Spurrier’s best quips and quotes at SEC Media Days
South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier’s best quips and quotes at the SEC Media Days on Tuesday:
On the media: “A lot of familiar faces out there after a lot of years coming to this event. I figured a bunch of you guys would have retired by now.”
On last year’s record: “We got new life. We were 7-6, same as Tennessee and the same as Arkansas, and I think they're sort of celebrating big seasons last year. So we were celebrating also. They are turning cartwheels in Knoxville and Fayetteville.”
On new defensive coordinator Jon Hoke: “I decided to go pro. I went to the NFL, and Jon Hoke went to the NFL. I lasted two years, and John Hoke lasted 13. So he's a lot smarter, better coach than I am.”
On star wide receiver Pharoh Cooper: “We call him the South Carolina Pharoh, not the American Pharaoh, South Carolina Pharoh.”
On not talking after tough losses: “I was watching Dustin Johnson interviewed on the Golf Channel the other day, and they said, Dustin, after you three-putted at Chambers Bay, you didn't come to the trophy presentation. Why weren't you there? Gee, the guy just three-putted from 12 feet. He just said, I needed to get away. After we sort of blew a game, or you can say Tennessee beat us, but we couldn't hold on to a 14-point lead with a little over four minutes, yeah, I felt like getting away a minute. I was quickly at the press conference and left. So hopefully, people can understand, some losses are tougher than others, especially when you have a good lead and you can't hold it.”
On how to deal with highly-hyped recruits like Jadeveon Clowney: “Every now and then, I'll tell the player, are we going to have to put you on the Clowney program? But no, he was fine. He was fine most of the time.”
On how he keeps his sanity as a head football coach: “Same way you sports writers do it, I think. Yeah, I really think the program I own helps to hang around a long time. Somebody said, why are you still coaching? I said, well, I forgot to get fired, and I'm not going to cheat. That's about the way you lose your job. You get fired for losing or you cheat, and then they get somebody else. So I've not done any of those to any extent big time, I guess.”
On being 70, does he have an exit strategy? “Well, like I told people, I breezed right through age 60, breezed right through 65, and I'm going to try my best to breeze right on through 70. I can still remember just about everything. So mentally, I think I'm the same as I was. We got two people running for president, I think Hillary and Donald Trump are both 69, I believe. Coach K at Duke, he's still doing pretty good at, I think 69 also. So the age really doesn't mean a lot. The number on your years is not what's important. It's whether you can function physically, emotionally, mentally, get your team ready to play.”
On how close he came to quitting: “Listen, you ever lost four out of five, you had a chance to win, and two of them by two touchdowns? You've never lost the way we were losing. It wears on you a little bit. You need something to pick you back up.”
On the death of Ken Stabler: “He was one of the all time best and probably made his mark more as a pro, a little bit like Joe Namath. Namath was an excellent quarterback at Alabama, but his big years, Super Bowl years were in the NFL.”
This story was originally published July 14, 2015 at 12:58 PM.