I see a lot of talk about mac being a great motivator. He's a great guy with what seems to be an electric personality, but after thinking this through for awhile, I am having a hard time buying that he was that great of motivator. If you look at his teams over the years, I would say, if anything, there has been a major tendency to come out flat in big games. The first time this dawned on me was the A&M homecoming game in 2000. If I remember right, a ranked, yet very beatable A&M team came into Ames, on homecoming, and beat us pretty good. Granted, we still finished 9-3, but I remember thinking to myself during that game that we just looked flat, and uninspired in a situation where you would think we would just be jacked up and ready to sieze the day. Ever since then, I have noticed so many times were Mac's teams just don't seem to have the fire they needed, especially at the start of the game. Key examples: Oklahoma '02, Texas '02, Missouri '04, Missouri '05, Kansas '05, Nebraska '06 (well pretty much this whole season). Just to name a few. All were games that had they gone the other way, they could have done huge things for this program, yet it seems in all those games, and a others that don't come to mind, the team just didn't look that fired up. Outside of Iowa games, the only times I can really remember the team (under mac) being that fired up were Nebraska '02 and '04, and Colorado '05. It just seems to me, as you look over Mac's career there have been so many important games where the team has come out flat and gotten stomped, that I have to question why people think he is such a great motivator.