Guitar Shots to the Head 11/12

For weeks now we have heard about how we feel, and what we think about this football team. As an offshoot of a conversation with Larkin and Freak on Volchat, I thought it would be appropriate to re-examine the collective psyche of the Volnation after a big win. At first, while watching the Arkansas game, I began to think about inviting a guest columnist to do guitar shots for this week. Perhaps Volinbham or Reemus would have been appropriate stand ins. They are the car aficionados of the Volnation after all.

I was thinking that a “car” man might be able to explain the turnaround of this UT football team. After being in the driver’s seat in the SEC east on two previous occasions, it appears that the Vols have finally found a vehicle they are comfortable driving. In route to the win, the UT team pieced together their best defensive effort of the season, holding the Hogs to 279 yards of total offense. I would say they straightened the curves and flattened the hills!

Sure there were a few offensive hiccups here and there, and there were offensive drives that went unrealized, but all in all the Vols turned in there most complete ball game of the year. The offense set the tone by slowly chewing yardage and keeping McJones off of the field, and when the Arkansas offense did take the field the UT defense took over the football game with energy and emotion.

Yep….you read correctly. In relationship to the collective psyche, when the defense begins to hand out Guitar Shots the fan base can also begin re-investing some emotion into this football team. The majority of posters on this site are intelligent enough to know that this defense has been down right deplorable in just about every area this season. Watching Georgia chew up yardage on every opponent that they play, makes the defensive performance against the Dawgs stand out as well. This defense has some talent.

Before we become too emotionally invested this team still has questions to answer. Dick is a bad QB without a full compliment of receivers, and he cannot run the football. All in all, that led to a favorable match up with the Vols front four. They could concentrate on stopping one player to win the game. The good news is that they displayed the ability to do it. In the process, they also displayed a veracious intensity that is usually found on a Florida Gator or New England Patriot sideline. As a fan, that makes me stand up and take notice.

Whether it is Tebow and Meyer or Brady and Belichick those tandems generate enough buzz on the Volnation to power Los Angeles after and earthquake. Some simply hate them for winning. I despise both for a different reason. I want what they have. I am not talking about their championships (although those would be nice as well). I covet their hatred of losing. Look closely at either pair on the sidelines when they are losing a game. Pay special attention to their facial expressions when they fall behind in a football game. Every tear (I couldn’t resist), tick and wrinkle tells a story. Every groan singles one thing. Losing makes them physically ill. The thought of losing makes them so uncomfortable that they repetitively kick opponents in the head when you are down. They also understand the nature of the game. They understand that beating someone badly enough, you might just remove their will to win the next time you play them as well. Football is a merciless sport to be played without mercy.

Before the death threats begin, know that I am proud of this football program. Aside from NCAA investigations, if there is such a thing as winning with class CPF has cornered the market. While CPF has never taken this hatred of losing to such an extreme, the championship defenses fielded by UT during his tenure certainly did. An opposing team might get a break from offensive play calling during the end of a blowout, but the UT defense was going to kick you in the teeth for the entire game. Perhaps when Pennington wrote his ill advised article, this was what the former UT players were trying to convey to the public. “We hated losing so much that everything involving the UT football program was a competition”.

Believe it or not, there is a point to my rambling, and once again, perhaps my summation will help verbalize another grievance long shared by the collective on the Volnation. With or without this current coaching staff, I am ready for the Vols to play every game like they did on Saturday. This team clearly provided the correct response; it is the stimulus that concerns me.

For the third time this season, the press was very aggressive in their tone about CPF’s future, and apparently that lit a fire. Couple this with a classless and inappropriate advertisement put together by several former players, and you have a full fledged inferno. Some might argue, at this point in the season, any fire that is not squarely located under Fulmer’s hiney is a good thing, but I am looking for a different stimulus. I want to see the desire to win. I want losing to be so uncomfortable for this coaching staff that they begin to hate it again.

Putting this crazy season into words has been a challenge to say the least. Now, coaching preferences aside, like Julia Roberts in “Pretty Woman” I want the fairy tale ending. I hope to see the Vols soundly defeat their next opponents, and return a longstanding favor that was handed out by LSU back in 2001. That would be the perfect ending to a less than perfect season.