Did Dan Mullen cancel his subscription to The Athletic?

Because he got reamed harder there yesterday than the most brutal take down at a Georgia football fan message board you might read.

First, Ari Wasserman ($$) took notice of Mullen’s comment about not discussing recruiting at yesterday’s presser.

Some will say Mullen was in a bad mood and got caught with the Monday blues. But at a college football powerhouse — one that expects to be winning the SEC and national titles — there are no bad days. Recruiting is life.

“Mullen is an embarrassment to the recruiting profession,” a Power 5 recruiting staffer with deep knowledge of the SEC told The Athletic on Monday afternoon. “Mullen has shown a propensity to be clueless with why recruiting is so important, and this just adds to what is already known out there: He doesn’t get it. By ‘it,’ I mean he doesn’t understand what it takes to be an elite program. Kirby was 100 percent correct.”

Notice how the recruiting staffer said “the recruiting profession.” That’s what coaching is in 2021. It’s recruiting and then coaching. Without recruiting, as Smart said, it doesn’t matter how good of a coach you are. You’re never winning a national title because you’re an X’s and O’s guru.

This, of course, only comes as a shock to your average Daily Gator whose been insisting for years that he wouldn’t trade coaches with Georgia.

But the real pièce de résistance comes from this brutal takedown at the hands of Bruce Feldman and Allen Taylor ($$).  The quotes are so rough you’d think Tommy Tuberville was still coaching at Auburn.  A sample:

“Florida, they just don’t play hard,” said an SEC East coach. “… You watch UF on tape. They’ve got skill but they’re not physical.”

“They play with zero discipline,” said one SEC offensive coach whose team faced the Gators this season. “They don’t play hard.”

“We were more physical and much better than them in the box,” said another SEC offensive coach. “We were mauling them.”

“We thought going in that it was going to be one of the best defenses we faced,” said an SEC offensive coach. “But they just weren’t physical. They don’t look motivated. Not fired up. No juice.”

“Last year, we thought these guys were soft on the O-line but they had skill guys — (Kyle) Pitts and (Kadarius) Toney and weapons. We thought they were more physical up front, but then you play them and they’re just not a tough team. They just don’t finish. They don’t strain.”

Which is worse, no juice or fake juice?  Eh, I digress, probably.  There’s definitely a common theme through those quotes.  The new Florida Standard.

Anyway, here’s the quote that should serve as Mullen’s epigraph, if that day ever comes:

“Georgia is trying to take your soul the way they play the game,” said one of the SEC East coaches. “That’s not how Florida plays.”

It looks like Dan’s gonna need a bigger transfer portal.