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TRC brings you the historic 20th episode of Unleashed tonight at 6 p.m. It’s hard to believe three guys with nothing to talk about have produced 10 hours worth of podcasts. Tonight we’ll try to make a boring week exciting with:
Plus, Tbone tells us how to make a Mitt Romney cake from several flavorless ingredients.
Reports are out there that Carolina Runningbacks Tight Ends Safeties Spurs Coach Jeep Hunter is no longer a part of the coaching staff.
We here at TRC are saddened by this news for many reasons, not the least of which is the fun that can be had by googling “Jeep Hunter.”
Witness:
The word ‘parvenu’ might not be the most common of english usages, but it nevertheless conveys a meaning that any of us would readily understand. It’s “new money”, but with a decidedly pejorative connotation. Think The Great Gatsby, trying to overcompensate for a meager upbringing by lavishly spending new-found wealth. Garish fortune notwithstanding, the erstwhile tycoon still struggled for acceptance among the elites.
Confused? Let me illustrate:
Once upon a time, there was a relatively minor football program at a state agricultural college that was tucked away in an undeveloped backwater of a small southern town. This program was not considered a threat by any of the football elites, in fact it was only marginally competitive with other regional schools. This school blatantly lifted its athletic traditions from other, more successful, programs and ultimately offered repeated and desperate protestations that it deserved to be treated with the same respect.
But the school had a problem, and the problem was money.
Such were the school’s financial woes that its head coach created a new concept: a non-alumni booster organization. This group would raise much-needed capital from the modest working folks that surrounded the school. A relatively meager amount was required to join – only ten dollars a year. But the idea worked, and quite well. “I Pay Ten a Year” became a slogan for those farmers and factory workers who had no hope of a college education, but could still identify with the upstart college program up the road.
Money poured in.
When the product on the field didn’t match either the aspirations of the desperate program or the expectations of the locals, questions began to be asked. Difficult questions about how all that money was being spent. The powerful within the department soon made a decision: they would take their newfound cash, and use it to both purchase the national legitimacy they so desperately desired, and also placate their yeoman supporters.
They were gonna buy their way to success.
Initially, it seemed to work. An unheard of accomplishment, the Mythical National Championship was obtained. But then disaster struck, as the sport’s governing organization recognized the blatant shenanigans and slapped the eager upstarts with the worst penalties ever handed down at the time, and the second worst penalties still to date.
A second probation would soon follow, as more pay-for-play allegations swirled. But with new-found TV dollars added to the pile, the chance to cash in only grew.
These rumors continue until this day, although the school’s relatively low profile, remote location, and penchant for offering compliance officers ridiculously high salaries have thus far allowed them to escape NCAA notice. Examples nevertheless abound, such as a star running back spurning the NFL and returning to school after discovering that the free use of a local lake house would vanish with the expiration of his amateur status. Recruits were repeatedly (I mean, repeatedly, oh, and repeatedly) seen posing with large amounts of cash, and one in Marlboro County even widely claimed to have won the lottery on national signing day. One recruit allegedly had his entire family comp’ed at a luxury hotel for weeks leading up to signing day. Another player even admitted on air that the NFL wouldn’t be able to pay him as much as this school could.
Beyond paying players, this school demonstrates its desperate search for attention and importance in other ways. It is currently paying the salary of its last head coach, last defensive coordinator, and last offensive coordinator, and all of them are working elsewhere. At the same time, it is paying its current head coach an amount that could liquidate the local Dollar General, and just announced that it will pay its two current coordinators the highest joint salary of any school in NCAA history.
Our word of the day relates to this school because of the absolute glee with which its supporters celebrate these spending sprees. Whether for coaches, facilities, or for players outright, the fanbase of this school is so hungry for acceptance, and so haunted by feelings of inferiority to their collegiate neighbors, that they will celebrate being first in anything, even if it’s just being first in lavishly wasting money.
Someone who wildly spends money to try to obtain long-dreamed heights of social status, allthewhile only reinforcing their own undesirableness – that’s a parvenu.
You’re welcome.
