Although he knows, Bobby Bowden insists he doesn't want other people to know when he's going to retire, exactly. But the evidence has been mounting for months that 2010 will be the end of one very esteemed trail: Jimbo Fisher's buyout was raised to $5 million if he's not Florida State's head coach by January 2011, and Bowden told a group of boosters in Miami he didn't want this to be the last year. Long-term defensive coordinator Mickey Andrews is apparently considering retirement and could be finished after this season.

And today, Terry Bowden effectively told the Sporting News it's 2010 or bust:

WE SAY: Florida State will win the ACC Atlantic Division, and coach Bobby Bowden will retire at the end of the season.

North Alabama coach TERRY BOWDEN says: "That's false. How do I know? Because I just asked him and he told me so. He said, 'I'm not retiring at the end of the season.' Now there may be a new president at the school and he may not want him or (coach-in-waiting) Jimbo Fisher. We don't know that."

I respect Terry for playing it straight, and if anyone at Florida State is even remotely interested in replacing ex-Bowden player T.K. Wetherell with a president who comes in swinging an ax at the most revered figure the university has ever known and the much-sought-after successor it spent millions to keep in the fold, then hell, I'll do it. Where do I send my C.V.? Because I think it's pretty safe to presume no one with a real PhD. is going to go there.

As for Bobby, no one at his age will be able to avoid at least some degree of increasing retirement chatter as the year goes on, especially if things go in one extreme or another, and with Fisher looking at Year Four as dauphin. But unless his health takes a wrong turn, or Terry is completely making things up while on the phone with reporters (or Bobby is completely making things up, which may be the Occam's razor solution here), it looks like two more dadgum years.