BMatt’s Monday musings
AUBURN | Joe Whitt did so much for Auburn in his 34 years as an assistant coach and administrator, and one of the best decisions he ever made was to offer an undersized and relatively unknown recruit out of Spring Valley High School in Columbia, S.C., in the 2001 class.
In many ways, Travis Williams has been an extension of Whitt for the last 20 years.
T-Will was the quintessential underdog story as a player, redshirting his first season while he put on weight and then starting 36 games, earning first-team All-SEC honors as a senior in 2005 and finishing with 225 tackles. He won an SEC Championship in 2004 and should have had an opportunity to play for a national championship. He was 4-1 against Alabama with the only loss coming during his redshirt year.
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After a short stint in the NFL and pursuing a music career, T-Will was back at Auburn as a graduate assistant in 2009 to start his coaching career and was there as the Tigers won the national championship in 2010. He’s been Auburn’s linebacker coach for the past five seasons, distinguishing himself as a good evaluator, recruiter, developer and coach, much like his mentor, Whitt.
T-Will’s had to earn everything in his life and he made his linebackers do the same in every workout and every practice. His linebackers played their guts out for him just like he did for Whitt. And they developed into young men under him just like he did under Whitt.
That Bryan Harsin chose not to retain Williams on his new staff was disappointing, but perhaps it will turn out to be the opportunity for T-Will to achieve what, for Whitt, was never an option. And that’s to advance in his profession.
Williams is ready and he’s capable. Of that, I can 100 percent attest. And perhaps his Auburn journey is not over just yet and the next time he walks through those doors at the athletic complex (or the new football performance center), it will be as Auburn's defensive coordinator or head coach.
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There are a lot of reasons why Bruce Pearl is an elite coach — a lot. And Auburn is very fortunate to have him. But I want to focus on one of his many assets, and that’s his ability to motivate and build trust with his players.
Take Sharife Cooper for instance. Auburn’s superstar freshman guard shot just 37.0 percent from the floor and made 1 of 16 3-pointers in his first three games. Pearl was asked about his shooting before the Arkansas game.
“I'll put the ball in his hands and trust him. That's what I do with my players. I trust them, and if he's open he better shoot it,” Pearl said.
Cooper has done just that. In the last two games, he’s shot 44.8 percent from the floor and made 4 of 9 3-pointers.
Pearl is hard on his players. He pushes them to fulfill their potential, but at the same time instills confidence in them. He trusts them and they, in turn, trust and believe and him. It’s a winning combination.
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In today’s musical journey, we go back 10 years to the release of one of the best-selling albums of all time. On January 24, 2011, Adele Laurie Blue Adkins released her second studio album, 21. Its title corresponds to her age during its production. The album went on to top the charts in more than 30 countries and was the world’s best-selling album in both 2011 and 2012. It’s the fourth-best selling album of all time and the best-selling by a solo artist in the UK. In the US, it held the top position on the Billboard 200 for 24 weeks, the longest by any female solo artist in history. It won the 2012 Grammy for Album of the Year. Overall, it has sold over 31 million copies making it the best-selling album of the 21st century.
Adele was born on May 5, 1988 in Tottenham, London, and raised by a single mother. She began singing at age of four and often imitated the Spice Girls at dinner parties. She graduated from the BRIT School for Performing Arts and Technology where she was classmates with Leona Lewis and Jessie J. She got her big break when a friend published her three-song demo on Myspace in 2006 where it gained popularity and eventually led to her signing with XL Recordings. By 2008, she released her first album, 19, which included the song, Hometown Glory, and was named the Best New Artist at the 2009 Grammy Awards. Her 2012 song, Skyfall, won an Academy Award, Golden Globe and Brit Award for Single of the Year. Her third album, 25, came out in 2015 and won five more Grammys. She has over 120 million record sales at the age of 32, which already ranks in the top 40 of all time, and has won 15 Grammys.
The 21 album had four No. 1 hits in Rolling in the Deep, Someone Like You, Set Fire to the Rain and Rumour Has It. Written by Adele and music producer Paul Epworth, Rolling in the Deep was the lead single and was inspired by Adele’s breakup with her boyfriend. She said in an interview the song was a FU to being told that her life was going to be “boring, lonely and rubbish” by not staying in the relationship.
