Opinion: Cheering for other SEC teams is dumb
This past Monday one current SEC team and a future SEC team played in the semifinals of the CFP. Alabama faced off against number one-ranked Michigan while Texas did battle with Washington. Now for some reason, a good number of fans from other SEC schools were rooting for Alabama and Texas to pull out wins. This old-fashioned mindset is perplexing to me and I’m going to prove why this mindset is in no way beneficial for Tennessee.
The main argument in favor of cheering for the SEC is the notion that “A rising tide lifts all boats”. This means that more exposure means more money and more money means more success for everyone. This may sound cute but in reality, it is blatantly false. What good has it done Tennessee that Alabama has won 6 National Championships since 2009? What good has it done Tennessee that Georgia and Florida have won 2 National Championships a piece since the Vols last won in it 1998? The truth is that the success of these teams that the Vols play every single year makes it infinitely more difficult for the Vols to get back to the national prominence that every fan expects. The share of the conference’s money that Tennessee gained from 2008 to 2021 did not seem to make much of a dent in the success of the football program. Shockingly Tennessee’s three biggest rivals that enjoyed recent success were still able to consistently beat the Vols. At the end of the day, leadership matters a whole lot more than the financial bottom line of a football program, and for Tennessee’s sake, every loss that Florida, Georgia, and Alabama suffer makes the march back to relevance easier.
The bigger point to me though is that cheering for teams that you play on a regular basis just makes me question your fandom. These are the teams that you go up against for recruits every year. These are the teams that you must beat to have a successful season. Their success has no bearing on the success of your team. As a matter of fact, it is quite the opposite. Do you think Alabama fans were tearing their clothes and screaming in agony when Tennessee lost to Georgia State in 2019? I can guarantee you they were not, and the only SEC team that the Georgia State loss was embarrassing for was Tennessee. The other SEC teams pointed and laughed at the Vols, and if you think they didn’t you are living in a fantasy world. So why would we as Tennessee fans do anything but cheer for every other SEC team to lose every game they play in every sport? The bottom line is that programs in the SEC stay horrible because the leadership within the program is not up to snuff. It is not because the other SEC teams aren’t winning enough games for them to be good again. Just look at the 3 biggest programs at Tennessee. The basketball program became relevant because they hired Rick Barnes. The baseball program became relevant because they hired Tony Vitello. The football program is knocking on the door of relevancy because they made a good hire in Josh Heupel. No other SEC team helped the Vols in any of these journeys to consistent success, and if you think other SEC teams are thrilled with Tennessee’s success you are mistaken.
The notion that Alabama Football, Kentucky Basketball, and Vanderbilt Baseball are giant mama birds throwing up in the mouths of other SEC teams to keep them alive is absolutely insane. By the way, I was thrilled to see Alabama and Texas lose on Monday in the CFP, and that is the only way Tennessee fans should have felt.