The Arkansas Saga

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Talk about a bunch of drama, holy cow. Why couldn't bama have hired this guy?

The Razor's Edge

Under fire, Nutt fights for job as controversy rages on

For the past two months, the state of Arkansas has been witness to one of the strangest soap operas this side of General Hospital. An ostensibly successful SEC football program appears to be unraveling.

A heralded young offensive coordinator left town after just one season. The most decorated recruit in school history will soon follow. Last Saturday, the Razorbacks' Hall of Fame patriarch/athletic director became the latest casualty.

Many figure it won't be long before the head coach joins their ranks.

If you're not an Arkansas fan, you probably have no idea as to the extent of the drama that's engulfed the Razorback State since the end of the season. You might be puzzled to hear that reigning SEC Coach of the Year Houston Nutt -- a man whose team won 10 straight games last season, played for the conference championship and reached a New Year's Day bowl -- is facing rampant speculation about his job security.

Rumors flew this week that a group of Arkansas boosters was trying to buy Nutt out of the remainder of his contract. One group of fans took out a $5,000 ad in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette last month demanding he step down. Others held a mini-protest on campus. A visit to the popular message board on Hogville.net this week turned up such subject lines as "If Nutt Were Fired Today," "Possible Replacements for Nutt," "Another Victim of Nutt's Lies" and "If Nutt Stays Here Long Term, will Vanderbilt Become Our Rival?"

It's gotten so bad that the chancellor of the university, John A. White, was moved to issue a statement Thursday saying, "I want to be abundantly clear -- the University of Arkansas is committed to head football coach Houston Nutt's leadership of the Razorback football program." Over the past two weeks, Nutt has made an unsolicited call to a Little Rock radio show to defend himself and sat for a lengthy newspaper interview in which he might as well have been on trial. And last weekend, Nutt's boss and chief supporter, 82-year-old AD Frank Broyles, announced his retirement effective at the end of the year, a move most believe was not entirely up to him.

"I've never experienced anything like this before," Nutt, the former Razorbacks quarterback and 10th-year head coach, told SI.com on Thursday morning. "To win a Western Division championship, 10 games, [produce] a Doak Walker award winner and Heisman finalist [Darren McFadden], it's just been unbelievable. It's a little bit sad."

What exactly did Nutt do wrong? In a nutshell, he sold his soul to land a prominent recruit -- and it backfired.

The Springdale saga

The subjects at the center of this storm are quarterback Mitch Mustain, the 2005 Parade Magazine prep Player of the Year who started eight games as a freshman for Arkansas, and Gus Malzahn, Mustain's former coach at nearby Springdale High. Nutt hired Malzahn as offensive coordinator days after Mustain backed off an oral commitment to the Razorbacks in December 2005. Malzahn, whom Rivals.com named its national Offensive Coordinator of the Year last season, left in January for Tulsa when he learned Nutt was hiring Dallas Cowboys quarterbacks coach (and former Nutt assistant) David Lee to serve as a co-coordinator. Mustain asked for his release shortly thereafter. Last week, the quarterback visited USC, where another former Springdale and Razorback teammate, receiver Damian Williams, has already transferred.

The departures of Malzahn and Mustain -- who had been the faces of Arkansas' promising future -- shocked Razorback followers, who have since divided themselves into two camps: those who believe Mustain and the rest of his Springdale posse were spoiled brats who damaged the program, and those who believe Nutt lied and broke promises to both the Springdale crew and the public regarding the direction of his program.

Malzahn, who Nutt insisted would have complete play-calling authority, ran a wide-open, hurry-up offense at Springdale. Upon his hiring, Nutt said he would rely on Malzahn's passing-game expertise to give the Razorbacks a more balanced attack. But Arkansas went 10-4 last season by doing what it's always done under Nutt: running the ball early and often. It was hard to argue with the results: One tailback, McFadden, ran for 1,647 yards, 14 touchdowns and finished second in the Heisman Trophy race, while another, Felix Jones, ran for 1,168 yards.

Still, the Hogs' lack of a passing game (they finished 108th nationally in passing offense) combined with Nutt's hiring of Lee convinced critics that Nutt used Malzahn solely as a pawn to sign a vaunted Springdale High trio and never actually intended to implement Malzahn's ideas, a charge Nutt vehemently denies. (Malzahn has remained mum about his short tenure at Arkansas and declined an interview request for this story.)