Oh, and this picture, just because:
Oh holy crap what have I done. How did I wind up here? I was at Oklahoma…home of Wilkinson and Switzer and Sims and Holieway…home of seven National Championships and five Heisman Trophy winners. Tradition. REAL tradition. Not clinging like grim death to some title that was bought thirty years ago…OK, so Switzer bought a couple, but still… Aw geez, look at this guy, he’s my boss. MY BOSS. Bob Stoops WAS my boss, National Championship winner himself. Protege of Steve Spurrier. Sure, I was being semi-demoted because he brought his cro-magnon brother back, but so what? That was a sweet gig. Defensive coordinator for the Oklahoma Sooners football team. I was a rising star. Soon to be head head coach of a major program. Now look at me. Wearing a stupid orange and purple jacket and reporting to a real, live, honest to goodness clown. I know that’s an overused term, but crap man, give this guy a red nose, floppy shoes, a 1969 VW bug and ten more like him and you’re charging $35 a ticket under a big striped tent. God, those videos of him screaming and dancing and posturing, what a freakin’ phony. How am I going to endure this? OK, gotta calm down, hang in there Ven-man, stay the course. Maybe we tank next year and I can slide into this guy’s job. I mean, it’s the ACC, and it’s Clemson, but a head coaching job is a head coaching job, right? A stepping stone. Yeah, that’s how I have to approach it. A fresh start. Ugh, look at him. Is that a booger? Gross. I’ve been here three days and I can’t stand to be in his presence. I want to punch him in the face. Geez I think I’m gonna vomit. Seriously, how did I wind up here?
Editor’s Note: TRC is pleased to announce that Bill Cornflute, known to all Palmetto State football fans as our very own recruiting guru, has agreed to begin sharing inside and exclusive recruiting news, otherwise known as “poop,” to our blog. We are glad to welcome the well-respected Mr. Cornflute to the TRC family. Below is Cornflute’s first inside and exclusive report to TRC readership. And remember, you got this scoop here and no place else. No one except you, and I mean no one (and that includes Clark, Newburg, Wallace, Lemming, Shurburtt, Hood, Morrell, and countless other recruitniks), has this info. With Cornflute’s help, we are now the razor sharp part of the cutting edge.
Recruiting Report 1-23-12
By Bill Cornflute
Breaking News: Elite 11 QB Prospect and super competitive Gunner Kiel has withdrawn from Notre Dame and re-opened his recruitment-again. After previously committing to Indiana, LSU, and Notre Dame, Kiel has decided that he wants to set the all time record for broken commitments during a recruiting season. Upon learning that former Auburn star QB Cam Newton decommitted from five different schools during the recruiting process, Kiel has announced plans that he will commit and then de-commit to at least four more schools before signing day. I asked Kiel why he was planning for four de-commits instead of three when three would set the record. Kiel’s reply: “I’m a super competitive guy. If I go ahead and do it four more times, that sets the bar pretty high for the next guy. I like to set records and hope I can establish one that lasts for a while.” When asked which schools he plans to spurn next, Kiel replied: “I’m thinking Southern Cal, Oklahoma, Stanford, and Georgia. Those schools have produced some pretty good QB’s. It will be fun to screw with their fan bases a little.” When asked where he will ultimately end up playing next year after setting the de-commitment record, Kiel was, predictably, non-committal: “I’m not really sure at this point. There are so many possibilities out there — so many people looking for stories. I might just keep this going for a while.”
2018 RB prospect Skyler “Pee Wee” Thompson of Atlanta, a member of the ESPN Pre-Teen Phenoms, is drawing early attention from multiple SEC and ACC programs. Surprisingly strong for a player measuring in at 5-2, 110 pounds, Thompson has been known to lift his friend Felix (nicknamed “Bigun”) clear off the ground when playing “Tackle the Man with the Ball” with the neighborhood kids. Quick and nimble, Pee Wee is almost never “it” when the group plays “Manhunt” in the back yard. Pee Wee is a Pop Warner legend, having rushed for almost 900 yards in his flag football career. Clemson, Auburn and Tennessee have expressed some early interest in Thompson. When pressed about his recruiting (we had to pull him away from a spirited game of Mario Cart to take our call), Pee Wee claimed to having no favorites and played things close to the vest: “It’s still pretty early in the process. I want to take all my visits and see what each school has to offer. For starters, the school I choose has gotta have lots of pizza and chicken nuggets at the training table. And eggs. And pancakes. I love pancakes.”
