By Buford T. Ledbetter
Friends, I have been patient. I was patient in 2025, when this football team went 7-6 and I told Gary from Seneca it was a rebuilding year for a program that had not, technically, been torn down. I was patient on opening night against LSU, which turned out to be the worst loss of the head coach’s entire career and, if my math is right, the fourth season opener in a row we’ve lost. That is the kind of streak you usually only see in a man who keeps buying the same lottery ticket.
But I have reached the end of my patience, which, I’ll remind you, is located about two inches above the ankle I hurt rushing the field in 1999.
Let’s talk about the offense. Or rather, let’s talk about where the offense used to be, because it is not there anymore. They brought Chad Morris back as offensive coordinator this year, and everybody said he’d bring the old fireworks with him. I have seen more fireworks at a Baptist potluck. The quarterback threw one touchdown pass in his first six games. One. I have personally thrown more touchdowns than that, and every one of them was a chicken bone into a trash can at a tailgate.
Gary says I’m being too hard on everybody. Gary also thinks a screen pass on third-and-14 is a “philosophy.” Gary is part of the problem.
I have seen more fireworks at a Baptist potluck, and the potluck had a better red zone plan.
Then came Miami, and the Hurricanes ran us right out of our own britches, and the offense didn’t find the end zone until the fourth quarter, by which point half of Section F had gone home to watch reruns of better football, like 2018, or that one game in Columbia where the crowd was just electric and the garnet looked so — never mind. I don’t know why I said Columbia. Strike that.
Here is my proposal, and I have written it on the back of a church bulletin so you know it’s binding. Leadership change, top to bottom. New play-caller. New philosophy. New headsets, because the old ones are clearly picking up a gospel station. And if they need somebody to call plays in the meantime, I am available Saturdays, and I work for hot dogs.
I’m not saying fire everybody. I’m saying start firing and stop when the offense scores. Some folks say that’s not how it works at a program with two national championships. Those folks were not sitting through the fourth quarter against Miami with a frozen ankle and a dentist explaining the zone read to them.
Senior Day is coming up against Georgia Tech, and I’ll be there. Same seat. Same ankle. Same orange visor. Same garnet necktie, which I wear for warmth. It’s for warmth.