SEC Media Days: Our Quick Coaches’ Press Conference Awards
Now the SEC Media Days are in the book, we’re giving 14 awards to our head coaches’ press conferences.
Our award for “Most God-Like” is easy, though. It’s to Commissioner Mike Slive, because he’s God, Ali and The President and you aren’t.
So without further ado:
STRANGEST PRESS CONFERENCE: Les Miles (LSU) – I mean, who in the hell goes on vacation in Austin, talks about the weather a lot, then declines to mention anything about the strangest thing that happened to him in all of 2013 – the fact that he let his team vote on whether to keep a running back who punched somebody, instead of simply booting him? Or was this just Les being Les?
MOST MALCOLM GLADWELL-LIKE PRESS CONFERENCE: Nick Saban (Alabama) – Seriously, I felt more intelligent after Nick Saban’s speech. People talk about the best CEOs being the guy able to simplify. And Saban did that.
MOST BILLY GRAHAM-LIKE PRESS CONFERENCE: Hugh Freeze (Ole Miss) – He mentioned ‘blessed’ a lot, and even threw a ‘God’ in there..
MOST INSPIRING PRESS CONFERENCE: Mark Richt (Georgia) – Because he talked about why Georgia doesn’t screw around with suspending players and I immediately wanted to beg Commissioner Slive to make that LAW in the SEC.
MOST HONEST PRESS CONFERENCE: Will Muschamp (Florida) – I wish he’d said: “Yeah, I’m on the hot seat. So **** you.”
MOST DESPERATE PRESS CONFERENCE: Mark Stoops (Kentucky) – He sounded like he was ALREADY pleading with bowl organisers to let his sub-500 Kentucky team into one. We were slightly surprised when he didn’t start saying: “Hey! Each bowl game appearance comes with the Kentucky Wildcats basketball team playing a game in your city!”
MOST SUCKS-TO-BE-YOU PRESS CONFERENCE: Dan Mullen (Mississippi State) – Made sure he talked about how damned big his stadium was, and how it would be the biggest in Mississippi. Sounded li Am surprised he didn’t go overboard and mention the overtime victory against Ole Miss over and over and over and over and over again.
MOST TWITTER ‘FIRESTORM’ PRESS CONFERENCE: Butch Jones (Tennessee) – A lot of people were kinda pissed that Butch Jones said that Tennessee was the ‘Original’ ‘Wide Receiver U’. He’s probably right, but not recently. Here’s an interesting article on it.
MOST ‘MAKE NICE’ PRESS CONFERENCE: Bret Bielema (Arkansas) – Because he and Gus Malzahn really love each other, apparently.
MOST ‘MY QUARTERBACK’S IN THE CRAPPER’ PRESS CONFERENCE: Gus Malzahn (Auburn) – Because Nick Marshall is in the crapper. You think Gus Malzahn gives a **** that it was a citation for weed? We don’t!
MOST ‘WOULD YOU SHUT UP ABOUT MY LAST QUARTERBACK?’ PRESS CONFERENCE: Kevin Sumlin (Texas A&M) – Because no-one could shut the hell up about Johnny Manziel.
LOOKING AWESOME WHEN DOING THE PRESS CONFERENCE: Derek Mason (Vanderbilt) – Because Coach Mason – complete in his bow tie – looked THE BOMB while doing his press conference in Hoover.
SPEED OVER SLOW PRESS CONFERENCE: Gary Pinkel (Missouri) – Because Gary Pinkel doesn’t believe Bret Bielema’s lines about fast-paced offenses affecting player safety, and wants his offense to be faster than yours.
AND FINALLY….
MOST SPURRIER-LIKE PRESS CONFERENCE: Steve Spurrier (South Carolina) – Obviously.
OH, AND ONE MORE THING….
Jesse Palmer, South Carolina ‘arrived’ a few years ago. Not in 2014 [addition of words like ‘you tool’ are optional here].