I’ll be back next week with more insider info from the recruiting trail.
bill
TRC Unleashed, Episode 19 recovered from a depressing start to finish strong on Monday night. Topics included:
It’s fun, join in!
That’s right, it’s time for another episode of TRC Unleashed. Tonight, in Episode 19, we cover some of the events and stories of the past week, including:
Tune in tonight at 6:30!
WARNING: Major league no-purpose ramble below. If you make it all the way to the end, don’t complain, you were warned. (Also, there’s a little language in a couple of the linked clips if you’re on company time.)
There have been several comments across the webernets the last few days about American Movie Classics airing the 1993 movie The Program this month. Haven’t thought about that film in a while, but once I reflected on it for a few minutes today I couldn’t resist looking up the trailer for the film:
Most of you, even the young-uns, I’m sure have seen the Fox College Flash Classic episode multiple times, with Hank Campbell making an epic stop on a Tennessee two-point conversion attempt to preserve a win in the 1992 Gamecock football rags-to-riches season. But some of you probably don’t know that quite a few scenes for The Program were shot on that day as well. And if you do know, but weren’t there, I can assure you it was quite a surreal scene.
It was October 31, 1992. Halftime of a pretty doggone exciting game consisted of USC and UT fans banding together to cheer on the fictional ESU Timberwolves football team. (Did they ever identify what ESU stood for in the movie? Eastern State University?) The PA guy had to do his best to get the crowd revved up, because quite frankly it was very awkward to see these bunch of scrubs running around on the field executing scripted plays and being followed by guys carrying huge cameras. It was comical to a certain extent, and at times I felt a little sorry for the dudes on the field, because a lot of times we were cheering AT them instead of FOR them if you know what I mean. But after the first few attempts, the crowd got into it and it turned out being kind of fun.
If you pay close attention to the movie you can really see how Williams-Brice has transformed over the last 20 years. Amazing what a coat of paint, an end zone upper deck, football offices and a few signs will do to spruce a place up.
I had graduated from USC in the winter of 1991, worked as a waiter for a while and had only recently gotten a “real” job in Augusta. My old buddy Gman, in law school at USC at the time, asked me to come up for the game, he was having a big crowd at his apartment that weekend.
I’m pretty sure this is the first weekend I was introduced to Tbone, who was in law school with the G. I also met two of Tbone’s good friends from his hometown – Mike, which is a generic enough name, and the other guy, let’s just call him Bill, because he actually has a nickname so unique that some of you folks might know who he is…and that wouldn’t be a good thing.
BTW, I have zero recollection of Tbone from this weekend. Nada. But by everyone else’s account he was there. Great first impression that guy gives, huh.
So “Bill” gets hammered before the game, and gets so sick in Gman’s apartment that he is physically unable to go to the game. We pile about 15 people in the bed of Tbone’s pickup truck (purportedly) after some pre-tailgate cocktails, and ride down to the W-B on a gorgeous Halloween day. The rest is pretty much history – great tailgating, great seats (30 yard line, lower level) great first half, very unique halftime, great second half, and then Hank Campbell. Truly one of the great Saturdays I’ve ever spent at a Carolina football game.
(Side note: the Braves lost to the Blue Jays that night in the World Series 3-2, which put only a slight damper on the day.)
Now, for the film itself, some random thoughts:
So, you made it all the way through. Do you have any of your own memories from October 31, 1992? (The “I wasn’t born yet” crowd, shut the hell up.)
So word has finally leaked that USC and UNC are deep in talks about a proposed 5 game series in football. No one on our side of the border is talking yet, but note reports such as this are prevalent:
With the info now out there, we here at TRC feel comfortable releasing our own intel on the topic, which we’ve been holding close for some time now. Our own crack investigative team has uncovered intra-office memos detailing the Gamecock AD’s approach to the negotiations. Don’t ask us how we came across the info (OK, Gman is a janitor in the AD’s Office), and please do NOT forward or disseminate publicly:
The Rubber Chickens Blog 