SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE MEDIA DAYS

July 27, 2005

Phillip Fulmer

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: As I have said to everyone as we have gone through the day, I am really glad to be back in Birmingham and representing my school and with my players and looking forward to a really big season. I really regret that I wasn't able to be here last year and hate all the circumstances that kept me from being here last year. I haven't seen the commissioner yet, but if you see him make sure he knows that I was here because it can be expensive when you don't show up, you know. Charles, you make sure he knows I was here, will you please? A lot has happened over the last year. We had a good good football team last year, beat Georgia and Florida and Alabama in the same year, that's a really hard thing to do. SEC East champions as we came out of this meeting last year picked third, I think. Won our bowl game and a good year recruiting so it was a good year for the Tennessee Volunteers. Obviously there's a lot of interest in the last year that was squirreling all around the trial stuff and a lot of intense media coverage, especially here in Alabama and theatrics that were worthy of Oscars. Legal battles that went on and even some threats of harm to some of the people involved and their families and including mine. And I do not take that lightly and I am not well over that yet as far as being angry about that. The end results were two things, it was a criminal investigation and a conviction. The college football system of self-governance prevailed, the facts that came through all of that, there was cheating in Memphis Tennessee, a lot of coaches and others that tried to stop it, federal courts that proved it, consequences were assessed and a few people outside the main-stream of college sports tried to retaliate and lost the ridiculous and absurd conspiracy theories in the courts. Several media guys have asked me if I felt vindicated. We all fear, out-of-control boosters or people getting involved in our programs that prey on kids and their families; that are usually the less fortunate people. They usually have their own selfish reasons for doing it and we have seen it as gamblers do it, bad agents or their runners do it to our kids, and bad boosters do it. I truly believe that we all have an obligation and responsibility to keep our game clean of these people to the best of our abilities. I do appreciate and thank the people at the levels of this process that did the right thing and the cheating in Memphis has stopped. We have a great game and I respect all of our sister schools and the players and coaches and their loyal fans. I have been doing college football counting my playing days since the summer of 1968. I have a great love and great passion for the game of college football. I love the fall, especially the fall the games, the stadiums, the preparation, the planning, the camaraderie with the coaches and the players, the great wins, the tough losses, I enjoy the off-season program, spring and summer. Not anything about college football that I don't enjoy, especially the rivalries that we have in this great conference of ours. I love being around great players and celebrating their success, but I love just as much being around the second and third teamers that continue to be a part of the team to find their place on the team. With all that said, I understand and appreciate the standards and rules we abide by and the governing bodies we are accountable to. I have and will defend my program, my coaches and their families and their livelihoods, our loyal fans, and especially defend my player's rights to have a level field to compete on. As we stand here today the court cases are almost done, some people may choose to wallow in the stench of cheating for publicity purposes; the only writings that I am looking for is in the SEC's east and a chance to be a part of an SEC Championship game. I appreciate the many that stand besides me and supported me in this, especially my administration. I'd like to talk about our team and then I will take a few questions that you might have and I will answer them the best of my ability if it's a technical legal question obviously I am not an attorney, or if it's about something that's ongoing then I can't really comment on that at this particular time. As far as our football team, I think that we can have a very good football team. Our schedule is really hard. UAB is a tough football team to open with and then having to go on the road at Florida and LSU, is very difficult. If you look down the rest of it, having to go to Alabama and playing in Notre Dame and Kentucky Memphis, Vanderbilt. With the top-heavy schedule that we have it's really important for us and a challenge for us right now because we had a number of surgeries coming out of spring practice and coming out of the season that we report in great shape and great health. We have to be ready early. We don't have time to wait on somebody to get in shape. We don't have time to experiment a whole bunch. We certainly don't have time to waste any days and two days as we get ready for our season. A lot of things will center around our quarterbacks, last year at this time I couldn't begin to tell you who our quarterback would have been between the young men that went through spring practice. Those two freshman came in last year and just did a great job of inserting a lot of energy and enthusiasm into our football team. And we managed it very well and I think got the very most out of those guys throughout the year and then when we had the injury, Rick Clausen comes in like the white night and saves the day, led us to the SEC Championship game and also did very well in the bowl game. I don't know who our quarterback will be next year at this particular time but it will be a good one between Eric and Rick. I think Eric has a lot of the same qualities that Peyton Manning had when he came in as a freshman and sophomore. I am very encouraged about his future. Our wide receiver group as a whole should be one of the best in the league. I don't know if we exactly have the premier receivers, the guys like Dante Stalworth (phonetic) that were there, or that sort of