"It's hard to understand," said Nutt, who emphasized that Arkansas changed the entire passing-game terminology of its playbook to mirror what Malzahn used at Springdale. "I thought we worked very well together; I thought Gus did a very nice job. The thing is, we had Darren McFadden, Felix Jones, Peyton Hillis and a strong offensive line. We knew we were going to win some games with them, and Gus added in some nice things [in the passing game].

"But I thought our quarterback play and our receiver play could improve. So when another one of our coaches [QB coach Alex Wood] was being interviewed elsewhere [Wood ended up staying], I thought bringing in David Lee, who took [Cowboys QB] Tony Romo to the Pro Bowl, would really help our passing game, and I brought this to the attention of Gus."

More dicey is the issue of Mustain, who is still enrolled at the school. You may recall reading stories last December about the Springdale parents meeting with Broyles after the SEC championship game. Since that time, they've been portrayed as little league-type parents who presumably whined because their sons weren't getting the ball enough.

According to multiple accounts of the meeting, however, the parents voiced concerns over several aspects of the program (academics, curfew rules, etc.) that had not played out the way they'd been assured during the recruitment process. Most notably, the parents felt Malzahn was not being allowed to run the type of offense for which their sons had been recruited. Broyles reportedly responded that "experts" had told him Malzahn's spread offense would never work in the SEC. (Never mind that Florida won the SEC and national titles last season running a similar system.) Asked later about the meeting, Broyles said mockingly of the parents, "You know what they wanted to know about? Why their tickets were on the 40-yard line." (According to multiple accounts, player tickets did come up, but they weren't the crux of the discussion.)

More troubling details have emerged, however, about the treatment Mustain endured during his short tenure as a Razorback. The freshman started eight straight games at quarterback -- all of them victories -- completing 52.3 percent of his passes for 894 yards, 10 touchdowns and nine interceptions before losing his job to sophomore Casey Dick after throwing an interception on his opening snap against South Carolina. Nutt told the Morning News of Northwest Arkansas he'd been contemplating pulling Mustain for some time, citing a "concentration problem" in practice. Dick played the rest of the season, which ended in three straight losses, but was no more effective than the freshman (49.2 percent, 991 yards, nine TDs, six INTs).

According to multiple accounts, Mustain sensed he'd fallen out of favor with Nutt as early as the season's fifth game at Auburn. Multiple staff members had expressed disdain toward the Springdale contingent, in particular Malzahn, whom one assistant reportedly referred to derisively as "high school." (In his interview last week, Nutt said, "I never saw that at all.") Shortly thereafter, Nutt became aware of a then-forthcoming book about Springdale's 2005 title season that included critical comments Mustain made about Nutt during his senior year of high school. (Mustain said at the time Arkansas would have a better chance of signing him if Nutt wasn't the coach.) Nutt insists the comments "didn't have anything to do with" Mustain's benching but does feel they contributed to his poor practices.

"You could tell two weeks prior to the South Carolina game that something was really bothering him," said Nutt. "What happened was, [news of] that book came out. There was a lot of pressure on him because he knew it was coming and a lot of the stuff in there was derogatory to me. I went to him before the South Carolina game and said, 'Listen, Gus told me what's bothering you. I don't care what's in the book. I'm not worried about that, I'm worried about you being the best you can be.' I said, 'Forget about it, let's play.'"

On Dec. 7, shortly after the SEC championship game loss to Florida, Mustain received a particularly hateful e-mail from Arkansas booster Teresa Prewett, a Little Rock physical therapist who once had Nutt's brother, Danny, as a patient and is a friend of the family. "It was awful," Nutt said of the e-mail. The vile three-paragraph diatribe, which began "Hello Mr. Interception King," called the quarterback a gay slur, referred to Malzahn as the player's "lover" and continually repeated the phrase "did I mention that I want you to transfer?"

Around the same time, Prewett sent a similar, longer rant to longtime Arkansas Democrat Gazette columnist Wally Hall, assailing Mustain, Malzahn and the Springdale contingent and copied Houston Nutt's wife, Diana. Diana Nutt forwarded the message to at least one business associate in Springdale along with a note that said, "the Gus and Springdale section are quite funny."

