Welcome to Bevo’s Fake Nuts, our weekly-ish column on the Texas Longhorns.
Every now and then, the University of Texas will interact with the University of Tennessee, and every now and then, Texans will notice the throngs of scrappy little Tennesseans bellowing how they’re “the real UT.”
It’s one of those things where if you’re trying to have the argument, you’ve already lost, kind of like those people on internet forums saying Leninism works. Your stance is self-evidently wrong. If it wasn’t, you wouldn’t have to make it.
Still, the exchanges make for a fun time, if your version of a fun time is watching a Napoleon-complexed mouse walk up to a fat cat and get swatted halfway across the greater South. The feeling is similar to that generated when Texas A&M tried to stop Texas from joining the SEC, or when the United States invaded Grenada. It’s a little ugly, but damn, the big guy’s still got it.
Last week, UT-Knoxville made headlines when they received their notice of allegations for the Jeremy Pruitt misdeeds the school unearthed eighteen months ago, when they decided they’d really prefer to fire Pruitt with cause rather than pay his buyout. The allegations caused a stir mostly because of the number of them, and not at all because of the amount of money changing hands. We need to stress this last point: Jeremy Pruitt could not buy shoes from LaVar Ball. He is too small a baller.
Texas fans reacted with utter silence, which demonstrates the whole point of this. Not even a snicker out of UT. Texas fans are so unaware of the existence of UT-Knoxville that they didn’t bat an eye when the Vols came close to an NCAA record through their sheer quantity of documented wrongs. No schadenfreude whatsoever. Texas fans legitimately did not care.
There’s a reason our relationship with Texas is a love-hate one, and this is the reason for the love. These bastards can go 5-7. They can cycle through coaches like they’re Attorneys General during a harebrained coup attempt. They can get pummeled every September and act like it was a surprise, and they can lose to their conference rivals in the most devastating manners imaginable. And yet, they’re still the fattest cat on the block, and in this they’re untouchable. Earnest, excellent Oklahoma up in Norman ground tooth and nail to get into the SEC. When Texas heard their friends were interested? “Oh, sure. We can get you the password.” Mighty Texas A&M, NIL warriors over in College Station and always seemingly on the cusp of glory? A pebble before a steamroller. Little Tennessee, throwing their mustard bottles and flipping outfielders the bird? Entirely irrelevant if Bustopher Jones is swinging those neuticles down the block.
Tennessee fans need to drop the UT thing. If they don’t, Texas is going to send them to Conference USA even if they lose to the Vols five times in a row.