thing, but Robert Mitchell and Chris Hannon could be those kinds of guys. As a unit I am really excited about them. We have a thousand yard rusher returning in Gerald Riggs. It will be interesting to see if Gerald can carry that load and manage it from a maturity standpoint that he prepares himself well every week. I have seen a lot of growth in Gerald over the last year and a half or so. But when we have been our best we have had two or three guys that have been able to compete and contribute at tailback. I hope that we can find a couple of guys that are youngsters that can come on and do that for us. Our offensive line, I expect to be as good as we have had at Tennessee. Arron Sears is a great football player. Not a good one; he's a great football player. Rob Smith is a captain junior, tell you what the rest of the team thinks of him in his ability, his toughness I am excited about him. Cody Douglas needs to be 100% well for us at right guard and right tackle Albert Toeaina has improved 100% since last year when he came in from junior college and had very little idea about the fundamentals and techniques. I am hopeful that he will be a big time player for us. Our center is questionable right now. Richard Gandy hurt his knee playing a pick-up game in the off-season. It is a concern right now whether he will be back for the opening game or the second game or just when he will get back. He's ahead of schedule and we expect him back. If he doesn't make it back or if he does, David Ligon has done a tremendous job of getting himself ready to participate. He took advantage of all the work that he got in the spring. Right now I will be comfortable with him being our center. Our tight end position, we haven't had a tight end really contribute a whole lot for us since Jason Whitten left early to go to pro football and we're still looking for that guy, Chris Brown did a good job when he came in and last year as a true freshman, Brad, a kid that has had shoulder problems last year, he's well, expect big things from him. He can really run, hopefully we will get more out of him. Took a punter, Justin Reade, made him into a tight end. He helped some. And walk-on Jake Finlayson helped some but we're not where we need to be right now at that position. Our defense last year times played outstanding we really struggled at the end of the year up until the bowl game and played really well in the bowl game. We overcame some injuries. We were the youngest defense in the conference at beginning of the year. They are all back. I expect big things from them. Paris Harson (phonetic) is as good a defensive end as there is in the conference. Jesse Malone was defensive tackle, ended up All-American for us, played really well. Justin Harrell, M.V.P. of the Cotton Bowl, had a great season for us, and the best of the bunch, I think didn't get a lot of credit last year. Turk McBride played both end and tackle. He may end up starting for us at right end or all uniting a lot of positions or taking one of those other starting spots. We have got some ability there, some depth that we're working with. I am encouraged about our defensive front. Our three linebackers will all be seniors. Kevin Simon is back and 100% he could have probably practiced more in the spring than he actually did after being lost for the year in the Florida game, second game last year. Two years ago he led us in tackles and I am expecting a huge year from Kevin. He's one of our leaders on our team and really outstanding football player. Omar Gaither filled in for him and made some all conference teams last year played exceptionally well for us and Jason Mitchell is the other senior linebacker that's also can run and done some good things. We have got some depth there so I am pretty happy with where we are at linebacker. In the secondary we will be I think better than at the beginning of the season than we were at any time last year because we will be more athletic in the secondary. I don't know how smart we are moving Jason Allen from safety to corner. That's kind of a twofold one; that's what he wanted to play and he chose to come back for his senior year and stay and play and he played there the year before and he will do a great job for us. The second reason is really the biggest reason, that it allows us to be more athletic in the secondary as we move Jonathan Hefney and Antwan Stewart from corners into the safety positions in the spring. That's why I said we will be better -- we will be more athletic, that's why. Left corners Jonathan Wade is a guy on our track team, I just think that we need to get a lot more out of him than what we have gotten because I think he's talented enough to be All-SEC or an All-American kind of football player, that's our challenge with him. Our kicker is back James Wilhoit in a really good year last year. You know things are tough when your kicker has surgery in the off-season. He had surgery on his foot as well but he's kicking really well right now. Expect big things from James. Punter Brad Cottam (phonetic) will be a big-time key for us in this process because he is only a freshman, having to go on the road to Florida and LSU very early there. He's going to have to do a great job for us. They all tell me, looks to me like Britten (phonetic) may be the most talented of the bunch. I hope that's right. Some of questions you might ask, we have got four newcomers in the league, makes it hard. It's kind of a double-edge sword. Actually because we are this summer having to go back and study their personnel that work for the school that they are currently at, having to study the schemes where they come from, that's a bit of a challenge but in the same token they haven't seen us either. Everybody but obviously Steve has at South Carolina. He's seen us every year for a lot of years. You might ask what I think about Steve coming back. I think he brings a lot of personality obviously to the conference and he's a great football coach and great competitor. We have accomplished a lot of things with the record and everything done pretty well there. You go back and look at winning the ACC at Duke, you know, I mean that's a big time accomplishment of what he was able to do, so obviously he will make them very competitive