Tennessee Football head coach Butch Jones really, really hates the song “Sweet Home Alabama.” Don’t believe me? This video, released by Tennessee’s official Vimeo account, shows Jones becoming absolutely livid immediately after the first four chords of the song are heard from the practice field. The incident took place on the first day of Tennessee’s spring practice this year.
In case you weren’t aware, the Alabama-Tennessee football “rivalry” has been around since 1901, but the Crimson Tide have flat-out dominated the series for nearly a decade. Tennessee hasn’t beaten the Tide since 2006. Regardless, Jones is doing his duty as Vol head coach to be upset by anything relating to Alabama coming near Knoxville.
At first, Jones — who’s entering his third year as Tennessee’s head coach — and the rest of the staff couldn’t figure out where the unofficial state song of Alabama was coming from. They initially suspected it was from a nearby fraternity house, to which Jones suggested they just “throw a brick through their frickin’ window” to stop the noise. Shortly after, they realized it was coming from the adjacent baseball field.
“Call over to the baseball field and tell them to turn that sh*t off.” Jones said.
The perpetrator at the baseball field was found, and subsequently interviewed. His identity was left anonymous, but Jones eventually — and very creepily — found him.
Yep, that image of Jones is going to haunt my dreams. But at the end of the day, this is Jones’ way of trying to change the culture around Rocky Top. Sure, they haven’t beaten Alabama in eight years, but that shouldn’t make the rivalry any less significant. Tennessee’s 3-1 regular season finish last year topped off with a 45-28 victory over Iowa in the TaxSlayer Bowl have made the Vols pegged as legitimate SEC East contenders for 2015. As long as Jones is Tennessee’s head coach, he can hate “Sweet Home Alabama” as much as he wants.
[Source: Vimeo]
