Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Open mouth, insert foot (Bruce Pearl edition)


Tennessee basketball coach Bruce Pearl is an entertaining guy, but occasionally he doesn't think before he speaks.

Such was the case this week when Pearl was talking about the fact that four of his top eight Volunteer players would be out tonight in a game in Knoxville against the Charlotte 49ers. The players were arrested and have been suspended indefinitely in part because of a gun charge.

"The task at hand is formidable,'' he said. "But we have got weapons. We have still got weapons."

My friend Mike Strange, columnist at the Knoxville News-Sentinel, referred to the "weapons" quote in this column.

Give Pearl credit: he immediately realized his poor choice of words and said he was sorry. "That's terrible," Pearl said of his analogy. "I apologize." Still funny, though.

I predicted a win for Charlotte tonight in my notes column today that leads with some notes about the Carolina Panthers. That may be a stretch considering No.16 Tennessee is still favored by 16 points, according to our newspaper today. The 49ers will have to shoot very well from three-point range to make it happen -- Derrio Green, a revelation of late, probably needs another very big game.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Weapons? That's rich!!!!

I have high hopes for us tonight with the Vols being short-handed. Ultimately, I think we'll fall short, but nowhere near 16.

The worst thing that could happen to us is if Pearl wears that gawd-awful orange jacket. Then we'll lose becuase all of our players will go blind.

michael dock fowler said...

do we know which players still have guns. this must be the offense some teams use...run and guin or vise-versa.

Anonymous said...

GO NINERS!!

Anonymous said...

Wow! and what does this have to do with the Panthers or the NFL?

Curtis Watkins said...

The blog is called 'Scott says...'. Not 'Scott says about the NFL and the Panthers...'

Unknown said...

Scott---So what? It's funny. I'm sure Pearl didn't intentionally use that diction. Give him a break.

Anonymous said...

Well, then if it's not about the Panthers/NFL, why is it on this page, Curtis!

Curtis Watkins said...

Quinton, of course he didn't say it intentionally...that's why it is an expression where he "put his foot in his mouth". In other words, poor choice of words given then situation - but, like you noted, funny. Hence, why it is being written in the blog.

Anon, not sure what you mean about why it is on this page? I suppose you went to Sports/Panthers and saw a Scott Says link there? Not sure, but regardless, Scott says always covers more topics than just the Panthers...like I said, not called 'NFL/Panthers Says'.