quickly. Instant replay, I think the technology of it, I don't see that we will see it is a big deal for us except it's another opportunity to get it right. All 12 coaches I think unanimously in the league wanted to have instant replay. I am looking forward to seeing how it works out. Typically again there's four or five SEC schools in the Top 25. It will be really interesting to see how all that shakes out during the year. You might ask about all the issues that everybody, a lot of people have had, especially us have had as far as kids getting in trouble, and we have lost a couple of good players because of that. I think we are working really diligently to try to get those kinds of issues straightened out and not after the fact, we have for a long time tried to be proactive to this. We have had a number of things that fortunately, knock on wood, that we hadn't had anything, you know, real, real bad, but enough that it makes you madder than heck because it distracts from all the good things that say that Jason Allens (phonetic) of the worlds do. Jason Allens worked with boys and girls clubs for four years every summer, been very, very dedicated to that along with a number of other kids that have gone out in the community and done a lot of great things. You have 85 kids on scholarship, I'd say most of the coaches have the same kind of thing. You don't have but four, five that you really have to worry about. The other 80 or 79, whatever the right number is, just doing, the good things and great things. It makes you mad when Michael Monius (phonetic) wins an award, the academic equivalent of the Heisman and we get on the fourth page of sports and one of the guys go out and screws up, and it's on the front page. It's not the media's fault; it's the fact that they are just out there getting in trouble. It distracts you and makes you very angry about having to deal with it. Last thing that is key for us obviously is going to be playing well early. Staying healthy, playing to our abilities because I think we have good ability and playing consistent. A few cases where a young kid will have to come through and basically talking about a tailback for us and then also a punter coming through and our center coming through. That's where we are and what we look forward to doing is getting started with two-a-days right now with football on our minds. Questions.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: You can actually contact them but you can't have workouts with them. You can bring them into your office and talk to them a lot. A head coach particularly but all the coaches are stretched pretty good because we are on the road for long periods of time in the off-season, you know, either fund-raising or recruiting during those times, I think everybody in this league at least would have really good support groups that manage the kids while you are gone. They have got to be saying the same thing that the coaches are saying. I think it needs to be looked at personally as to anything and I am not trying to speak for all the other coaches but I think everybody would be receptive that anything we can help ourselves be more accountable as student athletes, we are going to listen to it. The M.V.P. program that the conferences are proposing for everybody to adapt, we did that last spring and a real quick poll of our kids, they felt like it was a really good program. Well, as it turned out, we had four, five kids that ended up getting in trouble so how much impact did it really make? Maybe it made some, maybe it saved some others. My wife reminded me of this. I was really angry after a couple things that we had later and I was venting to her -- she said, all the kids that you lost, and we lost a really good player there, James Banks (phonetic), we couldn't -- he had great parents, you can't blame it on his environment, nothing like that, it's just really unfortunate that we couldn't get him to listen and change to the point that we had to let him go. I was venting about that. He says -- she said, just think of all the guys that you saved. I think back when I was a youngster, thank goodness that there were some coaches and people that took opportunities to help me and get me over some humps, so there was a lot kids that we do do great things for, but unfortunately sometimes the publicity comes to the ones that do poorly. We are all embarrassed about it. We hate it. We're going to continue to work on it. We would be really naive to stand here and think with 18 to 22-year-old kids there's never going to be any problems or issues. I have got three wonderful daughters that have been raised right and everything, but I don't always know what they are doing either. But we have had more than our share and more than we intend to tolerate.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: That's one of those things that I just said since it's kind of ongoing that I am not an attorney and I would answer it in the wrong fashion so I sure don't want to pour any gas on any fires anywhere. I will let the attorneys handle that one.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: I really don't want to go any further with that. Lot of the local guys knew that it was out there, and I did not take that lightly at all.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: Ended up on my cell phone actually after it was released but that's all right.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: As I said earlier I think Rick Clausen is absolutely one of the greatest stories in college football last year and he brings a leadership, a calm demeanor, an intellect of knowing our offense and managing to use the personnel around him very effectively. He's not going to be fooled too many times by disguises, those kinds of things, because he's been really in two outstanding programs at LSU and our place and had a lot of practice reps. And he has enough ability to get the ball out to where he wants to get it out to. Eric has the ability to be, I think, one of the finest quarterbacks in the country as he matures and how fast he matures depends on how much leeway that we will continue to give him. If you look back last year he made a couple of those in the Florida game that made a tremendous difference in the game. He made a play at Georgia for a touch down to Brett Smith that made a difference in the ballgame. Later on a third and quite long - I don't remember exactly - threw the ball, it was a big-time throw. Just as intellectual as Rick, has worked diligently at the game, I expect great things from him. So when we name a starter, I can't tell you exactly that, but it's an entirely different situation when we started last season. If our kids would rally around those two I think they will both or either one, then I think that we will be fine.