Friends of the Program

 The removal of infidels will be swift and permanent

[photoshop courtesy: TZilla]

With the college football season drawing to a close, the every-year-around-this-time tradition of erasing the existence of those who have achieved less than desirable outcomes from the face of various degree granting institutions throughout the country has begun.  Some are justified…Sly Croom beat Greg Byrne to the punch and out and out resigned after his Mississippi State Bulldogs were decimated, and we mean pummelled to near unrecognition without the help of dental records, at the hands of instate rivals Ole Miss (we cannot direct you to this video enough…Peria Jerry is a beast son!), Greg Robinson’s tenure at Syracuse resulted in an overall record of 7-28 and an exit interview that included story time, Tommy Bowden was essentially let go for inflicting rousing disappointment to 80,000 people on at least 3 Saturdays every fall, but for what its worth,  he was always a nice guy while doing it, and Phil Fulmer was fired for letting a once proud program seap into mediocrity and also for helping David Cutcliffe continually find ways to gain employment.

Other firings, namely Tommy Tuberville’s, aren’t so easy to jump on board with. 

While Im sure my writing cohort Mr. Medallion could share with you all of the ways in which Tuberville had worn out his welcome on the Plains.  He’ll point to his failure to retain quality assistants, the inability to win on a grand scale with “gobs of NFL talent”, and how he tinkered with the system too much in the end…an end that involved a stagnant offense, an over-matched team, and an irate fan base.  But he’s too invested to think rationally about this.  I, on the other hand, am fully qualified…why?…because I hate Tommy Tuberville.  Seriously, screw that guy.  I think he’s a two faced opportunist that I would like to call your typical snake-oil salesman but won’t for fear I might insult snake-oil salesmen.  He sold me a bill of goods some 10 years ago after promising that his only method of exit from fair Oxford would be via a pine box and yet left to the more fruitful Plains.  I don’t necessarily blame him, I just think he sucks.  

So that being said, I still think that Auburn did him a disservice.  The guy went 85-40 in ten years at Aubrun and beat the hated Tide 7 out of 10 times.  He went undefeated in 2004 (and like other former undefeated Auburn coaches, wasn’t sleeping with a booster’s daughter at the time) only months removed from an attempted coup at the hands of Bobby Lowder and friends.  OK, ok, we’ll stop trying to rewrite Ivan Miasel’s article, but just know the dude had alligator blood in a conference that is known for knee jerk reactions and impatience.  He deserved better.  But now, for some odd reason, after one sub par year, the Tiger faithful felt it was time for a change. 

But now where do they turn in terms of a hire?  It can’t be a top assistant.  It can’t be a coaching retread.  It can’t be some middle of the road NFLer.  Its got to be a strong to very strong hire…its got to be Saban-strong.  And unfortunately, there arent many of those guys out there this year.  Leach is available and probably willing to talk, but we arent even sure that The Pirate is big enough.  Muschamp, if you can pry him away from the teat of Mack, might be an option.  Butch Davis is out there but just remember to get a refill on his Paxil.  There are up and comers like Peterson, Kelly, and Patterson, but those types of guys aren’t going to make Saban shake in his boots that were no doubt fashioned in the third world country sweat shop that is under his house (that was in his Bama contract we imagine) and made from the hides of former lowly grad assistants.  Its got to be a showstopper….and of course, we’ve got a name (albeit, probably an obvious one)…Petrino.

Seriously, could you imagine the Defcon 5 level of civil unrest in Fayetteville if this somehow happened.  Seriously, they’d have to bomb the entire city like Donald Sutherland wanted to do in Outbreak (Dustin Hoffman as a world renowned disease and bio-terrorism specialist?…mmm alright, Ill buy that) just so the insanity wouldn’t infect those outside the city limits.  There are reports that Petrino’s contract prevents him from taking another SEC West job, but we all know how well Bobby P honors those types of provisions in said documents.  We don’t usually support complete social upheaval, but in Arkansas’s case, we’ll make an exception.

As for Tubs, the world is his oyster.  He’s got $6 mil in buyout money waiting for him.  He can go coach somewhere else immediately (don’t you know Clemson is kicking themselves for hiring Dabo last week) or he could just sit it out for a while.  He could take a year for himself, pick up a hobby, catch up on his correspondence, and just bide his time…because it’ll happen all over again next year.