We are of YAW YAW YAW…always (photoshop by TZilla)
The invasion is upon us.
The Coach O makes his first trip to Ole Miss since he was mercifully dismissed after three years as head coach…a coaching tenure more significant for its barrage of lampooning and lamenting than for any actual football. For Orgeron, I imagine, the game has great personal significance, Im quite sure he is somewhat bitter about the way he was fired and how the current coaching regime is benefitting from what is perceived to be all his blood, sweat, and tears on the recruiting trail in his three years in Oxford. For Ole Miss fans, the sentiment isn’t nearly as vitriol-filled. Most Rebel fans acknowledge the talent that he brought…guys like Dexter McCluster, Greg Hardy, and Jerrell Powe may have never dressed in Red and Blue had it not been for O’s relentless pursuit, but there in lies the rub, with all that talent, Orgeron could never muster more than the occasional SEC win over Vandy and a slew of moral victories. And for that reason alone, he got fired after 3 seasons. But in those three seasons, college football was blessed with some of the most bat-shit insane stories and half truths about Ed Orgeron the person and head football coach at a BCS institution. And in honor of that sort of insanity, let us welcome the man’s return to Oxford with some of his most significant contributions to Ole Miss football, college football, and high comedy.
- The Ole Miss Wild Boys This story has taken on mythical proportions at this point. The basic story is that during Coach O’s first meeting with the team, he took off his shirt and challenged anyone in a room to a fight and then led the team in some sort of primitive chant centered around the theme that they were indeed “Ole Miss Wild Boys”. Chairs and other foreign objects were introduced into the fray at some point. Other additions to the story involve the drinking of mead and the offering of several virgin sacrifices. I believe all versions of this story.
- O introduces himself to Robert Lane Also part of the introduction of Coach O to Ole Miss legend. Story goes that Robert Lane, 5 star blue chip quarterback recruit from Monroe, La, who, it turns out, was a terrible passer of the football and would have been better off being converted to an H-back much sooner than he eventually was, was out throwing the football on the practice field. Orgeron, allegedly, ran up to Lane, tackled him, stripped the ball from Lane’s grasp, and took to tearing down the field with the ball for an apparent defensive touchdown. Again, I totally believe any and all versions of this story.
- Brent Schaeffer is named starter before he shows up on campus The “Next Mike Vick” signed with Ole Miss after transferring from Tennessee (after being beaten out by Erik Ainge…in hindsight, this should have been a red flag for all involved) and spending a year in junior college. Before the ink could even dry, Orgeron named Schaeffer the starting quarterback. Let that sink in…before the guy actually stepped foot in Oxford and threw a pass in practice in front of living, breathing human beings that evaluate football acumen for a living, he was named the starter. Coach O swore up and down that it was done strictly for recruiting purposes, I like to think it was done to shorten my life expectancy.
- The Shiv Not necessarily a direct result of anything O did, but still hilarious nonetheless. There was a rumor posted on various sites of a fight at an Oxford bar between Brent Schaeffer and Seth Adams, a walk-on who ultimately surpassed Schaeffer on the depth chart. The story got so embellished and out of hand that eventually a shiv wielded by the hand of Schaeffer was introduced into the play-by-play. Thus, theretofore, Brent Schaeffer was referred to as “The Shiv” by most cool and tough message board lurkers. PS. I couldn’t find the original thread on this, someone help a brother out. PSS. I totally believe all versions of this story.
- The Hummer Commercial. Tell em about it JoJo
- Moral Victories. Coach O was undefeated in tight games that Ole Miss ultimately lost but were left to feel good about because we almost beat a team that was better than us. UT fans might want to get used to this, it seems to be contagious.
- Intense at grocery stores too. This was a first hand account told to me by a friend of a time he ran in to Coach O. “So its the summer and we are walking in to Kroger and we see Coach O heading out of the store. Excited to see our Coach out around town we say to him as we cross paths, ‘Hey Coach, good luck this year!’ He turns to us, and in thick Cajun-speak screams ‘YEAH! YOU BOYS READY TO KICK SOME ASS!!!’ He then chest bumps all three of us.”
- Kelly Orgeron. Hot. Married to a crazy person.
- Shove it up your ass, kid. Another one of the many salacious rumors that is probably true. Orgeron was at some sort of sporting event for his kids when a young lad came up to Coach O seeking an autograph. Unfortunately for the youngster, all the tike had for the O to sign was a Florida hat. Coach O, always the gracious ambassador for Ole Miss, told the kid, in so many words, to get bent, he wasn’t going to sign any hat with that Florida logo on it. Also, totally believable.
- Meat Market. Bruce Feldman’s homage to recruiting and Ed Orgeron in particular. Feldman followed around the Red Bull fueled one for a recruiting season, picking up almost hard to believe stories of Orgeron’s relentless pursuit of football players for his program, my favorite being the story about him doing blocking drills with Jerrell Powe in a Waynesboro parking lot. Coach O supporters, through all of the losses, slept with this book under their pillow while visions of victories, above and beyond the moral variety, danced in their heads.
- Colonel Reb is Crying. If there was a soundtrack for the Coach O tenure in Oxford, this is what it would be. FOOTBAW!
0 responses so far ↓
1 ChristophG // Nov 13, 2009 at 2:15 pm
You left off the story about him almost fighting one of his neighbors in Grand Oaks. The guy was a dentist and he chastised one of O’s kids for hitting his car with a ball or something. O’s kid tells O and O, well, reacted like Coach O. Yaw yaw yaw.
2 snead's third read // Nov 13, 2009 at 3:12 pm
Coach O brought ‘em in but couldn’t coach ‘em to a victory. Thank God the admistration got rid of him and brought in Coach Giggity. At least with him, the Reb’s can boast of pre-season glory.
3 Bud Kilmer // Nov 13, 2009 at 3:35 pm
Snead’s third read, who are you? I haven’t seen you all season. I know you aren’t Patrick Patterson, Markeith Summers, or Lionel Breaux.
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