We snapped a number of shoddy pictures from our sideways seat in the main media room of the SEC's annual coach-and-pony show. Many of them were taken midsentence and made some of college football's most renowned figures look like gassy babies. Enjoy?
PRELUDE TO A STEAK
Before we get too far into this, a word: Everybody remember this little number from the Wynfrey's website?
We ask because it's still there, and because the following literature placed in everybody's rooms did not dissuade us from the notion that we were in for some unwanted erotica with our sirloin strips:
Dennis Shula will prepare only the most essential steaks for this night.
To the TraveLOLgue!
ARKANSAS
Our deepest apologies to any Hawgs fans hoping to see their beloved coach. We must have snapped twenty pictures of Petrino at the podium, and they kept coming out like this.
SOUTH CAROLINA
Steve Spurrier has, as his default facial expression, the most immaculate U MAD face we've ever seen on a real human. He also wore a pink tie to Media Days despite showing up the color of sunburnt brick, and looked fantastic. Your argument is invalid.
Spurrier's avatars are all pointy, and call on reporters themselves.
FLORIDA
You can't take a de-goofed picture of Will Muschamp. We tried for a half hour.
We had nothing to do with this, but would have if we'd thought of it: John Brantley's 2010 passing stats were projected at the front of the room during his interview session. MEAN.
MISSISSIPPI STATE
See the Muschamp Conundrum, above: Dan Mullen just Looks Like This. All The Time.
The expensive graphics swirling above his intro screen put us in mind of those plastic garbage ties baby-faced serial killers use to bind bodies for easy stacking in their crawlspaces. NO REASON.
KENTUCKY
This is the only sincere compliment you'll hear us give Kentucky all year: Joker Phillips has what it takes to be a successful D-I head coach, by virtue of having perfected the Nick Saban Patented Veiny JawClench after just one season. Look at that form!
GEORGIA
WHY HELLO THERE. Mark Richt is bizarrely, compellingly handsome in person. This is really upsetting.
SHIT YOU GUYS GOD SAW THAT RUN RUN INTERLUDE INTERLUDE --
INTERLUDE
We visited the Bahr's grave. It's not hard to find if you know where to look (down).
Fearless Leader pays his golden, flaky respects.
Girding our collective loins (gross), we return for:
AUBURN
According to several Auburn fans of our acquaintance, Gene "THE GOON" Chiznap has never been photographed with visible teeth. This is as close as we could get.
UNCANNY. Somebody in that ballroom setup crew was wearing houndstooth underoos.
TENNESSEE
Dolla Bill always says Doolander looks like one of our kittens. We never got that before. We totally see it now.
And this is Tauren Poole's face when we asked him about Lane Kiffin keeping him bottled up behind noted recruiting curio Bryce Brown.
ALABAMA, OR, THE PART WHERE WE ARE ALL BEATEN WITH SACKS OF ORANGES BY NICK SABAN'S DOLL EYES
YES COACH WE AGREE WE DO DESERVE IT
VANDERBILT
In photos, James Franklin meshes well with his doofy counterpart SEC skippers. In person, he's immaculately dressed and a polished salesman.
Then we asked him how many quarterbacks he had on the roster, and he made this face.
OLE MISS
Who're you gonna believe? Him, or your lying FOIA request?
Mercifully less visible here, but we swear the eight-foot image of HDN projected on the wall had pokies.
But really, we're all here to bask in the radiance of Kentrell Lockett's suit.
LSU
Even conference officials acknowledge, however tacitly, that the way the Hat holds his hands while clapping is strange and off-putting.
Yes, he really took the moderater's chair.
No, he was not happy to yield his seat. Never die, Hat.
EXEUNT, PURSUED BY BOWDEN
Via friend of the program Brian, here's an ESPN bus parked outside the convention center.
ENH--holy shit, Florence Alabama. And we'll bet all the money in our pockets against all the money in yours that Terry Bowden was clinging to the underside of this bus the whole way down to the 'Ham with his unusually prehensile fingers and toes, hissing, I'm still in the game, boys!