“The Worst Shower Discipline”

September 10, 2010 at 10:46am by Scott   •  3 Comments »

I’m pretty good about keeping up with all Volunteer news that comes across the wire, but I needed Jimmy Holt from WIVK in Knoxville to alert me to this after I missed it. Obviously, my brain is set to tune out anything that will hurt my soul to this degree. I love my Vols and Derek Dooley is my new Battle Captain, but this is a press conference blurb that rivals Raheem Morris‘s “take off your underwear and put your face on people”, and I was sure nothing could top that.

“We’ve had a few staph infections, so we did a clinic yesterday on proper shower technique and soap and using a rag,” Dooley said. “We put some new rags in — y’all think I’m kidding, but I’m serious.”

Proper shower technique. “Do not use someone else’s washcloth! Think about the last thing he washed and the first thing you wash and tell me if you want to use his washcloth.” Holy shit. Oh, and I like the way he calls a washcloth a rag. He still hasn’t completely gotten the Louisiana out of his system, I guess.

“We had, I told them, the worst shower discipline of any team I’ve ever been around. So we talked a little bit about application of soap to the rag and making sure you hit all your body. You know, you can neglect it trying to cut corners, and it shows in how you practice and elsewhere. I’m hoping we show some improvement in that.”

I’m trying… I’m really trying hard to conjure up some weird way in which this is a motivational tool for the players and somehow leads to winning more games. Maybe it’s some kind of Karate Kid wax-on wax-off thing where one activity can actually improve your performance in another seemingly unrelated one. Mr. Miyagi had Ralph Macchio paint that fence with a brush as a way to get him to unconsciously practice proper hand technique. Maybe Dooley knows some secret connection between shower discipline and football discipline. Hey, whatddaya know. I made myself all right with this.

Okay, let’s assume for a second that some of the players are filthy pigs who don’t know how to apply soap to themselves. Staph infections develop and finally the head coach has to get involved by actually instructing them on how to properly clean themselves in the shower. WHY WOULD YOU ANNOUNCE THIS TO THE PRESS? What could possibly be gained by saying this out loud? Wouldn’t it have been easier and more effective to hire a celebrity guest to instruct them on the finer points?

Footvol Time In Tennessee

September 02, 2010 at 12:22am by Scott   •  6 Comments »

College football starts in less than three days, over a week ahead the pro regular season, so my mind is more on the Vols than the Bucs at this moment. Above is Swiperboy‘s 2010 dedication to the Vols titled “Footvol”. At least I think it’s Swiperboy. I couldn’t quite tell from the two-thousand ads and mentions of himself. But despite that, it gets you geared up for the season. Normally I’d say butchering and sampling “Rocky Top” is a mortal sin, but this works for me.

Next is a good write-up about Eric Berry and how he’s basically the best person on the planet.

University of Tennessee managers would always wash, clean, paint and apply logos to helmets before games on Saturday. The managers with the most seniority would apply the decals, while the newest would have to scrub and paint over any scratches on the helmet. Eric Berry said he wanted to give back to the guys that do so much for the players, therefore he would be found washing and painting the Tennessee helmets before game day because he didn’t feel like he deserved to jump their hierarchy.

Okay, maybe that alone doesn’t make him the best person on the planet, but it’s still pretty cool and a good indication that he has his head on straight. How about his high school friend that credit Berry for keeping him away from the temptations that could have derailed his life.

One of his high school friends, Rokevious Watkins, a 6’4″, 340-pound tackle at South Carolina, grinds his teeth when he thinks about where he would be without Berry. Watkins and his father jumped around high schools and cities. “We were living in the streets” Watkins says.

“I was close to going the wrong way-to jail, killing somebody, things associated with street life. Eric snatched me up and told me there was a better way.”

Or how he entered the draft to help out his family?

He wanted to do whatever it took to help his parents’ living situation. The first deed Berry set out to do after declaring for the draft was to buy his mom a black Range Rover, and a box of grits set against the passengers seat. James [his father] always told Eric that he would be a grown man, when he could buy his own grits.

There’s a ton of other stuff in there, including his story about Deion Sanders not giving him an autograph (and Eric’s promise that he would never do that to a fan), how he corrected Monte Kiffin on defensive alignments, and how he’s doing everything right with the Chiefs. I think Gerald McCoy will be good and I’m glad the Bucs have him and everything, but I’d be lying if I didn’t still feel pangs from the Bucs missing out on Berry.

