November 28, 2008 was a cold, rainy day across the south. A mediocre South Carolina team was facing a similarly mediocre Clemson team at Memorial Stadium in the upstate. Connor Shaw and Marcus Lattimore had just finished their junior football seasons in high school, and Jadeveon Clowney was a high school sophomore newly on the recruiting radar of Division 1 schools.

Leading up to the Clemson game the 2008 season had offered a few bright moments for the Gamecocks – a season opening (albeit closer than the score would indicate) 34-0 win over NC State, a surprising road win at Ole Miss, and a thrilling victory at Kentucky in which redshirt freshman Stephen Garcia introduced himself to the college football world.

But there were also the here-we-go-again moments that were hallmarks of a South Carolina football season – playing down to our competition (23-13 over Wofford), near misses (a 14-7 loss to top-ranked UGA, a 24-17 loss to 13th-ranked LSU), and the standard humiliation on national TV (a 56-6 loss to eventual BCS national champion Florida on CBS).

Meanwhile, in the upstate, Clemson was having similar struggles. The Tigers had fired head coach Tommy Bowden midseason and promoted Dabo Swinney to interim head coach. Swinney was not considered a strong candidate to become the head coach at the time of his promotion, but by the time the South Carolina game rolled around there were enough positive signs within the program that he might have a shot at the job permanently. A win over the Gamecocks would definitely help his case.

The game started fine enough for USC, picking up an early turnover and driving into Clemson territory, only to turn the ball over themselves on the first of Chris Smelley’s four interceptions on the day. It was all downhill from there, as the Tigers built a 10-0 lead in the first quarter, and extended it to 24-0 before the Gamecocks scored a touchdown just before the half. Clemson cruised to a 31-14 win. It was an unsurprising game, and it capped off an unsurprising regular season. Of course, we finished off the campaign with an unsurprising 31-10 loss to Iowa in the Outback Bowl and an unsurprising 7-6 final record.

I barely watched the second half of the 2008 Carolina-Clemson game. I just couldn’t take the pain of hearing the Memorial Stadium crowd cheer every first down and big stop, and count down the final seconds of yet another win in this lopsided rivalry. It was a dreary day, a dreary game, and it made for a dreary mood for all Gamecocks.

But that was 2000 days ago. The rivalry doesn’t feel so lopsided anymore, because that was the last day that Clemson football fans counted down to a victory over South Carolina. That was the last day the air smelled fresher, the food tasted better and the wine sweeter because they had beaten their rival.

It’s been 2000 days since South Carolina last lost to Clemson. Almost five and a half years.

2000 days. And counting.

It has been a while since our last movie review, just shy of two years to be precise. And to be fair this isn’t really a movie review, it’s a review of a “pump up” video for the 2014 Gamecock football season. But you’re hooked now, so you might as well keep reading.

In the new #HereSC video (we’ll get to that hashtag in a moment), the thing that immediately jumps out at me, again, is the stodgy old voiceover guy who should be doing yearly recap videos for the Green Bay Packers. He was used in the 2012 “It’s Great to Be a Gamecock” video, and also is the voice of the stadium in the Saturday pre-game video among other appearances.

While I didn’t like his voice in 2012, the choice is even more odd this time around because the video is backed by a junkyard blues soundtrack (h/t @JorgeBrosada) and a script that touts USC as blue-collar underdogs who scratch and claw for everything we get. If that’s who we are, then how about a v/o man with at least a hint of a southern accent? Somebody we can relate to?

Or how about really think outside the box and (gasp) hire a WOMAN to do the voice. Radical, I know.

The script is once again penned, at least in part, by Andy Demetra. It has his fingerprints all over it, trying to hit a home run with every sentence instead of subtly building to a crescendo and having one message-reinforcing home run line.

“We believe that a blue-collar and a garnet heart can take you places you never thought possible.”

A nominee for the most Andy Demetra line ever. That’s saying a lot. And while being blue-collar is probably a source of pride in South Carolina, it’s a little limiting to our fan base, don’t you think?

“If it ain’t swayin’, we ain’t playin’.”

Still?

“Here, when we fall we dust ourselves off and get back up. That hasn’t happened very often.”

It hasn’t? Was the person who wrote this born in 2010?

“Here, we have the Head Ball Coach, and you don’t.”

Y’all know I love the HBC, but who are we talking to? Florida? Are we taunting Florida? Maybe we’re taunting Vandy. Or Kentucky, I don’t know.

