5 questions for SEC Football Media Days
Off-the-wall questions, intentionally bland answers and competitively dressed coaches will be among the many features at SEC Football Media Days. The annual event kicks off Monday in Atlanta. National champion Alabama will arrive on Wednesday, along with Tennessee. NCAA runnerup Georgia will appear on Tuesday. Vanderbilt will be featured on Thursday. Here are five quirky questions that need to be asked:
Who owns ‘aight’ — Nick Saban or Jeremy Pruitt?
New UT coach Jeremy Pruitt dropped 44 references to “aight” — that’s southern for “all right” — during his introductory press conference in December. And in Big Orange Country, that’s quickly become his catchphrase, or catchword.
But many years before Pruitt, a former Alabama defensive coordinator, brought “aight” to Knoxville, Nick Saban coined it in Tuscaloosa and elsewhere. On Wednesday, both Pruitt and Saban will take the podium. Anyone want to keep a competitive count of their “aight” uses?
Will Paul Finebaum make light of his payday?
USA Today called it the biggest sto-
ryline of Media Days, but ESPN diffused the topic by signing on-air personality Paul Finebaum to a multiyear contract extension on Friday. Finebaum had been in a dispute with the ESPN-owned SEC Network over his contract, which was set to expire at the end of July, and there were reports that he could jump to Fox and the Big Ten Network.
With Finebaum’s show arriving at SEC Media Days, expect him to make light of his lucrative situation. Perhaps even Saban, college football’s highest-paid coach, will take a lighthearted jab at Finebaum during their usual on-air chat.
What will Dan Mullen, Derek Mason wear?
Former Mississippi State coach Dan Mullen’s shoe game is a longstanding topic at Media Days because he has shown up wearing a pair of Adidas Yeezy shoes, Kanye West’s line, the past three years. But now Mullen is at Florida, a Nike school, so he must deviate from his usual footwear.
Mullen won’t be the only welldressed coach there. Vanderbilt coach Derek Mason often dons a designer suit or custom-made Commodores shoes, and other coaches also try to win the unofficial best-dressed award at the event to catch attention for their program.
Who does it better — Alabama or Atlanta?
Media Days moves to Atlanta this year, leaving the Birmingham/Hoover area for the first time since 1985. It will return to Hoover in 2019 and move to other locations throughout the SEC footprint in future years, commissioner Greg Sankey said.
Crazy Alabama and Auburn fans have been fixtures at past events. They wear outlandish outfits and wait in the lobby for hours to get autographs. So will Georgia fans be just as dedicated with Media Days on their home turf? And will Alabama and Auburn fans cross state lines to take their craziness on the road?
Can you name 6 new SEC football coaches?
The SEC coaching family has become downright incestuous over the past few years, and this year’s turnover of six new coaches has some of that. Mullen left Mississippi State for Florida. Pruitt, a former defensive coordinator at Georgia and Alabama, will debut as UT’s coach. Matt Luke, a former UT offensive line coach, was promoted from Ole Miss interim to head coach at his alma mater. Jimbo Fisher, though outside the conference, has moved from Florida State, in the SEC’s footprint, to Texas A&M. Similarly, new Arkansas coach Chad Morris debuts after coaching at SMU and Clemson. Mississippi State’s Joe Moorhead is the region’s only outsider after a successful stint as Penn State’s offensive coordinator.
Reach Adam Sparks at asparks@tennessean.com and on Twitter @AdamSparks.