Arkansas Sports 360 - ArkansasSports360.com

7/25/2011 at 2:50pm

It's hard to believe that one year ago, Vanderbilt interim-soon-to-be-head-coach Robbie Caldwell was the star of the Southeastern Conference Media Days. In a poll on this site, he ranked tops among the 12 SEC coaches in their performance before the main media in the three-day confab at Hoover, Ala.

Caldwell was gone from Vanderbilt before the 2-9 Commodores finished up losing to Tennessee to complete a dreary season in which the wannabe standup comedian proved he was a lifer assistant coach and not cut out for dueling with the big dogs.

Vanderbilt and Florida had the only new faces last week in Hoover.

Will Muschamp, longtime coach in waiting at Texas, former Georgia Bulldog and former assistant at Auburn and LSU, begins his head coaching career at Florida.

Meanwhile, James Franklin, formerly offensive coordinator for Ralph Friedgen at Maryland, tried to sell the same spiel that Vanderbilt has everything a recruit is looking for and, soon enough, the Commodores can be lining up with similar manpower to Alabama and Florida. Franklin was a solid VU and Nashville city spokesman, to be sure, but maybe it's also a good thing he didn't do stand-up and have the main media room bursting with laughter. The media were only chuckling under their breath that Franklin actually believes that hooyah about recruiting the top talent to Nashville. (A college coach who was a great recruiter of talent long ago told us it starts with "winning," and at VU that will take a while.)

Steve Spurrier entertained us with his well-timed barbs at rivals, and typically straight-forward Nick Saban had the media laughing at themselves at times. If Gene Chizik had not been questioned nine times out of 23 questions on Thursday about the NCAA investigation into the Cam Newton recruitment, the walls of the large Wynfrey Hotel ballroom would have been rattled by the mass snoring.

Houston Nutt didn't disappoint — he said he didn't mind regularly being picked last in the division, which to some in the media seemed to be THE problem he just doesn't get. And Les Miles may be the absent-minded mad scientist who stumbled into an empty coaching office one day and stayed, but he was maybe the most likable guy in the room. He was the last guy, after lunch on Friday, so maybe that's why he was so liked.

Here's how the SEC coaches performed at Media Days:

1. Steve Spurrier, South Carolina. We just love it when he cracks wise. He complimented Mississippi State on finally getting its own jet. He evoked the word "stupid" at least twice with his regular doghouse inhabitant, quarterback Stephen Garcia. He sounded like he thinks his program has finally turned a corner recruiting the difference makers. But, even in winning a division last year, he called last season's team "mediocre," citing its middle-of-the-pack statistical standing on offense and defense. He's still near-impossible to please.

2. Les Miles, LSU. We asked Miles about CBS's move of the LSU-Arkansas game back to Friday after Thanksgiving, where it was for a decade until the network wanted Alabama-Auburn there. Rather than give us a Gene Chizik-like answer and say, "I'm only looking to the Oregon game and nothing past that," he gave us a good answer. That alone put him in the top three, and there was a certain earnestness in all his answers that put him above coach-speak. Well done, Lester. It appears he feels no hot seat in Baton Rouge.

3. Nick Saban, Alabama. He makes no excuses. He says Alabama has some manpower problems it didn't have in the past couple of years, such as in the defensive line, but he also acknowledged that Alabama (the state, the fans, the school) expects a level of excellence that he fully expects to meet. No beating around the bush. He even asked Tide fans to show Auburn's faithful some respect. Maybe he really did say something to the Tide fan in the "I Hate Auburn" T-shirt.

4. Derek Dooley, Tennessee. He's funny and smart. He said he was 8-7 in post-game handshakes last season (the Vols were 7-6 in actual record). Dooley made light of his shortcomings in those bizarre losses, and he was conversational. He's probably too nice to be a big winner in the SEC.

5. Will Muschamp, Florida. Young, sharp, matter-of-fact about the situation but still with some energy in the way he talked about his Gators. He gave his assistants plenty of credit up to this point, especially former NFL offensive guru Charlie Weis.

6. Mark Richt, Georgia. Class, as usual. He evoked the Bible a couple of times, and had a "que sera, sera" approach to his being on the proverbial hot seat this season after 10 years, but he sure sounded honest. He could have a good career on television after this season, if it doesn't work out.

7. Dan Mullen, Mississippi State. Anybody who can sell Starkville, Miss., the way Mullen did during his 30 minutes in the big room deserves to be in the top half of this poll. He's still childishly petty, refusing to refer to rival Ole Miss by name. Two years ago, in his first Media Days, we recall a Mullen who was fired up but not to the level he seemed last week. We think he honestly likes the team he has coming back (similar to Bobby Petrino). We can see how he gets the team, and the fans, energized in Starkville. In fact, we're almost ready to move there.

8. Bobby Petrino, Arkansas. Mostly monotone, as usual. But Petrino took on all questions and returned solid answers, not beating around the bush. He just flat-out expects nothing short of winning.

9. Joker Phillips, Kentucky. If Kentucky (the state, the school, the fans) ever needed a cheerleader, this guy is it. He's bled blue since playing for Jerry Claiborne in the 1980s. He needed an editor for his Media Days address, though: Once he said "We've made some positive changes with our coaches." Gosh help him or any coach if they're forced to make negative changes. One of those hires was bringing on Rick Minter, the one-time Arkansas grad assistant who played and started coaching at Henderson State. Minter, regarded as a top defensive mind, was once Joker's mentor; now the roles are reversed, and Joker joked that he had to remind Minter of that once earlier this year when he told his new coach to bring someone over to Joker's house for dinner.

10. James Franklin, Vanderbilt. The new Vanderbilt coach was the only one of the 12 coaches to not start with any opening statement. He went right to fielding questions. As it turned out, his time on the podium was short and sweet. Maybe we should have rated him higher just for that.

11. Houston Nutt, Ole Miss. With Nutt, as Arkansas fans learned, it quickly turns to what happened in the past. Just as Arkansas fans tired of hearing how Nutt was the first coach to regularly beat SMU, Ole Miss fans have to be worn out hearing "Fifty years." Ole Miss may have lost on the field to Mississippi State the past two years, but the Rebs won the recruiting battle in February, he reminded us. He did credit Arkansas with having a "great" year last season, which is a big step for him.

12. Gene Chizik, Auburn. There is simply no way this is the same guy who addresses the Auburn football team before games. This guy was a robot. And since few media wanted to know much about the team he has coming back, he was evasive, evasive, evasive. Concerning any worry about the NCAA investigation, which led him to confront an NCAA enforcement official in Destin, Fla., at the league's spring meetings, he says he sleeps well at night when his head hits the pillow. We got the feeling it was: denial, denial, denial.

Email: jharris@abpg.com. Also follow Jim on Twitter @jimharris360.

Tagged: Bobby Petrino, Nick Saban, Will Muschamp, Derek Dooley, Steve Spurrier, Mark Richt, James Franklin, Gene Chizik, Les Miles, Houston Nutt, Dan Mullen, Joker Phillips, Alabama Crimson Tide, Auburn Tigers, LSU Tigers, Ole Miss Rebels, Mississippi State Bulldogs, South Carolina Gamecocks, Florida Gators, Vanderbilt Commodores, Tennessee Vols, Kentucky Wildcats, Georgia Buldogs, Southeastern Conference, 2011 SEC Media Days, Hoover, Alabama