Elite but change is needed

[aubiefifty 16,766]

Joseph Goodman: Auburn remains elite, but change is needed

Updated: Sep. 30, 2022, 8:19 a.m.|Published: Sep. 30, 2022, 7:44 a.m.

7-9 minutes

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Any mid- to lower-tier roasting of former Alabama quarterback AJ McCarron should begin by pointing out that someone who opens a sushi restaurant and names it “Ajian” as a sort of joke maybe, just maybe, lacks the integrity required for honest words in a public space.

Great guest for a sports podcast, in other words.

McCarron went on the entertaining Slow News Day pod this week, and took the opportunity to slap at punch-drunk Auburn just as the Tigers stumble into the oncoming traffic of the most difficult schedule in the country. McCarron was entertaining. I laughed, so I give him credit for that. He called Auburn a “middle- to lower-tier” team in the SEC.

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GOODMAN: Joe vs. the Pro and the Hero

He was wrong, of course. Auburn has sabotaged itself for a couple years now with a weird form of seditious behavior one might call the Down Home Disagreement, but Auburn football is among the top teams in the conference and the country when it comes to all the significant measures of prestige: money, history, facilities, fans and, of course, dedicated boosters.

“The big-money people at Auburn, they look at Auburn in a whole different level than reality, especially right now,” McCarron said.

No, pretty much everyone who has seen Auburn play football this season understands the team is hurting. That doesn’t mean Auburn is doomed for years of losing football, though. It just means the Tigers need a better coach.

Laughing at a funeral, heaping dirt on a sick foe, Airport Boulevard Adam Levine will not be the last Crimson McKaren this season to celebrate Auburn’s sad misery. What? Is he supposed to go easy on Auburn? Heck no.

Some took his words as an insult, but anyone who understands the effects of getting hit in the head by one too many Moon Pies during Mardi Gras knows the dizzying truth. It was actually just a sign of respect. McCarron’s was the kind of tongue-wagging banter that makes the Iron Bowl an unending saga of hate, and one of the best rivalries in sports.

When it comes to Auburn’s long-term trajectory, I remain optimistic despite the unfortunate circumstances caused by one of the worst hires in the history of SEC football. That’s what Auburn coach Bryan Harsin represents, and that’s why this weekend is so important.

Auburn (3-1, 1-0 in the SEC) has LSU (3-1, 1-0 SEC) at home on Saturday, and the matchup presents a litmus test for the current state of Auburn football. Like, how bad is it really? Well, we’re all about to find out.

Why is it that when Auburn and LSU get together, more often than not, the game is served with a side-helping of existential dread for one side or the other? It’s because the programs are so similar. Last season, LSU’s loss in Baton Rouge to Auburn sounded the death knell for coach Ed Orgeron. The game of Bo Nix and his magic tricks was Auburn’s first win in Baton Rouge since 1999.

Go back to Auburn 18, LSU 13 in 2016. It represented Les Miles’ last blunder with the Tigers. He was fired the following day. This game at Jordan-Hare Stadium hits with the same urgency for Auburn, which understands how it arrived near the bottom of the SEC power rankings this season better than anyone. It’s the consequence of not hiring a proven coach and instead taking a flier on someone unknown in the hopes of being the athletics director who found the diamond in the rough.

Former Auburn athletics director Allen Greene chose incorrectly, and now he’s gone. Greene gambled with one of Alabama’s most important cultural treasures. What does a good hire look like? Don’t turn away, Auburn, even if it hurts. Greene guessed with Harsin. LSU athletics director Scott Woodward, a person who better respects the public trust tied to football in the SEC, went with Brian Kelly to fix a program spiraling out of control.

LSU began this season in shambles, but Kelly, despite all the jokes about his accent and awkward tendencies, has with impressive suddenness turned around LSU’s outlook not only for this season but probably beyond.

LSU lost enormous amounts of talent in the offseason, but Kelly hit the transfer portal and found replacements. Quarterback Max Johnson ditched LSU for rival Texas A&M, but Kelly’s first signal caller with the Tigers, Jayden Daniels of Arizona State, is actually a lot better than his predecessor. Is Kelly a fish-out-of-water at Baton Rouge dinner parties? Yeah, maybe so, but the guy can coach and that shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. He came to LSU as the coach with the most wins in Notre Dame history.

Kelly was a good hire, and LSU is now well-positioned for life in a new era of the SEC that’s about to include Texas, Oklahoma, a new scheduling format and the opportunity to make a 12-team playoff even with a loss to Alabama.

