Don't take things said to boosters So Seriously

Gator Bill · May 20, 2013

Have to agree with Tony Barnhart

Spring practice is over. Early recruiting has begun.

And, Lord help us, the booster club rubber chicken circuit is in full swing.

In college basketball, March is when the madness begins. In college football, May is when way too many people involved in this sport lose their freakin' minds.

Here is what I mean. College football is enjoying an explosion of growth and popularity. It is easily the No. 2 sport in the United States behind the NFL. In 2014 it will launch a four-team playoff that is going to be huge. The SEC is launching its own network, following the lead of the Big Ten, because fans just can't get enough information about college football.

I'm telling you folks. I started covering college football in the 1970s and followed it before then. There can be no argument about what time best represents the golden age of college football. We are living smack dab in the middle of it.

So inquiring minds want to know: With all of this neat stuff going on in a game we all love, why last week were we obsessed with what one coach said about another coach in a booster club meeting?

In case you missed it -- and you couldn't even if you wanted to -- Florida offensive line coach Tim Davis was trying to have some fun at his old boss's expense when he met with a bunch of Gators in Melbourne, Fla. Davis contrasted Nick Saban's style with his current boss, Will Muschamp, another former assistant to the Alabama coach. He called Saban "the devil himself."

My first reaction was that it was a backhanded compliment recognizing, quite begrudgingly, that Saban is the very best at what he does. I thought it was acknowledgment -- a bit sloppy perhaps -- of where Saban has set the bar and that everybody in college football is chasing him.

That view apparently was not shared by the public at large, as people started calling Davis everything but a Child of God. The only guy who had a worse week than Tim Davis was the head of the IRS -- whoever he is.

ESPN's Mark May -- a guy I like and respect a lot -- was incensed, calling Davis a "classless, backstabbing coward" because Saban kept Davis employed for three seasons and seemed less than grateful.

I would venture to say that before his comments, 90 percent of college football fans didn't know the identity of the offensive line coach at Florida. Now they do. Sometimes fame is not necessarily a good thing.

Saban said Davis's words were "terribly disappointing." And somehow I just don't think it's smart to have Nick Saban terribly disappointed in you -- even if you don't work for him. The best line of the week was SI.com's Holly Anderson who said when Nick Saban uses the word "disappointing" it is like Darth Vader saying "I find your lack of faith disturbing."

But to all of this I have a question and a couple of recommendations. First the question:

Did I miss the memo that said we're going to start taking seriously all the things that are said by coaches at booster clubs?

Come on! Back in the day when Steve Spurrier stood up before a Florida booster group and said that FSU stood for "Free Shoes University" everybody laughed, including Bobby Bowden.

Because the reality is this: Coaches speaking to booster clubs are like politicians giving their weekly stump speech to their base. They have to give their constituency some red meat. It's expected. And taking shots at a rival is standard fare.

Now I have no problem with Nick Saban being "disappointed" in Tim Davis. He's the only person who really should take any of this stuff personally because it was, well, personal. The fact is that Saban is the best college football coach of his generation. He can be tough to work for because, like he said to reporters last week: "We're in a tough business. It's very competitive. Sometimes you've got to demand that people do things that maybe they don't want to do, but it's not personal."

I'll tell you this about Saban. I know a lot of guys who have worked for him and to a man they describe him as tough, but fair. And they all said they were much better coaches for having worked for him.

But I'm more concerned about what this controversy -- and the mere fact that it is a controversy -- says about us and the state of the sport.

Has college football gotten so big -- is there so much money and prestige involved -- that the game has totally lost its sense of humor?
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Don't Take Booster Meetings So Seriously

Terry O'Keefe · May 20, 2013

Yeah...there was a time when coaches could go to booster clubs and say all kinds of stuff that never came back to bite them. But that was before the internet and the 24/7 news cycle.

Now as a coach is saying something that an opponent might take offense at, somebody is tweeting it word for word and several others are making cell phone videos so that it's documented and not rumor.

IrishCorey · May 21, 2013

I think another big difference in this is the reaction of the person saying it. Spurrier says things and stands by them. He doesn't back down for the media or anyone else. If he's wrong, he'll admit it but that's not very often. Usually, the best you'll get out of him is a 'well you don't have to like me, kiss my ass.'

and you gotta respect that.

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Don't take things said to boosters So Seriously

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