And finally, here’s a girl who did her wedding photo shoot in Neyland Stadium. Why? Because it’s the best idea ever, that’s why.

REAR ENTRIES: Barely Qualifies As News

July 26, 2010 at 02:21pm by Scott   •  3 Comments »

MONTARIO HARDESTY SIGNS: Just a small piece of Vol-related news.

The Browns felt so strongly about Hardesty’s ability that they traded a third-rounder and two fifths to move up to draft him.

Holy shit, I don’t think I ever knew that. Good for him. A great player and a great representative for the Volunteers. I’ll be keeping up with him on the Browns.

DON’T TAKE OFFENSE AT MY INNUENDO: I was going to write a whole entry on Pat Yasinskas‘s recent chat because it mentioned the Bucs a lot, even if it wasn’t particularly useful information. But then I got to his answer to a Falcons question and had to stop because I’m a fucking child.

Phillip (A-T-L): Will Michael Jenkins be a starting WR for Falcons at the end of the 2010 season?

Pat Yasinskas: Yep, he’ll play his role. But you’re going to see a lot of Harry D in the slot.

Yep, nothing like some Harry D in the slot to get things going.

FUCK PETER KING: Peter King discusses optimism.

I tweeted the other day the reason this is such a fun time is because 32 teams think they have a chance to make the playoffs right now, and I think about 28 actually do. (Scratch St. Louis, Tampa Bay, Buffalo and probably Cleveland, though I guess it’s possible Jake Delhomme can be reborn and the Browns could eke out nine wins.) Detroit? Kansas City? Seattle? Not dead at all. They can all throw the ball, and all have made some defensive progress.

I think I speak for Buccaneer fans everywhere when I say that Peter King can fornicate himself with an iron stick.

Bobby Johnson Snaps, Retires

July 16, 2010 at 11:08am by Scott   •  8 Comments »

Vanderbilt’s head football coach, Bobby Johnson, suddenly retired earlier this week, three weeks before the opening of summer camp. I feel for fans of the Commodores; this is much more of a shock than even what Lane Kiffin did to Tennessee. When Kiffin up and left in January, people were surprised and appalled and everything, but looking back it occurred to you that, yeah, this was a guy who we should have seen as capable of doing this. This is totally out of the blue for Johnson, though. He’s well-respected, well-liked and a class guy. So people are absolutely floored.

“Was I surprised? Yeah,” vice chancellor of university affairs and athletics David Williams said. “Even as he said that, I kind of was, ‘OK. Not what I wanted to hear. Not what I thought I would hear. But OK, we need to figure out how that’s going to work out over this, your last season.’ And he said, ‘No, immediately.’ That was the bigger shock.”

Johnson didn’t get up and make a teary “burned out” speech like Dick Vermeil, but it’s obvious that it was the grind of the job and the criticisms of an unappreciative fanbase that drove this decision. Johnson coached Vanderbilt to their first winning season since 1982 and only their second bowl game victory ever in 2008. Then in 2009 when they slid back to 2-10, people were calling for his head. That’s got to get to a man.

“Football is not life, but it’s a way of life. It consumes your life. You only have so many years to live, and you want to see a different way. In fact, I do. Some guys will coach one foot in the coffin. But I want to do some other things.”

He could have summed that up in two words: “Fuck this.” Vanderbilt is a private, academically-oriented university, which could be considered Ivy League if “ivy league” was a type of institution and not an actual conference. I bleed orange, but I’m perfectly willing to admit that Vanderbilt is a far, far superior academic school than any other in the SEC — possibly all of the others combined, actually. Their athletics do not belong in the SEC because the schools in the SEC take their sports far too seriously for Vanderbilt to compete properly now. But Vandy is an original member of the SEC and a traditional Tennessee rival and that’s not going to change. Why can’t Commodore fans simply bask in knowledge that their graduates will be curing cancer and AIDS and colonizing Mars and let that be enough? Bobby Johnson was one of the good guys, and they drove him out of the business because they got a taste of success and they liked it too much?

