On Tuesday of this week, the Southeastern Conference handed Ole Miss defensive back Trae Elston a one-game suspension for a wicked lick he made against UTEP receiver Jordan Leslie in the fourth quarter of a 28-10 Rebel victory last Saturday.

Here’s the hit in question:

The league’s press release regarding the suspension read as follows:

“This action was the result of a flagrant and dangerous act which occurred at the 3:18 mark in the fourth quarter.  The action is in violation of Rule 9-1-4 of the NCAA Football Rule Book, which reads, ‘No player shall target and initiate contact to the head or neck area of a defenseless opponent with the helmet, forearm, elbow or shoulder,’ and Rule 9-1-3 which states, ‘No player shall target and initiate contact against an opponent with the crown (top) of his helmet.’”

Ole Miss fans weren’t happy.  Others out there began to smell a conspiracy.  Heck, in what might be the single silliest thing I’ve ever read — prepare to laugh Vanderbilt fans — one sports radio host penned a piece suggesting that SEC commish Mike Slive might have suspended Elston while ignoring a hit Vandy’s Andre Hal put on South Carolina’s Justice Cunningham because Ole Miss is bad “while Vandy under second-year coach James Franklin was becoming a media darling.”

In terms of all the “Slive and the media are out to get us” emails I receive — and I get two or three every day — most come from Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Auburn, Kentucky, Tennessee and Vanderbilt fans.  Way ahead of the rest of the pack.  So I know Commodore fans will howl at the idea that Slive and SEC were looking out for VU.

Just for comparison, let’s look at the hit Hal put on Cunningham:

Nasty.  And in my view, that play could have resulted in a suspension, too.

But for kicks, let’s look at one more hit that ended with a suspension last season.  This one resulted in Arkansas’ Marquel Wade being ejected from the game and suspended.  (I’m pretty sure Arkansas was one of the league’s top teams and James Franklin hadn’t become a media darling yet, so I’m not sure what the conspiracy theorists would say about the one below.)

More on that one in a minute.

I wanted to get to the bottom of why one play earns a suspension and another doesn’t.  How does the SEC determine who sits and who plays?  (And for the record, I believe the league should absolutely be consistent in its rulings.  I also believe that there is never anything wrong with erring on the side of player safety.)

SEC associate commissioner and chief PR guy, Charles Bloom was kind enough to share some info with MrSEC.com.

“1.  Every game gets reviewed by the Coordinator of Officials (Steve Shaw).  Coaches are invited to send in specific plays for additional review and they get an explanation as to the play.  Any communication is between the school and the conference office.

2.  Differences between the UM/UTEP hit and the Vandy/Carolina hit:

a) In the UM hit, the defender has his head down prior to contact and makes contact with the crown of his helmet into the facemask of the receiver.  In the VU hit, the defender has his head up prior to contact and while there was initial contact with the helmet, it was at the side of the helmet.  The crown was not used by the defender.

b) A flag was thrown in the VU-USC hit and should have been thrown in the UM-UTEP hit.

c) By rule, the definition of a defenseless player is ‘A receiver whose focus is on catching a pass.’  NCAA Playing Rule 9-1-4 states, ‘No player shall target and initiate contact to the head or neck area of a defenseless opponent with the helmet, forearm, elbow or shoulder.  When in question, it is a foul.’  Also, NCAA Playing Rule 9-1-3 states, ‘No player shall target and initiate contact against an opponent with the crown (top) of his helmet.  When in question, it is a foul.’

d) The NCAA has made ‘Protection of Defenseless Players and Crown-of-Helmet Action’ a point of emphasis this year.”

Now, I’ve received dozens of emails from people saying that in the photo of the hit I posted Tuesday,  Elston’s shoulder is buried in the chest of the UTEP receiver.  I wrote on Tuesday that it looks to me like the crown of Elston’s helmet is hitting the receiver right in the neck/throat beneath at the base of his facemask.  According to Bloom’s response, it seems the SEC office apparently saw it that way, too.

Read the rest of this entry »

According to the Associated Press, James Franklin has already gone into “spin mode” following Vanderbilt’s 0-2 start to this season.  The Commodores have suffered a pair of come-from-ahead defeats to South Carolina (17-13 in Nashville) and to Northwestern (23-13 on the road).  Fans and some in the media expected more from the Dores.  Now Franklin’s trying to prevent those folks from jumping ship:

“We learned valuable lessons, and we are getting better.  I know there’s a frustration with our fans from years, and then the light started shining and there was hope.  All that is still there.  You know one game, one moment is not going to define who and what we’re going to be as a program.”

