SB Nation User Blog: Joel

ESPN and Bruce Feldman on the "commitment" of Evan Berry.

Joel — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 18:21:28 -0000

ESPN and Bruce Feldman on the "commitment" of Evan Berry.

Around the SB Nation: how to buy a numbered college football jersey

Joel — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 13:13:23 -0000

The day's best links from around the SB Nation network:

Before you buy a numbered-jersey, be sure to check out Bucky's 5th Quarter's helpful guidance on how to make sure you're not stuck with a loser. I'm certain that a Tennessee No. 14 is safe, but does anyone care to do a FanPost applying these rules to Tennessee to see what we're safe buying this season?
Hammer and Rails previews Purdue's game against Notre Dame and concludes that it's a "good chance for us to make a little noise."
Gobbler Country has the ACC storylines that are not getting enough play this preseason.
Blogger So Dear interviews Wake Forest guard L.D. Williams.
We Will Always Have Tempe previews Ohio State's game against Wisconsin.

Talking Points: Jim Bob Cooter arrested for aggravated, nekkid burglary

Joel — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 11:19:20 -0000

Tennessee football

Good night, Jim Bob. Former backup quarterback Jim Bob Cooter was recently arrested and charged with aggravated burglary (wrongful entry of a "habitation" with the intent to commit a felony, theft, or assault) after entering through some poor girl's window, stripping to his skivvies, and climbing into her bed. Moving on.
Got money? Want tickets? Support women's studies. Tennessee has instituted a new donation policy that requires any donors wanting football tickets to contribute to the new Tennessee Fund, which the athletic department will oversee. You can give a gift to academics, but you can't designate that gift for any particular academic programs. You can give a gift to a specific academic program, but then you won't be eligible for season tickets. So gone are the days of graduates of the medical, law, or engineering schools being rewarded with season tickets for supporting the schools from which they graduated.
Strength and quickness. GVX has a feature on Tennessee's new strength and conditioning coach Aaron Ausmus, who became a full-time assistant at USC in 2002 and Ole Miss's head strength coach in 2005.

Tennessee basketball

It's Maccabiah Game time for Bruce and Steven Pearl again.

SEC

Whew. Xavier Henry is indeed going to Kansas and not to help Kentucky with its perimeter shooting. Pop multiple choice quiz! A Sea of Blue says (1) Crap; (2) Jerk!; (3) we never wanted him anyway; or (4) I am pleased that the young man has kept his word.
Ooh, ooh, ooh! Are Georgia and Michigan headed for a home-and-home in 2010 and 2011? No. And no.
Patience, imposed. Steve Spurrier will likely give South Carolina QB Stephen Garcia more leeway this season, not because he's developed patience or anything, but because he really has no other options.
Roll Bama Roll provides a brief history of Nick Saban's 3-4 defense.

NCAA

Ooh, pretty! Clay Travis on college athletes and Facebook, including a sneaky tip on how to get them to add you as a friend.

Later today

The RTT create your own UT uniform contest
Around the SB Nation

The University of Tennessee is changing its rules on donations that result in the donor being...

Joel — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 18:57:26 -0000

The University of Tennessee is changing its rules on donations that result in the donor being eligible for athletic tickets, and it could shake up the way people donate to UT.

Donations made to specific academic departments will no longer make the donor eligible to purchase season tickets; all donations for tickets will have to go into a fund under athletic department control.

WBIR.com | Knoxville, TN | UT changes ticket policy for donors
Hmm. Anyone care to venture a guess at the impact of this change? (HT: raynoch46)

Around the SB Nation: did Army really play in camos?

Joel — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 11:31:45 -0000

The day's best links from around the SB Nation network:

Tomahawk Nation continues its dissection of the NCAA Committee on Infractions' reply to Florida State's appeal.
The Daily Gopher calls head coach Tim Brewster's management of academics and off the field issues a "moderate success."
How did I miss the fact that Army played in camo unis? Or am I being duped?
Maize N Brew takes a look at Michigan's recruiting of defensive tackles and includes that picture of Alan Branch that never gets old. Unless you're a Penn State fan.

