Mizzou Football fires head coach Barry Odom after four seasons

Mizzou football decided that they had seen enough, as head coach Barry Odom is on his way out the door after coaching the Tigers for four seasons.

After finally getting back in the win column and notching their first road victory of the season against the lowly Arkansas Razorbacks, the Missouri Tigers have decided to relieve head coach Barry Odom of his duties.

Despite winning on Friday, this isn’t a super shocking move, and is likely one that is welcomed for Mizzou fans.

Odom, who took over the head coaching reigns in 2016, has an overall record of 25-25 through four years. He finished right at .500 and never got this team to where they needed to be.

Take this season for example.

With all of the talent in the world and a hot quarterback who picked Missouri over the likes of Auburn, Mizzou went just 6-6. The bowl ban prevents them from capitalizing on their sixth win of the season, but even still, Missouri should have at least finished the season at 9-3 or even 10-2.

Losing to Kentucky, Vanderbilt, and Wyoming were all embarrassing moments for this program, especially after the team looked to be on a hot streak. They lost to Wyoming in week one and then followed it up with five straight wins. It truly looked like MU would have a special season, but then the bad coaching and poor performances showed up in their next five games, causing them to sit at 5-6 after starting at 5-1.

That’s mostly on coaching, folks.

Even in their 24-14 win over the Razorbacks on Friday, Missouri still didn’t play great. They had two backup quarterbacks playing, but there were obvious signs that coaching was holding them back.

Now we turn to who the university will hire.

KC Kingdom staffer Cullen Jekel outlined some potential hires weeks ago when firing Odom wasn’t a given. Among those, he listed Joe Brady, Alex Grinch, Willie Fritz, and Jason Candle. It’ll be interesting to see who Missouri targets for their next head coach, but the program needs to make sure they get this next hire right.

The SEC East could have belonged to Mizzou football this year, but poor coaching caused the wheels to fall off quickly. Hopefully the next coach brought in will lead to this program to bigger moments and brighter days.

Who do you think is the realistic hire made by the Missouri Tigers?