The NCAA's early signing day proposal -- early singing days, to be exact -- wasn't met with much fan fare. The idea of adding signing periods in June and December, in addition to the existing February one, was met with opposition from Urban Meyer, Nick Saban and a number of other high-profile coaches.
Add one more to that list: Dan Mullen.
Why does Mullen's opinion matter? He's the coaches' representative on the NCAA's Division I Football Oversight Committee.
Mullen and Nebraska AD Shawn Eichorst co-chaired an early signing period working group which produced a number of suggestions, which Mullen said the general committee then flatly rejected.
"Somehow," Mullen told ESPN.com, "the oversight committee decided to completely forego every suggestion of the working group and all the research that was done to come up with a signing day that everybody [on the working group] completely rejected as the worst idea."
Mullen said he's heard from a number of coaches strongly opposed to the June signing period. "The June signing day makes absolutely zero sense to me," Mullen said. "June, in my discussions and everyone I've talked to, was probably the worst time to have a signing date."
As on FBS assistant told me, "The June signing period is smack dab in the middle of the vacation of every FBS coach in America."
So how, exactly, did the Football Oversight Committee pass a "unanimous" vote if the coaches' representative is against the idea? The vote took place in September. Who'd have thought a coach might be busy during September?
"I'd have been very adamantly opposed to the proposal they came up with if I'd have been available," Mullen told ESPN.
For the record, committee member and Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby said Mullen had the opportunity to vote via telephone but wasn't able to make it.
"We have a lot of people with football backgrounds in the room," Bowlsby said. "I think the coach voice was certainly heard in the discussions."
So, what now becomes of the early signing dates? The Collegiate Commissioners Association -- which runs the National Letter of Intent program and, thus, controls anything related to singing day -- is in the midst of its regularly scheduled meetings at Big Ten headquarters in suburban Chicago. We should hear an update from them once those meetings adjourn.