Talking Points: Eighth grader Evan Berry speaks, world goes crazy

Joel — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 11:07:41 -0000

Tennessee football

On interpreting the comments of eighth graders. That whole Evan Berry committing to Tennessee thing? Over-eager reporter. The reporter saw him at a track meet, found out that he was Eric Berry's brother, and asked him about Tennessee. Evan answered "a follow up question" by saying he was "committed" to Tennessee. (Evan and Elliott, by the way, are rising eighth graders, not ninth, as was originally reported.) My eighth grader is "committed" to her pony and computer games, just for context.

Still, he's a Berry, and on the premise that a Berry doesn't fall far from the bush, not everyone thinks offering a kid way early based solely on genetics is a bad idea.
Lane Kiffin: he may now be moving mountains, but skinning smoke wagons? No:

HT: Orson.

Tennessee basketball

Lawyers take a long time. Bruce Pearl finally formalizes the contract extension that arose out of John Calipari's move from Memphis to Kentucky. It's a six-year deal that will pay him $1.9M this season and makes him the third-highest paid coach in the SEC.
[. . .]: C.J. Watson reacts to the news that Golden State signed Stephen Curry, possibly to replace Watson, the same way he reacts to everything else: . . .

SEC

A mixed bag, and we get the dried prunes. Team Speed Kills enters the discussion on whether QB play in the SEC has gotten worse over the past several years. With regard to Tennessee, they conclude "much worse."
Uh-oh. So John Calipari leaves Memphis to go to Kentucky, and Xavier Howard is released from his letter of intent to Memphis. He verbally commits to Kansas but is now seriously considering signing with Kentucky, who desperately needs an outside shooter to make its DDM offense work.
Please not these guys. And the Valley Shook identifies five players LSU can't afford to lose this year. Who are ours?

NCAA

Hey, yeah. Why aren't we seeing more end zone camera shots these days?

Rocky Top Tennessee 2009: what's in that 128-page thing?

Joel — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 16:28:56 -0000

via www.maplestreetpress.com

View full size photo uploaded June 30, 2009

Ah, at long last we can publish the table of contents for Rocky Top Tennessee 2009. You can pre-order right now and get the thing a couple of weeks before it hits the newsstands on July 21.

Life In The Fast Lane: 2009 Volunteers Position Profiles
by Joel Hollingsworth

Cue The Quickening
by Wes Rucker

Eric Crunch Berry
by David Hooper

Five Impact Freshmen And The Class Of 2009
by Josh Ward

The Agony & The Agony
by Holly Anderson

Self-Inflicted Wounds
by Joel Hollingsworth

Know Your Enemy: A Look At Tennessee's 2009 Opponents
by Holly Anderson

And Now A Word From Your Enemy: The Florida Gators
by Spencer Hall

And Now A Word From Your Enemy: Alabama Crimson Tide
by Todd Jones

And Now A Word From Your Enemy: Georgia Bulldogs
by Doug Gillett

Assembling a Coaching Staff
by Drew Edwards

Introducing The New Coaches
by Brad Shepard

Brand New Schemes
by Chris Brown and Matt Hinton

Countering The Culture
by John Pennington

Southern Cal Comes To Knoxville
by Bruce Feldmen

Recruiting For A National Championship
by Joel Hollingsworth

Reversing Apathy
by Will Shelton

Relative Pain
by Brian Cook

"Football Is Not Fun If You Lose. Period."
by Clay Travis

Still Sparkling At 90
by Matt Fisher

Farewell To The Man In The Arena
by Joel Hollingsworth

Phillip Fulmer's Legacy
by Will Shelton

Bios for each of the contributors is here. You should be able to divine the topic for most of those articles from the titles, but for the articles that are more ambiguously-named, there is clarification after the jump.