Franklin just happens to be right, of course.  You can’t turn around a football program like a skateboard, it’s more like moving a cruise ship.  Franklin inherited a team of redshirt juniors and seniors last season from Bobby Johnson (the previous coach didn’t get nearly enough credit for his part in VU’s 2011 bowl-bound season).  He fired up that veteran squad, fired up recruits and, in doing so, fired up fans as well.

Quickly, many, many media members fell right in line over-inflating the coach’s reputation.  Matt Hayes of The Sporting News, for one, wrote this offseason that Franklin — who has a single 6-7 season under his belt as a head coach — is already the 25th best football coach in the country.

Whoa, pardner.  Let’s just slow all this stuff down a bit.

Vandy’s team is faster this season thanks to a bevy of three-star recruits Franklin has brought onto his West End campus.  For years, the Dores had been dealing mostly with two-star guys.  But getting speed on his team is just Step One.

There’s still an issue of depth.  In the SEC, you can’t just be one-deep, you better be two- or even three-deep at most positions.  It will take Franklin more than two recruiting classes and 15 games to reach that point.

Also, as the coach himself has admitted, he still needs to win a tight game to get his team over the mental barrier of being the “same ol’ Vanderbilt.”  Trust me, if you hear something long enough, you start to believe it.  As Northwestern roared from behind to tie and then win last Saturday night’s game, it was if VU players knew the script, hung their heads, and sadly agreed to play their parts.  That mentality — which has been part of the program for nearly a century — will have to be changed.  It will take a late-game win over a good program to get that done.  Maybe more.

So what’s the verdict on Franklin?  There isn’t one and that’s the point.  It’s too soon to be judging him.  He did a nice job on the field last season and in living rooms this offseason.  That doesn’t mean he’s going to be the next Knute Rockne.

He’s now off to an 0-2 start and that will anger a lot of folks in the media who had already crowned him as the Prince of Football.  In reality, his squad faced a Top 10 Carolina team in its opener and then traveled to play a program whose success VU would like to eventually emulate.  The Commodores opened with two very losable games.  For that reason, no one should be saying, “I told ya Franklin wasn’t special” just yet.

The jury is still out on Franklin.  How ’bout we see where things stand at the end of this season?  And even if Vandy suffers through a losing season, the young coach can still prove that he indeed is the man for the job if his recruiting holds.  To this writer, he still looks like a good hire.  Not a great one, not a terrible one, but a good one.  Now he needs time to prove how good.

Franklin shouldn’t be going into spin mode now.  He shouldn’t have to.  Fixing Vanderbilt’s football fortunes won’t be done over the span of just 15 contests.

A strong argument can be made that no athletic department in the SEC has done a better job of using internet video to promote itself than Vanderbilt’s.  (And now that David Williams has actually been named “athletic director,” it’s probably time to stop with the “but Vandy doesn’t have an athletic department” jokes.)

From behind-the-scenes video on signing day to the unveiling of the Commodores’ new unis, the folks at VU “get it” when it comes to marketing their new “anchor down” brand online.  Which is no surprise, these folk are at Vanderbilt after all.

Yesterday, a new video was posted at the school’s website showing the Vandy football team — players and coaches — having a “dance-off” in a team meeting room.  Silly?  Maybe.

But to a prospect watching the clip and seeing a grown man do the worm while head coach James Franklin laughs his rear off, it’s probably a pretty good inducement to answer the phone when VU calls.  Get an eduction, live in a big city, play better football — at least that will be Franklin’s pitch — and have a good time while doing it.

The guy doing the worm?  Offensive line coach Herb Hand.  Not bad.

Not a bad way to continue to promote one’s program, either.

Since James Franklin arrived at Vanderbilt, the Commodore athletic department has zipped to the forefront of SEC self-promotion.  And we don’t mean that in a bad way.

Whether it was a behind-the-scenes, documentary-style look at the VU offices on signing day or today’s multi-tiered coverage of the Dores’ new football uniforms, Vandy seems to “get it” in a way that most schools didn’t five years ago.

But the revolution has begun and more and more SEC schools are falling in line.  As newspapers die off, more schools are hiring their own beatwriters for their official websites (how honest the opinions and reporting are is debatable, but with fans as readers that probably won’t matter as many just want to read positive stories anyway).  Schools like Texas A&M have been using Facebook and social media to trumpet their own uniform unveiling today.  And now Ole Miss has gotten into the act with a well-produced video introducing the latest class of Rebel basketball players.

Pushed on Twitter by new UM athletic director Ross Bjork, the video is not just some clips from the Rebs’ summer workouts.  It’s an interest-generator for fans and ticket buyers as well as a recruiting tool for any hoops player with an internet connection.

