Talk » Tigers what it is today.Heres how Smebs MVP

STARKVILLE, Miss. -- Mississippi State didnt have to look far to find its new athletics director, hiring Bulldogs baseball coach John Cohen on Friday.Cohen has coached college baseball for more than two decades and has been Mississippi States coach since 2009. The Tuscaloosa, Alabama, native has never been an athletics director, but was named associate athletics director at Mississippi State when his baseball contract was extended during the summer.The 50-year-old Cohen will replace Scott Stricklin, who left to become the athletics director at Florida in September.Cohen said hes grateful for the opportunity and has wanted to be an athletics director for a long time. He called Stricklin a really an incredible person who helped him get ready for the job.I just kept finding myself gravitating toward those athletic directors, those guys who would share information and talk about the future of intercollegiate athletics, Cohen said. I have to admit to you, I got hooked.Terms of Cohens new deal as athletics director were not released.Cohen led Mississippi State to the College World Series championship series in 2013 before the Bulldogs fell to UCLA. He also played baseball at Mississippi State from 1988-90.Cohen isnt the only athletics director in the Southeastern Conference who comes from a baseball background. South Carolinas Ray Tanner coached the Gamecocks to back-to-back national titles in 2010 and 11 before becoming the schools athletics director in 2012.Mississippi State President Mark E. Keenum said that the school hired a search firm to assist with finding Stricklins replacement, but that they kept coming back to Cohen as the best candidate for the job.We identified a number of truly outstanding collegiate athletic directors and senior associate directors from across the nation, Keenum said. It was a very exhaustive process and it led up to this past weekend. But we kept coming back to John Cohen. More than just leading our baseball program with great success, hes also been very involved in helping lead the entire department.Cohens first task will be hiring a new baseball coach to replace himself.I told our team, `You are not going to get a coach as good as John Cohen, you are going to get one that is better than John Cohen, Cohen said. We are on that job now.Cheap Shoes China Wholesale . What general manager Dave Nonis called "short and productive" negotiations ended with Kessel signing a US$64-million, eight-year contract on Tuesday. Cheap Shoes China Free Shipping . Perhaps Carroll was so prepared for a break because he believes there is very little the Seattle Seahawks need heading into the off-season. "I dont see anything that we need to add. We just have to get better," Carroll said. http://www.wholesaleshoes.us.org/ . -- Playing time has been limited for Maxim Tissot this season, so the Montreal Impact defender made the most of his first scoring opportunity on Saturday. Shoes Wholesale China Market .1 million pounds ($61.2 million) on Saturday, giving the beleaguered English Premier League champions a major lift. Replica Shoes Wholesale . The catch: It needs a lot of money, and it needs it fast.Welcome to the Esports Equivalent, where we take one of the biggest traditional sports stories currently going on in the world and try to find a what-if comparison in the competitive gaming scene.If youre not a fan of basketball, or were just too busy on the 4th of July to notice, one of the biggest free-agent signings in traditional sports history occurred. Former NBA MVP Kevin Durant left his longtime team, Oklahoma City Thunder, to sign with the Golden State Warriors. Anytime one of the top players in their field moves to a different team is a big deal, but the Independence Day signing is even greater in scope.Why?The Warriors last season accomplished something no squad has ever done in an 82-game season: win 73 of those contests. Steph Curry and his teammates secured the record for the best regular season in NBA history. Golden State were only one win from repeating as champions in the finals, and it took a herculean effort from LeBron James and Kyrie Irving of the Cleveland Cavaliers to stop it from happening.Now, one of the best teams the NBA has ever seen has added Kevin Durant to its already potent shooting lineup. The signing has formed two warring opinions: Warriors fans who are happy to have what looks to be the best starting five in NBA history, and everyone else wondering how in the world this is considered fair.To find the esports equivalent to the Kevin Durant signing, we head over to the so-called Mecca of esports, South Korea. In League of Legends, there is no other king than the one housed at the SK Telecom T1 headquarters. The team has won two of the past three Summoners Cups, are the reigning Intel Extreme Masters world champions, and have a Mid-Season Invitational crown in Shanghai. Its also working on an unprecedented four-peat in its domestic league in South Korea, the most competitive region in the world. Led by the best player of all time, Lee Faker Sang-hyeok, T1 has accrued one of the best statistical years. A fourth straight League of Legends Champions Korea championship and a third Summoners Cup in four years would solidify T1 as possibly the best organization in all of esports history.But what if SKT T1 wanted to stack the deck even more? For Durant and the Warriors, chemistry on the court (or the Rift) is far more important than how pretty a lineup appears on paper. Looking at all the esports scenarios that could run parallel to Durants move to the Bay Area, one player stood out for me from T1s main rival.Enter: Song Smeb Kyung-hoSince the organization formed in late 2014, Smebs Tigers have played a very similar role to OKC. One of the best regular season teams weve seen in the past two years, the Tigers have continually failed to win a title on the grand stage, similar to how Durant and Russell Westbrooks Thunder have repeatedly missed capturing the Larry OBrien Championship Trophy. The Tigers faced off versus SKT T1 in three major finals during the past two years and lost all three in disappointing fashion, despite often being the favoritee in the matchup.dddddddddddd. Anytime it felt like the league or tournament would turn out differently for Smeb & Co., Faker would be waiting for them at the finish line, and all the hard work up to that point would be all for naught.In 2016, Smeb received offers to play on various teams around the world for reportedly more money than the Tigers could offer. But he decided to stay in order to take down Fakers T1 once and for all.But what if Smeb went the Durant route? A former MVP himself in the LCK, Smeb has been considered one of, if not the best top laner in the world since the formation of the team. The leader of his team and the player that has come closest to grabbing away the title of best in the world, he still lacks the thing that will decide his legacy the most: a championship ring. Hes made two LCK finals and lost both times to SK Telecom T1. When the Tigers made an inspired run to the finals of last years World Championships thanks to Smebs carrying talents in the top lane juggernaut meta, it was SK Telecom T1 that took home the Summoners Cup.Smeb joining SKT T1 would be interesting. While a majority of fans would consider it an upgrade position-wise, its important to note T1 already has one of the elites at the top lane role with Lee Duke Ho-Seong. A former MVP from his days on the hapless NaJin e-mFire, Duke is the type of player who is quieter and less flashy than Smeb, but puts up close numbers in his role. The addition of Smeb would be a slight boost when it comes to offensive stats; however, the real benefit is his communication and shot calling.Unless Duke joined ROX in a trade, the signing of Smeb would also weaken T1s greatest competitor, the Tigers, for a third Summoners Cup. Just like the Warriors did by chopping the head off of the team that took them to seven games during this years Western Conference final, a Tigers team without Smeb just wouldnt be the Tigers anymore. Smebs evolution from a subpar player to being the second-best player in the world has made the Tigers what it is today.Heres how Smebs MVP standing has looked during the past four splits in Korea:Spring 2015: Third Summer 2015: Fourth Spring 2016: First Summer 2016: First (Halfway through season)Sadly for Smeb and the Tigers, Smebs legacy (if he retired today) would be the most bittersweet. Hes one of the best top laners of all time, but not the best because of his lack of a title. Smeb needs that championship to establish himself as one of the greats.If T1 did sign Smeb, that would majorly damage its closest competitor and bring on a player that has been top four in MVP voting and is an upgrade when it comes to communication. With Faker, Smeb and Bae Bang Jun-sik, the reigning champions of all major international competitions would possess three of the best five or six players on the entire planet.OK, lets end this before we give SK Telecom any ideas. ' ' '