Hey Vandy fans, IT’S NOT THE 1950s ANYMORE. A .500 team with a bowl game once in a while is about as good as it’s going to get for you. You can’t recruit the best talent because much of the time, the best talent cannot pass your academic standards. Every now and then you get a Jay Cutler or a Shelton Quarles or a Myron Lewis or… umm… hmm, that’s about all I can think of. Todd Yoder? Man, I’m really stretching now. But look at it this way: How often do you have to deal with news of a bar brawl that’s going to set your team back a couple years? How often does this happen to you? Or this? Never, that’s how often. Take some fucking pride in that. In 2010, Vanderbilt football should be an interesting diversion for you and not an obsession that drives a good man to throw in the towel over your constant bitching. If you’re so concerned about win-loss records, lobby for Vandy to leave the SEC (there is no penalty for them doing so, by the way) and join a lesser conference or to forge their own way as an independent. Personally, I wouldn’t want to see that happen because I think the SEC is a better conference with Vanderbilt in it. It classes up the joint and drives up our GPA and graduation rates to respectable levels. But, hell, if you’re going to shout down a man who just got you a bowl game victory a year ago, fucking leave and join the Sun Belt conference or something before some accidentally successful coach hangs himself from a shower rod because he didn’t deliver a national championship the following year. You guys are nuts.

You Just Couldn’t Keep Your Mouth Shut, Could You?

June 11, 2010 at 01:35pm by Scott   •  5 Comments »

I was just going to let this whole Southern Cal sanctions thing pass by with a douchebag smile on my face and a Shooter McGavin to Lane Kiffin, knowing that his employment there probably led to the NCAA handing down a harsher punishment than they would have otherwise and that his dream job that he abandoned Tennessee for has become significantly less dreamy. But then delusional and obviously drunk Mike Garrett had to start spouting off and getting me all aggravated again.

“As I read the decision by the NCAA, all I could get out of all of this was … I read between the lines and there was nothing but a lot of envy, and they wish they all were Trojans,” Garrett said to cheers Thursday night at the San Francisco Airport Marriott.

See, that’s the kind of ridiculous shit I might say on here when I’m being intentionally obnoxious or I’m trying to piss off some Gator fans. But as a Tennessee alumnus and a fan with no official school position, that’s fine. I can be a boisterous bastard. Garrett, a Southern Cal alumnus and fan, is also their athletic director, making this kind of childish remark an official school position. Southern Cal thinks the NCAA is sooooo jealous of them and really just wants to be them. Garrett sounds like the ugly kid that wasn’t invited to the prom.

I was pissed when Kiffin left Tennessee and by the manner in which it happened, but it’s for the best. Kiffin was at Southern Cal when all those violations happened and he had already racked up a few secondary violations in his one year at Tennessee. A couple more seasons and the NCAA would have torn down Neyland Stadium. And Kiffin definitely found his true home because he and Garrett were absolutely made for each other.

“Regardless of what happens in that appeal, we know this: SC is more powerful than anything else,” Kiffin said. “The university, the football program, the basketball program — no matter what they try to do to us, it won’t matter.”

YES! YES! Please keep poking the bear, Lane. It’s one thing to taunt Steve Spurrier and Urban Meyer. Spurrier has heard it all before and Meyer can always fake a heart attack and take some medical leave. But the NCAA? They don’t forget. Between Kiffin saying that nothing the NCAA does to them matters and Garrett telling them they all secretly want to be Trojans, these two years of bowl ineligibility will be nothing compared to the lifetime of deep scrutiny they’ve earned with their hubris.

“We’re fighters,” Garrett said. “As I told my staff, I said, ‘You know, I feel invigorated by all this stuff.’”

Everything is great! It only makes us stronger! We’ve learned nothing!

“We can’t control people 24 hours a day,” men’s basketball coach Kevin O’Neill said. “That’s all there is to it. You cannot control people from the outside. You cannot control agents. You cannot control runners. Those kinds of things get away from you sometimes because you have no way of knowing. I do know this: We do the right thing every single day by the university, by the athletic department, by the student-athletes.”

Hey, here’s something you can control.

[Former men's basketball coach] Floyd, who is coaching at UTEP, quit last June, after he was accused of giving $1,000 in cash to Rodney Guillory who helped steer Mayo to USC.

I’m pretty sure paying people to influence athletes to attend your school is against the rules, and can be controlled. You can also control who is present at your practices and whether your athletes properly document their vehicles. I’m sure it’s tough to keep everything in check and make sure their staff and players are all maintaining their integrity. And maybe the NCAA would have taken that into consideration if Southern Cal hadn’t waved its dick in their faces last year.

USC believes the [NCAA] has pursued these weak institutional allegations in football because it recognizes that without a direct institutional link, the allegations surrounding Student-Athlete I involve only amateurism issues with no institutional violation. After 3 1/2 years of intensive public and media scrutiny, including repeated public questions as to why USC football has not yet been “brought to justice” by the NCAA, the pressure to accuse USC of having had actual knowledge of and a direct connection to the alleged impermissible benefits is very real.