And it’s very well done:

With cell phones that shoot HD video and inexpensive editing equipment that can make any video look like 35mm film, a new day has dawned for schools who can now market themselves more often, in new, more affordable ways than ever before.  I started working in television 20 years ago.  By today’s standards, the technology I used back then would compare to an anvil or a horse-and-buggy.

Schools no longer have to depend on outside coverage for buzz.  They can and do create their own.  SEC schools — like Ole Miss’ basketball program — are now taking full advantage of these new opportunities to brand themselves.

If not for the video above, Bjork’s tweet, and various websites that have posted the video after reading the tweet and watching the clip… would you be thinking about Mississippi’s basketball team today?  And that’s the point.

Vanderbilt’s new 2012 football uniforms have been unveiled and three things stand out:

1.  Vandy’s has incorporated a big black stripe on the shoulders of their gold jerseys, not unlike the jersey design of the crosstown Tennessee Titans.

2.  The Commodores will now have a white helmet (to go with their gold and black helmets).

3.  VU held their fashion store at a Barnes & Noble.  Not sure why I find that amusing, but it beats a chemistry lab.

More details on the new unis can be found right here.  (Did ya know that “Anchor Down” is stitched into the interior of each jersey neckline!?)

Video of the fashion show can be found here.

James Franklin says his players are happy with the new uniforms.  “Our players will tell you the gold jersey went from being the worst to being the best.”  Quarterback Jordan Rodgers said simply, “Look good, play good,” after descending down an escalator in VU’s new all-white uniform complete with the white helmet that was “hush-hush.”  At the unveiling, only the seniors knew about the white helmets.

“We wanted to save one more as a surprise for (the players),” Franklin said.  “We wanted our family, fans, the media, alumni and team to see them at the same time.”  While Franklin said Vandy will wear its traditional gold helmet on most occasions, his players seem to have a different new favorite look.

“My favorite is the white-black-white,” Rodgers said of the white helmet, black jersey, white pants combo.  “It’s awesome.”  Linebacker Tristan Strong agreed.  “Definitely the white-black-white.”

Franklin also used the opportunity to share his tough talk message with Commodore fans:

“You guys saw last year, we’re not gonna take a backseat to anybody.  You come into Vanderbilt Stadium you better be ready for a fight…  Change is happening.  The culture has been changed.”

In the end, Vanderbilt becomes the latest school to feature umpteen mix-and-match uniform combinations.  While this writer isn’t big on gold jerseys for any school unless they’re extremely shiny — hey, my story, my opinion — there’s certainly nothing too off the wall with the new design.  They’re less a break from tradition than what we’ve already seen at Missouri and Arkansas this offseason.

Texas A&M will break out their new uniforms this afternoon.  Here’s hoping they’ll go the VU route and tweak… rather than overhaul.

Looks like you can add another school to the long, long list of folks getting outfitted with new football uniforms this fall.  Once there was a day when schools would stick with the same uniform and design for years.  Now, if you’re not tweaking or overhauling things every other year, you’re falling behind.

Well, James Franklin isn’t allowing Vanderbilt to fall behind.  In fact, the second-year Commodore coach is picking up right where he left off last year by building another solid recruiting class.  And how do schools lure in teenage superstars?  With the promise of slick new unis.

According to an email sent from the VU ticket office to several Commodore boosters, new unis are indeed on the way in Nashville:

“Mark your calendar for the Commodore Football fashion event of the summer.  On July 11, the 2012 Commodore Football uniforms will be unveiled at the Vanderbilt Barnes and Noble Bookstore from 6:00 pm until 8:00 pm.  Check out the new look as it comes down the moving runway within the “official Commodore Gear Outlet”  located in the 2525 Building on West End, right across from Centennial Park.  James Franklin in a fashion show…surely you don’t want to miss that.”

Here’s hoping Vandy’s uniforms feature a traditional look with… oh, who am I kidding?  When in doubte expect any school’s new duds to be gaudy, flashy and over the top.  Especially when that school’s got a deal with Nike (and VU does).

Gimme $5 on the color “anthracite” being mentioned.

Last week, James Franklin tried to let down his hair — bad analogy — and he shared what he now claims was a joke on a Nashville radio station.  For those who missed it, he said that he won’t hire an assistant until he sees that the man has a pretty wife which, ha-ha, proves he can recruit.  (Ironically, he was led down the path toward that statement by the hosts of the show and they have probably been the biggest the coach’s biggest cheerleaders.)

