|
(EDITED BY AUTHOR: 9/9/2003 - 10:41 p.m.) Pat Dye's speech to the players the morning of the Vandy game-
Men, this stuff that some sources sling around about Auburn wanting out of the FSU game, not wanting to play against a slanting defense, is a crock of bull#badword#. Auburn Tigers love to fight, traditionally. All real tigers love the sting and clash of battle.
You are here today for three reasons. First, because you are here to defend the honor of Auburn University and your loved ones. Second, you are here for your own self respect, because you would not want to be anywhere else. Third, you are here because you are real men and all real men like to play ball. When you, here, every one of you, were kids, you all admired the champion marble player, the fastest runner, the toughest boxer, the big league ball players, the rapper, the homie selling crack, and the All-American Auburn football players. Americans love a winner. Auburn will not tolerate a loser. Auburn despises woosies. Tigers play to win all of the time. I wouldn't give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That's why Auburn has not lost to Vanerbilt in years nor will ever lose to Vandy again; for the very idea of losing is hateful to an Auburn Tiger.
You are not all going to get hurt. Only two percent of you right here today would get hurt in a major battle. Injury must not be feared. Injury, in time, comes to all men. Yes, every man is scared in his first SEC battle. If he says he's not, he's a liar. Some men are cowards but they fight the same as the brave men or they get the hell slammed out of them watching men fight who are just as scared as they are. The real hero is the man who fights even though he is scared. Some men get over their fright after a minute into the game. For some, it takes a quarter. For some, it takes most of the game. But a real man will never let his fear of losing overpower his honor, his sense of duty to his school, and his innate manhood.
Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best and it removes all that is base. Tigers pride themselves on being He Men and they ARE He Men. Remember that the enemy is just as frightened as you are, and probably more so. They are not supermen. They're Commodores for Christ's sake!!
All through your playing careers, you men have bitched about what you call "chicken #badword# drilling." That, like everything else in this game, has a definite purpose. That purpose is alertness. Alertness must be bred into every player. I don't give a #badword# for a man who's not always on his toes. You men are sophomores, jumiors, and seniors or you wouldn't be here. You are ready for what's to come. A man must be alert at all times if he expects to win. If you're not alert, sometime, a Vandy son-of-an-a$$hole-bitch is going to sneak up behind you and pancake you right into the ground!
The Auburn Tigers is a team. It lives, sleeps, eats, and fights as a team. This individual heroic stuff is pure horse #badword#. The bilious bastards who write that kind of stuff for the Birmingham Post-Herald don't know any more about real football under fire than they know about #badword#ing! We have the finest food, the finest equipment, the best spirit, and the best men in the world. Why, by God, I actually pity those poor sons-of-bitches we're going up against. By God, I do.
My men don't quit, and I don't want to hear of any player under my command being beat unless he has been clipped. Even if you are beat, you can still fight back. That's not just bull #badword# either. The kind of man that I want in my command is just like the player in Opelika, who, with a MAC-10 against his chest, jerked off his FUBU hat, swept the gun aside with one hand, and busted the hell out of the blood with his bling-bling. Then he jumped on the gun and went out and killed another homeboy before they knew what the hell was coming off. And, all of that time, this man had a bullet through a lung. There was a real man!
All of the real heroes are not storybook ball players, either. Every single man in this team plays a vital role. Don't ever let up. Don't ever think that your job is unimportant. Every man has a job to do and he must do it. Every man is a vital link in the great chain. What if every center suddenly decided that he didn't like having Jason's hands brushing against his a$$, turned around, and said, "whatch you rubbin there, Willis?" and run off the field? The cowardly bastard could say, 'Hell, they won't miss me, just one man in a hundred.' But, what if every man thought that way? Where in the hell would we be now? What would our team, our loved ones, our dorms, even the world, be like? No, Goddamnit, Tigers don't think like that. Every man does his job. Every man serves the whole. Every string, every special team, is important in the vast scheme of this game. The water boys are needed to supply the liquids to keep us rolling. Every last man on kickoff coverage has a job to do, even the one whose job it is to sacrifice his body to bust up a wedge.