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: No, I didn't.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: I am appreciative -- well, why should I? This is the kickoff of the season. Exciting time. Most of the issues are over with to any great degree and I am not avoiding everybody, didn't last year, just the circumstances were such and didn't have anything to do with subpoenas or anything it was adjusting issue. Everybody really needs to go look at that. I didn't understand it for a while either. I am glad to be here. This kicks off our season. It has for a lot of years and the volatility of our profession and the high expectations that are out there for coaches these days, you know, we don't get to exchange like this very often with these many people and tell folks about our programs. I like that. As much as you think I don't, I like it.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: Not a lot of people. A couple of guys.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: I think I basically expressed it in my opening, yes.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: I am not going to give any advice to Steve. (Laughter) (inaudible) I already said what I think of Steve. What an incredible coach and what a great job he's done, he will do a great job for South Carolina. As I said, the other coaches, I don't have any advice for them. They are very mature guys and very capable guys and competitors now. But until they have actually experienced this conference and this league you have no way to understand the depth of the incredible rivalries that are here. And as I said, that's one of the trademarks of this conference and one of the great things about this conference is you go into the unbelievable environments to play and most of the time they are really clean hard fought tough football games and I know they have been in good leagues and good schools and good places and everything, but there's no comparison to going to the Swamp or going to Death Valley or hopefully coming to our stadium or down to Auburn. Those are great venues to play in. They will have to experience that themselves.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: Well, I don't know. I don't know if there's any demands I didn't anticipate. I don't know that I really appreciated you know, for a while the scrutiny that you would be under, you know, as a coach or really appreciated why we were under so much scrutiny. At first you never really know -- I am thinking back when I first started in the league -- heck, can you get this done, can you do it because you have never done it before. I thought I could and I know I was going to work hard enough to, but you didn't know for sure if you were going to be able to. Who could you trust, who is your mentors and confidantes, those things, and I think I have grown you know, in the job and matured in the position to, which you should after 14 years, and -- 14 years as a head coach, there's lots of things that have changed over the years and the accountability is the biggest thing probably. They pay us a lot of money to do what we do, and I am not saying that accountability shouldn't be there. It certainly should be. Whether it's winning enough games to keep your job, which I think every school in our conference has changed at least once most of them twice, you know, in my 14 years, whether it's accountability of the kids doing the right things off the field; whether it's accountability of maintaining a level playing field at your school; that we don't cheat, and all those things, I have come to accept rather than fight. I think those are good things for college football. One of the issues I have out there and it is an issue -- we continue to allow a lesser student into our universities and that everybody -- yet we're requiring a lot more of them once they get there than ever before. That doesn't fit. That doesn't make sense. It needs to be a national thing because the Southeastern Conference can't do it just themselves. They are cutting their throats if we do that. But if we get a national movement to pass, that certain standards to get in schools all of your lives will be a lot better from accountability standpoint, academically socially and other things, but I am probably preaching to the choir, you guys know that--

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: Every year -- I don't have a crystal ball to really know all their personnel and what will happen, but I am sure Steve will have them ready to play and they will have a good team. We have got so much to do before we get to them. We don't spend a whole lot of time on them in the off-season not because they are not a threat but we usually try to concentrate on the first four games that we play. Coaching changes, it's incredible. I mean, I inherited a program that was in pretty good shape when I became the head coach and sometimes maintaining it and building, on it is harder than starting all over again because you have got all the dynamics in place already and very few changes I had to make two or three big things, but these guys are all coming into to quality programs and people like Tennessee they will be patient to a point but not too long and so they understand that. They are big boys and certainly realize the challenges that they have as we do. The thing that we have done the best, I think, enabled to maintain our consistency, is we have stayed together as a staff for a long time so there's been continuity in that and the players are hearing the same things constantly, and the recruiting base has pretty much stayed the same as far as who is out doing those kinds of things, and once they get there we really work hard to develop our kids and develop them to their fullest in the academic area and great young men hopefully you know, like a Jason Allen who is here with us, that's going to have a chance to have his second degree at the end of December and hopefully be a first-round draft choice.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: You mean internal off the field things that are --

