Oh Dan.
Dan, Dan, Dan.
Former Florida coach Dan Mullen was on the Paul Finebaum Show on Wednesday to talk about his UNLV squad and the fact the Rebels are legit contenders to be the Group of Six representative for the playoffs in 2026.
But in classic Mullen fashion, he had to dive into one of his semi-annual grievances with Florida as he still refuses to acknowledge the basis for his failure in Gainesville that led to him getting exiled to Las Vegas in the first place.
Dan Mullen can’t stop whining about getting fired from Florida
During his appearance, Mullen took note of the state of the Gators since his departure. As he has done multiple times, there seems to be a part of him that takes glee from the failures of Billy Napier:
“And I think maybe if the Playoff era was around, I think three out of my four years, we would have made the College Football Playoff. Maybe that would have looked a little bit different back then with the resume, of keeping me around a little bit longer to try go win that national title. But hey, it is what it is. Probably hasn’t gone as well there since I left, it doesn’t seem like.”
We noted last week that there is some revisionist history with the Dan Mullen era. He is correct that with expanded playoffs, the Gators would have for sure made it in 2019 and 2020 and would have been on the bubble in 2018. And it should be noted that Mullen has the third-best winning percentage for a head coach who was in charge for at least 30 games.
What Mullen accomplished at Florida
- 2018: 10-3 and No. 10 in the final CFP rankings
- 2019: 11-2 and No. 9 in CFP rankings
- 2020: 8-4, SEC East champion and No. 7 in CFP rankings
- Overall record: 34-15
- New Year’s Six appearances: Three
Florida fired the 2021 version of Dan Mullen
But he keeps floating this idea that if Florida had kept him, the Gators would have won a national championship.
No, no they wouldn’t have.
If Mullen were really the guy who could win a national title, he would have been on the sidelines in 2022 at a Power Four school out to prove Florida did him wrong.
But that’s not what Mullen did. He sat in a TV studio for three years and then opted to return to the sidelines with UNLV. You know all those NFL jobs Mullen kept hinting he was interested in during his time as Florida’s head coach? Where did all of those jobs go? This is rhetorical, but please explain how the coach who claims he could have won a national title is on the sidelines with a Group of Six school five seasons after getting fired?
Oh, right, because Mullen has a revisionist history of how things went down in Gainesville.
Dan Mullen wants credit for Florida’s peak without owning its collapse
He seems to believe that because Billy Napier was such a dumpster fire, it validates his own legacy. It’s kind of like believing that because you passed a third-grade math test you're ready to score a level five on your AP Calculus test. That’s not how any of this works. But ever since 2021, Mullen has held this grudge with Florida and has never missed a moment to take a pot shot.
But since we are doing an airing of grievances, does Mullen care to comment on the fact that his recruiting was bare-bones and he gave the same effort that a CFB 27 player gives when they set recruiting to auto?
He talks about being within two points of winning the SEC title. He doesn’t talk about naming Marco Wilson a captain for that game one week after his infamous shoe toss.
He talks about how he could have turned it around, but with what QB? Mullen did everything he could not to play Anthony Richardson.
He talks about competing for national titles but would not fire his defensive coordinator, who cost Florida a national title after the Gators were 74th in points per game allowed in 2020.
We could keep going, but the point is Mullen is five years removed from Gainesville and still hurls little jabs at the Gators like he is in middle school. He has convinced himself he did no wrong and the Billy Napier era was karma.
Do you Dan, do you.
There is a reason, however, why you won’t be getting in the Ring of Honor.
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