So, to recap, the NCAA is a bunch of jealous, Trojan wannabes who are sucking off the media and the fans, but none of that matters because Southern Cal is untouchable. They really should offer a course called Making Friends 101 because they obviously have significant expertise in that area.

Well, I’ve spent considerably longer on this than I intended to. All the history and connections between people really turns into a rabbit hole; I probably could have gone on with this all day. In the end, though, Southern Cal as an institution isn’t really on my radar and I have nothing against it. I even know some lovely people that went to there and are big fans, so I wouldn’t want any of the above to be an implied disparagement of them. I actually just wanted to see Lane’s recruiting efforts hurt and his reputation suffer. And being bowl ineligible won’t hurt his program all that much. Do kids go to Southern Cal so they can play in the Rose Bowl, or do they go so they can attend a high-profile school with a long history of sending guys to the NFL? I’m guessing the latter. But it will still sting, and the loss of scholarships will hurt, too. He’s going to have some rebuilding to do. It’s actually got a nice karmic balance to it. Kiffin’s departure from Tennessee has crippled the Vols and it will take Derek Dooley a while to build his program at UT and his own reputation in the SEC. By the time the 2012 season rolls around, both Southern Cal and Tennessee should be in roughly the same shape. It will be interesting to see who wins the first bowl game. Of course, by then Lane’s mouth will have pissed off the wrong dude at the NCAA and Lane will be reduced to recruiting out of prison leagues. I’m telling you, the hair never lies.

The Hair Theory Confirmed

June 05, 2010 at 03:18pm by Scott   •  5 Comments »

Sometimes I use hair as a gauge as to whether someone is a winner. I’m talking men now; obviously you always use hair to grade a chick’s worth. For example, I have said in the past that Lane Kiffin does not have championship hair but Josh Freeman does. You all thought it was one of my stupid jokes, but Derek Dooley reveals that he uses his hair as a metaphor for his coaching philosophy.

You know, it’s amazing,” Dooley said. “Some people are worried about what offense we’re gonna run, other people’s worrying about how multiple we are on defense. You guys are worried about my hair. I will say this: I’ve had the same haircut since I was 12 years old. OK, so do the math. That’s 30 years of the exact same haircut. At some point your hair finally concedes and says, ‘I’m gonna just do what the heck you want me to do, and I’m not gonna fight it anymore.’ And so everybody has their hair fighting them all the time because they don’t train it and do it consistently over time, all right? It’s no different than training a team. You do it over, and you do it over, and you do it over, and you don’t deviate from the plan, and you bring it across and you shape it down, and then eventually they do it how you want it. And then once my hair said, ‘OK, I’ll do it how you want it,’ I haven’t changed. Why change?”

Girly men like Urban Meyer and Nick Saban and Mark Richt have no style and allow their hair to flap any which way it wants to. Meyer’s hair is so undisciplined it has actually been arrested twice. Jimmy Johnson, famous for his cast iron hair, may have looked like he had things under control, but he used more cans of Aqua Net than Poison in the 80s to maintain that coif. That is not hair discipline — that’s chemical-enhancement on par with steroids. Dooley is the only one that beat his hair into submission. One right-handed part and done. He walks out of the shower with that hairdo. The lawyer will control his players like he controls his hair: effortlessly. They will become an extension of himself and will bend to his will to create a seamless connection between coach and player. At the end of the season, all other SEC coaches will be shaving their heads and starting from scratch when they see the success Dooley has with his “Hair is life” philosophy. Spurrier, you’re first. You can’t hide underneath a visor forever.

Will The SEC Expand Soon?

May 12, 2010 at 01:34pm by Scott   •  4 Comments »

There’s been a good amount of talk about the Big Ten expanding their conference lately and how it would affect the other conferences, including the SEC, and I thought I’d take a second to cover it. And by “a second”, I mean this entry took way longer than I thought it would to complete.

The latest news came a couple days ago when a rumor was floated that Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany had extended offers to Missouri, Nebraska, Notre Dame and Rutgers to join the conference and make its name even more confusing. Speculation had been buzzing for weeks prior to that but this was the first mention of something actually happening. Ohio State AD Gene Smith killed the rumor, saying he received an email from Delany denying that any offers were made.