“Here, they said it couldn’t be done. But guess what, we’re doing it.”

Finally, at the 1:20 mark, we get a decent line.

All I’m asking is for somebody to write like a human being, not a cliche’-spouting robot.

The clips and images are fine, but two years after the first “It’s Great to Be a Gamecock” video the vignettes and muted colors are getting a little tiresome. It’s time for video editors to learn what most decent photographers and photo editors finally figured out: step away from the “apply filter” button.

Finally, the new hashtag: #HereSC.

At first glance there’s not much wrong with it, but eventually you have to actually SAY it, whether it’s in your head or out loud. Everybody I’ve shown the hashtag to, without prompting, says “wow, sounds a lot like ‘heresy’”.

I don’t know what #HereSC sounding like heresy even means, but it’s not good. As a matter of fact, it’s terrible that the idea even made it into serious discussion.

As a guy who has spent 20+ years as a marketer, I’m probably a little harder on the athletic department’s efforts to promote our programs than most would be. I tend to notice things others might not give a second thought, which is probably a good thing for our marketing department.

Think I’ll soothe my disappointment by taking a #GamecockSelfie.

TRC Unleashed welcomes a special guest to the podcast – USC head volleyball coach Scott Swanson. Coach Swanson walks through what it takes to recruit and become a top flight program in college volleyball. He brings tremendous insight to a program we might not follow closely, but should.

We also discuss:

• The best four-day stretch in USC sports history?
• What the weekend sweep of Clemson means
• The Gamecocks’ upset of Kentucky
• Harris Pastides is the coolest college president ever
• The powerhouse program Dawn Staley appears to be building
• Andy Demetra was once courted by an NBA team

All this plus we answer Twitter questions. It’s a fun but very disjointed show, so hang in there, you’ll be better for it!

Click here, or click the graphic to listen, and enjoy!

You guys think we’re funny? You think we’re here to amuse you? Here to make you laugh? Well not tonight my friends…

Well, ok, maybe a little, but in the latest episode of TRC Unleashed we also tackle the tough issues, like Michael Sam being on a path to become the NFL’s first openly gay player, the Confederate flag on the State House grounds, and global warming.

Of course, we also talk about the Gamecocks – football’s freshly minted recruiting class, the fifth-ranked women’s basketball team, and the super high expectations for the 2014 edition of the USC baseball team.

All that and more, just click here or click the graphic to listen, and enjoy!

Someone has one last Letter of Intent to send you.

Happy National Signing Day y’all!

We don’t have a lot of time to blog these days, and I wish we had more to say about recruiting or the state of our basketball program or give an in-depth baseball preview. Unfortunately life is just really busy these days so it’s hard to find time to blog.

But when we come across pieces like this gem, or what our friend Avery Wilks (@AveryGWilks) alerted us to over on Tigernet this morning, it’s just hard not to write about it. These types of articles basically write our posts for us. (Which we like because we’re kinda lazy.)

The rivalry is as hot as it’s ever been, so it’s natural to want to talk/write about them or for them to want to talk/write about us. People love clicks on their articles, and they long to read the praise in the comments section of their blog (we have first-hand knowledge).

Sometimes this leads to “I’M JUST SAYING WHAT EVERYBODY’S THINKING” posts like “Prophet to Dabo: Don’t respond to ‘crazy uncle’ anymore”. It’s designed to rile up the reader and make him/her feel better about themselves and their beloved university.

But it lacks a lot of sense and a few important facts. Let’s take a look:

“(Talking smack) makes the rivalry relevant, and even though Clemson has owned bragging rights since Moby Dick was a sardine, the Gamecocks have won five in a row and written their own revisionist history and given the rivalry a little kick.”

HAHA THE MOBY DICK THING

The “Pigskin Prophet” doesn’t identify what the revisionist history is that Gamecock fans have written. The last five years are not revisionist history, those are fact.

Any Gamecock fan that claims anything other than a barely mediocre football history prior to Steve Spurrier’s arrival at USC is either delusional or just flat-out lying. I’ll say it – we sucked. We sucked at football for more than 100 years.  Sucked in regular season games. Sucked in the rare bowl games we played in. Sucked as in independent. Sucked in the SEC. For 100 years we were arguably the most underachieving football program in the country.

So, noble Clemson* fan, if you want to claim football superiority from 1892-2008, have at it. There’s really not much we can argue.

