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Vols – You Can’t Spell Quit Without Spurrier?

By Randy Sharber

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Vol fans have a special love-hate relationship for Steve Spurrier.

Yes, they love to hate him. But make no mistake, most have big time respect for him in some form or fashion. Spurrier is that kind of guy. You either hate him, or you dislike him immensely. This is while he is on the field coaching against you of course.

Spurrier made a career of ticking off Tennessee fans all over the State while he was coaching Florida to six SEC Championships. For many of those years, Florida and Tennessee were the two best teams in the SEC. Whoever won this game was usually assured to win the SEC East. Unfortunately for Vol fans, that usually was won by Spurrier and his Gators.

He instituted his cutting, snide little remarks at the expense of Vol head coach Phil Fulmer. The Vols consistently ended up in the Citrus Bowl back in the day. As Spurrier’s team played in the Sugar Bowl as the SEC champion, the Vols would be in Florida for New Years.

“Well, you can’t spell Citrus without UT” Spurrier would say. And he said it a lot. This statement and his sideline antics made him a top target for Vol fans. The Visor did not care. I find it funny that now enemy number one, Lane Kiffin, also wears a visor.

Well now you can’t spell quit without Spurrier. I know that makes no sense. I just have a problem with him quitting now. At least play out the season. It is only fair to your players.

I wrote an article early in the year as Spurrier baited Vol Coach Butch Jones into some banter at the SEC media days. Spurrier eluded that Tennessee was doing flips over a 7=5 season while the Gamecocks were upset their season ended in the same record.

I wanted Jones to just not even worry with Spurrier. I wrote that I thought Spurrier was “short time” as South Carolina’s coach, and that he had become irrelevant in the SEC, and in College Football. Jones of course had beaten Spurrier in both of his games with the Visor as the Vols head coach. He was underdogs in both games.

Last season’s game with Spurrier and the Gamecocks was a classic game in Tennessee history. The Vols mounted a monumental comeback to defeat Spurrier in Columbia. Losing that game to Tennessee took a lot out of Spurrier. He was getting ready to get another dose, his third in a row, from the Vols in a few weeks.

But we won’t get to see it anymore. He quit in midstream. I do hope that this is not a health related issue. I hope he just came to terms with himself and said enough is enough. Look, he has a bad football team at the moment. He is getting ready to lose to Vanderbilt. That can be enough to send many coaches to retirement.

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But I think the mid season retirement, if it is not for a health issue, is poor form. As a coach you teach your kids to play for sixty minutes. You start something, you finish it. You play all the way through the whistle. Evidently Spurrier doesn’t believe in that. No, he is quitting on his players before the whistle blows.

He assured his players that he has recruited he would see it through. He will not now. Now they are stuck at South Carolina on a team that is unraveling. Not to mention that the South Carolina area has been devastated by flooding recently. This is a bad time for this.

But I guess it is time for the Ball Coach to hang it up. He has been great for the SEC. He is Florida and South Carolina’s winningest coach in history. He is the first Heisman Trophy winner to coach another Heisman Trophy winner. He has won a National Championship. He has coached in the NFL. He has done it all.

So although I find it poor form to quit in mid season, he has earned the right. He is 70. He has all the money you could ever need and a membership to Augusta National. I would quit too. But it would be after the season.

For Vol fans it is like an old cowboy moving where the respected adversary rides off into the sunset. We don’t have a bad taste since we have beaten him like a drum the last few years. So, you let him pass by, and say Peace be with you. But you know he will turn around, thumb his nose, and say remember when you used to go to the Citrus Bowl every year, well that was me. You just laugh it off out of a misguided sense of respect, and let him ride his golf cart away.

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