Mitch Mustain in summary: former all-world everything blue chip quarterback con gusto who signs with Arkansas as part of Houston Nutt's dodgy bid to actually get a quarterback at Arkansas, a gambit that required him to take Springdale coach Gus Malzahn along with him in 2006 to Fayetteville. Mustain goes 8-0 as a starter at Arkansas and still gets benched because GIGGITY BOTARKUS ARBITRARY NUTTAGE.*
The odyssey is just starting, however. Mustain transfers after his benching, heading to USC where he sinks so low on the depth chart he takes snaps at punter in 2009. Then, the writers from Lifetime take over, and Mustain recovers from breast cancer, takes over half in the divorce settlement, and may be on the way to getting back at life in full by competing to take the first-string job outright at USC.
Lane Kiffin insists for the moment that Matt Barkley has the starting job, and he in fact likely does. (Mustain's been going against the 2s while Barkley's throwing against the 1s, and the 1s are by all accounts running him ragged.) Kiffin in his vast experience as a head coach** has shown a willingness to stick with one qb, as he did with Crompton last year through some truly dreadful performances.
Should he feel the temptation to go to Mustain, though, the storyline would not be an unwelcome one, especially since he got the raw end of one of the stranger recruiting debacles in SEC history***, and because this made-for-TV movie ends with Mustain throwing stalker Nutt out of a moving car, watching him tumble off a cliff on the PCH, and then a finale of white wine toasts at a seaside restaurant with his new dreamy hunkmate Kiffin.
*One of the most bizarre benchings in recent college football history, especially because Nutt's qb then became Casey Dick. So powerful is Nutt's strange mojo that they still made it to the SEC title game, albeit with the aftereffects of losing one of the hottest offensive coordinators in the country, their blue chip quarterback, several players who came with Malzahn from Springdale, and ultimately Nutt's job when this all got too sketchy for anyone to bear.
**Two and a half vast seasons.
***The alternate history could be even weirder, though, and not necessarily bad for Mustain, since in years four an five he would have had the chance to play in Petrino's offense. in fact, his presence could have warded off a transfer from Ryan Mallett. Or go further down this alternate reality tree, and assume Mallett transfers anyway. Mustain might have hypothetically transferred from in 2008, and gone to Tulsa to join his old coach Malzahn. In short: we watched far too much of James Burke's Connections as a child.
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