Nice Buyout by Razorback Officials, But Where Was The Non-Compete?

Expect Houston Nutt to be introduced as the next football coach at the University of Mississippi at midday Wednesday. Ole Miss hero Archie Manning has -- with athletic director Pete Boone and another major Ole Miss booster and former football player -- engineered the hiring of Nutt and will be there when the new coach is introduced.

Ole Miss chancellor Robert Khayat was determined, one, to stick with Ed Orgeron and, two, to not fill the job if he had to with a man carrying the kind of baggage Nutt will take to Oxford, and was overruled on both.

We now know who and what is running Ole Miss.

We may also know who and what is running the University of Arkansas, and for all those who believe athletics, and specifically, football is the engine that drives the UA, you can rest easy knowing that is no longer the case.

So, what we have is Houston Nutt taking $3.65 million from the University of Arkansas to leave. The $2.4 million "contract extension" that UA chancellor John White floated out there during Monday night's press conference announcing Nutt's resignation was window dressing for the next coach to consider. I don't want to go as far as calling the esteemed chancellor a big fibber, but there was never an extension planned for a guy that the university was asking to leave. But it all sounded good.

With that $3.65 million buyout, Nutt will also receive a five-year contract from Ole Miss for close to $2 million a year.

Not bad, indeed. Nutt ran himself right out of one job that was, after Darren McFadden and Felix Jones leave for the NFL, going nowhere to one that will be on the upswing thanks to recruiter-but-no-head-coach Ed Orgeron. He's left a horde of athletes Nutt had no a chance of signing at Arkansas. Nutt even inherits a quarterback, Texas transfer Jevan Sneed, who performed better than the wondrous Mitch Mustain in a prep all-star game two years ago. Nutt barely would recruit for defense in 10 years at Arkansas, and walks into some of the best young defensive talent in the SEC. All they need is some coaching and discipline. The Grove will be hopping.

I wrote on more than one occasion in the past three years that whoever followed Orgeron will find a talented team to work with. Who'd a-thunk it would be Nutt?

Who would have thought Arkansas would agree to pay the coach $3.65 million to leave and then not include a non-compete clause in the deal? "Yes, Houston, what we have here is a lump sum for you and your super agent, and all you have to agree is to go to Baylor or Nebraska or anybody else not on our schedule in the next five years. Deal?"

Apparently no one saw it that far.