Audio By Carbonatix
James Franklin was in the Vanderbilt dugout for Saturday’s college baseball conference championship game against Ole Miss. Head football coach Clark Lea sat in the stands.
Wait, what?! Yes, you read that correctly.
Franklin is actually the most successful college football coach in Vanderbilt history. He led the Commodores to back-to-back nine-win seasons in 2012 and 2013 with two bowl wins and a top-25 ranking. They had not won nine games in a single season since 1915. They have not won nine games since.
It is not uncommon for the college football coach and the college baseball coach at the same school to become friends. That is exactly what happened in Nashville. Franklin became very close with Tim Corbin during his three years on West End. They are still very close today even though the former is no longer with the university and hasn’t been in more than a decade.
Corbin typically gets up to watch a Penn State game each fall. Franklin often returns to Nashville.
In this instance, Franklin was already in the south when the Vandy Boys advanced to the conference title game. He was on vacation in Destin, Florida. Destin is about four hours from Hoover, Alabama, which is the host of the SEC baseball tournament. Not a bad drive!
Franklin decided to make the trip on Sunday morning to pay his old friend a visit and to support his former school. Corbin actually invited him to hang out in the team dugout.
I don’t really understand why James Franklin needs to be in the dugout instead of the stands but I don’t see a huge issue with this arrangement. This kind of thing is not that uncommon. He and Tim Corbin are close friends. ESPN was thrilled to get him on the mic for an interview.
James Franklin pulled up to the SEC baseball tournament to support his long-time friend and Vandy head coach Tim Corbin 🤝 @SECNetwork pic.twitter.com/Ud9MRmJVSg
— ESPN College Football (@ESPNCFB) May 25, 2025
However, Vanderbilt head football coach Clark Lea was also in attendance at the SEC Championship. While Franklin watched the game from the dugout, Lea watched the game from… behind the dugout.
I am sure Clark Lea did not mind. He was there with his family. He is a man of the people.
With that being said, I cannot wrap my head around the hilarious contrast between current head coach and former head coach. Franklin has been at Penn State since 2014 and got to be in the dugout. Lea led Vanderbilt to its first winning season since the Franklin era just last year but he did not get to be in the dugout. Kinda weird, no?