We all have heavy hearts and send our prayers to the victims and their families of Thursday's tragic, terroristic event in our wonderful city.
I have too many words right now and too many thoughts to say too much more, but we will discuss this on many levels in the days, weeks and months to come.
This is a discussion too big to be silenced and too important to be rushed. We are beyond the point of hoping it will go away.
Thanks to everyone who reads this and participates, and as I've always said, the exchanging of ideas is the first step to a better discourse which always leads to improvement.
From the "Talks too much" studios, join me in a moment of silence for the four heroic Marines who were killed Thursday right here.
From Jomo
Jay- for the mailbag, Vegas now has over/under for UTK at 8.5, if Butchy and boys only win 7 or less would this be a big failure ? Would Butch be considered, now with all this talent, just a great recruiter but not much of a coach ? the Guy Lewis of football ? despite who you root for you would have to agree this is a fair question. You can only blame losses on Fulmer, Hamilton, Kiffin, Dooley, Counzo for so long . . .
Jomo -
Completely fair question and one that we will explore fairly often in the next five months.
The over/under we have consistently seen in regard to UT wins is 7.5, and we feel eight wins is the baseline
To be fair though, not all seven- or even eight-win seasons are created the same.
If UT goes 7-5 in the regular season and then beats an overmatched MAC team in Shreveport, yes, that's 8-5 and a step forward but how big of a step.
And we wrote this earlier this week from the media event, Butch Jones has arguably the second-biggest make-or-break season as far as showing us what he's got in the league. (We think Kevin Sumlin's standing at the ultimate coaching crossroad: Win big and the sky's the limit; go 7-5 and the seat gets really warm, really quick.)
We think this will be a very interesting year to see what Butch brings as a sideline guy and an in-season guy.
He has been an amazing builder, be it in recruiting or be it in terms of galvanizing his fan base and marketing his message. Even the biggest UT hater can't doubt his skills on those fronts.
Yes, the cliches and mottos get tired, but the message has been clear and unwavering.
Now we will see what he does on the field, and that lesson will be most interesting.
And to answer your question as simply as we can: Anything under eight wins would be considered a step back for UT in our eyes.
---
From a host of you on Twitter/email as a reminder
Here are our personal answers to the questions we asked this week.
Monday - Supersized sports "events" of today: Home run derby (which was way better this year, by the way), SEC media days, Super Bowl halftime, NFL draft (we love the draft, you know this).
Tuesday - Will Tiger win another major? Wow, we want to say yes, and will say yes, but it's looking more and more doubtful with every 76 he posts.
Wednesday - Rushmore of female foils in sports movies: Barbera Hershey as Mira Fleenor in Hoosiers; Susan Sarandon as Annie Savoy in Bull Durham, the girl that played Wendy Peffercorn in the Sandlot, Maragret Whitton as Rachel Phelps in Major League.
Thursday - Rushmore of Will Ferrell movies (and while Ferrell got some major heat from some you guys, there are several of his movies we enjoyed greatly, and even some that did not make this list that we find enjoyable): Anchorman (which we admit to having an irrational, over-the-top fondness for), The Lego Movie
---
From MocTastic
Question for JG's mailbag: Does the media learn enough "new" information at these media days to make them justifiable to be had, or is it just an excuse to get out of town for both coaches and media alike for a few days?
MT-
As far as "new' information, that's a fair question and we're not sure. But almost all of these coaches would rather give up kickoff returns for TDs than offer up too much "new" information.
Overall, yes, it's worth the trip and we'll touch on this a little bit more in the next question in terms of access. (And I can assure you if we're just looking for a way to get out of town, everyone would be angling to cover the spring meetings in Destin at the beach rather than this thing in a mall in Hoover, Ala.)
We'll also add the SEC is super smart about self-promotion. Think about this past week. What has been the biggest sports story going?
Yep, we don't believe it was an accident that the SEC moved this event to overlap the All-Star break to maximize the information bubble. And it's also not an accident that the SEC wanted to be first in the order of these things.
From JMC
Jay,
This week has been SEC Media Day or around here, the closest thing to San Diego Comic-con until kickoff November 5th. While I'm sure Hoover has pulled out all the stops short of shipping in Sushi Chefs from Kyoto to make rolls named after all the schools, how much, if any coverage, will be for "that other team" when they have "their" Media Days at the Motel 6 down off of I-20 in Beaver Gulch, North Carolina where the "finest" in Vienna Sausages and Daybreak Sausage Gravy in a can will be served luke warm for Jacob & Co. (Hey, when I parody the have and have nots, I PARODY the have and have nots)
On a sidenote, given the high-rankings of of us vs. Jax State, how much, if any, media push will be made towards this game? Did I mention BOTH teams are going in highly ranked, while Orange Nation is playing some Western Carolina wannabe around the same time? Just saying.
JMC -
Can't really say.
We can say this, though. A big part of the resources devoted to the SEC media event rather than the SoCon media event is about access and interest across the league.
As for access, well, you get direct contact - not one on one mind you, but still direct contact - with every coach and three players from each SEC team. That would be difficult to do in four months nevermind four days during any other time of the offseason.
We as a paper are blessed to have great access with UTC, and in truth when any of our guys have needed to contact a SoCon coach in the past, they have been pretty successful just calling them.
As for interest, this is not about direct best stuff, as in UT or UTC, but more to do with the conference as a whole.
If you take the Vols and the Mocs out of the mix, then the numbers of fans/readers interested in the rest of the SEC compared to the rest of the SoCon is exponentially higher.
(As for the parody, well-played sir. Well-played indeed.)
And it's funny you mention the season opener. On the way back from Birmingham and without knowing your question, TFP SEC ace David Paschall said plainly, "As far as the opening weekend for the teams we mainly cover, the UTC-Jax State game is easily the biggest."
So there's that.
---
From Sportsfan
Hey Football season is getting closer. I'm starting to feel it. I understand you've been at the SEC Media days this week. For the mailbag What's your Rushmore of dumbest questions you heard asked by the media this week?
Sportsfan -
Great question, and one that varies from year to year. There were no clear cut headliners like a few years ago when Kevin Sumlin was asked what it's like to not coach Johnny Manziel or when Hugh Freeze was asked about pace of play in his golf game with Gus Malzahn.
And we view it a little bit different than most in far as a bad question. First asking someone to "Talk about" is not a question but a request and shows little preparation or thought.
As for this week, well, and we referenced this in an earlier answer, a lot of the reporters are getting access to players for the first time so something they are extremely interested in is something some of us have known for a long while. Case in point: This just in, Josh Dobbs is a super smart kid who is an aerospace engineer major.
In no particular order, and with direct quotes, these were chunks of questions to the various head coaches:
To Les Miles, "Obviously Vadal Alexander has worked real hard to become the player he's become, but can you describe in your own words and from your eyes how much he's grown into the role of the leadership role that he's had on the offensive line?"
To Hugh Freeze, "You ended the season probably not the way you wanted to, blowout loss 42-3 to TCU. As a coach, how do you bounce back from that?"
To Gus Malzahn, "Coach, having the largest scoreboard or video board in college football, how excited are the guys to get on the field and practice with that?"
To Derek Mason, "Coach, it's imperative, of course, to have a competitive team. It starts with the mindset. What's the mindset of this year's Vanderbilt team coming in? What's the mindset of Anchor Down?"