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Mack Rhoades' abrupt departure offers Missouri a chance to pivot from an awful year ... or make more mistakes

Here are today's Mizzou Links.

By Bill Connelly
Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images

Mizzou Tigers pennant What's On

I'll give you one guess.

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The Trib: Rhoades leaving Missouri for Baylor

Post-Dispatch: Mizzou AD Rhoades leaves for Baylor

The Missourian: Mack Rhoades is leaving MU

KC Star (Sam Mellinger): Missouri is down an athletic director — and can be better off in spite of it

the next leader will be tasked with pushing forward facility improvements to keep pace in the country’s best and most expensive conference and to help support a rookie football coach. If things don’t improve quickly, he or she might also be hiring a new basketball coach.

That’s a lot to handle. Rhoades wasn’t up for it. Making the right decision on the next AD is critical. Mizzou has a lot to overcome and much to fix. But the Tigers also have a passionate fan base with a demonstrated generosity and every reason and opportunity to get this right.

Around the country, this is being seen as one more sad day for Mizzou.

But handled the right way, this can be the beginning of something much better.

PowerMizzou: Rhoades gone, what's next?

The immediate reaction is going to be this: How bad must it be at Missouri for the AD to go to Baylor? And that’s fair. It’s been bad at Missouri. No one can deny that. But I don’t know that Rhoades’ departure makes any grand statements other than what HE thought of Missouri. It doesn’t have to mean that’s what somebody else thinks.

Rhoades took over a bad situation. No question. But he didn’t make it any better. The football protest in November wasn’t his fault. But he handled the aftermath poorly. He retained Tim Jamieson only to part ways with him a year later. He reportedly shopped the basketball job to multiple candidates and then gave the guy he had a vote of confidence. He hired a baseball coach TWO WEEKS AGO. And then he left.

Post-Dispatch (Jose de Jesus Ortiz): Rhoades' patience runs out

Some Mizzou fans are happy to see Rhoades gone, but it’s also important to note that the Tigers’ leadership must look in the mirror. The University of Missouri hasn’t exactly been a portrait of steady leadership or loyalty.

How many folks can you run out of town before people realize they must look out for their best interests first and foremost?

The Trib (Blake Toppmeyer): Coaches weigh in on Rhoades' departure to Baylor

Brian Smith: Smith: Mack came and talked to us real quick, and I went back to my practice room, and there was an open mat, and I had 35 guys, and I was kind of depressed. Then I walked in there, and I had a team working out to win the national title. So I’m like, I can’t focus on things like this. I’ve got to look and see the positives. There is an unbelievable thing going on on the fourth floor of the Hearnes, and these kids were excited, and I told them that. I said, ‘Guys, you made my day today,’ because I keep finding out and you hear bad news, and you can sometimes dwell on it, but I focused on that. I have some unbelievable athletes. I have a kid in the room there that’s training for the Olympics. There are so many good things. I just hope the next hire – I know Wren is the interim – if he comes the guy or whoever the guy is, I just hope the next guy is kicking the door down and it’s this great leaderhip and somebody here that’s going to hang out and stay with us for a while and believe what Mizzou is, because I love it here, and we can win national titles, and we can accomplish great things, and we do have great student-athletes.

I hope our leadership will see that and say, ‘Let’s hire this guy that’s going to make some special things happen and wants to be here.’ That’s all. I think that’s what every coach wants.

A lot of Mizzou folks had opinions yesterday afternoon!

I'll have some thoughts to post later this morning. It's taken a little while to collect them.

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