I have never seen so many ignorant people in all my life. People making fun of Fulmer because of his weight or anything else is crazy to me. I realize many people can make the argument that the game has passed him by. And I can't say that from the looks of things I can't totally dissagree. But nobody realizes that without Fulmer NON of the success over the last 18 years would have happened. This man brought this program up and the greatest heights of Tennessee Football have been accomplished by Fulmer. I know people are frustrated but I just don't understand how some can take shots at him like this. In my opinion, he is to be commended and completely respected regardless of how things unfold based on what he has done for UT. I fully support him and I wish others could really put everything in perspective. GO VOLS!!
The most similar situation that I can think of with regards to Fulmer right now is that of Denny Crum, former UofL basketball coach. Coach crum brought the program to national prominence in the late 70's and early to mid 80's. Then the program started to fall off. It fell off in a similar way that UT has fallen off: a slowly declining curve with an occassional upward spike (i.e. decent year). The fan base definitely became split on Crum into two different camps.
In camp A, you had the "Crum made this program what it is, and he can get it back to prominence" argument. Camp A would also look to a relatively recent decent season and latch onto that as support for the idea that Crum could still get it together.
In camp B, it was the "Crum may have made the program, but he is letting slip from prominence before our very eyes" argument. Camp B would dismiss the occassional upward spike year and would instead focus on the state of the program as a whole and where it was relative to where it had been 10 years ago.
Luckily for UofL fans, a perfect replacement came along: Pitino. Realizing that Pitino was the perfect guy for the job, and recognizing that Crum's best days were behind, the AD nudged Crum out the door firmly but politely. He was given a front office position and a halftime ceremony in tribute to his career and what he had done for the program.
I think this is really very similar to what we have right now with Fulmer. Fulmer unquestionably brought this program to an elite level of prominence. Fulmer has also unquestionably allowed the program to slip out of the prominence he helped create.
I am in camp B. I respect Fulmer. I respect what he's done. But his best days are behind him. He will never be able to bring the program back to that level.
So I agree with the thread-starter. Fulmer deserves respect. But Fulmer also deserves to be shown the door.