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: Certain things you have got to do as a head coach and as assistant coach. Obviously the recruiting and usually the time you have your issues is in January and February right after the season, things start and coaches aren't there and then in the spring and we have tried to be as I said proactive in putting some road blocks up to those things. We have intramural basketball games. I have a coach in charge of that. I build a relationship with those folks on campus that are in charge and if there's any issues with our kids they pick up the phone and let us know. They go to most of the games. We have places that our kids go on campus and stuff and not myself personally recently, but we frequent those places from time to time just to let them know we're going to be there and everything. How do you keep a kid from -- after you have a huge win like we can over Florida, he goes out on his balcony and shoots a gun in the air. Where did he get the gun? Never had a problem, excellent student, you know, da-da-da, one circumstance leads to another and we all get -- instead of celebrating a huge win, we all get embarrassed as heck nationally over something stupid. Try to do a better job of orientating them on the front end. I had a young man long time ago that we signed from Detroit, Michigan and he came to campus and since he was in 8th grade he carried a gun. I said we don't -- I mean, you don't have to carry one in Knocksville, Tennessee. It's not like that. It took a little cultural change for him but he understood and now he's working and has great job over in Memphis and doing really well with his family but he just didn't understand. Making him understand -- I am not talking about just inner city kids either, I am talking about the kids from the country, so many of these -- I have talked to so many groups, I don't know what I said to y'all. Two parents, maybe the grandmother has raised him and she's done the best that she could or both parents working in this day and age, it's not just a football issue or a college football thing, it's a societal issue and cultural issue that we better darn sure face. We'll take any help from anybody that we can get. Because in the end I've got to win enough games to keep my job, but I love my job because I love kids. I love watching kids grow into manhood and it sounds corny as heck but that's really the essence of what you enjoy the most about college football. They think they are men when they come in, but they are kids, they are adolescents. When they leave at 22 and if, 24, whatever it is, they are men, they are much more ready for life and to be a husband, be a father those kind of things and to me, that's huge.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: We didn't beat him enough in there. We beat him the last two out of the last four or something like that, I can't remember exactly. When I first heard he was coming back I said, oh, crap, something like that (laughter), something like that. He's an interesting personality. Dynamic personality, and I think he very much knows that he has got a real demanding job in front of him to do that, but if anybody can do it, he can.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: It's really difficult. I thought Randy -- Randy has taken a lot of grief, you know, after the -- he was a hero, Randy, our offensive coordinator, in 1998, he was a hero, basically called the game in the National Championship game was former Tennessee quarterback, '99 he did fine because he had a lot of really good players. We graduated a lot of kids that year. And lost five juniors to the NFL. In 2000 he wasn't such a hero anymore because we were playing with lesser people than we had been playing with, that needed time to develop. Well, 2001 all of a sudden he's a hero again because we are right there in the SEC Championship game: He's a good play-caller, again all of a sudden in 2003, two and 3 all of a sudden it is a little bit different I guess. What was the question?

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: Randy did a fabulous job last year with those two freshmen and not giving them too much to do, using the strengths around them, whether personnel strengths, from a formation standpoint trying to keep people off balance and not putting them in positions where they are going to have to make a whole lot of big-time decisions. As smart as Eric was last year, obviously smart, still those few seconds that he has to make a decision, we did not give him that opportunity as a freshman. He will get more now as he goes along, but not short-circuiting their circuits is really important and let them play. We had a bit of a setback yesterday, actually found out that Johnathan our really outstanding freshman, our incoming freshman quarterback probably is going to have shoulder surgery and probably miss the season with it from an old high school injury. We're not only trying to get our older guys ready, we're going to have to find the young guys we know last year, we have got to have a third team guy.

COACH PHILLIP FULMER: I have got a fabulous reception. I appreciate it very, very much. I really do. As I said, I respect all of our schools in our conference and especially the great tradition in Alabama and all that they have accomplished in the past. It's unfortunate that they have had to endure some significant consequences, especially the innocent kids that had nothing to do with any of that because of the actions of a few. You can shoot the messenger if you want to or whatever, but you really got to go back to the root of the problem. I'd like to get back to where we have a completely great, clean, tough, hard fought rivalry; and have none of this other stench in it. Whether we can get to that, I don't know, but I have no hard feelings against anybody that's a true Alabama fan.