...I present to you, the biggest idiot on the internet, vampirereb:
State fans are unique in that they are the only fan base in America whose football program has been obviously inferior to their rival's but will deny it to the grave.
Inspite of the comparison in bowl games, championships, All Americans, our winning 80% of the games from WWII to the end of the century (same as our overall record against Bama) they insist their program in on par with ours because they have basically split with us since 2000. What they fail to mention is that this selective timeframe includes their best ever 2 coaches and probably our 2 worst. The fact that we sent Jackie packing on Jackie Day 31-0 and humiliated Dans's best teams during that timeframe doesn't phase them.
Can you imagine or have you ever heard of a Vandy fan arguing their program was equal to Tenn's or a GT fan arguing their's was equal to GA's. No you won't.
So the question is how can a State fan do it? I've witnessed two ridiculous lines of reasoning all my life:
-Cheating. Although they know every school has boosters who cheat we do it more effectively than basically anyone else including Bama, LSU certainly their school who's cheaters are somehow always justified in light of our cheaters. Bottom line- totally justified hypocrisy.
-Delusion. You do understand that we have never beaten State fair and square. We have never played well and won. They got beat because of their ineptness. We never won a game, They simple gave it to us. Or maybe we have never been as good as people think because we played a weak schedule or got all the brakes. Has anyone noticed that our opponents never play well against us?
For these reasons and many more contrived in the head of an obsessed Rebel hater, our football program has never been, isn't and never will be better than theirs. Considering all these reasons, not really.
This is truly a unique fan base. Hypocrisy and denial and just good ole red blooded hatred and envy drives the engine.
But I want to be quick to point out that within that fan base there are plenty of fine people I know like in every fan base I've found who are not totally innocent of the above charges but not affected enough to change their good character. I have many friends who are Bulldogs who don't fit this description.