AUBURN | Just watch, he said.

Well, I have coach and here’s some of the things I’ve seen over the last couple of months and years…

** I’ve seen a team that can’t block, can’t tackle and can’t hold onto the football. A failure of the fundamentals that are supposed to be the bedrock of your program.

** I’ve seen a team completely collapse in second halves over and over and over again. Your halftime adjustments completely inept or falling on deaf ears or perhaps both.

** I’ve seen a coach that needed a fortuitous finish last December to bring in the SEC’s ninth-best recruiting class and will enter this November with the league’s No. 11 class. A coach that went 0-for-6 on targets in the late signing period, went 1-for-27 on high school official visitors this summer and has secured just three of the top 30 in a loaded in-state 2023 class.

** I’ve seen a coach inexplicably make a bad offense even worse. Gus Malzahn was fired in 2020 after his offense averaged 25.7 points against 10 SEC opponents. Auburn has averaged 20.9 points against 16 Power 5 opponents since.

** I’ve seen a once proud, tough and fierce defense wither away into one of the nation’s worst units. It takes a special kind of ineptitude to dismantle in two short years what Kevin Steele, Rodney Garner and Travis Williams built.

** I’ve seen you secure a place in Auburn history by becoming the first coach in 130 seasons to give up 40 or more points four times in a season, and there’s still four games left to add to your legacy.

** And when rightly asked about the collapse of your defense Saturday, I saw you reply, “In comparison to everybody else? And all the other teams that we didn't coach when we were here? That were here?” Yes coach, Auburn has historically had good to great defenses. It was part of the culture that you inherited and then completely decimated.

** I’ve seen a coach that’s on track to make more history as the first at Auburn since Earl Brown in 1949-50 to have back-to-back losing seasons. Perhaps the best argument for Auburn continuing your employment over the next month is to make sure you wear every single one of the remaining losses and not pass them off to some hapless interim coach.

Frankly, I’ve seen more than enough of Bryan Dale Harsin.

Seems like most Auburn alumni and fans have too. It remains to be seen how much more patience AU’s leadership has left for Mr. Just Watch over the next four weeks.

Regardless, an end point is coming and then comes renewal and hope. Man, this place could sure use some hope.

That's how I see it.

***

In today’s musical journey, we go back 60 years to the rise of the spookiest Halloween song of all time. On Oct. 31, 1962, Monster Mash by Bobby ‘Boris’ Pickett spent its second and final week at No. 1 on the Billboard 100, becoming the most popular Halloween song of all time. The song makes a comeback every Halloween, also making appearances on the Billboard 100 in 1970, 1973 and 2021. Pickett, who was auditioning for acting roles during the day, also played with a band, the Cordials, at night. He started imitating horror movie star Boris Karloff, which led to him and bandmate Leonard Capizzi to compose the parody song, which was also inspired by another novelty song, Alley Oop, and the Mashed Potato dance craze. Pickett, who passed away at age 69 in 2007, never had another hit but did contribute to a number of other songs throughout his career, was a disc jockey and made several appearances on T.V. shows including Long Hot Summer and Petticoat Junction. He also starred in several movies including It’s a Bikini World, Chrome and Hot Leather, Lobster Man from Mars and 1995’s Monster Mash: The Movie.