re: Texas A&M job the 7th best in the SEC

There are (will be) roughly 9 jobs that could be considered to be in a "top tier" and those are Alabama, Texas, Georgia, LSU, Florida, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, Auburn and Tennessee. There are almost no schools outside of those other 8 for which if their job and the Texas A&M were open, that a coach would choose their job except in extraordinary circumstances (nobody is looking at a job offer from Texas A&M and like South Carolina or Kentucky and seriously taking the other job).

Among those 8 however, the distinctions are blurry. A&M may or may not be chosen, and that is mostly true for all schools in the group.

Texas A&M in my lifetime hired a coach from Alabama that Alabama wanted to keep, which I'm guessing is everybody's clear #1 in this list. IMO, Tennessee and Oklahoma are the hardest school to put in that group. Those are good programs, but its hard to say really how attractive they are, and Oklahoma I dont think has really stretched itself out there for a long time (although they havent been fricking it up since hiring Stoops either)