PRESS CONFERENCE: Coach Johnny Chavis – Transcript

Takes podium – 11:23 a.m.

[CHAVIS] First of all, I want to thank you all for coming.  It is with a heavy heart that I announce my resignation as defensive coordinator for the University of Tennessee football team.  For twenty years, I have given my all for Tennessee.  Last week, I finally realized that my all is not enough to keep us from losing football games anymore.  I have no clue what I am doing now, and I haven’t for ten years.  Actually, the more I think about it, the more I realize that I may never have known what I was doing and was just pretty lucky.  If I could do it over again, I would have stayed the linebackers coach because I was actually really good at that.  I want to apologize for some things, but before I get to that, I would like to thank a few people.

First, I thank Coach John Majors for giving me a chance to come home to Tennessee and be a coach and Phillip Fulmer for promoting me to defensive coordinator.  Second, I want to thank the players, especially the great ones.  I owe the majority of my salary and the better part of my career at Tennessee to those great defensive players we have been lucky to recruit. The 1998 squad single-handedly kept Coach Fulmer and myself employed for the last ten years.  Don’t laugh.  I think about it sometimes, and now I realize that not even I could screw up a defense that has Al Wilson, Raynoch Thompson, Dwayne Goodrich, Darwin Walker, and Deon Grant on it.  I just told them to get on the field every Saturday and never had to do anything else.  Man, I miss those guys.  If you remember, I got criticized a great deal before 1998, and most people told Phillip that I was a bad choice for defensive coordinator.  Thank God for that championship because I probably would have never lasted more than another couple years, and then when Phillip refused to fire me, we both would have lost our jobs.

(long pause … clears throat)

[CHAVIS] Now that I got that out of the way, I feel that I should confess my sins against the Tennessee program.  I have been been exposed lately as a has been, and it is actually a little bit of a relief.  Now, I can apologize to the millions of Vol fans that I have hurt over the years.

I apologize for last week at UCLA, and it is one of the losses that hurt me the most.  I have a hell of a defense, but I just get scared at the end of games and I panic.  I skip like a broken record, and all I can say is the word Mustang.  It’s my safe word when I am scared, and it has been since I was little.  This puts us in a prevent defense, and I just look up at the clock and pray that all that time disappears before the other team scores.  The time wouldn’t go away last week, and I am sorry.

Next, I want to apologize to the fans and to Peyton Manning for the 1995 Florida game.  Florida had some great teams during those years, but we allowed 62 points … 62 points.  There is no excuse for any team … ever … to score 62 points on a Tennessee Volunteers team.  Not even Florida.  There are at least two nights a week that I wake up in a cold sweat because I am picturing Danny Wuerffel throwing deep passes downfield.  The ball is always on fire as it soars down the field into  hands, like how the ball used to do in that NBA Jam game.  Oh my God, the guy threw SIX TOUCHDOWN PASSES!  (has head in his hands … looks back up)  For some reason, Spurrier is standing on our sideline right next to me cackling in my ear, “You like that don’t you Johnny?  Heh heh heh.  I just scored 48 straight points on you, and not even Peyton Manning can stop that!  HEH HEH HEH!”  It is awful.  It was awful.

And Peyton?  I am sorry about1996 too.  Five touchdowns in 25 minutes … it makes me want to throw up, and I still don’t even know how that is possible to this day.  Wuerffel scares me.  (looks around nervously)  He’s not here is he?  I remember hearing the commentators saying during that game that the only way Tennessee had a chance is if Wuerffel changed jerseys.  I think I might have won that Heisman for him in that game.

Speaking of Heismans, I also owe Peyton an apology for costing him the Heisman Trophy in 1997.  I mistook Doug Johnson for Danny Wuerffel, and I was very scared.  I am so sorry, and I hope he can forgive me someday.

2002 was a bad year as well. Hobnail boot …  My friends in Georgia say that they call me Johnny Hobnail, which hurts my feelings pretty bad.  I guess I deserve it though, and I apologize to everyone for letting the Bulldogs slice through our defense like a hot butter knife.

Did you know that we have to play Auburn again this year?  Do they still have those two running backs?  Oh, thank goodness!  It seemed like those boys picked up twenty yards every time they touched the ball in 2003 and 2004.

I can’t remember 2005, and my therapist says I have repressed it because it was too traumatic an experience.  I hear that it was a very discouraging experience for Tennessee fans, too, so I guess I should apologize.  Someone even told me that Vanderbilt beat us that year.  WOW.  I am not sure how Phillip and I survived it, and I am sure he rocked me to sleep more than one Saturday night that year.

In 2006, we let Florida and LSU run all over us at the end of the game.  Air Force did too, but thankfully their coach was a bigger idiot than me and went for two.  Thank you Xavier Mitchell!  For some reason, I was voted Assistant Football Coach of the Year at the end of 2006.

In 2007, California rolled through our defense like Phil and me through mashed potatoes on a buffet at Ryan’s.  We shouldn’t be losing games when the offense scores over thirty points.  Two games later, Florida scored 59 points on us.  That means the two highest scoring Florida games ever have happened while I was defensive coordinator.  Later, South Carolina almost beat us after we blew a three touchdown lead, but you have to cut me some slack.  Steve Spurrier SCARES ME.  I hear him in my head when I am coaching, and like I told you, I just start saying MUSTANG MUSTANG MUSTANG MUSTANG.  Both Kentucky and Vanderbilt almost beat us, too, but thank the good lord for missed field goals and failed two point conversions.  When we played Alabama, I think I may have blacked out.  I remember thinking one minute that John Parker Wilson’s name sounded a lot like that chick from the Sex and the City movies, which is my favorite show, and then the next minute, Alabama had 41 points.  I don’t even know if I was there the whole time or not, but I heard that may have been the best game of John Parker Wilson’s career.

I am going to have a nervous breakdown if I keep thinking about all of these games.  I am going to have nightmares for months as it is, so I will wrap this press conference up.

Over the years, I have let opponents’ offenses mount way too many comebacks, and I know I have caused a lot of heartache to the Tennessee faithful over the years.  I thought so many times I was fired, but those people in Stokely must be even stupider than me.  Therefore, I am forced to resign, basically firing myself.  I can’t take the pressure anymore, and I am tired of seeing Tennessee lose.  I know that’s what will continue to happen as long as I am in charge of the defensive side of the ball.  Goodbye Vol fans.  I am as excited as you are to see what Tennessee can do now that I am gone.  I am sorry I will not be taking questions, but you guys know I don’t like press conferences very much because they frighten me, much like the fourth quarter of a football game.  Goodbye.

(walks off podium and shuffles quickly out of the room)

END