Back before Lou Holtz turned into Granny Clampett, he won quite a few football games and developed a (well earned) reputation as a master motivator.  Some of Lou’s more notable quotations:

“Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you respond.”

“Motivation is simple.  You eliminate those who are not motivated.”

“The man who complains about how the ball bounces is likely the one who dropped it.” 

But Holtz left his biggest mark on the coaching profession by practically inventing ‘down-speak’, giving inordinate credit to his opponents prior to each game.  Even when he had championship caliber teams at Notre Dame, it was often comical to listen to his stated concerns about Army’s running game or Stanford’s pass rush.   You still hear that sort of exaggerated concern labeled a “Lou Holtz like’ pregame comment. 

My personal favorite Holtz story came before the 1978 Orange Bowl, where his Razorbacks were 24 point underdogs to Oklahoma.   A litany of injuries and the suspension of three star players (another trademark of Holtz coached teams, inherent shadiness) had reduced a promising matchup to an expected blowout.   When the Hogs were announced, the team ran onto the field in a frenzy, visibly fired up back when such displays were uncommon.  When asked by the sideline reporter how he managed to motivate his team so intensely before the game, he responded “I told them the last eleven on the field had to start.”   The true story is slightly different and can be read here but Holtz again downplayed his team’s chances against a superior opponent in a very public manner.   Arkansas won 31-6. 

Contrast the above with the following trash talk and bulletin board material coming out across the Big XII this week.  Kansas State kick/punt returner had these gems “I’m taking one to the crib this weekend…”  and continued by stating Kansas Coach Mark Mangino and the rest of the Jayhawk staff “…probably going to wish they recruited this whole team, the way we’re going to play this weekend.”   Interesting comments from a guy that is basically relying on the sportsmanship of the Jayhawk coverage teams to avoid being decapitated Saturday.   Closer to home for Mizzou fans, from Tuesday’s St. Louis Post Dispatch, MU nose tackle Jarod Baston :  “If we played Texas again (in that same game), with that focus that we had, I feel confident that we would have come out with a win.” 

After conducting an agonizing flashlight and metal detector search for a silver lining after the game in Austin, I was only able to come up with this:  Mizzou was so thoroughly dominated that at least they won’t be giving UT any bulletin board material if we happen to meet them again in the championship game.    Perhaps the subconscious mental intangibles will be on our side.    I contrasted this with the championship game against Oklahoma last year, where it seemed our players would tell anyone that would listen how we ‘gave away’ the game in Norman and couldn’t wait to prove who the better team was in San Antonio.   Ugh.  It didn’t help that every talking head was spouting the same nonsense about how turnovers and mental mistakes led to Oklahoma squeaking out a 17 point win (Martin Rucker didn’t score on that last drive.  You know it, I know it, and everyone that had OU -11 knows it).   The post championship game comments from the OU players were all the same.   We were disrespected, tired of hearing how they lost the game and that we didn’t win it, we wanted to show the last game wasn’t a fluke.   Part of me honestly believes without that extra motivation the Sooners might have given us the “wow, are they sleepwalking through this one” game we saw multiple times last year instead of the ‘Christ these guys are good’ game we got instead.     

The last time I vividly remember a Tiger’s trash talk coming back to bite us was before the 1997 Holiday Bowl against Colorado State.  The teams apparently scuffled on an aircraft carrier a few days before the game, and one of Missouri’s defensive players, I believe Shad Criss, said Mizzou was going to “put 83 in a hurt locker”.   83 being CSU wide receiver/returner Darren Hall.  Hall of course scored two touchdowns, one an 85 yard punt return, and was Co-MVP of the game with Rams quarterback Moses Moreno.   (I searched for more details of this incident, but a Google search of “Hurt Locker” is difficult while Washington quarterback Jake Locker is injured.  Apologies to Shad if he wasn’t the culprit.  Could have been Caldrinoff Easter.  Or Harold Piersey. )   

I’m not sure of the practical effect of ‘bulletin board material’.   College football is such an emotional game, and those emotions swing wildly from week to week for 18-22 year old males.   I’m hoping Baston’s comment is buried deep in an otherwise unremarkable (I listened to Coach Pinkel twice this week, I’m making remarkable remarks) article.   Players and coaches would probably be well served to follow Lou’s steady diet of platitudes when talking about future opponents.   It will be interesting to see how the Cocktail Party unfolds Saturday with a steaming, heaping pile of motivation on the Gators side after last year’s ‘endzone mob’ stunt pulled by Georgia.