In case no one’s seen the video, here’s a transcript of it…
“It’s not fun, and it’s certainly not easy when you get fired. That’s a bad day. Okay. That’s not a good day at the office.
“I do want to thank…I got a lot of…I’ve been here nine years and I got a lot of good memories, lot of people, players, coaches, fans, in a nine-year period of time that we were really lucky and fortunate to be around, to have a chance to be a part of them, and I don’t want to take anything for that.
“I do want to say that, to our people, we got some really good fans. But they got to stand up right now. Okay? And sometimes when you’re the head coach, you can’t say things. Because if you do it’s kind of sour grapes. You know? You can’t say exactly what it is. But what I would say to them is now is the time to stand up for your university and your football program.
“I’m the seventh straight coach that stands here, saying the same things to you. This is the seventh straight time this has happened. And history will continue to repeat itself, folks, if they don’t do something about it.
“Whoever they hire, they’ll hire a good guy, and I’ll pull for them. Okay? But our fans have got to demand…you gotta do one of two things. You have to demand that you give him an equal stick to fight with within our conference. You gotta give him a level playing field to fight. Give him that.
“Stobart stood here the same way. Stobart became a bad coach. Wouldn’t recruit and he was a bad coach. But he was good enough to beat Southern Cal. And Rip became a bad coach and wouldn’t recruit. But he could beat Peyton Manning and Tennessee. We could beat Eli in his senior year and Ole Miss again the next year down there.
“At some point in time you gotta say ‘we gotta help this football program. We gotta do the things necessary to make this what we want, or do away with it.’ And I couldn’t say that as a coach, but you gotta do one or the other because it’s too painful. It’s painful. For coaches, for players and for people, for fans, it’s painful.
“Put something in it or do away with it. One or the other. That’s what they should do.
“And I don’t say that in a negative way. I’ve been here nine years. I got nine years of my life invested here. Hard years. Hard years. Fighting years. Every day, a fist fight to try to move this program. I don’t say any of it in a negative way. I say it in a very positive way, because I want to see this program be successful.
“The only other thing I would say is you gotta somehow take the negative out of it. You gotta find a way to get the negative surrounding this thing out of it. I don’t know how you do it, I don’t know if you can do it. But you gotta do that.
“Because there is a group, there is a negativity like nowhere I’ve ever coached, I’ve coached at a lot of places, this is the only place. There’s a negativity here that, in the end, eats you up. It’s hard to win. Today’s game, it’s harder to win than it’s ever been. And if you gotta fight battles around your own program and around your own campus and around your own city, it’s hard. It makes it very difficult.
“If you want to be…don’t be negative. Ask what you can do to help the football program. Instead of being negative about the coach or the team, ‘what can I do to help? How can I help?’ Come to a game and bring somebody with you. Do that for the next guy. Give him a fighting chance.
“Just like our…and I’m not picking on our paper, but instead of writing sarcastic, smart-aleck remark articles, why not call me and ask me, ‘coach, what can I do to help your football program? We love this city, we love this university and we love this football program. And we’d love to see it be succe…How can I help it?’ Instead of running it down all the time, when it doesn’t go exactly right and running it down. Do something to help. Give the next guy a fighting chance. That’s what I would ask all of our fans.
“But to our fans, demand that he get a fighting chance or give it up, one or the other. Thank you very much.”