Auburn, despite everything that has happened over the last few years, has the money and the prestige to hire someone better than Kelly. That’s why Auburn remains one of the top football schools in the country. And, hear me out, what if Auburn and Georgia don’t play every season anymore when the SEC decides on its new scheduling system?

Urban Meyer won a national championship at Florida in his second season. Despite all of Florida’s success with Meyer and Steve Spurrier, Auburn leads the all-time series against the Gators 43-39-2. Auburn is elite, but it’s time to stop fooling around. The transfer portal and NIL collectives can bring Auburn back quickly.

The truth is that Auburn is the equal of Alabama in every way except for one very important reason, and that reason is Nick Saban. Even still, despite Alabama’s unmatched success over the last 15 years, Auburn is only one blown lead in the 2021 Iron Bowl away from leading Alabama in the head-to-head series since 1981. That’s when Pat Dye unlocked the Tigers’ potential and forever changed the dynamics of college football in the SEC.

Since Dye, Auburn has twice won at least four games in a row against Alabama. Tommy Tuberville, of course, won six straight Iron Bowls from 2002 to 2007. Since the 1980s, Alabama, even with Saban, has never won more than three straight against the Tigers.

What does average look like? Alabama’s record in Jordan-Hare Stadium since the first Iron Bowl at Auburn in 1989. It’s 6-11.

And, when it comes to all things Saban, Georgia can also thank Alabama’s coach for help against the Tigers. Saban’s protégé, Kirby Smart, is 6-1 against Auburn, which has allowed the Bulldogs to take a slight lead in the all-time series of the Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry, 62-56-8.

The big fish eat the little fish in this sea of cannibals, and Auburn’s only sin is being a greedy shark.

It’s not my job to go trawling for hope on behalf of Auburn, though. The nets are dragging the bottom now, and it doesn’t take a fishmonger from Mobile to recognize the signs of rot.

Joseph Goodman is a columnist for the Alabama Media Group, and author of “We Want Bama: A season of hope and the making of Nick Saban’s ‘ultimate team’”. You can find him on Twitter @JoeGoodmanJr.

 

mr goodman is kissing up boys............lol. hell just froze over

Edited September 30, 2022 by aubiefifty

[Tiger 8,822]

He's not wrong here though

[AUwent 3,748]

The coach of five of the last six home losers of the Tiger Bowl was not there the next season.

Edited September 30, 2022 by AUwent

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,662]

I’ve honestly never seen an article from Goodman that was explicitly anti-Auburn. Hell most of them are just anti-Harsin, who has been a joke from mid 2021, in terms of off the field material. 
 

Unfortunately many people can’t appreciate a good writer if it is criticizing their interest, but I always appreciate his style of writing 

[aubiefifty 16,766]

Paul Finebaum on AJ McCarron’s Bryan Harsin take: ‘He’s now 0-2 in the last 2 encounters with Auburn’

Updated: Sep. 29, 2022, 2:05 p.m.|Published: Sep. 29, 2022, 11:02 a.m.

3 minutes

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AJ McCarron talks to Kendrick Able Sr. and Kendrick Able Jr. on Thursday, July 7, 2022, at Academy Sports + Outdoors in Mobile. (Mark Inabinett/minabinett@al.com)

Paul Finebaum isn’t buying what AJ McCarron is selling.

A day after the former Alabama quarterback told WNSP-FM 105.5 in Mobile - as well as “The Ringer” podcast “Slow News Day” - that Auburn coach Bryan Harsin has been told he is out at the end of the season, Finebaum, the SEC Network analyst, questioned the lack of evidence to support such a claim.

“AJ has fumbled this one terribly,” Finebaum told me on “The Opening Kickoff” on WNSP-FM 105.5 on Thursday morning. “He’s now 0-2 in his last two encounters with Auburn.”

The reference, of course, is to the 2013 Iron Bowl in which the McCarron-led undefeated Tide suffered a 34-28 loss in the famous “Kick 6″ game.

“There’s no justification for that,” Finebaum said of McCarron’s claim. “There’s no evidence of that. When I heard that yesterday, I did what any ‘legitimate’ reporter would do and that was to dig as deep as possible with available sources. There’s no evidence to support that.

“I’ve only done this for 40 years. I don’t have the journalistic chops and Pulitzer Prizes that AJ McCarron has on his wall, but I would like to know what he is basing that on other than some rumor he heard in a men’s room.”

