The tired narrative that Tennessee fans are the most unreasonable and unrealistic

[Vol#17]

I'm getting so sick of the media coming after Tennessee fans. There's this narrative that we are the worst fans and think too highly of ourselves for a program that has only won 1 national title in the last 50 years.
Look at LSU. They just fired a coach after a win over Florida right after he won a national title there. And he was a Louisiana guy who loved LSU. Just let all that sink in.

We gave Phil a lot of leverage after his national title. We kept him for a decade after that despite the fact that he continued underachieve.

So, how exactly are we so unreasonable? We support this program through thick and thin and the program has the resources to succeed (money, facilities, tradition, and recruiting), so why is it so unreasonable and bad for us to have expectations? Seriously, why does the media have it out for us?

Coach O didn’t get fired just for on field performance. There was a lot going on behind the scenes.

 

[Longsufferingvol]

"We kept him for a decade after that despite the fact that he continued underachieve."

I am just answering your question, not being a smart@55. Comments like this that are why we catch that label. Until they stop, we continue to volunteer ourselves for it.

Fulmer had 4 10+ win seasons before that NC and 4 after. 9 10+ win seasons in 17 years is nothing to scoff at especially when his predecessor, Johnny Majors, had 2 in his entire career at Tennessee.

Not to put this on our fans, but our administration is another indication of what's been wrong not just in Knoxville, but in general. Wrong guys at the helm. They fired an HOF coach without a replacement in mind that could do much of anything.

I agree that LSU may be may be end up taking that title and that's one I think we would all invite, but there are a BUNCH of attractive candidates out there today that LSU can get. We shall see how it all unfolds.

What do you mean? It should be obvious why I said what I said. The program stopped being successful in bowl games and stopped winning SEC titles. Things plateaued; that's the best way to put it. Fulmer also didn't evolve with the times and there was a lack of discipline and a lot of off the field issues in the last few years of the Fulmer era. I'm not saying that we should have fired him earlier. My point was the UT leadership was pretty lenient with Fulmer because of the '98 championship and his deep ties to the university. Florida and the other top SEC programs would have fired their coaches for much less, but yet we get singled out as the most impatient and unreasonable fan base.

 

[VFL28]

With the current state of the program, I’d say 6 wins is a giant W for Heupel. I’ll be honest to say I expected more than 9 wins with Butch’s teams, they were very talented just not well coached.

 

[Longsufferingvol]

Coach O didn’t get fired just for on field performance. There was a lot going on behind the scenes.

Yeah right. All coaches do that stuff. If you are high status and make millions of dollars you are probably going to be a player. That stuff is only an issue if the people in charge aren't satisfied with the product on the field.

 

[Voltopia]

I love that being utterly fed up with a terrible officiating crew that materially impacted your team's performance, combined with watching another team screw with yours by making a joke of a rule meant for serious situations, leads the media to sputter about Tennessee's fans being the unacceptable thing. "That's unacceptable!" "That's embarrassing the sport!" Oh like stealing points from Tennessee was somehow more acceptable? Like watching Ole Miss players drag the game out for an extra hour with fake injuries was less of a joke?

Maybe, just maybe, some of those drunk, ill-tempered fans thought that watching another team and the officials rub their noses in the dirty was unreasonable too. But you never hear that part -- or if you do, the SEC sure never does anything to fix it. As evidenced by letting the same dipstick crew that officiated Mississippi State - Memphis touch another SEC game.

I don't condone the throwing crap part but I cannot get over how the media seems to be totally fine with crappy officiating and teams being unsportsmanlike. Had the students not revolted, no one would even bat an eye at that game. They certainly wouldn't have made any stink about the stolen points. It would just be another W for Ole Miss, without comment. You know not a one of them would either care or comment about the awful on-field product provided by the SEC.

