The Men that Killed UT Football

[Samuellbronkowitz]

It all started with the elevation of Hamilton to Director of Men's Athletics. Hamilton was a great fundraiser, but he had no qualifications for the AD job. Funds, programs, the university's reputation - all took a nose dive during his tenure. "Hurricane" Hamilton devastated Tennessee athletics. 2003, a year that will live in infamy...

Imagine if UT had chosen to unify men's and women's athletics under Joan Cronan in 2003. Imagine the candidates who would have wanted to follow her in the job. Imagine the last 15 years of Tennessee athletics being filled with achievements and accolades. Imagine athletes in all sports yearning to wear the orange & white, praying to receive an offer from UT.

Yep. We could have had Filet Mignon, but chose Hamburger Helper instead.

 

[Jack Burton]

A lot of things went wrong before firing Fulmer. The biggest being Doug Dickey’s retirement replacement. Hamilton came in and limited funds for Fulmer’s hires. Also academic restrictions prevented Fulmer from getting in players that could get in at LSU, UGA, etc. Opinions on him vary, and Fulmer wasn’t perfect, but he never tried to harm the University.

Then you have multiple presidents, chancellors, ADs, coaches over the years and one big booster throwing shade. It was a perfect storm of crap.

Stability gets us back to where we need to be and not just with coaches but all management. That will take patience which isn’t easy for me either. I feel good that Fulmer is in charge and knows what it takes both as a coach and from his years watching Dickey. Boyd seems to be on board with Fulmer, despite being friendly with Jimmy Haslam, so they should be pulling in the same direction. Word is Jimmy has stepped back anyway because of last years fan backlash.

Culture change happens at the top and takes time to flow down.

 

[Tin Man]

Future course offering at Haslam College of Business, How to Buy/Bully Your Alma Mater?

 

[05_never_again]

A lot of things went wrong before firing Fulmer. The biggest being Doug Dickey’s retirement replacement. Hamilton came in and limited funds for Fulmer’s hires. Also academic restrictions prevented Fulmer from getting in players that could get in at LSU, UGA, etc. Opinions on him vary, and Fulmer wasn’t perfect, but he never tried to harm the University.

Then you have multiple presidents, chancellors, ADs, coaches over the years and one big booster throwing shade. It was a perfect storm of crap.

Stability gets us back to where we need to be and not just with coaches but all management. That will take patience which isn’t easy for me either. I feel good that Fulmer is in charge and knows what it takes both as a coach and from his years watching Dickey. Boyd seems to be on board with Fulmer, despite being friendly with Jimmy Haslam, so they should be pulling in the same direction. Word is Jimmy has stepped back anyway because of last years fan backlash.

Culture change happens at the top and takes time to flow down.

Yep. So much of the blame that gets assigned today goes to Dooley or even Butch but they were involved in the afterbirth of the failure. Those guys took over after the car was already in the ditch, and while they ultimately did a poor job trying to get the car out of the ditch and were ill-equipped to do so, it's more important who ran the car into the ditch in the first place.

The culprits for the downfall are booster involvement generally speaking, specifically the Haslams, Fulmer (yes, he played a role in this), Mike Hamilton, and Kiffin. People like Hart, Currie, Davenport, Dooley, Butch, etc. all made bad decisions in a situation where they were effectively set up to fail.

 

[Jack Burton]

Yep. So much of the blame that gets assigned today goes to Dooley or even Butch but they were involved in the afterbirth of the failure. Those guys took over after the car was already in the ditch, and while they ultimately did a poor job trying to get the car out of the ditch and were ill-equipped to do so, it's more important who ran the car into the ditch in the first place.

The culprits for the downfall are booster involvement generally speaking, specifically the Haslams, Fulmer (yes, he played a role in this), Mike Hamilton, and Kiffin. People like Hart, Currie, Davenport, Dooley, Butch, etc. all made bad decisions in a situation where they were effectively set up to fail.

Yes, but I would contend that Davenport redeemed herself by installing Fulmer basically without the approval of anyone else.

This is from the Summers & Mattingly book about how Davenport saved us in the end.

 

[chuckb1448]

Have a buddy here in Birmingham that got tickets to the SEC Championship, he seen me this morning at work and said you won't believe who I met this weekend! I said Bill Clinton, he said "nope Coach Fulmer!" He said he was being honored at some banquet and got to meet Phil. He said "some dude decked out in a cowboy hat and all Orange stuff on was with Phil, he said I believe the guy flew Phil and his wife down for the event. I said "oh lord its Haslem, my friend didn't know so he googled him and sure enough it was Jimmy. I said "I hope you punched him in the gut for me", my buddy said "Phil?" I said "heck no that Haslem punk" lol