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Bag of Mail

Mike Hamilton Sharpening the Knives?


Wednesday, October 15, 2008


I've gotten this from several of you today. I'm sure most Vol fans have already seen the interview UT AD Mike Hamilton gave the News-Sentinel. But lots of SEC fans probably haven't. Here are a few extracts.

Hamilton confirmed that some boosters have discussed Fulmer's possible replacement, but said those conversations have been limited.

More than just a .500 record, Fulmer is also fighting off apathy from UT’s fan base.

“You don't want apathy,” Hamilton said. “Apathy is a program killer.”

And not just the football program.

More than 80 percent of UT’s athletic department revenue comes from football, meaning apathy could harm most every sport on campus if allowed to grow unfettered.

“I think there's some fan apathy out there, yeah, without question, but I do think there's a lot of people that still want to be a part of that (Tennessee football) experience,” Hamilton said.

Hamilton said finances won't be an issue if a change is made. He said there is a $7 million reserve in place to cover such unforeseen expenses. That would nearly cover the cost of the football coaches’ buyouts, which Hamilton said could be over $7.5 million. That figure depends on whether coaches are hired elsewhere.


For those of you who are Kentucky fans the UT head coaching situation is beginning to eerily resemble the Tubby Smith imbroglio. Both coaches win a championship in 1998, meet with decent success after, but are never able to recapture what they've lost. Football is king at Tennessee and basketball is king at Kentucky. But the opposite sports start to rise in the SEC. Kentucky has back-to-back Music City Bowl wins and 8 win seasons in football, Tennessee is the defending SEC champs and has been a 2, a 4, and a 2 seed in the past three NCAA Tournaments.

The primary difference is that unlike Tubby Smith's jump to Minnesota Phil Fulmer is not going to leave Tennessee for another coaching job. But in the same way that UK fans were shocked when their AD came out and addressed the Tubby issue midseason, I have to admit I'm pretty shocked that it happened yesterday in Vol-land. Things are ominous on Rocky Top, ominous indeed.

As an aside, I've been very impressed with Mike Hamilton during our conversations and his hire of Bruce Pearl proves that he can make a difficult decision when need-be, but, man, I'd be lying if I said I saw this interview coming. Put plainly, you don't give this interview if it's your goal to lower the pressure on your coach.

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