d be a bad fit, and then they went and hired Leach.
Godfrey likes to say that the Mississippi schools are like two crabs in a bucket. They constantly fight with each other trying to get out, but they never can because the bucket is the state of Mississippi. The Egg Bowl is low key one of the most personally insane rivalries, and coaches have been getting fired for losing it for decades.
Ole Miss made a splash by hiring Lane Kiffin. MSU ultimately went with one of the few coaching personalities that can hold its own with Kiffin in the attention-drawing game. The crabs will fight on.
As for Franks, I don’t think Mullen would rescind his Leach recommendation now that the pirate is in Starkville. As best as I understand it, Bulldog fans are more mad at Scott Stricklin for leaving than they are at Mullen for the same. Stricklin is from Jackson and attended Mississippi State, so he’s one of them. However, he used MSU as a stepping stool job and is also the one who hired Mullen away.
Some of them are mad at Mullen for a few reasons, like staying within in the conference and bailing right before a cyclical peak year. The Bulldogs ended up being in the running with Clemson for the nation’s best defense in 2018; pair it with a Mullen offense and it could’ve been a historically special season. Instead they watched Moorhead mismanage Nick Fitzgerald and put up several single-digit point totals in losses on the way to an 8-5 (4-4) finish. That mismatch of potential and outcome is as big a reason as any why Moorhead is gone.
All of this is to say that I don’t think there are any real hard feelings between Mississippi State and Mullen. I’m certainly not aware of any from Mullen’s side. I consider it likely that he really did develop a fondness for the place, though it obviously wasn’t enough to keep him from returning to the big stage in Gainesville. I don’t think he’d rescind his nudge in Leach’s direction because MSU now employs him.
It’s going to be a rough transition to the Air Raid. State loses five of its top six pass catchers from 2019, and it doesn’t exactly have a bunch of promising young guys ready to step up. The quarterback job is certainly winnable though, as Shrader is a dual threat guy who’s not a great passer and Tommy Stevens is out of eligibility. Franks could easily walk in the door as the presumptive starter before he even finds his locker.
I used to like Leach but I’ve soured on him in recent years. Underneath his increasingly carefully maintained oddball persona is an ugly callousness that is hard to root for. Also by staying faithful to the pure Air Raid vision that he and Hal Mumme developed 25 years ago, his offense just doesn’t evolve much even as it’s grown and developed elsewhere. Then-DC and now-head coach at Washington Jimmy Lake dunked on Leach after the 2018 Apple Cup, saying that it’s easy to prepare for Leach because he just does the same thing every year.
I’m glad Florida never hired Leach and, at this point, never will. If nothing else, he simply pays too little attention to defense to average more than about eight wins per year over the long haul. But for one year to get Franks a crash course in the NFL’s new favorite offense while working through his single biggest flaw and trying to position himself as maybe the next Mahomes, Leach would do just fine.