Rucker's Cue the Quickening is an article comparing 2008-2009 Jonathan Crompton to 2005-2006 Erik Ainge.
Holly's The Agony and The Agony is the 2008 season review as only Holly can do it.
My Self-Inflicted Wounds is an analysis of the handful of plays that defined the 2008 season.
Chris Brown and Matt Hinton team up to provide some much-needed detail on Lane's offense and Monte's Tampa-2 defense.
John Pennington's Countering the Culture is a look at how the Tennessee football program has gotten to where it is right now and what Lane Kiffin needs to do to reverse the trend.
My Recruiting for a National Championship is me not learning not to play with numbers and making the case that recruiting is necessary, but not sufficient, to compete for national championships.
Will's Reversing Apathy is an article on the fan's role in the turn around.
MGoBrian's Relative Pain is a comparison of Michigan's first year under Rich Rodriguez last season to the way the table's set for Tennessee for its first year under a new head coach.
Clay's "Football is not fun if you lose. Period." is an interview with Josh McNeil.
Matt's Still Sparkling at 90 is a piece on the history of Neyland Stadium and its new face lift, with lots o pretty pics.
The last two articles from me and Will are in tribute to Fulmer.

In all, there's a lot of really good stuff in there that you won't want to miss. Pre-order now or find it on the shelves beginning on July 21.

Around the SB Nation: back when the SEC was an underdog to the Big 10 edition

Joel — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:41:09 -0000

The day's best links from around the network:

Team Speed Kills and the Rivalry, Esq. wrap up their series on the Top 10 SEC-Big 10 Games of the Last Decade with a great recap of the 2007 National Championship Game between the Florida Gators and the can't-miss Ohio State Buckeyes.
The Crimson Quarry on Indiana mending fences with Bobby Knight.
Roll Bama Roll has Rutgers on its list of Top 10 Road Trips. Why? Proximity to NYC.
Maize N Brew on Michigan's cornerbacks.
The Only Colors' take on Lake the Posts' Big 10 Bloggers' Preseason Awards.
Please welcome Backing the Pack, SB Nation's new N.C. State blog.

Talking Points: Some Tennessee fans prefer losing in white jerseys over winning in black

Joel — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:11:59 -0000

Tennessee football

None more black. It's becoming increasingly apparent that black jerseys are somewhere in our immediate future, especially now that Al Wilson says it's okay. But 7 of 22 fans are opposed to black even if it guaranteed 10 wins? What, exactly, are they fans of? By the way, Wilson walks the fine line perfectly between appreciation of coaches Fulmer and Chavis and the embracing of the new regime. Gotta love that guy.
Tennessee adds nearly thirteen feet to its offensive line. Offensive linemen Zach Fulton (6'5", 305 pounds) and Marques Pair (6'6", 255-pounds) committed to Tennessee yesterday. Now if only they had someone to pass block for.
Bruuuuuuuce! Missed this last week, but In the Bleachers has a podcast interview of Bruce Feldman, who apparently talks a bit of Tennessee during the thing.

Tennessee basketball

Oh, for more eligibility. Former Tennessee basketball guard JaJuan Smith hit a game-winning three-pointer from the corner with 2.6 seconds remaining to get his News Sentinel team the win over First Tennessee in the Pilot Rocky Top League last night.

SEC

ESPN's got a great behind-the-scenes look at the filming of The Blind Side. Many of the scenes were ad-libbed by the coaches rather than scripted. For instance, the coaches were told in one scene to simply give their standard recruiting pitch within a certain time frame, and Ed Orgeron "came out of his seat and forearmed the couch." Exaggeration, perhaps, but you never know with the O. The thing even gave Tommy Tuberville the opportunity for one last shot at Nick Saban: "It was a good time. They weren't asking us to play a bad guy or anything. Of course, I'm sure Nick had a hard time doing that."
A Sea of Blue has more on Calipari's dribble drive motion offense as a recruiting tool.
Dawg Sports's taunting in the SEC provides clues on how to get under the Georgia fan's foldy hide.
CFN's preview of LSU is out.

NCAA/Other

This is what success looks like.
Big 10 Bloggers' Preseason Awards, from Lake the Posts.
Over the Pylon's got some more numbers and more dollars.

Poll

Black jerseys, yay or nay?