When Franklin’s quote hit the internet, he quickly backtracked and apologized in a series of tweets.  Then Vandy de facto AD David Williams released a statement saying that Franklin’s poor statements were his own and not a reflection on Vanderbilt’s beliefs or policies.

But things didn’t stop there.  Some groups wanted Franklin’s scalp — wow, two unintentional hair jokes in one piece — and VU had to get out the word that no disciplinary action would be taken against Franklin.

Meanwhile, a columnist for The Baltimore Sun went so far over the weekend as to say that Franklin’s remarks proved that he is “a sexist” and “just another used car salesman.”  

To that we say — duh.  Football coaches are football coaches.  They’re not diplomats, rocket scientists or brain surgeons (though they make more money than all of those folks).  These guys are hired to win football games and the best way to win football games is to sign good players.  They’ll say anything and in some cases do anything to ink top talent.

Frankin a used car salesman?  Sure he is.  But his comment from last week doesn’t prove that.  His comment from last week only proves that when made to feel comfortable he can still come across as a stereotypical dumb jock in the media.  He’s not the first coach to make that mistake and he won’t be the last.

Franklin has been a controversial figure since arriving in Nashville.  He’s had some dust-ups with coaches at Georgia and Tennessee and now he’s put his foot in his mouth with a goofy statement on a radio show that tabs itself as providing more entertainment than credible information.  Franklin’s coach has got a little Lane Kiffin in him.  So has Dan Mullen at Mississippi State, for that matter.  None of those three have shown much fear of saying whatever the heck they want to say, consequences and angered rivals be damned.

That’s why the fans at Tennessee, Vanderbilt and MSU have all loved those guys.  And claimed that anyone criticizing them is just scared of their potential.  (In Kiffin’s case, Vol fans loved him right up until the time they hated him… it was a split-second flip-flop.)

But saying something goofy, snide, or bragadocious isn’t a fireable offense.  And Franklin’s comment was goofy, not heinous or terribly offensive.  We’ve all heard worse.  If Bobby Knight could survive his comments about rape 20 years ago, the fact that anyone would expect Franklin to catch heat over this recruiting analogy just shows how much times have changed.

Franklin was dumb.  The reaction has been dumber.

But here’s betting this won’t be the last time Franklin’s jaws cause him and his Vandy bosses some headaches.  He shoots from the lip and he’s fiery.  Most likely, he’ll pop off again.  Here’s hoping that when that happens, he won’t say something so offensive that he actually deserves the heat that he’s getting over his most recent comments.

The coach is good for Vanderbilt and that’s good for the SEC as a whole.  So someone should probably remind Franklin of a line that was stated to George C. Scott’s title character in the movie “Patton,” before he says something that could really do damage to his reputation or his standing — “Remember, your worst enemy is your own big mouth.”

The forward momentum at Vanderbilt keeps on keeping on.

Thanks to new life breathed into the program by second-year coach James Franklin, the school has announced plans to build a hill or “berm” at the open end of Vanderbilt Stadium for fans attending Dores’ games this fall.  The project will begin after Vandy’s spring scrimmage next week.

New SEC member Missouri has berm seating at one end of Faurot Field.  Groves Stadium at Wake Forest — where Vandy played last season with a number of its administrators on hand — also features a berm area.  Ditto Clemson’s and Virginia’s stadiums.

“I wouldn’t call it a hill,” VU de facto AD David Williams said at the announcement.  “But it certainly won’t look like it’s looking now.  Ours is on the line of, but not to the same effect as Wake’s.  Wake’s is a natural hill.  Ours is something we’re creating.  With Wake’s, I think you enter at the top.  Ours won’t be like that.  I don’t think there’s any place that has it like this because ours is not going to be that huge.”

Hillside tickets are already available and Vanderbilt is targeting families for the area.  According to Steve Walsh, the school’s director of sales and marketing:


“We want to appeal to fans with young kids… where their kids can run around and they can still watch the game and keep an eye on the kids.  We want to make it more of a ‘blanket in the park’ thing.”


The Dores’ coach would like bigger and better things added to the stadium eventually, but Franklin says this is a start.  “There have been discussions of building a football complex there.  There have been discussions of closing the stadium in (with permanent seating).  But until we prove we have a demand for those things, it’s hard to justify.”

He added: “This is a way to do something inexpensive, relatively speaking, that isn’t permanent.  It can be bulldozed if we decide (to do something different in the future).”

Vanderbilt fans proved last bowl season that they would travel by gobbling up their allotment of tickets for the Liberty Bowl in Memphis.  Now they’re being given another chance to step up and support what Franklin, Williams and Vanderbilt are attempting to build.

