Dear Santa – Please Stop The Butch Jones To Michigan Talk

Dear Santa – Please stop the Butch Jones to Michigan talk on the radio and Tennessee message boards. That is all I want…well…the BMW, a new fishing boat, a modest 7 figure lottery win, luxury suite at Neyland, another National Championship for Tennessee in Football, and to lose 40 pounds are still on the table. That will do fine.

In recent days I have heard some of the most absurd comments come from fairly intelligent humans. Believe me, in the talk show world “fairly intelligent” is generous. That includes on-air personalities as well as callers, especially in Nashville.

I heard a caller yesterday during the drive home mention that Dave Hart should be fired for allowing Butch to get away to Michigan AND THE ON AIR PERSONALITIES WERE IN AGREEMENT as if it had already happened. Now I am not a Dave Hart guy, but the last thing he needs to be fired for is Butch Jones going to Michigan. Why? Because it hasn’t happened and won’t happen!

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News Flash….Michigan has not offered Butch Jones a job. Stop acting like they have please! Butch Jones is the head football coach at the University of Tennessee. He is under contract for whatever that is worth. Michigan has to find a head football coach. They have a list of names of people they may be interested in. Butch Jones is on that list more than likely. That does not mean much. Look at my Christmas List above to prove a point.

Let’s look at it from a Michigan point of view. They are going to have to pay someone a lot of money to beat Urban Meyer at Ohio State. Now this is no cut at Butch, but do you think it would be an easy sell to the Michigan fan base that they were going to offer 3.5 – 4 million dollars to the head coach of Tennessee that has won a total of 11 games that include only 4 conference wins in 2 seasons? How would that get you fired up as a Michigan fan?

Let’s compare SEC Coaching hires up there in that league. Urban Meyer won a National Championship at Florida, and had multiple 10 win seasons. James Franklin (although I think this was just the perfect storm as well as scheduling Division 2 schools and area high schools) won 9 games twice at Vanderbilt. Those two hirings had some meat on the bones. Winning 5 games in your first year and 6 games your second year at a storied program like Tennessee in the weakest SEC Eastern Division that the SEC has ever seen is hardly grounds to go get a guy and pay him 4 million.

Athletic Directors can not afford to pay for potential, nor should they. Which brings me to Tennessee’s perspective.

Dave Hart will have to renew Coach Jones contract. From what I understand as it stands now with the new hirings and with new contracts on the table for present coaches in the SEC Coach Jones would have the lowest salary other than Derek Mason of Vanderbilt. This is where you as a Tennessee fan get to play Athletic Director Dave Hart. Do you pay the guy top tier SEC Coaching money for the potential he brings and the recruiting he is doing, or do you pay him middle of the road SEC Coaching money since that is in a sense where he has finished this season?

Keep in mind at Tennessee you are still paying Derek Dooley for not coaching your team and your reserves that were once the envy of the SEC now looks more like mine and most of the readers bank accounts. You don’t have much to play with any more. In order to pay more, you have to have more donors and more ticket sales. In order to get those, you have to win more. In order to win more you have to have a top notch coach. In order to have a top notch coach you have to pay more. Funny how that works

Bottom line. Dave needs to lock Butch up. Tennessee needs coaching longevity in its future. We can not afford to start over again. But Dave can’t give Butch the password to the bank account either. There has to be some more evidence. I think Butch would agree.

Now look at it from Butch Jones’ perspective. I am going to be really naive here I guess. I believe Coach Jones when he said Tennessee is a “destination” job. It is a top job in the coaching realm. The facilities are second to none. The fan base is second to none. The administration’s support is there (not second to none level, but still there). Tennessee is going to be a top 20 educational University in the United States, so it is not just football you are selling like in the past. The conference is second to none.

Butch has a defensive line that will look like the Henderson-Haynesworth line coming in with Khalil McKenzie and Shy Tuttle added to the likes of Derek Barnett and Curt Maggitt. He has special teams stars everywhere. He has 2 highly rated quarterbacks coming in. He is about to sign his second top 5 class in back to back years. He is building something special, and he knows it.

Butch has a great relationship with his players and their families. He is believable when he looks them in the eyes and tells them he will take care of their son and make them better players and men. He has been blessed by the football bloodlines that have come before him and have been passed down to their sons by past Tennessee football greats. Those people have a lot of love for Tennessee, and a lot of faith in Coach Jones. He will not want to walk away from this.

Coach Jones is part of the Tennessee family now. He has Peyton Manning coming to see him now. He has Johnny Majors blessing as well as Phillip Fulmer. He wants to be at Tennessee, and I think he wants to be at Tennessee for a long time. Now, maybe Michigan comes up with 4 million more reasons for him to leave, but this writer does not see it.

Suffice it to say this is a waste of time for me to write and you to read probably. But I am sick of listening to all of this talk and speculation as if it has already happened. Let’s all use some common sense! Butch is the Coach at The University of Tennessee. Was yesterday, is today, and will be after Michigan names its’ new head coach.