Asked if there was anything to that speculation, Smith said, “Nothing. There’s no truth to it whatsoever. Actually, Jim sent us all an e-mail telling us there’s no truth to that — which we knew. There’s no extensions of offers that have been made, so that’s not true.”

With nothing else to do until the summer practices, speculation is off the charts with the possibilities, even more so than in years past. In the end, the change could be as simple as the Big Ten expanding by one team, Notre Dame, to twelve and everything else stays the same. But what fun is that? You’ve got a couple minutes, right?

Let’s say the Big Ten does expand to 16 and does so by poaching Missouri and Nebraska among others. The SEC would feel the need to expand to 16 also to remain competitive and the giant of the Big XII, Texas, would make the most sense as their first target. If Texas accepted the invitation, it would likely require that Texas A&M also join to maintain that tradition and rivalry. Those two would almost be certain. Oklahoma is the other major player in the Big XII, and they’d likely require Oklahoma State join too for the same reasons of tradition that Texas would want A&M.

Oklahoma has a good football tradition, but it doesn’t bring as much to the table as Texas does in terms of viewership. SEC Commissioner Mike Slive could try to move in a different direction to get to 16. Florida State and Miami are logical choices, but Florida would buck against either one of them. Florida State refused an offer to join the SEC back in 1990 after a lengthy history of begging to get in (excellent article here on that history), a snub the Gators are still sore over, and Florida opposed Miami’s admission at the same time. For his part, Miami’s AD Kirby Hocutt recently threw his support behind the ACC.

For Miami, Hocutt said, the ACC is “the most desirable conference in terms of make-up between academics and athletics … We are very pleased with the ACC.”

He kind of has to say that, though. But if not any Florida teams, then who else would be used to expand to 16? Clemson’s name has been thrown around, and that’s a choice I like a lot. Clemson is an SEC town — build around the school and with a completely devoted fanbase. I’m not so sure I like the idea of another orange team entering the conference, but that’s open for discussion. Georgia Tech is another option. Tech was actually a charter member of the SEC, but left in 1964. It has a long-standing rivalry with Georgia and makes geographic sense. Unfortunately, Tech doesn’t bring in the kind of viewership that Slive is looking for. Even walking down 10th Street, you see more Bulldog bumper stickers than Yellow Jackets.

This is assuming viewership matters. According to this In The Bleachers article, the SEC’s $3-billion deal with CBS and ESPN is not dependent on households that carry the conference games.

That’s right the SEC’s deal, although very sweet appears to be very fixed. Multiple factors, most notably the economy and more prudent fiscal responsibility are working against the theory that with expansion the SEC could still print their own money. While the Big Ten Network has limitless possibilities through expansion into more television markets the SEC is fixed in the amount of cash that their going to bring in.

Their argument is that any expansion of the conference only serves to carve the same pie into more slices, and no school would vote for reducing their share for practically no return. The addition of Texas could force the networks to renegotiate that deal because Texas’s market is so damn big, so all of the above speculation about who brings in the most viewers is probably still valid. But without Texas, the whole thing likely falls apart.

And that would be okay with me. I’m not a big fan of expanding the SEC, honestly. Twelve teams works out nice. Everyone plays everyone in their own division, three teams in the other division, and four out of conference. If you expand to 16, your division games already take up seven of twelve, leaving less room for cross-divisional and interconference games. If you stick with four interconference games, that means you only have one cross-divisional game per year. It would be almost a decade between those matchups, and that’s too long to maintain any kind of bond within your conference.

There’s also the social differences to consider as you push out west. Even though I am required to despise everything about Gainesville, Athens, Tuscaloosa and all those other shitholes, the fact is that SEC towns generally share a cultural kinship. I’ve heard it called southern pride and I guess that’s what I mean, although that expression smacks of racism and I’d like to disassociate from that aspect of it. Texas and Oklahoma are different. Worse. Maybe they love football as much as we do and maybe there are some small southeastern towns you couldn’t tell from a small Texas town just by looking at it. But they have their own history and traditions that are strong with their fanbases and I personally see no need to try and assimilate that into one big mess of a conference that is getting big enough to sniff the Pacific ocean. And all this is just football. The conference covers all collegiate sports. So multiply these complications by 15 or so.

In the end, I want what’s best for the SEC, and specifically what’s best for Tennessee. If expansion ends up meaning significantly more money to the Volunteers, increased exposure for the Vols and Knoxville and remaining in the most competitive and talented conference in the country, I’ll go along with it. A couple 16-team superconferences seems unwieldy and a logistical mess, but I’m sure the smart people that lead them will figure out a way to make it work.

