DALLAS — Sonny Dykes picked up the Stallings Award on Tuesday at the Dallas Country Club, the latest in a long list of national-coach-of-the-year merits. Just how many, the TCU coach couldn’t say. Even his wife, Kate, wasn’t sure. You know it’s been a good year when your loving spouse doesn’t know how much hardware clutters your mantle.
For the record, that makes 10. Pretty much a consensus, then, that Sonny did a better job than anyone in college football last season, and apparently nobody held what happened at SoFi Stadium against him.
Well, nobody but Jimbo Fisher.
“They stayed healthy, they had a lot of experience and they got to where they had to get to,” Jimbo told the Fort Worth A&M Club last week.
“And then when they got to the SEC, it changed, didn’t it?”
Turns out Sonny saw those comments, and the way he sees it, they were taken out of context from a larger, lighthearted statement.
“I know Jimbo well enough to know he’s a pro,” he added, “and he wouldn’t disparage anyone else’s success or a bunch of 18- and 22-year-old kids’ success, so I’m sure that was a small part of the comment that he made.”
Which is probably not the kind of smart, classy response Jimbo would have made if in a similar position. We can only guess, of course, but it seems a good bet, given his response a year ago after Alabama coach Nick Saban said the Aggies “bought every player on their team.”
Maybe instead of calling Saban a “narcissist” and a guy who thinks he’s “God” and claiming college football’s “czar” has skeletons rattling around in his California closets, Jimbo — who used the word “despicable” six times in a two-minute rant and said he was “done” with his old boss — should have just smiled and said he couldn’t imagine what he meant.
Better yet, maybe just laugh it off.
Bought every player? Nah, just the good ones!
Had Jimbo not melted down last May, he wouldn’t have looked so silly in July. On the podium at SEC Media Days, after telling ESPN he had “great respect” for Saban as well as a “great friendship” with the Alabama coach, Jimbo said, “Unfortunately, our thing went public. Sometimes those things happen in this world.
“Nothing is private anymore, is it?”
Not when you open a press conference with it, no, not really.
For the record, let me just say that I didn’t have any problem with Jimbo going off on Saban. Good copy, is what it is. Had he stuck to his sentiments, it could have made for a real potboiler in October. Jimbo has shown he can beat Saban, so the game last fall had must-see potential.
Turns out only losing by four points to the Crimson Tide was one of the highlights of the Aggies’ 5-7 season.
Considering how disappointing it was, you’d think Jimbo wouldn’t cast any stones at anyone else’s season, even in jest. I mean, it’s not as if A&M fans are laughing.
The Aggies didn’t guarantee Jimbo $95 million for Kevin Sumlin results. Come to think of it, he’s not just pocket change short of that.
Had it been Kirby Smart who said it changed when TCU got to the national title game, well, OK. A little harsh, maybe, but Georgia earned the right to talk any smack after a 65-7 blowout.
Sonny said he still hasn’t gotten over the whiplash.
“I don’t know that you ever really get over it,” he said Tuesday. “You just kind of chalk it up as a missed opportunity. I think we would love to have that opportunity again to go play better, put our best foot forward. We played lights out for 14 weeks, and we didn’t play well against the best team we played all season. It was a recipe for disaster, and it just kinda got away from us.
“But, you know, next time we get that opportunity, we’ll play better.”
Had the Horned Frogs’ loss to Georgia been their only national exposure, it might have been easy to write off the best season in school history. Except that was a good Michigan team they beat in the semis. Say what you want about the Big 12, and you won’t get much argument here, but the Frogs beat the Wolverines, who nearly doubled Ohio State last fall.
“I think that’s the feather in the cap last year,” Sonny said. “Number one, nobody thought we were gonna be there in the first place and, number two, nobody thought we would find a way to win that game.”
No, the Frogs weren’t in Georgia’s league, and I don’t mean the SEC. Even if you belong to the king of college football conferences, membership doesn’t guarantee privileges.
You don’t get to play the SEC card when you can’t beat Appalachian State.
TCU will have a hard time making it back to the College Football Playoff after eight players disappeared in the draft, tied for most in school history. Even so, one of the perks of playing in the last game of the year, no matter the result, is that a recruit can’t sniff when you tell him he might play for a national championship. No one can take that away from TCU.
No coach coming off 5-7, anyway.
Sure you’re not mad, Sonny?
“When you’re coaching,” he said, “you learn to have thick skin. There’s nothing anybody can say that is gonna hurt my feelings in our profession anymore.”
Too bad, really, because we could use a good feud. At least one that sticks.