 

[TNDeb3]

99% of the media is full of crap. They can take a blade of grass that's growing and make a national disaster of it. If they said the sky was blue, I'd step outside and verify that before I believed it. EVERY fan base has it's rabid members. And any fan that tries to deny that, well they're full of crap too.

GBO!!!

 

[The Original Fade]

Nothing would piss the media off more than for Tennessee to pull off a miracle and upset Bama. The narrative would probably be “Heupel and the Vols show their solidarity with the degenerate bottle throwers in their fan base by playing out of their minds in Tuscaloosa”

 

[vegasvolfan]

What do you mean? It should be obvious why I said what I said. The program stopped being successful in bowl games and stopped winning SEC titles. Things plateaued; that's the best way to put it. Fulmer also didn't evolve with the times and there was a lack of discipline and a lot of off the field issues in the last few years of the Fulmer era. I'm not saying that we should have fired him earlier. My point was the UT leadership was pretty lenient with Fulmer because of the '98 championship and his deep ties to the university. Florida and the other top SEC programs would have fired their coaches for much less, but yet we get singled out as the most impatient and unreasonable fan base.

I think making it to the SEC Championship one year prior to being let go is hardly a plateau.

Fulmer tried to evolve, but he did not have the personnel necessary to run the Clawfense. I think that was actually his downfall. We went from SEC Champs to him being fired lol.

I will forever think we made a mistake letting him go. Definitely without someone to replace him. But to your point, we didn’t fire him 2 years after an NC. We were more patient however.

 

[vegasvolfan]

I have said this before on here, but Fulmer was fortunate to be the coach at Tennessee when most every other team in the SEC was going through the same feeble coaching rotation that Tennessee has been in. He benefited from poor coaching hires by Florida, Alabama, LSU, and he had the alsorans of the conference in Kentucky, Georgia, Ole Miss, any other team you want to include. It was only after the other teams in the conference started to take their football coaching hires seriously that Fulmer's ability shown through. Spurrier embarrassed Fulmer when he coached Duke and soundly whipped Tennessee, Saban to LSU, Richt to Georgia, Stallings to Alabama, even Tuberville at Auburn. That's not to mention how poor his record was in bowl games for the most part. I was a Fulmer fan longer than I should have been, and even when he was brought in as the "interim" AD, I supported it, until he showed he was still living in the past, and then got an extension as the AD. Fouled his legacy badly.

Probably the best argument I have heard.

 

[DonjoVol]

I'm getting so sick of the media coming after Tennessee fans. There's this narrative that we are the worst fans and think too highly of ourselves for a program that has only won 1 national title in the last 50 years.
Look at LSU. They just fired a coach after a win over Florida right after he won a national title there. And he was a Louisiana guy who loved LSU. Just let all that sink in.

We gave Phil a lot of leverage after his national title. We kept him for a decade after that despite the fact that he continued underachieve.

So, how exactly are we so unreasonable? We support this program through thick and thin and the program has the resources to succeed (money, facilities, tradition, and recruiting), so why is it so unreasonable and bad for us to have expectations? Seriously, why does the media have it out for us?

Some LSU fan tried telling me they are patient enough to give the next coach 6 years to compete for a national championship. Best joke I've heard all week.

 

[stolitonic]

I think making it to the SEC Championship one year prior to being let go is hardly a plateau.

Fulmer tried to evolve, but he did not have the personnel necessary to run the Clawfense. I think that was actually his downfall. We went from SEC Champs to him being fired lol.

I will forever think we made a mistake letting him go. Definitely without someone to replace him. But to your point, we didn’t fire him 2 years after an NC. We were more patient however.

If I remember correctly, one of the big problems of the only year of the Clawfense was that Phil would not get out of the way.

Rather than let the OC run the O and worry about other things, Fulmer basically dictated which plays to run.

So we ended up with some Frankenstein version of new age mixed with whatever Phil insisted on.
This predictably failed miserably and here we are.