By the way, this entry inspired today’s clicky choices. Another reason the SEC rules.

Don’t You Dare Make Me Like You

April 28, 2010 at 02:39pm by Scott   •  1 Comment »

Matt Simms has had quite a career so far. From being suspended and leaving Louisville to last season pursuing his dream at a nameless community college in California to throwing three picks at the Orange and White game in Tennessee last weekend and losing to a true freshman, oh what a ride it’s been. And through all of it, most people look at Simms and think “prick”. Well, that or “weed“.

But now Simms is dangerously toying with my emotions by doing this interview on Inside the Orange where he comes across well-spoken, humble, and eager to win for the Vols. And on top of that, he discusses his brother Chris‘s womanlike indecision and his last-minute switch to Texas after committing to Tennessee all those years ago.

Your brother was recruiting by Tennessee. Do you remember coming to Knoxville ten years ago?

“I was really young at that time, all that stuff was way over my head. I didn’t really know anything that was going on. I do know that he shafted us a little bit going to the other UT. But now I’m finally here so I’m happy to be part of the real UT.”

Hear how he digs his own brother in the name of the Volunteers while also referring to Tennessee as “us”? It’s… *sniff*… it’s fucking beautiful, man. I swear if I come over to your side and you screw the team somehow with the same kind of bitch shenanigans you’ve been pulling for years, I will throw your beaten and chloroform-drenched body into a pen of starving and rabid wolverines. Trust me, I know a guy.

And The Homerism Continues

April 25, 2010 at 07:59pm by Scott   •  4 Comments »

Everyone here knows how bad I wanted a certain Volunteer safety to get drafted by the Bucs. And although Eric Berry was nabbed by the Chiefs, I’ve always heard that when life closes a door, it opens a window. In this case, it’s a very small window. And it’s only open a crack. And you can only run through it at about 4.64, but still… I’ll take what I can get.

Former Fulton High School star and early draft entrant Dennis Rogan wasn’t selected in the draft after leaving UT following his junior year, but the defensive back also signed as a free agent with Tampa Bay on Saturday.

I know every moron who defends a late-round pick or undrafted free agent immediately turns to their special teams ability as a justification for their NFL team to take him, but in Rogan’s case that actually holds water. Rogan is the all-time leading Volunteer in kick return yardage. He actually broke Willie Gault‘s record from almost 30 years ago. That’s worth something. He’s more of a prospect than DeAngelo Willingham was last year. And in case you were wondering how Willingham was doing, he is currently with Seattle, his fourth team in the last twelve months.

The Douchier Simms Gets More Playing Time

April 09, 2010 at 10:52am by Scott   •  1 Comment »

Big news for the Tennessee quarterback depth chart as fifth-year senior Nick Stephens quits the team when coach Derek Dooley told him he was going to have his reps decreased after a particularly poor performance in a scrimmage. This elevates newcomer junior Matt Simms to the starting spot, mostly because they don’t really have anyone else.

“This is a business,” Simms said. “This stuff is going to happen. It’s all about what makes you happy. If someone is unhappy, they have to make changes.”

I won’t belabor my general dislike for Simms here. You can read this entry for all the links to Simms’s Louisville suspension and his bad sportsmanship and all that other shit unbecoming of a Tennessee Volunteer. And he’s not even that good! Last I heard, he wasn’t even completing 60% at the community college he played at last year. He had 17/12 TD/INT ratio — at community college. Shouldn’t a highly-recruited big time quarterback prospect be able to do more against guys who, you know, pay their tuition with a credit card? Before that he did virtually nothing at Louisville. And now he’s going to be the starter if he can beat out freshman Tyler Bray, who shows a lot of raw tools but come on, he was picking between Tennessee and San Diego State. And now I’m going to have to root for Simms on Saturdays. I’m going to have to defend him on this site and SEC message boards and make excuses for him when he fucks up and… ugh, this is going to be a hell of a season.

Well, I didn’t like Jonathan Crompton either and he turned in a pretty good season for the Vols last year and I even stopped holding my breath when he cocked back for a pass, so anything is possible I suppose. Maybe Dooley and the offensive coaches can elevate his play to something resembling an SEC quarterback and with enough help from a solid offensive line and a decent running game, maybe Simms can be okay. There, the delusion has already begun.