On Wednesday, McCarron - a Mobile native - told WNSP, citing sources, of Auburn, “It’s a dumpster fire. Things I’ve heard behind the scenes from some people that are very well-connected up there, I’m sure other people know: I heard he’s already gone. That he’s already been told he’ll finish out this year, and you’re done.”

He went on to add that, “I heard if he would’ve lost to Missouri, he was done on Sunday. I think if it is a lower-tier SEC school that he has on the schedule - and it’s a bad loss - I think they have no problem letting him go (before the end of the season).”

As far as Finebaum is concerned, nothing has changed since last week in regard to Harsin’s future.

“To me, it’s a situation where most people accept the inevitable and are now waiting and watching,” Finebaum said. “If you’re an Auburn fan, you go to the games and hope your team wins. I don’t think anyone outside of Harsin’s family walked out of the stadium (after beating Missouri) feeling particularly good.

“That was an abominable performance.”

Mark Heim is a sports reporter for The Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @Mark_Heim.

If you purchase a product or register for an account through one of the links on our site, we may receive compensation.

[aubiefifty 16,766]

remember here, today, finebaum and goodman talked well about us.

Edited September 30, 2022 by aubiefifty

[Muscle Shoals Tiger 144]

8 minutes ago, Dual-Threat Rigby said:

I’ve honestly never seen an article from Goodman that was explicitly anti-Auburn. Hell most of them are just anti-Harsin, who has been a joke from mid 2021, in terms of off the field material. 
 

Unfortunately many people can’t appreciate a good writer if it is criticizing their interest, but I always appreciate his style of writing 

I rarely agree with him, but he's got a point here. We are a great place for Football  and have great fans and facilities.  Harsin is wrong for Auburn and the SEC. If we can't recruit we can't be competitive.

[aubiefifty 16,766]

2 minutes ago, Muscle Shoals Tiger said:

I rarely agree with him, but he's got a point here. We are a great place for Football  and have great fans and facilities.  Harsin is wrong for Auburn and the SEC. If we can't recruit we can't be competitive.

i think we might have needed that little bit of love today.

[Viper 3,132]

2 hours ago, aubiefifty said:

seperately

My English professor taught us there is “a 🐀” in separate.

[aubiefifty 16,766]

4 minutes ago, Viper said:

My English professor taught us there is “a 🐀” in separate.

can you repeat that again in red ink for me please? 

Edited September 30, 2022 by aubiefifty

[woodford 3,655]

I thought that said McElroy at first and was very surprised because he's very intelligent and approaches football with an open mind. AJ McCarron is white trash. Does anyone remember his mom and his chest tatt? Lmao who cares about this guy

 

 

[Old fan 47 770]

21 minutes ago, woodford said:

I thought that said McElroy at first and was very surprised because he's very intelligent and approaches football with an open mind. AJ McCarron is white trash. Does anyone remember his mom and his chest tatt? Lmao who cares about this guy

 

 

His best claim to fame is marrying a gorgeous AU alum way out of his pee wee league. 

[zeroforwinger 443]

Airport Blvd. Adam Levine hahahaha

[Viper 3,132]

1 hour ago, aubiefifty said:

can you repeat that again in red ink for me please? 

[aubiefifty 16,766]

9 minutes ago, Viper said:

i am going to need to see copies of your degree now.

[Viper 3,132]

41 minutes ago, aubiefifty said:

i am going to need to see copies of your degree now.

[aubiefifty 16,766]

and i will need at least three people on this site to verify you are a genius.

[einatlanta 502]

23 minutes ago, aubiefifty said:

and i will need at least three people on this site to verify you are a genius.

I will absolutely attest to this man's brilliance!........this was about Bruce Pearl correct?

[TeamZero77 1,784]

The only time I want to see AJ McCarron is when his smoking hot wife and his hot mom are accompanying him. 

Seriously though, this is what makes the Auburn/Alabama rivalry so great. Talk smack about the other team and their fanbase and also kick them everytime they're down. We ran our mouths at will during the Dubose/Franchione/Price/Shula years and their fanbase does the same. 

It is what it is and Auburn needs to get better.

[AUx 3,001]

AJ McCarrion. Bless his widdle heart.

[Tigger1985 806]

AJ Moron is still crying from his loss at Auburn. Also what “sources” would he have at Auburn? His wife never ever went to a ballgame per her words.

[tsande07 271]

Wow...