DISLIKING DEREK DOOLEY: A PROPAGANDIST'S GUIDE

in the past, one of the easiest things about Hate Week with Tennessee came in the form of their coach, Phil Fulmer. Fulmer, a lifer at Tennessee, symbolized everything the Tennessee program was in the eyes of its opponents. Fulmer was provincial, having never held a job outside the state of Tennessee. He was sullen, ponderous, and slow, much like Tennessee's brand of football. In public he swore to hang fifty on Steve Spurrier and never did, while in private he gossiped like a church biddy about other coaches and sent tattling emails and faxes detailing their foibles to the SEC. His ascent to the job came with the tossing of Johnny Majors over the steepest of cliffs, and his departure was an acrimonious one.

In short: a black hat fit him all too well, and it was all too easy to get a proper froth on when it came to Hate Week Haterage. This got even easier with the one year hire of Lane Kiffin, a character so detestable he eventually made Tennessee fans hate him when he went out for cigarettes and never returned. Our favorite part of that will be Bud Ford crumbling in front of the collected media at the chaotic one minute press conference announcing Kiffin's departure, and always will be. 

Then came Derek Dooley, and here's the most difficult challenge of all: disliking him. Dooley should be repellent. He is an attorney, he comes from football aristocracy, he has perfect hair,  and above all he is the coach at the University of Tennessee. Yet the complications keep coming. In press conferences, he is both honest and entertaining. In games, he makes a compelling number of indescribably entertaining poses. Take this one, for instance, one we'll call "The Flamenco Impassionato"

Ole!

Add in his quirks--the focus on shower discipline, his long, misbegotten riffs on Rommel, using Shakespeare to motivate his troops, his penchant for natty coaching couture--and we still have no tangible reasons to dislike the man. Given this sad state of affairs, we will simply have to make them up, or otherwise distort available quotes to suit our cause. These are all real quotes. The framing, um, may be slightly disingenuous.

"Where's Rommel?"

Translation: Derek Dooley is a Nazi Sympathizer. 

"She’s violated the media policy and she doesn’t give a damn what I say."

My mother and I do not speak, and haven't spoken for years. Iciness surrounds even the very thought of her. I am a terrible son, and she a tyrannical mother who told me that her repeated attempts to drown me were "swimming lessons." Phil Collins wrote every song on his first two albums just about her. That's how cruel she is. 

If a trash can’s supposed to be facing a certain way in the building and it stays in that area, that’s what I expect. And if it’s not, I’m going to be on somebody.

I find any excuse to rape my employees for their mistakes.

You shouldn't be sick on a Monday. Nobody gets sick on a Monday. You're not sick.

[applies to rest of world]

[waits for results]

THANKS DEREK DOOLEY NOW EVERYONE IS DEAD OF THE CHINESE AARDVARK FLU WAY TO GO JERKSTOREFACE.

I don't think it has any impact.

--Dooley on child cancers, earthquakes, global warming, the deaths of adorable puppies at the hands of mustachioed madmen, and those affected by the Japanese earthquake and nuclear crisis of 2011. (Note: MAY BE TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT BUT ROLL WITH IT.)

Leonard has his picture on the wall ... He's an All-American. He was a part one of those banners in there and that's what we're playing for. He's a guy who lived it and breathed it. I think he lost about four games in his career and then went on to be a great NFL player.

Um...since that's about Leonard Little, DUI magician, that actually needs no massaging. Proceed.

It doesn’t mean we’re any good.

Dooley, after an entire practice that just consisted of the team yelling verbal abuse at a class of visiting third-graders.

A hungry dog fights harder.

Yes it does, and I know this personally from my extensive tours of Uzbek dogfighting circuits.

Probably the freshmen are more fried than anybody

Derek Dooley scalds his freshmen with hot peanut oil to show them what mental toughness really looks like. He borrowed this technique from Nick Saban, who does this to his secretaries and office staff in addition to his football players.

"I think General Neyland has a small penis."