Silky Johnson, 2002 Player Hater of the Year, has long been a hero of mine.
The man loved to hate as much as Dabo Swinney loves opening his mouth to switch feet. Silky made hatin' an art form and for that we should all be grateful.
During the average college football season, a lengthy list of coaches, players, fans, administrators and national media members make their case to face Silky's wrath.
Even with an abbreviated season, there was no shortage of scrubs making my list for being insufferable and/or making me suffer.
With that, my 2020 sour rankings are as follows.
5. MIKE LEACH AND ANYONE STILL GASSING UP MIKE LEACH
Mike Leach has sucked for a really long time. His suck has always been made worse by the nonsensical adulation tossed at him by some media members and fans during what's been a decidedly mediocre coaching career. He's like a poor man's Steven Wright with that dry delivery but he strikes out far more often than he hits homers.
I sincerely enjoyed his first season at Mississippi State - a 4-7 effort capped off with a bench-clearing brawl against Tulsa in the Armed Forces Bowl. Immediately after the embarrassing event came to a close, Leach was flippantly dismissive about the whole thing.
He was also a jackass in multiple pressers discussing protocols and masks and basically the guy sucks. Can you imagine paying this guy $5 million a year to lead your favorite team's program?
He went 36-36 in eight years of Pac-12 conference play and just went 3-7 in his first SEC slate, publicly ripping his own players along the way. I look forward to an even worse season in 2021.
4. INDIANA FOOTBALL
Yeah, I know this is probably a surprise to some of you. I was definitely on the Tom Allen train and still kind of am but the program and its fanbase went full dementia heel-turn down the stretch.
All the crying over the Big Ten deciding to bag the stupid six-game rule, allowing Ohio State to take its rightful spot in the conference championship game as the East division champ was something.
Hell, one of our own former writers here at 11W (a truly solid dude btw) freaked out over the decision, somehow forgetting Ohio State beat Indiana head-to-head as part of an undefeated record. The mental gymnastics spun a tale about how the Hoosiers darn sure tried hard and made it close at the end or some irrelevant shit like that.
After all the gum-flapping, the Hoosiers then covered up the Big Ten logo on their Outback Bowl fit in favor of a patch celebrating whatever team mantra Allen had cooking and proceeded to get ran by an Ole Miss team putting the capstone on its 4-7 season. Well done, Hoosiers. Know your place next time.
3. NICK SABAN
This one isn't me hating on Saban the coach, it's me hating what Saban does to me, the Ohio State fan.
The little dude just took the Buckeyes behind the woodshed in a matchup that probably wouldn't have been close if they played 10 times with both squads at full strength. Sucks to read but don't @ me.
With Saban at the helm, Alabama's been atop the weekly CFP rankings in more than 50% of the polls since its inception. Oh, and Bama's won 92% of its games in the CFP era and captured six titles in 12 years. And no, I don't think Alabama cheats any worse than any other program.
Bottom line, it's Alabama and then everybody else. Ohio State is firmly in that next tier with Clemson but decidedly behind the Tide. Saban having a five-year headstart on Urban is something Ryan Day will have to overcome if the Buckeyes want to catch up.
So yeah, Saban's on this list out of pure envy.
2. KEVIN WARREN AND THE B1G CHANCELLORS
If you're searching for the masterclass in derp from 2020, look no further than the Big Ten's leadership.
First-year commissioner Kevin Warren spent 2020 looking like a man who didn't sleep at a Holiday Inn Express last night, stepping in steaming dog pile after steaming dog pile despite being largely invisible. Certainly an interesting approach to crisis management.
The dude and his bosses spent the summer failing to think through options and actions needed to have a season, announced a season schedule on August 5, canceled the season less than a week later, went into hiding while players, player families, coaches and some school administrators roasted or sued them, then on September 16 announced a schedule with zero padding.
Bold flavors right there, folks.
1. WILLIAM CHRISTOPHER SWINNEY
Yeah, not much drama here. Who else could it be? This fool seriously didn't learn his actual first name until he was in third grade. I guess it makes sense for someone lacking self-awareness at such a historic level.
The "Football Matters" t-shirt timing, ostarine flowing like Listerine, the whole holier than thou bullshit about how he'd go pro if college players were able to be paid more than he apparently thinks they're worth - while he makes over $9 million a year off the backs of those very players. He could top this list ever year.
For 2020, he put a little cherry on top with his impassioned stance that Ohio State shouldn't be playoff eligible because it didn't play enough games. I think his arbitrary minimum number of games played might've been nine but I'm admittedly unsure. I am sure however (1) that wasn't his stance in September and (2) he wouldn't have adopted that stance if little ole Clemson would've been in line to play less than nine games.
William Christopher voted Ohio State outside his top-10 in the Coaches Poll then the Buckeyes waxed his ass 49-28 in a College Football Playoff semifinal. After the game, content to die on his hill, he clutched his pearls while offering up the same tripe.
No Ragrets, I suppose.