But if you want to talk about where both programs are situated on January 23, 2014, we’ll be glad to have that conversation as well.

“…he took the mic away from the guy at the Capital One Bowl and started his own little rant, totally taking away the accomplishment of his team’s win over a good Wisconsin team and throwing it back on himself.”

Here’s the clip, tell me exactly how he takes away from the accomplishment of his team. I know not of a single South Carolina player, coach or fan who was upset at how he handled the post-game. It was quite entertaining actually.

“(This past weekend) Spurrier again looked like a drunk sailor grabbing for a mic at a karaoke bar…”

I didn’t see the video so I’ll take Mr. Prophet’s word for it. In my head it looks something like this:

“…and again showed his obsession with all things Clemson when he talked about the streak.”

Spurrier plays to his crowd just like Dabo plays to his. It’s called a rivalry. (Except for those who still deny it’s a rivalry I guess.)

“…he went on to talk about Clemson’s Sammy Watkins, who to my knowledge has never said anything bad about South Carolina or Spurrier.”

No, Spurrier went on to talk about Bruce Ellington, one of his favorite players, whom he is trying to help get a better draft position. In a sense he was actually complimenting Watkins, a consensus top-10 pick, by saying “hey, my guy had more TD catches than a bonifide superstar, you scouts should pay more attention to him.” I can guarantee you Steve Spurrier has the utmost respect for Sammy Watkins’ football skills. Lighten up, Francis.

“(If I’m Dabo) I take the high road, and show the kind of class other people will never find by going shirtless in public or rolling around on rubber balls in videos.”

CLASS is now defined by keeping your shirt on and not exercising, or at least not being videoed while exercising. Check.

(FYI – South Carolina fans were delighted by the video of Spurrier on the exercise ball. I’m not sure why Clemson fans feel that’s going to get under our skin.)

“Or talking about student athletes from another program. That crossed the line.”

I guess they edited the part of the video where Spurrier called Watkins a no-talent POS. Did I miss that?

“Heck, even the people who cover college football nationally are beginning to wonder what is wrong with that man…”

Got any names to associate with this statement? Kirk Herbstreit? Joe Tessitore? Chris Low? Dennis Dodd?

I got news for you, national writers and broadcasters LOVE Steve Spurrier and love what he brings to the sport. I’d like to see or hear evidence of any respectable journalist who thinks Spurrier has lost his marbles. (Please nobody link anything from Bleacher Report, have some respect for yourself.)

“So, every year they get invited back to the South Carolina Memorial Outback or Champs Bowls…”

What?

“…and they play a team from somewhere in the Midwest and they win and go home and wonder what Clemson is doing in recruiting.”

Clemson played a team from somewhere in the Midwest and went home and wondered what South Carolina is doing in recruiting. Let’ s call it  a draw.

“In short – Spurrier has turned into a South Carolina fan.”

Well hell, I hope so.

“A friend of mine once gave me his login and told me to go to (South Carolina’s) message boards…”

Because message boards are a haven for fair and reasoned discussion.

“…and asked me if I noticed a trend.”

Yes, there was a trend – idiots bantering back and forth over nonsense was trending.

Message boards indeed. Mr. Prophet should be banned from writing for a year for even bringing that up.

“Examples, if you will.”

He gives examples of what he saw on the message board, but no links or proof that he didn’t just make stuff up. Actually, I believe what he wrote, but if you substitute “Clemson” anywhere you see “South Carolina” then you have a Clemson message board. THEY’RE ALL THE SAME.

“See what I mean?”

Good point.

“The Tigers have gone on to steal the bowl spotlight, if you will…”

I’m still trying to figure this one out. It was a great win for them, no doubt, but the only reason they “stole the spotlight” is because they played two days after us. I got news for you, people stopped talking about Jan. 1 bowls on Jan. 2, and stopped talking about Jan. 3 bowls on Jan. 4.

“…and the Ole Ball Coach has to find someway (sic) to keep his fans on his side.”

33 wins in three years will do that. He just talks smack because it’s fun. Probably his second favorite hobby behind golf.

“The rivalry will turn, and if you follow recruiting or were paying attention this season, it’s closer than they want to think.”

Well, at least he admits the rivalry is currently in our favor. And it is close, nobody should deny that either. Clemson has a good football team, we just happen to be a little better. But their fans are not paying attention if they think it’s ever going to return to the way it used to be. Those days are over.

“It’s like I tell my friend – you can’t argue with stupidity.”