 

[Carl Pickens]

I'm getting so sick of the media coming after Tennessee fans. There's this narrative that we are the worst fans and think too highly of ourselves for a program that has only won 1 national title in the last 50 years.
Look at LSU. They just fired a coach after a win over Florida right after he won a national title there. And he was a Louisiana guy who loved LSU. Just let all that sink in.

We gave Phil a lot of leverage after his national title. We kept him for a decade after that despite the fact that he continued underachieve.

So, how exactly are we so unreasonable? We support this program through thick and thin and the program has the resources to succeed (money, facilities, tradition, and recruiting), so why is it so unreasonable and bad for us to have expectations? Seriously, why does the media have it out for us?

Everyone gets fed up after a while and the frustration comes out……while I don’t condone throwing water bottles and etc….I think the fans did a good job of letting everyone know the SEC officiating is like road kill all stuffed with dog S. …. Horrible if you will. I’m not embarrassed at all. When Vols fans throw bricks through the coach’s window I’ll be concerned…. Or when one poisons some trees on Vanderbilt’s campus….or murders someone after a loss…. Basically when they start acting like a buncha bammers

 

[volfanhill]

We are LOUD STUPID. That's the problem. And yes entitled has hell.

 

[Iam4utalways]

I'm getting so sick of the media coming after Tennessee fans. There's this narrative that we are the worst fans and think too highly of ourselves for a program that has only won 1 national title in the last 50 years.
Look at LSU. They just fired a coach after a win over Florida right after he won a national title there. And he was a Louisiana guy who loved LSU. Just let all that sink in.

We gave Phil a lot of leverage after his national title. We kept him for a decade after that despite the fact that he continued underachieve.

So, how exactly are we so unreasonable? We support this program through thick and thin and the program has the resources to succeed (money, facilities, tradition, and recruiting), so why is it so unreasonable and bad for us to have expectations? Seriously, why does the media have it out for us?

The media is made up of people with an axe to grind. These people have had their hearts broken by the Vols in the past. These people are bitter because of the way our football team has treated their football team for years and years. Now that we have hit some hard times they are more than willing to use their platform to stick it to the Vols and the fans of the Vols. Sure throwing all that trash Saturday was so far out of line, you really can’t blame them for blasting Vol fans. Blame the fans that were throwing the trash. When the 13 years old misbehaves I use the word immature to describe the behavior. We have our fair share of immature fans that pitched a fit and maybe they will face the consequences due to them for their actions.

 

[unfrozencvmanvol]

Clack O had a lot of serious issues in addition to losing.

Yeah, ole boy was bringing his side hoes to practice.

 

[Woke]

"We kept him for a decade after that despite the fact that he continued underachieve."

I am just answering your question, not being a smart@55. Comments like this that are why we catch that label. Until they stop, we continue to volunteer ourselves for it.

Fulmer had 4 10+ win seasons before that NC and 4 after. 9 10+ win seasons in 17 years is nothing to scoff at especially when his predecessor, Johnny Majors, had 2 in his entire career at Tennessee.

Not to put this on our fans, but our administration is another indication of what's been wrong not just in Knoxville, but in general. Wrong guys at the helm. They fired an HOF coach without a replacement in mind that could do much of anything.

I agree that LSU may be may be end up taking that title and that's one I think we would all invite, but there are a BUNCH of attractive candidates out there today that LSU can get. We shall see how it all unfolds.

I kinda like the narrative that TN fans are tough, demanding and won’t roll over. I like the fact that we erupted when Kiffin bolted, ran off the milquetoast Schifano, and metaphorically set the house on fire last Saturday night (I’m not condoning violence or public drunkenness).

Instead the narrative I’m completely sick of hearing that continues to hold us back is the one where Phil Fulmer is the modern-era savior of Vol football.

Context matters. PF was a career underachiever who hit the lottery with Cut and Manning. When all that was gone he became lazy entitled and entrenched.

Majors was a career overachiever who rebuilt TN Vol football basically from scratch. From ashes really. Those of us who lived thru all that with eyes wide open know the truth.