Each man must not think only of himself, but also of his buddy playing beside him. We don't want yellow cowards on this team. They should be run off like rats. If not, they will go home after this game and breed more cowards. The brave men will breed more brave men. Run off the Goddamned cowards and we will have a team of brave men. One of the bravest men that I ever saw was a fellow on top of a speaker at a disco in Atlanta while a hundred strippers were daning like there was no tomorrow. I stopped and asked what the hell he was doing up there at a time like that. He answered, 'Spankin the Monkey, Sir.' I asked, 'Isn't that a little unhealthy right about now?' He answered, 'Yes Sir, but the monkey needs to be spanked.' I asked, 'Don't those strippers dancing around you bother you?' And he answered, 'No, Sir, but you sure as hell do!' Now, there was a real man. A real player. There was a man who devoted all he had to his monkey, no matter how seemingly insignificant his monkey might appear at the time, no matter how great the spanking.
Don't forget, you men don't know that I'm here. No mention of that fact is to be made in any letters. The world is not supposed to know what the hell happened to me. I'm not supposed to be commanding this team. I'm not even supposed to be here in Tennessee. Let the first bastards to find out be the #badword# Commodores. Someday I want to see them raise up on their piss-soaked hind legs and howl, 'Jesus Christ, it's the #badword# Auburn Tigers again and that son-of-a-#badword#-bitch Dye.' We want to get the hell over there." The quicker we clean up this #badowrd# mess, the quicker we can take a little jaunt over to Phenix City for a little hochie-coochie before #badowrd# Nall gets all of the credit.
Sure, we want to go home. We want this game over with. The quickest way to get it over with is to go get the Commodores and beat the #badowrd# out of them. The quicker they are whipped, the quicker we can go home. The shortest way home is I-65 to Birmingham then US-280 through Alexander City, assuming the #badowrd#ing construction is completed, and then onto 147. And when we get to Auburn, I am personally going to shoot that paper hanging son-of-a-#badowrd# Tuberville. Just like I'd shoot a snake!
When a man is sitting on the bench, if he just stays there all day, a sore butt will get to him eventually. The hell with that idea. The hell with taking it. My men don't sit on the bench. I don't want them to. Benches only slow up an offensive. Keep moving. We'll win this game, but we'll win it only by fighting and by showing the Commodores that we've got more guts than they have; or ever will have. We're not going to just beat the sons-of-bitches, we're going to rip out their living #badowrd# guts and use them to grease the treads of our Hummers. We're going to murder those lousy #badowrd# suckers by the bushel-#badowrd#-basket.
Football is a bloody game. You've got to spill their blood, or they will spill yours. Rip them up the belly. Shoot them in the guts. When players are hitting all around you and you wipe the dirt off your face and realize that instead of dirt it's the blood and guts of your best friend beside you, you'll know what to do!
I don't want to get any messages saying, 'I am holding my position.' We are not holding a Goddamned thing. Let the Commodores do that. We are advancing constantly and we are not interested in holding onto anything, except the enemy's balls. We are going to twist his balls and kick the living #badowrd# out of him all of the time. Our basic plan of operation is to advance and to keep on advancing regardless of whether we have to go over, under, or through the enemy. We are going to go through him like crap through a goose; like #badowrd# through a tin horn!
From time to time there will be some complaints that we are pushing our people too hard. I don't give a good Goddamn about such complaints. I believe in the old and sound rule that an ounce of sweat will save a gallon of blood. The harder WE push, the more Commodores we will knock down. The more Commodores we knock down, the fewer of our men will be hurt. Pushing means fewer casualties. I want you all to remember that.
There is one great thing that you men will all be able to say after this war is over and you are home once again. You may be thankful that twenty years from now when you are sitting by the fireplace with your grandson on your knee and he asks you what you did during the poor start of the 2003 Auburn season, you WON'T have to cough, shift him to the other knee and say, 'Well, your Granddaddy ran off to join the coon-asses in Louisiana.' No, Sir, you can look him straight in the eye and say, 'Son, your Granddaddy played for the Great Auburn Tigers and a Son-of-a- Goddamned-Bitch named Pat Dye'
|