And that’s an honest to God SEC football program in Nashville.

Earlier this year, when former Maryland quarterback Danny O’Brien announced that he would transfer from the school, head coach Randy Edsall told him and two other departing Terrapins that they could not go to Vanderbilt.  The court of public opinion weighed in and the coach backtracked.

But after giving the players the green light to go wherever they liked, Edsall and Maryland filed an official complaint against Vanderbilt and ex-Terp offensive coordinator James Franklin for tampering.  The complaint went to the ACC which then filed it with the SEC.  VU officials were instructed to dig into the matter.

This afternoon, Vandy vice chancellor David Williams released a statement saying that the school had finished its internal investigation:


“We did a thorough review.  We looked closely at months of phone and email records, and Twitter accounts.  We interviewed all of our coaches with University of Maryland backgrounds and we also interviewed the student-athlete (O’Brien).”


And?  And? 

Vandy would not say if the report — which has been forwarded to the SEC office — revealed that tampering had taken place or not.  That said, I think we can all guess what Vanderbilt’s verdict would be.

“Our reputation is our primary concern,” Williams said.  “We have a long and proud history of playing by the letter and the spirit of the rules.  Coach Franklin feels the same way.  He and his staff were most cooperative.”

If Vandy found no tampering and the SEC finds no tampering, then it’s doubtful that the NCAA will dig further to determine if a secondary violation — and that’s what it would be — has taken place.

If/when O’Brien transfers to Vandy, he will have two years of eligibility remaining.

Score one for the road teams as Ole Miss surprised collapsing Arkansas in Fayetteville last night.  In Nashville, the Commodores sent their seniors out as winners and pulled into second-place tie in the SEC with downtrodden Florida.


Ole Miss 77, Arkansas 75

After opening the season 17-0 at Bud Walton Arena, the Razorbacks dropped their third straight home game last night in a battle of teams likely fighting for an NIT bid.  Making matters worse, Mike Anderson’s team blew a 15-point second-half lead.

The Rebels needed Terrance Henry’s three-point play — a bucket and a free throw — with 8.2 seconds remaining to steal the victory.  Henry finished with a game-high 19 points.  Ole Miss blew out LSU on Saturday and is suddenly riding a two-game winning streak after having dropped three in a row.

If you’re looking for consistency in the SEC, only Kentucky (good) and South Carolina (bad) offer it.



Vanderbilt 77, Florida 67

Florida’s struggles continued last night in Nashville as hot-shooting John Jenkins — six 3-pointers — gunned Vanderbilt to victory.  The Commodores have now won five of their last seven with both losses coming in single-digits to top-ranked Kentucky.  Translation: Vandy is playing its best basketball late.

The Gators are not.  Florida had won three games in a row until Will Yeguete — so important to UF’s front court — broke a bone in his left foot.  Since then Florida has fallen at Georgia in a bad 14-point loss Saturday and at Vandy.

Florida did show fight in last night’s game, twice getting within a point at about the five-minute mark, but Kevin Stallings team pulled away in the end


The Battle for the #2 Seed

The second seed in the SEC Tournament remains up for grabs at this point and there are still three team that can claim it, depending on tie-breakers:


* Florida can win with an upset of Kentucky at home on Sunday.  If the Gators win and Vandy loses to Tennessee, the Gators will grab the #2 seed outright.  If Vandy wins at Tennessee, both schools would finish with 11 SEC wins and the race would go to tie-breakers.  The schools went 1-1 against each other head-to-head, so their records against top-seeded Kentucky would be taken into account next.  UF would have beaten UK once while VU lost to the Cats in both their matchups.  Bottom line: Beat Kentucky and Florida grabs the #2 seed.

* Vanderbilt can win the #2 seed with a win over Tennessee on Saturday coupled with a Kentucky win over Florida the next day.  In that scenario, Vandy would finish with 11 league wins while UF would have only 10.

* Tennessee got the help it needed last night.  For the Volunteers to grab the #2 seed — and it’s still shocking that the Volunteers can even talk about this at this point of the season — they needed Florida to lose twice.  Vandy took care of the first one.  If the Gators lose to Kentucky, the UF will finish with 10 SEC wins.  If Tennessee beats LSU on the road tonight (tough) and then beats Vanderbilt at home on Saturday (tough), UT and Vandy would both close with 10 league wins as well.  In a three-team tie-breaker, the winning percentage amongst the tied teams would decide the race.  Tennessee would be 3-1 against UF and VU while those teams would 2-2 (VU) and 1-3 (UF).  Also, the Vols would still grab the tie-breaker even if Alabama matches the other three with 10 league wins.