ESPN ranks Florida State 7th best job in college football

Travis Haney of ESPN asked a bunch of coaches their thoughts on the various college head coaching jobs. They looked at factors like factors such as "location, administrative stability, support from those bosses, facilities, recruiting base, path to conference titles/playoff, sense of tradition, fervor of fan base, too much fervor from a fan base, etc."

Keep in mind that this is really based on the perception of those factors, not necessarily actual experience with it. Florida State came in at No. 7 ($), which seems very reasonable. Ahead: LSU, UF, Ohio State, USC, Alabama and Texas, which shouldn't surprise anyone.

"Two or three coaches thought we had FSU way too low. One thought it deserved to be in the top three, if not No. 1. He thought it was well on the way to replacing Alabama as the dynasty du jour in the sport. "With the way you can recruit there, it's the best job in the country," he said. To his point, the Seminoles have had 36 ESPN 300 recruits in the past three classes -- and 26 of them were Floridians. With Florida struggling, FSU has again become the "it" school in the state. So what held it back from a higher ranking in our poll? It was likely the sense from coaches that its facilities and assistants' pay appeared to be lagging. That's an evolving perception, however. There's a $250 million plan on the books to update Doak Campbell Stadium between now and 2018. That includes the outdated-looking offices and training areas in the south end zone of the stadium. Also, an indoor facility adjacent to Doak Campbell was completed in 2013. Another reason FSU isn't in our top five? Tallahassee, while it's the state's capital city, is bland and average. It is at least relatively close to the Panama City and Destin beaches. Florida State has been trending up for the past three or four years. It's back to where it was at Bobby Bowden's high point, more than one coach has said."

The assistant coach salaries concern is interesting, but rather unfounded now that Florida State has increased its assistant pay by $750,000 to over $4.1M, being one of only seven public schools to top that number.

Also of note: Clemson 16th, Miami 24th.