I would hope that PF’s complete, utter, sheer incompetence and vapid judgment as AD would close the book on that virus forever.

 

[kcvols1]

I'm getting so sick of the media coming after Tennessee fans. There's this narrative that we are the worst fans and think too highly of ourselves for a program that has only won 1 national title in the last 50 years.
Look at LSU. They just fired a coach after a win over Florida right after he won a national title there. And he was a Louisiana guy who loved LSU. Just let all that sink in.

We gave Phil a lot of leverage after his national title. We kept him for a decade after that despite the fact that he continued underachieve.

So, how exactly are we so unreasonable? We support this program through thick and thin and the program has the resources to succeed (money, facilities, tradition, and recruiting), so why is it so unreasonable and bad for us to have expectations? Seriously, why does the media have it out for us?

They keep writing articles because we keep reading them.

Continue to reject the narrative.

 

[whobethis16]

I have said this before on here, but Fulmer was fortunate to be the coach at Tennessee when most every other team in the SEC was going through the same feeble coaching rotation that Tennessee has been in. He benefited from poor coaching hires by Florida, Alabama, LSU, and he had the alsorans of the conference in Kentucky, Georgia, Ole Miss, any other team you want to include. It was only after the other teams in the conference started to take their football coaching hires seriously that Fulmer's ability shown through. Spurrier embarrassed Fulmer when he coached Duke and soundly whipped Tennessee, Saban to LSU, Richt to Georgia, Stallings to Alabama, even Tuberville at Auburn. That's not to mention how poor his record was in bowl games for the most part. I was a Fulmer fan longer than I should have been, and even when he was brought in as the "interim" AD, I supported it, until he showed he was still living in the past, and then got an extension as the AD. Fouled his legacy badly.

You do realize that Fulmer was not the head coach when Spurrier was at Duke, right? Spurrier "embarrassed" Majors while at Duke. Can't even get your years straight.

 

[tbones0711]

Media is FOS about 99% of the time. It’s not about being right it’s about generating clicks. Pandering to the bandwagon fan bases are the best ways to do that.

Factor in the fact that UT has a better than average,(huge), following. That alone leads to more clicks in general. Subject matter and truth are afterthoughts. Just the mention of UT and a catchy headline is the #1 factor.

 

[bigorangepoppa]

You do realize that Fulmer was not the head coach when Spurrier was at Duke, right? Spurrier "embarrassed" Majors while at Duke. Can't even get your years straight.

My bad, dude. I didn't look it up, I just remember listening to the game over the radio, and how he beat up on Tennessee. I don't see any reason for the last sentence in your response. I thought Fulmer was a great coach, I actually hung on longer to that belief than many others. I eventually came to the conclusion it was time to change but I never expected the carnage that decision has led to.

 

[bpalmer28]

If we aren’t the most unreasonable and unrealistic, who is?

 

[VolsRule]

No surprise--the national sports media has long hated UT. This will not change.

 

[DaddyChad]

Factor in the fact that UT has a better than average,(huge), following. That alone leads to more clicks in general. Subject matter and truth are afterthoughts. Just the mention of UT and a catchy headline is the #1 factor.

We have a fairly good size loyal following. That’s not who media targets. They target the biggest fanbases which are largely comprised of loyal fans and a really good portion of bandwagon fans that will follow whichever team is the front runner.

 

[Remy]

I could give less than a rats bedonkadonk what the media or other fan bases think of the Vols, our school, our fan base, our AD, or our teams. I do not go out looking for it and if I happen to bump into it, I step around it like I do a dog turd and keep it moving.

 

[OrangeTsar]

You do realize that Fulmer was not the head coach when Spurrier was at Duke, right? Spurrier "embarrassed" Majors while at Duke. Can't even get your years straight.

Majors wasn’t always the best game day coach, especially towards the end of his tenure. But when it came to rebuilding a program and getting the most out of his players, he was top notch