Old Testament Dabo
CLEMSON — Ten minutes after Dabo Swinney’s press conference ended yesterday, we were walking from the football facility when a familiar black Toyota Tundra stopped, and the rolled-down passenger window revealed the most familiar face in Clemson.
You ain’t giving up on us yet are you?
The head coach had a big smile as he said this. That’s important to note.
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We’re guessing he was headed home for lunch, but the brief conversation we had with him reinforced one fact about him that’s always been remarkable:
The man is great at compartmentalizing his emotions.
So while there’s probably a lot of Old Testament Dabo going on behind closed doors this week in the wake of a weak offensive performance Saturday night, his demeanor and his laughter in other situations would never let on that he’s breathing fire.
That said, yesterday was a landmark moment for us in all our years of knowing and covering this man.
Over the previous three days he certainly let on that he wasn’t pleased with his offensive coordinator and his quarterback.
But on this day, Tuesday, he breathed fire publicly.
Nationally, the bigger Clemson-related story yesterday was Swinney giving LSU a grade of 65 for its performance Saturday (he gave Clemson a 58).
That little controversy, if you want to call it that, was part of what makes college football so funky and fun.
But it was relatively meaningless — relative to Swinney, for the first time we can recall, publicly ripping people in his own building to this degree.
The following seems much more likely to come from the mouth of Stephen Orr Spurrier than William Christopher Swinney:
“A lot of narratives in the offseason, and the only one held up was (defensive coordinator) Tom Allen and that D-line and them linebackers. The rest of them? Nah, none of them held up. All these great wideouts we got? Hey, great wideouts make them contested plays to win the game. If you’re a Heisman quarterback and all that and first pick in the draft and all that crap, you don’t show up and play like that.”
Seriously, that’s Spurrier to a T. Just add visor.
Yeah, this is different.
Later, Swinney was asked why he didn’t use his third timeout late in the game, before the final fourth-down play.
He seemingly thought the question was why he didn’t use his third timeout of the first half.
Or maybe he knew the question was about the fourth quarter but still wanted to turn the answer to the first half.
He chose fire.
“We wasted two timeouts early in the half. Yeah, we called the play wrong. So we screwed it up. Again, first game. Coaching. We called it wrong, had to call two timeouts. That’s unacceptable. And the third one was, we just took a knee there (to end the first half).”
Again, Spurrier.
Again, whoa.
At this point there’s zero doubt that Swinney doesn’t look fondly on all the fawning adulation this program received during the offseason. Nick Saban used to call it rat poison, and probably what concerned Swinney most during the summer of Clemson love was that it followed a four-loss season.
Yeah, Clemson did some nice things last year and by the end appeared on an upward trajectory offensively.
But go back and watch the entirety of that game at Texas that was so uplifting. Still plenty of things for the quarterback to clean up in that game. Still plenty of reason to wonder why the offensive coordinator didn’t show more aggression earlier. They were still down 31-10 at one point. And still lost by two touchdowns.
Go back and watch the long offensive droughts that preceded Clemson taking route 56 with Nolan Hauser to get its ACC title against SMU.
And you don’t have to go back and watch Cade Klubnik’s final play against South Carolina, or the couple of missed throws earlier that could’ve made it a different game. Those images will be seared into your psyche forever.
Point is, it’s always going to make any coach uncomfortable when his team is presented as world-beaters.
Now add to it this coach, who’s spent his whole life being fueled by what people told him he and his teams couldn’t do.
Now add to it that last year’s team, other than that miraculous survival of SMU in Charlotte, simply couldn’t close the deal in big-stage moments. And in two instances, in Atlanta against Georgia and inside Death Valley against Louisville, they weren’t even in position to close the deal because they were throttled.
Quite clearly, Swinney is trying to create an edge when he tells the media to start writing that his team sucks. He’s figuratively scouring Facebook Marketplace in search of an old ROY Bus.
Heck, maybe he’s even trying to get in touch with Tyler from Spartanburg to gauge his interest in joining the Tigers’ support staff.
Over his Hall of Fame coaching career, Swinney has gone scorched-earth on his team plenty. The most relentless assault probably came two years ago when the Tigers returned home from back-to-back losses to Miami and N.C. State.
He put everyone in the building on notice that week. Even the guy who cuts the grass was afraid he might lose his job.
But here’s the key difference: Every other time in the past Swinney has felt the need to tear into whoever he felt deserved it, he’s done so privately while standing up for his guys publicly.
That’s what he was doing that Notre Dame week two years ago when the phone call from the ‘Burg unleashed a blistering defense of everything his program was about.
He has always had his guys’ backs publicly, particularly his quarterbacks.
Fifteen years ago, we ripped his quarterback after Kyle Parker threw a pick-6 against South Carolina and was summarily benched in the blowout loss at Death Valley.
The head coach responded by going nuclear on us via email two days later.
Later, he called and said there were no hard feelings and he just had to stick up for his guy.
Fast-forward to the DJ Uiagalelei years, and Swinney was highly protective of his quarterback amid struggles that were far more pronounced and prolonged than Klubnik’s.
And during some of the downturns that made the case for Swinney parting ways with coordinators — from Kevin Steele to Brandon Streeter to Wes Goodwin — you had to sort of read between the lines of what he was saying to get an indication that change might be coming. He was never as harsh with them as he’s been with Garrett Riley the past few days.
Privately? Sure. But publicly? No way.
So that’s the clear and fascinating juncture he has created here one game into his 17th full season leading Clemson.
Maybe he senses that 2025 is going to be his best opportunity in a while to claim his third national title.
Maybe he feels like these are different times that make it more kosher to blast a coordinator and quarterback who will combine to make more than $4 million this year.
Maybe he senses that the fan base is no longer going to be big on him rallying to the defense of players and coaches who simply aren’t performing.
Maybe he believes this coordinator and this quarterback, unlike past coordinators and quarterbacks, can take it. That’s our hunch.
We can only guess as to the motives, and as to the results.
But we know this is different and unlike what we’ve seen from Swinney over his entire tenure.
Normally he says criticism from the outside is a pile of crap.
Now he’s joining in and piling on.
He’s always been great at pushing buttons. But never these buttons.
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It’s a new spin on Old Testament Dabo, and it’s utterly fascinating.
Maybe Swinney was going home for lunch when we saw him yesterday.
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Or maybe he was going to try to trade his Tundra for a ROY Bus.
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