Reports: O’Connor clear-cut favorite for Mississippi State job; What has changed?

By Jerry Ratcliffe

According to numerous reports, Virginia’s Brian O’Connor is the leading candidate to take over the Mississippi State baseball program, one of the top jobs in all of college baseball.

This is an about face from when rumors tying the longtime UVA coach to the MSU vacancy first surfaced.

On May 6, O’Connor addressed those rumors with this reporter, saying: “This happens every darn year. Someone in the SEC fires their coach and immediately, I’m the top target. It doesn’t mean anything and has no substance.”

However, reports have emerged that the 54-year-old O’Connor, a three-time National Coach of the Year, has grown frustrated over some issues with UVA’s athletic department policies concerning his program.

Kendall Rogers of D1 Baseball, who is very well plugged into the college baseball scene, was the first to report Thursday that, “O’Connor has emerged as the clear-cut frontrunner to be the next head coach at Mississippi State.”

Not long afterward, the Clarion-Ledger newspaper in Mississippi confirmed Rogers’ report. Mississippi State is searching for the replacement of Chris Lemons, who was fired in late April for “inconsistency,” after leading the school to a national championship in 2021.

The Bulldogs (34-21) are being led by an interim coach as they compete in the NCAA Tallahassee Regional this weekend.

O’Connor is considered one of the nation’s top coaches and several SEC schools have made runs at him in the past, notably Florida, LSU and Texas A&M. However, after signing an extension last year with a contract that runs through 2031, the veteran coach has grown frustrated, according to sources close to him.

Apparently one sticking point, sources say, is the NCAA’s rule adopted for 2025-26 concerning funding for full scholarships in the sport of baseball.

The new rules “significantly alter scholarship and roster limits.” Division I baseball programs may now offer full scholarships to as many as 34 players (the new roster limit, trimmed from 40). Under the old rules, baseball could only offer 11.7 scholarships, which forced coaches to hand out partial scholarships to some of their players.

Some coaches have complained because the sport’s largest-budgeted athletic departments can ensure that others can’t compete with them.

“They are pulling up the drawbridge and leaving everyone else outside the moat,” one coach complained.

Some programs leave it up for the coach to raise the extra scholarship money for the jump from 11.7 to 34, which requires raising an additional $1 million to $1.2 million per year, every year.

We have reached out to the Virginia athletic department and requested what AD Carla Williams plans in terms of funding the 34 scholarships, but haven’t yet received a response.

Sources close to the program said that O’Connor was told not to expect more than 20 scholarships to be funded.

That is a major problem because schools with larger budgets or simply more money can easily fund 34, leaving schools that can’t afford to fully fund the limit unable to compete, certainly on the national level, which Virginia has become accustomed to. O’Connor has led the Cavaliers to 18 NCAA Tournaments since 2004, seven appearances in the College World Series (including 3 of the previous 4 seasons) and the national championship.

Another issue, which clearly has agitated the UVA coach, is the inability to travel outside a restricted area for midweek games. O’Connor complained Tuesday that his team is geographically locked into playing midweek road games within a couple of hours of Charlottesville, which limits his nonconference schedule, which in turn impacted Virginia’s RPI this past season. The NCAA selection committee pointed out UVA’s nonconference schedule as one of the reasons the Cavaliers were omitted from this year’s tournament, which included nine ACC teams, three that finished below Virginia in the regular-season standings.

A source said that O’Connor has unsuccessfully politicked for the ability to expand the distance of nonconference road trips for the past three years.

Ironically, Mississippi State was eliminated from the 2024 NCAA tournament by Virginia, perhaps leaving a strong impression on the Bulldogs’ athletic department. O’Connor’s buyout is $500,000.

Mississippi State is viewed as one of the crown jewels of college baseball jobs with spectacular facilities, including Dudy Noble Field, a strong NIL program and a passionate fan base. The Bulldogs held the top 10 attendance records in NCAA baseball history from 1988 to 2023, including an NCAA record of 16,423 vs. Ole Miss. No other schools have had more than 14,000 attendance on that list.