Vols

Fulmer is no lax disciplinarian. You haven't heard the name Brent Vinson being called on O or D because he hasn't gone to class. Britton Colquitt (last name ring a bell?) has been off the team and will be for another week or two for an alcohol related violation. Fulmer screamed bloody murder when the UT President Peterson forced the athletic dept to go to the UNiversity wide three strikes and you're out policy. You didn't get that many with Fulmer, Pearl, et.al. There;s a very long list of guys (Lynn Mcgruder, Onterrio Smith, James Banks, I could go on) that Fulmer kicked off the team but who landed at Oregon, Oklahoma, etc., and went on to play pro ball, but Fulmer wouldn't have their shenanigans.

 

That Fulmer Cup thing cracks me up. It's a blog. It's not from any reputable news source. And the language leaves something to be desired. Even John Adams, Knoxville News Sentinel editor, referenced it and was called out by three columnists from his own paper.

I'm not surprised that people portray Fulmer in less than flattering lights. For one thing, he's been around an awfully long time. He's also done the unthinkable: cooperate with NCAA/SEC investigations against other teams. That's why Bruce Pearl is hated in basketball coaching circles. He's also spoken of his faith. When has that even endeared himself to anyone?

Does TN have more go on than should? Yes, every school does. But the Fulmer critics have to make some pretty logical gymnastic leaps to say he doesn't punish wrong-doers. The facts just don't gel with that sort of sophistry.

 

Papers will always have biases and will never let the facts get in the way of a good story.

Pearl was practicaly shunned by coaches when he was an assistant at Iowa over the recruiting shenaningans of Illinois and Lou Henson. It's very widely known. I'm surprised you haven't heard it.

Fulmer and Spurrier do get along well. I don't know too many coaches who don't get along well with Spurrier. The state of Alabama hates him for obvious reasons. People in Fla do too, again, for obvious reasons.

 

The Illini faithful hate him and will never forgive him. I guarantee that Illinois fans had a little party when the Vols lost to the Tarheels in the NCAA Tourney.

I'm sure Vols fans will be calling for Fulmer's head after the Bama loss.

 

There are divisions.

First, you have the folks who say Fulmer's a man who's a strong recruiter, a man who has won 150 of his 200 games, and who has two SEC titles and a National Title. He has played for one more national title and was one game away from playing for a third. He has owned our archrival, Alabama. He won two divisonal titles in four years. He dominated some of the great coaches in the league. 7-2 in bowls through 2001.

That said, others point to the fact that no coach has gone longer without a conference title at Tennessee. He is 30-20 in his last fifty games. He is .500 in his last thirty conference games. This decade, he has only defeated one top ten team at home. Since 2002, only two bowl wins. Back to back losses to Bama. Last time a coach did that, he was fired.

The most vocal contingent is the latter. The season must play out. If the Vols look good the rest of the way and the donors stay on board, Fulmer is likely safe provided there's a scapegoat (Dave Clawson). One more loss means the best you can do is .500. I just don't think Fulmer, who is Mr. Tennessee football, can overcome that.

The problem is, who do you get? Mike Hamilton likes the midmajor guys who have promise, but there are drawbacks there. That would be a step back. Either we get a top-notch guy or I say we stay the course. Remember that Nebraska has never been the same since making a change. Neither has Colorado. Bama kissed quite a few frogs. Georgia floundered after a change. Notre Dame has fallen off the map. Oklahoma was a joke between Switzer and Stoops. So changes can backfire in a big way. It's either handled right or you take major steps backwards.

 

Must have been a lonely party. :thumbs: We haven't lost to NC since 2000 in the tourney and that was when Jerry (K-Mart) Green was coach.

Amazing, isn't it? UT has a football coach and a basketball coach that have developed reputations for being willing to blow the whistle on improprieties.

 

Who did Tennessee lose to in the NCAA last March? Thought it was UNC.

 

Louisville, who in turn lost to UNC. UT did lose to NC in 2000 in the Sweet 16.

Huge bromide that has made the rounds round Knoxville since 1992. Majors actually went on a local TV station with so-called proof that this happened. It was the phone records from Fulmer's house and office that showed conversations with a UT booster. The booster was a loan officer who was doing the financing for Fulmer's house, and the half a dozen phone calls totaled no more than 15 minutes, with one or two being one minute phone calls. When Fulmer asked how Johnny got his private phone records, Majors decided to drop it (must have been one of Johnny's rare sober moments) and that was that, save for the Phil haters and Bama fans who regularly throw this junk around.

I find this a curious argument. Isn't picking your staff and recruiting part of coaching?

Well, hard to say. UT had great success with Cut there, but there was some success without him. Cut didn't coach in the National championship game, and without him, UT won or shared, what, three or four more SEC titles? True that they haven't won one without him. Remember that Cutcliffe was villified by the local fan base and the cries of "Good Riddance" were heard all round when he left for both Ole Miss and Duke. Of course, these same people wanted him back to save us from Randy Sanders and now to save us from Fulmer himself. We have a very spoiled fan base at times.

Fulmer has a beter record. Spurrier and Fulmer both have a NC, but Spurrier's came pre-BCS. Post BCS, the Gators would not have even been playing for one. And Spurrier never went undefeated in a season. That said, Spurrier has plenty of positives. I have known Danny Wuerffuel (never spell his name right) for a while and his insight into Spurrier is insightful. He is credited with a lot of genius-ness that may not be rightfullly Spurrier's, and I'll leave it at that.

He has a couple of things going for him. 1) He's not a drunken mad-man that is infuriating the fan base and donor base. 2) He is assembling a top 5 recruiting class. That said, you cannot lose to Bama in back to back years while compiling (at best) a .500 record. IMHO, and in conversations I am having with other donors who are far more priviliged than I in terms of access and so forth, I believe Hamilton has made a decision to make a decision. Expect an announcement to come soon. There's a very simple reason: Hamilton is an accountant by trade. He looks at the numbers. When you only have 90-95,000 fans show up for a game, something has to give. You may see only 80,000 this Sat for Wyoming, even though it's homecoming.

This is re: Spurrier's Heisman trophy. He did give one to UF but had the Heisman people make him one that he keeps with him. That is now the norm.