Tubby for Auburn '09 campaign sees odds dip

Wait, wasn't there supposed to be more yelling?

You've probably read the new Scarbinsky column by now, the one in which the following passage appears:

Wouldn't it be ironic if he left Oxford in a pine box after all?

After Ole Miss 17, Auburn 7, the former Ole Miss coach sounded like a man resigned to becoming the former Auburn coach one day soon.

"What happens at the end of the year happens, and there's nothing anybody can do about it," Tuberville said.

Consider the weight of those words.

This didn't sound like the same coach who vowed, 12 days before, that he planned to be at Auburn 10 more years. But that coach hadn't watched his team lose four straight games for the first time since his first season at Auburn.

What do we make of this?

A loose quote just hanging in the air like that is begging for some context, context just a bit less inflammatory than K-Scar's "sounded like a man resigned" editorializing. Tubby was talking in the immediate aftermath of a fourth straight loss, the first one all year where his team hadn't at least been ahead at the half. It's not like Tubby's exaggerating his situation: as much as he'd like it to be, if the buyout gets scraped together, it's out of his hands. And of course, reading too much into any coach's quotes--particularly a coach as traditionally deft at handling the media as Tubby is--is always a waste.

But K-Scar's sadly, demoralizingly accurate when he says that this sure ain't the same angry, firebrandy, you'll-pry-this-headset-from-my-cold-dead-handsy Tuberville we saw a few weeks back. Tubby's best quality has always, always been his ability to fight out from whatever perceived corner he's felt himself and his team had been backed into. It's not necessarily that I mind him acknowledging the difficulties of his situation, but if he's going to drop his gloves to the media after the Ole Miss loss ... what's he going to do if, say, he finishes at 5-7 after a 30-point whipping at the hands of Alabama AAAAAAAAUGGHHH MY FINGERS IT BURNS IT BURNS MAKE IT STOP PLEASE MAKE THE BURNING STOP? Not to mention to effect on the rest of the team--if they see Tubby slumping his shoulders, how are they going to keep theirs, um, unslumped?

Over the past couple of weeks, I've posited two different scenarios in which Tubby might join the realm of the dearly departed head coaches after this year:

1) He decides he's not interested in coaching Auburn without his friends on the offensive staff, whom I can't imagine he has the coaching capital to retain any longer.

2) The Fulmeresque atmosphere surrounding the program after a 5-7 season culminating in a blowout loss to the Tide GOOD GOSH THAT STINGS becomes so toxic it's best for all involved if he moves on.

I saw the first of these two as substantially more likely, since between the intimidating buyout and the goodwill Tubby's built up over the past several seasons amongst the majority of the Auburn fanbase, I had a hard time believing the "Tubby Out!" factions would gain that much sway even in the event of 5-7. I still do. (The trustees' nonsupport is a nonissue, in my humble opinion; when the entire university has nearly lost its freaking accreditation because of trustees' athletic meddling, "no comment" or "We just support the team" is absolutely the correct response, whatever they actually think of Tubby.)

But hearing Tubby respond "there's nothing anybody can do about it" when asked about his chances to stay on after 4-5 makes me think that maybe, just maybe, 5-7 is going to be harder on him and harder on Auburn than I've expected it to be. If I had to place a bet on Tubby staying/Tubby leaving, the JCCW's would still be on the former. But having watched the anger and defiance leak away from Tubby's public proclamations about his job status over the course of just two losses makes me think that the odds are shifting, however slightly, in the direction of the latter.