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- Dabo Swinney has always shied away from confrontation and constantly spins his own narrative.
- He did exactly that at ACC Media Days after being asked why he didn’t quit .
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Dabo Swinney is completely full of it. He has consistently carried a holier-than-thou, false prophet persona into his Clemson program and never owns up to his downfalls.
That was the case again at ACC Media Days on Tuesday.
The 51-year-old head coach was asked about a 2014 comment that went viral earlier this summer and completely avoided the question.
Why hasn’t he quit yet?
Collegiate athletes are allowed to profit from their names, images and likenesses as of July 1, 2021. Seven years prior, Swinney was asked about athletes unionizing or profiting from their sport and he could not have been more against the idea.
“As far as paying players, professionalizing college athletics, that’s where you lose me,” he said. “I’ll go do something else, because there’s enough entitlement in this world as it is. To say these guys get nothing totally devalues an education. It just blows my mind people don’t even want to quantify an education.”
Well, it has been 20 days since athletes were allowed rights to profit from their NIL and Swinney has not gone to do something else. Former Alabama cornerback Marlon Humphrey even asked on Twitter if Swinney was going to quit.
He has not.
Swinney swerves from stance.
For the first, and likely only, time since the NCAA ruling on NIL, Swinney was asked about his 2014 stance ahead of the 2021 season. His response was a total backtrack.
“We live in a world now where not everybody does much research,” Swinney said. “You go in the bathroom and hear somebody on the phone in the third stall and that’s your source. Just calling it like it is. And that’s the headline. I think people hear what they want to hear, and then unfortunately a lot of people write what they want to write to fit the story that they need. And it’s just not accurate. I’ve never had a problem with name, image and likeness. I think it should have been more. If I’d have been the czar, I’d have done it differently, because I don’t think everybody’s gonna have much opportunity with it. Some will. But not everybody will have opportunity.
“I would have liked to have seen it tied to graduation, education. … What I said, whenever that was, I still say. I am against professionalizing college athletics where we get away from the collegiate model and the value of a degree and the value of an education. I’ve never, ever said I’m against name, image and likeness. I think it’s a lot of common sense. I think it could be more. I think it could be tied more to the education process so everybody would have had a little more opportunity. I said that, whenever it was, but people hear what they want to hear.”
Classic cop-out.
The answer, while expected, was cowardly. Swinney had an opportunity to own his comment in 2014 (right when the conversation surrounding NIL really began to take off) and admit his wrongs.
Instead, as is per usual with Swinney, he spun it his way.
- He starts things off by saying “We live in a world now where not everybody does much research,” as if to say his 2014 quote was not accurate. He says that even though it is well-documented in exact context and was frequently cited since.
- He’s “never had a problem with name, image and likeness,” not because he means it, but because he was never caught on camera/audio saying otherwise.
- He said “If I’d have been the czar, I’d have done it differently” which is essentially saying he disagrees with the NIL rules and completely discredits his statement above.
- “What I said, whenever that was, I still say,” he said, as if he didn’t know exactly when he said it and that he was going to be questioned about it.
- “People hear what they want to hear” is the most egregious statement of them all. While what he is saying might be true, in this instance, he literally said what everybody heard. There was no twisting of words.
Swinney continues to be the biggest false face in college football. If you didn’t want NIL, own it. You were wrong. It’s okay.