The Democrat-Gazette reported last week that Nutt formally reprimanded Prewett in January over the e-mail sent to Mustain, including revoking her sideline passes to games. But this punishment only occurred after Mustain's mother, Beck Campbell, informed the campus chancellor about the e-mail. Meanwhile, the day after Prewett's e-mail -- which she later said was prompted by reading about Mustain's book comments -- two Arkansas senior defensive players, linebacker Sam Olajubutu and defensive tackle Keith Jackson, instigated a players-only meeting in which they lambasted Mustain over the same comments. Interestingly, Prewett's e-mail -- which was reportedly forwarded to other individuals connected to the program -- included a line about wishing Mustain would be subjected to "a private meeting with the offensive and defensive linemen -- I think I'd even throw [Olajubutu] in there." All parties insist there was no prior knowledge of the players' meeting.

When Mustain came to Nutt in mid-January and asked for his release, Nutt initially refused. "I told him, 'I really want you to stay until May,'" the end of Arkansas' second semester, said Nutt, who himself transferred to Oklahoma State as a player. "But his mother was so adamant. She was really bitter. She wanted his release right now, so I granted his release."

Told Thursday of Nutt's comment about her, Campbell, who has not spoken publicly for more than a month, wrote by e-mail: "I called Houston and asked him why he would not grant the release. He said he wanted Mitchell to stay at least 90 days and then he would give him the release. I honestly did not understand the '90 days' thing. I explained that Mitchell did not go to class that day. I told him he intended to transfer and he couldn't go to class while on scholarship if he was going to leave so we needed to get this resolved as quickly as possible." (See Campbell's complete response, bottom.)

Said Nutt: "I really felt like if we could have gotten through spring practice, we would have been fine. I've been there. I know what it's like to be a first-year quarterback. It's hard. But hey, you went [8-0] as a starter. Be patient. It just seemed like everything had to be rushed. He's not the first player to get a nasty letter. Reggie Fish got a lot of e-mails for dropping the punt in the SEC championship game.

"The thing that's tough about this deal right here is -- you win a championship, you've got players that are closer than ever before, but the light's not on them, the light's on two guys who transferred. Everyone in the country has guys that transferred."

SEC title or bust?

Broyles, the school's iconic athletic director, made his own contribution to the circus last month with a series of bizarre comments to a Dallas alumni club. He called his own program "the eighth-ranked team in our conference for potential," said his friends "have told me that you will never be able to hire a top coach at Arkansas because of that ranking way down here," and hinted that Nutt should fire his special-teams coach after kicking-game problems contributed to the Hogs' season-ending losing streak. NBC affiliate KNWA led its Jan. 25 newscast with an audiotape of Broyles' comments.

All parties involved, including White, insist that Broyles, Arkansas' coach from 1958 to '76 and its athletic director since '73, was not forced to retire. However, the timing of the announcement seems more than a tad suspicious considering Broyles had recently maintained a desire to stay on the job into his 90s. Nutt indicated as much when he told the fan site HawgsIllustrated.com, "I was upset at how this has happened. You just didn't think it would be like this, where he was forced to do something. ... I thought he would be here two, three, four more years." Speaking about Broyles' retirement Thursday, Nutt said "I think [the recent turmoil] definitely contributed to it, and that's what hurts."

As for his own future, Nutt said Thursday, "right now, my contract [which was recently extended by a year] says 'til 2012. I'm excited about it." In January 2004, the Little Rock native -- who at the time had reached bowl games in each of his first six seasons -- turned down an offer from Nebraska that would have doubled his salary, saying in a tearful press conference, "my heart was here." Nutt's loyalty to the school and his reputation for integrity made him an admired figure at the time in a state that revolves around Hawgs football.

His popularity took a hit, however, when the Razorbacks, after going 48-27 and winning two division titles in his first six seasons, slipped to 5-6 in 2004 and 4-7 in '05. His loyalty was called into question after he flirted with LSU and others. And now his integrity is being questioned by those who feel he deceived Malzahn and Mustain. Nutt was considered to be on the hot seat headed into '06, but not nearly to the extent he is now, despite producing the school's first 10-win season since 1989.

In Nutt's interview with the Morning News, reporter Alex Abrams asked the coach whether he viewed himself as a "polarizing figure" in the state. "You know, I do. I do," he replied. "... This has been the toughest time of my career here because of rumors, Internets, different things like that that you're constantly trying to fight off."

Abrams later asked, "With all the protests and people saying that you should be fired, why should you continue to be the head coach?" Nutt replied: "No. 1, nobody loves the state of Arkansas as much as I do, I don't think. I think I understand the Arkansas Razorbacks. I think that, a mother and a father, when they get to know me, if they truly get to know me and not what you hear, you want your son with me."

