It's hard to get a read when watching the press conferences from Gene Chizik. Is it ok to think he's awesome yet? Questions remain. What's up with losing football games? I mean, it's your first season. You sir, are no Terry Bowden. You'll have to settle with striving to be a Jordan, Dye, or Tuberville. Anyways, there are a few things that we do know...

He has a thing for near palindrome sentences;

Do what we do.

Plan your work, work your plan.

Day by day (when speaking on injuries – all injuries)

I want to see Chizik and Trooper Taylor to do an Abbot and Costello routine with some of their slogans.

Why yes. I do have a folder on my desktop called “Chizik_Yelling”. What about it?*

He speaks in circular enigmas and his emotions are few. Instead of having a range of emotions he has two; "on" and "off". Gene Chizik is like a Japanese cartoon. His mouth is huge when open, and nearly nonexistent when closed. Try to find a picture of Gene Chizik smiling with his teeth visible. Such a picture does not exist. Not only did Auburn lose to Kentucky, but Alabama also happens to be the #1 team in the country. And when I turn to al.com or collegefootballnews.com for football news, I'm faced with an abundance of Ford truck ads starring an oiled, bronzed and buttered Nick Saban. These ads disgust me so much that I'm tempted to make a foreign vehicle my next purchase. Unfortunately, that makes me a prime candidate for a Tuscaloosa made vehicle. Even though Auburn still doing better than most expected at the beginning of the season, the highs of 5-0 made the last two losses more depressing than they should be.

The following quote comes from a December 2004 edition of ESPN The Magazine. It's about Jason Campbell and how he dealt with good and bad times at Auburn;

Campbell isn't afraid to flip through the sports section. What can they say about him that hasn't been said already? Still, while he is quick to greet well-wishers, his polite smile comes with a swig of skepticism. "People are going to be people," he says. "Right now we're winning, we're having great success. You speak to everyone and they'll say, 'We're behind you 100%.'" Campbell pauses. "What they don't say is, 'until something goes bad.'"

I hate that Campbell's statement is so true. I've jumped on and off the Chris Todd bandwagon multiple times between snaps. It seems like Gene Chizik has dealt with the same stuff. Fans, myself especially, have not been quick to get behind him... that is, until things started to go well. So, now that Auburn is losing, it's comforting to see that fans are not turning on him. I think we've just witnessed the first Auburn losses in six years that haven't resulted in people demanding benchings or firings.

So, forget Arkansas and Kentucky. Let's go back to happier times, like that time Auburn beat Tennessee. Here's the image which gave this website the most traffic it's seen in about a year... in which Eric Berry killed the joe, yet failed to make some 'mo.

WHOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

This image is really the perfect Rocky moment. While Eric Berry spent time making music videos and doing promotional events, Tate was probably punching stuff in a meat locker. Some say that Tate lowered his shoulder and took out Berry. It doesn't look like that to me. The beautiful part about this run is that Tate doesn't even lower his shoulder here. He's just running hard. Actually, he was already slightly slowed from dodging another tackle an instant before Berry hit him... yet Berry still bounces right off. The physics classes I took at Auburn have failed me, because I can't view the above video and comprehend how Tate didn't fall over, or have his right ankle shatter into pieces.

The most disturbing thing about this video is the production quality. If it was done with a sense of humor by some students working in the athletic department - that could've been cool... but that's obviously not the case. People were flown in to work on something as stupid and well produced as this. Also, a note to little girls: If you work hard in the classroom and in your dance classes, maybe you too can one day go to a major university and be used as a dancer for a promotional rap video. It's every little girl's dream.

Fun Ben Tate fact of the day:
According to auburn.edu, Ben Tate's full name is:

Benjamin Franklin Tate.





That's cool. I have no further comment either.

I thought the media was unfair to Lane Kiffin after he predicted a Tennessee win over Florida during his first press conference.

Pat Dye did the same thing in his introductory press conference as Auburn's head coach. When asked how long it would take Alabama, he said “60 minutes”. Dye ended up being wrong. It took Dye 120 minutes of a running play clock to finally beat Alabama.

Unlike Kiffin's comment, Dye's was actually clever. Still, the ribbing portion of both comments were equal and were in no way uncalled for. However, everything else Lane Kiffin has done since that point has been ridiculous and as impossible to defend.

5-0 was enough to get fans excited. Hopefully the two losses are enough to keep athletic directors away from Malzahn and Taylor. If I were Chizik, I'd spread as many horrible rumors as possible about Gus Malzahn and Trooper Taylor as possible. I'd mail every head coach and athletic director in the country photoshopped pictures of those two guys setting orphanages on fire.

Shortly after Trooper Taylor was hired, one of the first things I noticed was the way he dressed. Backward hats, an abundance of gold jewelry, leather jackets, bowling shirts... it was all pretty cool. But wait a minute. If Gus Malzahn or Gene Chizik wore these things, I would think of it as a cause for concern. These points were brought up ad nauseum on Finebaum's radio show a few weeks ago. Uh oh. Did that make me racist? According to Finebaum, it did. I disagree.


TGIFDWWD: Hangin' with Mr. Trooper

Consider the greatest coordinator in all the world – a guy who is a combined 8-0 against national championship winners Urban Meyer, Nick Saban, Steve Spurrier and Phil Fulmer. Here's a guy that wears goofy Hawaiian shirts at every opportunity. Those shirts, like Trooper's attire, were awesome. Gene Chizik, Tommy Tuberville, Gus Mazahn, Paul Finebaum... none of those guys could wear a Hawaiin shirt without looking ridiculous. The same goes for the stuff Taylor wears.

Why is that? It's not a race thing. It's about being a short, stocky bald guy.... it's these qualities which somehow allows Taylor and Borges to wear what they do. Taller, thinner guys cannot pull it off. Speaking of Al Borges, here's another instance of why the standard rules of etiquette do not apply to him. From San Diego Newspapers;

“Those plays are feast or famine,” Borges said, feasting on a bag of French onion chips during a postgame interview. (link)

And from a column a few weeks ago....

Al Borges clutched a half-eaten sandwich as he spit out the words describing San Diego State's performance in a 26-14 loss to Air Force at Falcon Stadium on Saturday. (link)

The way the beat writer ended that last his piece shows that he understands.

There will be other days, however. With Al Borges around, they ought to be entertaining.

So the rules are different for Al and Trooper. That's the way it is. It's been fun watching the first half of the season. The remaining games ought to be filled with terror, joy and entertainment. War Eagle!




E-mail Mark at mark@theauburner.com


* My “Chris Todd looks funny when throwing the ball” folder is far creepier.