Today is the second day of SEC Media Days, which now start earlier than ever, and also last longer than any media days in college football history. Even though the actual season is still six weeks away, I’m totally okay with this. Because this week has zero sports events. Instead of sports it has the ESPYs and the MLB All-Star festivities.
As you might expect, SEC Media Days of course featured a Johnny Manziel question or two, and Texas A&M Coach Kevin Sumlin rightfully condescended to the reporters who asked about ESPN’s favorite football player.
Manziel of course is no longer with the Texas A&M Aggies, having declared early for the NFL Draft where he was selected by the Cleveland Browns with the 22nd overall pick. The first query to Kevin Sumlin during his Q&A sessions was about Johnny on the field.
“Let me get this straight, the question is ‘what is it like not to Coach Johnny Manziel?” Sumlin responded.
Then he gave a long answer filled with coachspeak, boring corporate cliches relating to football and said “There’s not be going to be another Johnny Manziel. That’s part of the game.” Sumlin then labeled that question as irrelevant.
Then Sumlin received the inevitable question about Johnny Manziel off-the-field, about his drinking party photos. He seemed to have his responses rehearsed, since he was smiling through the entire thing. I’m sure Kevin knew it was coming. Here’s what he said:
“Is this the SEC media days, right? No, that’s a great question about the Cleveland Browns. Anybody else got something?”
Well played Kevin Sumlin, well played.
Paul M. Banks owns The Sports Bank.net, an affiliate of Fox Sports and Yahoo! The Postgame. He’s been a guest on news talk shows all across the world. Banks has been featured in numerous media outlets including NFL.com, Forbes, Bleacher Report, Deadspin, ESPN, NBC, the History Channel and more. President Barack Obama follows him on Twitter (@paulmbanks)