In what many viewed as an act of desperation, Nutt called in to Little Rock radio station The Buzz on Feb. 9 to confront the Democrat Gazette's Hall during a show he co-hosts about a column he'd published that morning that contained many of the aforementioned allegations. Regarding the alleged treatment of Malzahn, an angry Nutt said, "there was no one that was rude to Gus Malzahn. No one. Never have been rude," and "not one time have I ever told Guz Malzahn not to run the hurry-up, no-huddle offense. Not once. Not one time." At the conclusion of the segment, Hall said, "I stand by what I wrote."

With all the turmoil surrounding Nutt's program, it's easy to forget that Arkansas returns a Heisman Trophy runner-up and 14 other starters from a team that will likely start next season ranked around 10th-to-15th in the national polls. It may take nothing less than an SEC championship, however, to silence the criticism of Nutt.

Asked Thursday if that was a realistic assessment, Nutt said, "Probably so. The ones that hate are going to hate no matter what. It will never be good enough."

The climate is such that the first time Nutt suffers a disappointing loss, makes a questionable play-call or, for pete's sake, struggles in the passing game (particularly if Tulsa happens to light things up with Malzahn), the backlash figures to be intense. Much like when Ron Zook was at Florida or Gary Barnett was at Colorado, there is now a significant contingent of Arkansas fans waiting, perhaps even hoping, for Nutt to fail.

Asked if he has any regrets about the situation, Nutt said: "I don't have any regrets about hiring Gus. What I would have done different, if I had known what I know now, I would have sat all the [springdale] parents down and been real clear about expectations and the difference in level of competition from high school to college. That's the only thing I would have done differently, but I had no idea because I've never experienced anything like this."

We may never know exactly what went down during the Malzahn-Mustain era, particularly since Malzahn, the one figure who could clarify nearly all of the controversies, is not talking. Some believe he is torn between his loyalty to Nutt and his loyalty to the Springdale parents. In college football, however, perception often outweighs reality. The perception surrounding Arkansas' program right now is that of an out-of-control mess. Fans are talking that way. No doubt opposing recruiters are, too. There's only two ways the school can make that perception go away: Win a championship or cut ties with Nutt.

In what figures to be another ultracompetitive SEC season, one scenario appears more plausible than the other.

Statement from Mitch Mustain's mother

Beck Campbell, mother of Mitch Mustain, e-mailed this statement Thursday in response to Houston Nutt's comment that Campbell was "bitter" in demanding he be released from his scholarship:

"Mitchell made the decision to ask for his release late Monday [Jan. 15] night. Tuesday was the first day of class and he could not attend classes if he intended to transfer, so he did not go. He attempted to contact Nutt earlier in the morning but he was not available until 2 p.m. I think he was out of town. He asked a trusted friend, his high school youth pastor, to go with him. He asked for his release and explained to Houston why he wanted it. Houston tried to talk him into staying for 90 days and give Coach Lee time to work out with him. I am not sure what that was about, but regardless Mitchell told him he definitely want the release.

"Houston refused to give it to him and told him he would release him in May. Mitchell left his office and called me and told me Houston would not release him. He told me there was a team meeting at 4 and we both agreed he had to go since he had not been released from the team. I called Houston and asked him why he would not grant the release. He said he wanted Mitchell to stay at least 90 days and then he would give him the release. I honestly did not understand the 90 days' thing. I explained that Mitchell did not go to class that day. I told him he intended to transfer and he couldn't go to class while on scholarship if he was going to leave so we needed to get this resolved as quickly as possible. He still refused and said he would let him transfer in May. I called a friend of mine who knew what was going on and who is close friends with [board of Trustees member] Jim Lindsey. I told him what Houston had said. He called me back about an hour later and told me AD Frank Broyles had been made aware of situation. He told me everything had been taken care of. Within a few minutes Houston called and said he would release Mitchell."

That was about 10 minutes til 4 and Mitchell was already at the team meeting so I couldn't call him. Houston told him he would grant the release before the meeting. I assume my phone call had no impact on Houston's decision since he told me he wouldn't let him go for "90 days" and he wouldn't release him from his scholarship until May."

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I take the very unpopular position and side with Mustain and his parents....but, nobody on the UGA board agrees with me.