This is an opinion column.

Times, they are strange.

It’s Iron Bowl week in the United States and the buzz sounds more like a hum. If it weren’t for ex-Alabama receiver Marquis Maze dropping Spike 80DF on social media Monday morning, this could feel like any other college football game week.

Where’s the juice?

Who besides Maze and the triggered masses are bringing that heat?

Down in Auburn on Monday, you had Hugh Freeze going full Eeyore kicking off the media gauntlet. His news conference opening statement sounded almost despondent, understandable given his team just got bullied into a 31-10 loss to New Mexico State but not exactly setting an emotional tone for his first Iron Bowl.

Asked if he was worried about his players getting too amped up for Saturday, Freeze sounded the opposite alarm.

“Most everybody I’ve seen it’s like they’re in a fog from what happened Saturday,” Freeze said. “We’ve got to snap out of that fast And so I need to see a little amped up come practice today and tomorrow.”

On Iron Bowl week.

Let that linger for a minute.

This is the same Hugh Freeze who stood at a podium in that same spot last Nov. 29 dropping Iron Bowl warning shots. The day he was introduced as Auburn’s new football coach saw Freeze talk about his relationship with Nick Saban and wife Terry. They’re great friends, Freeze said “but I hope they’re a little nervous today.”

Asked Monday if this team was capable of responding after what Freeze called “an embarrassment,” the new-hire swagger was missing.

“Yeah, I don’t know yet,” Freeze said. “I sure hope so.”

Welp, we’ll see, I suppose.

On the bright side, Vegas has taken a more optimistic view of this Iron Bowl than the previous three. Since Alabama lost in 2019 as a 3.5-point favorite, the Crimson Tide have been favored by north of 20 points in each of the last three meetings.

That’s staggering.

Even more jarring, they covered twice with the exception coming in 2021. The last trip to Jordan-Hare turned into a real slap fight with Alabama escaping a 24-22 winner in four overtimes despite being favored by 20.5 points.

This year, the spread is right around 14.5. That’s notable given the Crimson Tide momentum and the fact Auburn’s still waking up from losing a game by 21 after being favored by 25.

Meanwhile, the center of rivalry-week gravity is way north of here.

Michigan-Ohio State has long been an Iron Bowl contemporary, but this Big Ten border feud is taking it to another level. We’re talking espionage, disinformation campaigns, coaching suspensions and court dates.

Makes one wistful for 2010.

Playing in the shadow of still-unresolved-recruiting allegations, Cam Newton took the Bryant-Denny Stadium field to musical selections that would get the in-house DJ fired. Playing “Take the Money and Run” and “Son of a Preacher Man” was the perfect opening act to the first of four iconic Auburn wins in the 2010s.

Of course, that’s also the year Al from Dadeville became a household name in the most shameful moment of this rivalry. But that was the act of one criminally misguided fan. What’s going on with those teams up north is like a fling between the Houston Astros scandal and Watergate.

We’re talking serious billable hours.

And that’ll make Ann Arbor the focus of a college football nation Saturday afternoon. If you use the ESPN College GameDay location as a barometer, the traveling cable sports circus has been to three straight Ohio State-Michigan games instead of the Iron Bowl. It came to Tuscaloosa for a no-crowd broadcast during the 2020 season. Not since 2017 in Auburn has Lee Corso done the mascot head thing in front of witnesses on Iron Bowl weekend.

This year, SEC Nation will be the warmup act on campus.

And it’s crazy considering the backdrop for this year’s game. Auburn will honor the 2013 SEC championship team before kickoff in a stark reminder of where things were. Nobody who has read this far has any trouble identifying the historical significance of what happened on that Jordan-Hare Stadium grass a decade ago. The pregame hype was there too as The Birmingham News dubbed it “The Mother of All Iron Bowls.”

It was part of a four-year span when GameDay came to three Iron Bowls on a day Chris Davis became an icon and those poor bushes got trampled.

Those were the days.

Now this reunion in Auburn isn’t without storylines. It marks the return of former Tiger interim head coach and spurned candidate Kevin Steele as Alabama’s defensive coordinator. Crimson Tide defensive back Malachi Moore said the locker room will “definitely going to be trash-talking” cornerbacks coach and Auburn graduate Travaris Robinson all week.

Otherwise, this is looking like a slow-burn Iron Bowl week.

Anecdotal evidence comes in the form of a highly unscientific social media poll asking to gauge excitement. It drew a tepid response.

So, stay tuned.

The Iron Bowl’s been known to solar flare when you’d least expect it, take two years ago as an example. Few were expecting a classic when Bryan Harsin’s only shot at Alabama came stunningly close to successful so … anything is possible?

Just not likely.

Strange times, indeed.

Michael Casagrande is a reporter for the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @ByCasagrande or on Facebook.