Says the guy who just spent 5000 words arguing with alleged stupidity.

“Just sit back and smile – they know how they sound and it frustrates them.”

I do wish I was a better singer, dammit.

“They know that despite the streak, we still laugh at them. And now, their head coach embodies the very reason we laugh at them. We get it. They don’t.”

This is one helluvan inside joke they have going on us given it’s been 1800+ days since they’ve beaten us.

“They know we laugh at them.”

And it makes us so sad.

“Dabo needs to teach Spurrier the same lesson, and let the rest of the country sit back and laugh at the crazy uncle with us.”

The rest of the country is laughing at the guy who has won 33 games in three years and beaten his school’s rival five straight. Meanwhile, the guy with the five-game losing streak to his school’s rival just negotiated an 8-year deal with buyouts of $24 million the first year and $20 million the second year.

Yep, the country is laughing at Steve Spurrier.

“Oh yeah, and just win baby.”

 Sound advice, they should use it.

As if Connor Shaw needed to do anything to further endear himself to Gamecock fans, Andy Wontor (@AndyWonter) of WCBD in Charleston filed this report on Connor Shaw signing autographs at an establishment in Charleston. Not normally big news, except Connor did the most awesome/trollsome thing possible:

We don’t know why a person would want him to sign a Clemson* helmet (there’s no mention in the accompanying video). Maybe it was a Gamecock fan planning on gifting to a Tiger friend, or a Tiger fan who lost a bet, or perhaps a Clemson* fan who has finally come to understand what Gamecock fans have known for some 1500+ days:

This is OUR State.

Note: At the beginning of the podcast Buck says Episode 61, but rest assured it is Episode 62, you are at the right place. Numbers are hard.

TRC Unleashed welcomes 2014 with the first podcast of the year. Buck, Tbone and the Gman break down the Capital One Bowl, and talk about how the rivalry with Clemson* has reached all time highs in smack talk the last few days.

Click here or click the graphic to listen, and enjoy!

Admittedly, none of us at TRC are more than moderately adequate at what we do on this blog – writing, graphics, producing a podcast, etc. – but we do try to give our readers what they want. So, with that in mind, below is a more printable version of the “We Beat You” cartoon, with a  PDF link so you can print if from your very own computer. (I did it and it looked fine, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it will work for you, so good luck.)

If you get a chance to print it out, we’d love to see where you hang it – at home or in the office or maybe even somewhere around Clemson’s* campus – so send us a photo on Twitter at @rubrchickens or send us an email at rubberchickensblog@gmail.com. We’ll re-tweet them all.

Thanks, and again, good luck!

PDF: WeBeatYou Cartoon

At last night’s Orange Bowl, Clemson* escaped Ohio State and claimed the state of South Carolina’s first ever BCS bowl victory (SUCK IT WOFFORD!). After the game Twitter exploded with some amazing hot takes about the Clemson* program, many coming from “professionals” who cover the school every day and are paid to report on said program. Hot takes like this:

Eat it indeed. Others chose to be more verbose, albeit much less clear in exactly what they were trying to communicate:

When a posse of twitterati and I gently asked Mr. Thurn to explain himself, he kept asking us to dispute what he was saying when we didn’t exactly understand what he was saying. So, what Clemson* “has done nationally” will somehow vault them past South Carolina, but only once the streak ends, at a time which he does not identify? I guess he believes the two BCS bowl games (ahem, 70-33) and one ACC conference title have given them a national relevance we cannot match. Our five-game win streak and higher rankings while the Tigers are making bank “nationally” are conveniently not addressed.

But I digress.

To the point – arguments with angry Clemson* fans should be easier than we’re making them out to be, even in a medium of brevity such as Twitter. The game of football is designed to match two teams, play 60 minutes, and at the end determine a winner and loser. Most of the time the winner is considered the better team, but we do encounter upsets on occasion.

But upsets between the same two teams do not happen five times in a row, especially in games determined by double-digits. The team who wins five in a  row by double digits is the better team, no matter the number of BCS games or conference championship (singular) the losing team can claim. The easiest way to win this argument is three words, or a variation of three words:

We beat you.

To illustrate, literally, I took a few minutes to mock up a hypothetical conversation between a South Carolina representative and a Clemson* representative. Feel free to print this out and hang it on your refrigerator, in your cube or office, or in the living space of a real live Clemson* fan to help them free up time to do more important things like trim their ear hair or pull their underwear out of their butt.

Enjoy.