HOOVER, Ala. – Frankly, I sometimes wonder if the Florida Gators aren’t just getting on the nerves of people who are tired of seeing them win. That, and the brilliant quarterback without a personal flaw, is just driving them nuts.
What was that Jeremy Foley and Ron Zook used to call the buzz around the Florida football program? Noise? Well, the volume is turned up again. And even though it’s a different kind of “noise,” the sound of it is equally annoying. That thud you heard was that noise falling on Alabama.
Apparently my media brethren and sisters are running out of things to ask, say and write. Or at least in one case, somebody posing as a media person, as evidenced by the question so-called writer Clay Travis asked Tim Tebow on Thursday at SEC Media Days. He wanted to know if Tebow was a virgin.
“Are you saving yourself for somebody?” Travis asked.
Either way Tebow answers, it could be construed as a negative. Held up to ridicule if he says yes; belittled and called a hypocrite if he says no. And if he says nothing, they assume he just wants to withhold the truth.
“Yes I am,” Tebow said.
Boy, I’m glad we got this news bulletin before we broke camp.
Wonder if we’ll find out before long if Tebow flosses. There has just got to be something wrong with this guy, although when asked what habits of Tebow annoyed him, Meyer couldn’t think of any.
So it turns out that Travis is a lawyer/blogger who has written several books – not really a media person – but somebody who claims to be a fan of Tebow’s and claims to be a man of faith himself (says he was a Southern Baptist raised in Nashville). He also claims he has a book coming out soon called “Rocky Top” that will be printed by a major national publisher. Let me know how it turns out.
He said he made a list on a website several weeks ago of “Ten Burning Questions” and that he was very concerned about asking it of Tebow.
“I cleared it with a lot of other media members I know and they approved it,” Travis told Paul Finebaum Thursday on his radio show. “I actually thought Tim Tebow’s answer would be, ‘Yes I am.’”
Surprise, surprise. We later discover that Travis is a big Tennessee fan, an avowed Urban Meyer disliker and has a new book out he’s trying to promote. Travis also wrote a book on SEC football in 2006 and “hung out” with Tebow (although I seriously question whether Tim has any recollection of the latter). According to Google:
“In September 2006, popular sports columnist and lifelong University of Tennessee fan Clay Travis set out on his ’Dixieland Delight Tour.’ Without a single map, hotel reservation or game ticket, he began an 8,000-mile journey through the beating heart of the Southland. As Travis toured the SEC, he immersed himself in the bizarre game-day rituals of the common fan, brazenly dancing with the chancellor’s wife at a Vanderbilt frat party, hanging with University of Florida demigod quarterback Tim Tebow, and abandoning himself totally to the ribald intensity and religious fervor of SEC football.”
Sounds like he’s working on another book about the sex life of college football icons.
Maybe Travis is just misunderstood. He says he asked the question in the interest of religion. Yeah, sure he did. And philandering South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford also went to Argentina to see the tall grass in the Pampas. Had nothing to do with book or self-promotion at all.
Meanwhile, Mr. Agitation of Birmingham radio kept pouring it on with his negative comments about Urban Meyer. Seemed like every caller Thursday wanted to talk about Meyer with Finebaum. Wonder what he talked about on his shows before he started “The Trash Urban Meyer Campaign.”
Funny part about it is that Finebaum never showed his face around Meyer or came to the press conference to ask a question. It wouldn’t have mattered if he had. According to a source close to Meyer, he has no idea who Finebaum is or what he looks like.
The mission here, apparently, is to pit Meyer against Saban. Sorry, but it won’t work. Not if we can believe the words of Saban at his conference Thursday.
”Urban is a great coach, surrounds himself with outstanding people, has a good staff,” said Saban. “They work about as hard as anybody I know. I mean, we’re kind of a blue-collar program. We have a tremendous amount of respect for that.”
When he was asked about how working for Bill Belichick might have impacted him and how it effected Meyer, Saban added:
“I know that Bill is like that (hard-working). But I think Urban was like that before he ever met Bill. I think that’s why they have a tremendous amount of success in recruiting, and they do a phenomenal job of developing the players that they have.”
Told what Saban said, Meyer responded: “He is a good coach. Loves ball.”
That’s their common bond and, in fact, there are other similarities between the two coaches.
When I asked Saban about the SEC title game and how the Gators were able to swing the fourth-quarter momentum in their favor, the Alabama coach had no shame in admitting his team got outplayed.
“Tim Tebow and the Florida players sort of rose to the occasion and finished the game like you need to … to win a difficult game, especially a championship game,” Saban confessed. “We have a tremendous amount of respect. And it wasn’t that our players didn’t do it. I mean, Florida didn’t win the game on our lack of execution. They won it because they executed and did the things they had to do to win. That’s a compliment to them. It’s not disrespect to our players, because I’m not ashamed for a minute the way we competed in the game and the way we tried to finish the game. They made the plays they needed to make.”
Now that intrepid reporters have uncovered everything else, we are down to solving the final riddle Friday in the last of Media Days: Who stiffed Tim Tebow on the preseason All-SEC balloting?
Up Friday are Les Miles of LSU, Gene Chizik of Auburn, Steve Spurrier of South Carolina and Lane Kiffin of Tennessee.
Kiffin has already said he voted for Tebow. Miles Tweeted (Twittered) Thursday that it wasn’t him. That means we are down to two former Gator players: Spurrier and Chizik, a walk-on in the early 1980s under Charlie Pell.
Hey, inquiring minds want to know.