Talking points: Alabama and Auburn decline to take the breathalyzer

Joel — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 11:06:15 -0000

Five straight days at the state horse show in the sweltering Shelbyville heat, and I'm ludicrously behind. More on the horses below, but first the news:

Tennessee football

An answer to The Question. Finally. Sort of. How does Tennessee stack up with the other schools in the SEC with regard to secondary violations? FIRST! Kinda:
UT, however, leads most SEC schools in football-related secondary violations since Lane Kiffin was hired as coach on Dec. 1, 2008, according to information obtained through Freedom of Information requests by the News Sentinel. Tennessee has had six. Ole Miss is next with five. Alabama and Auburn did not respond to the FOI requests and Vanderbilt, as a private school, is not subject to FOI requests.
So Alabama and Auburn refused to incriminate themselves. Okay, then. Mike Griffith gives the behind the scenes on the running down of the info.
Program on the rebound desperately seeks QB for long-term commitment. No threesomes. Andrew Hendrix -- Tennessee's apparent ~~Plan C~~ Plan B -- committed to Notre Dame last Thursday. ~~Plan B~~ Plan A Jesse Scroggins was wooed by Southern Cal and offered a scholarship last week as the winner of an eight-man competition for said scholarship. So with all those fragile eggs in the possession of Mr. Scroggins, we're gonna do everything we can to get him, right? I mean, all he wants is a scholarship for his cousin. Not gonna happen says Lane Kiffin, even if Bruce Pearl says he's learned his lesson. So we sit and wait and think happy thoughts about those eggs.

GVX's coach of the week: David Reaves, who is energetic and likeable. Well.

Jonathan Crompton is happy with summer workouts, especially the fact that the offensive linemen are participating.

Don't sleep on UCLA. Did you know that the Bruins were 116th in rushing offense, 111th in total offense, and 109th in scoring and passing efficiency last year? Sounds a lot like the Clawfense, huh? Except that the guy piloting their offense is Norm Chow, and Chow's 33 seasons of experience in college, three national championships, and three Heisman Trophy winners earns him more than one year to install his scheme. Hmm.

Head over to Gate 21 to marvel at the new digs, which are sure to rival Neyland Stadium's own face lift. The Jumbo Tron is on its way.

Tennessee basketball

Isaiah Victor will be playing in the Pilot Rocky Top League this week. His first professional gig featured three weeks of sleeping in sweatsuits with every blanket he could find in romantic France.

SEC

Team Speed Kills takes a look at South Carolina and is perplexed by Steve Spurrier's inability so far to procure, retain, or train a solid contributor at quarterback. Garnet and Black Attack, though, thinks Stephen Garcia will be just fine this year and puts the QB question as a mere No. 3 on its list of keys to a successful 2009. Kyle at Dawg Sports lumps South Carolina in with Ole Miss and Kansas as three teams he's not buying in 2009.

Other

Tomahawk Nation on why Florida State should drop its appeal.
The Rivalry, Esq. continues its 80 reasons to love the Big Ten with numbers 72-70: Penn State's white-outs, midwest farmer's daughters, and hot chocolate.

The horse show

Me and mine were four of a group of 28 who just spent the last five straight days at the state horse show in Shelbyville. For those of you who don't know, Shelbyville is the home of the Tennessee Walking Horse, which is cool. What is not so cool is Shelbyville's complete and utter lack of any satisfactory accommodations.

They have a Best Western, which in hindsight might have been the best choice. But no, we stayed at a hotel that shall remain nameless, not because anyone not familiar with Shelbyville would recognize the name, but because I don't care to admit I just gave them $400. If they gave ribbons to hotels, this one would get a "participation ribbon."

Fortunately, my wife had been tipped off beforehand, and so she went to the dollar store and bought some sheets, pillows, and pillow cases, and the first thing we did was strip off the bed and cover up the unsightlies on the mattresses. We then super glued the do not disturb sign to the outside of the door for the duration of the stay out of a concern that the housekeeping folks would make off with our premium dollar sheets.

That made getting clean towels a bit tricky especially in light of the fact that the bathroom was roughly the size of a port-a-potty and was missing a towel rack. Wait, that's not exactly right. It had a towel rack, but it was in three pieces on the back of the toilet.

I don't know. Something about building a town around giant, skittish animals who poop when and where ever they please must mess with your hygienic expectations or something.

Actually, though, we had a great time despite waking up at ungodly hours every day and baking ourselves in the Middle Tennessee sun at every opportunity. Except for the time we spent "backstage," which was shielded from the sun but was much like being inside a gerbil cage. Oh, and 13-year-old Freaktoe placed third in some jumping class (green oversaddle hunting dressage equitack?) and sixth in trail. Kudos to her and her little pony who looks like Billy Idol back in the day.