This first appeared in Kevin Scarbinsky’s weekly newsletter. Subscribe to get it in your inbox every Thursday, $5/month or $50/year.

Have you ordered your playoff tickets yet? Put down a deposit on one of those DIY-looking field-level, barstool, big-screen patios in the four corners of Pat Dye Field? Better get ‘em while they’re hot – and they will be hot – because it’s just a hop, skip and a jump through the hedges from a Freeze warning to a field storming.

Give ‘em hell, give ‘em hell, stand up and yell, hey, and OK, the hay may not be in the barn, or the signature on the letter of intent, but the Power of Dixieland is back in business after a Big Cat Weekend that would make Trooper and Luper proud. I mean, not taking a back seat to Georgia or Alabama for a five-star ‘backer? Flipping a five-star receiver committed to the Capstone from the home of Julio Jones?

If this keeps up, the new prayer in Jordan-Hare – to stop serving as the Deep South’s oldest fire hydrant – will be answered when those barking Dawgs come calling in September. Jordan-Hare will resume its rightful place as Nick Saban’s personal Waterloo two days after Thanksgiving. Hugh Freeze will even the score with Gus Malzahn as a GOAT slayer and outdo Terry Bowden with a perfect first impression.

Too much? Too soon? Who cares? Everybody in the pool!

Let the Auburn family have its fun in the sun. When you’ve suffered through the last, gloomy stages of Gus and the dark ages of Bryan Harsin, a ray or two of sunshine looks like a heat wave. A few recruiting victories feel like the promise of plenty of satisfying Saturdays to come.

Reality is likely to return no later than the last Saturday in September when Georgia takes its next step toward a three-peat at Auburn’s expense in Auburn’s house. A more sobering reality check is available now in a glance at the 247 team recruiting rankings, which on Wednesday showed Auburn 18th in the country but ninth among schools that will compete in the SEC in 2024.

The silver lining is that Auburn’s average ranking for its commitments is fifth in the country behind only Georgia, Ohio State, Alabama and USC. The dark cloud is the distance between now and the early December signing period. In the NIL world, the potential exists for the kind of furious flipping – into and out of the Loveliest Village – that would dizzy Suni Lee. TJ Yeldon, legacy Rashaan Evans and Reuben Foster’s AU tattoo say hello.

But why worry about what could go wrong when you can celebrate something going right for a change? Freeze did his best at SEC Media Days to dampen unrealistic expectations for a quick lightning strike of 1993 or 2013 proportions. Barely a week later, his program made quite a splash.

Hey, it’s still summer, where the living is easy. Party on, Auburn. Party on.

Only one promotion left for Auburn’s Steven Pearl

Sandwiched as it was between Big Cat Weekend and the start of preseason football practice, Tuesday’s news from Auburn basketball almost seemed like an afterthought. But the official announcement that Steven Pearl has been promoted to associate head coach should have residents of the Jungle thinking about the future – and the possibility that Pearl’s next promotion will be taking over for his dad as head coach.

It could happen.

Bruce Pearl is 63. He’s been at Auburn for nine seasons, and though he just finished the first year of an eight-year, $50.2-million contract that runs through the 2029-30 season, no one expects him to stay on the sideline for the duration.

It’s no secret inside the athletics department that Pearl would like to see his son take over as head coach when he decides to retire. We witnessed a similar transition years ago at UAB when the legendary Gene Bartow retired as head coach and son Murry, his right-hand assistant, succeeded him.

Murry did good things with the Blazers, but in hindsight, it likely would have been better for him and the program had he gotten his baptism as the boss at another school.

As Bruce Pearl has turned Auburn from a punch line into a champion – with three SEC titles, the program’s first No. 1 ranking and the state’s first trip to the Final Four – his son has been there from the start, beginning as an assistant strength coach and stepping up regularly as a progressively larger part of the operation.

In the press release announcing his son’s promotion, Pearl called Steven “truly one of the best assistant coaches in the country” and noted that he “has earned this promotion,” which “has the full support of our coaching staff and the administration.”

Hmmm. Those last two phrases are particularly interesting. A cynic might regard them as pre-emptive strikes against any suggestion of nepotism. Bruce Pearl also said this about Steven Pearl: “He’s a younger version of me.”

The Auburn sports information staff may want to keep that quote on file. It could come in handy one day.

You wrote, and you are so right

In last week’s edition, in the wake of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution apologizing for and making corrections to a seriously misleading story on Georgia football while firing the reporter who wrote it, I asked what you wanted from me in particular and sports journalism in general.

You answered with some excellent insight. Tom from North Carolina shared that his “idealistic view of columnists and their readers is of an extended conversation on the issues of the day in the town square or the village pub,” which he witnessed while serving in the Army and stationed in a small town in England.

Cheers to your service and your ideal, Tom, as well as your stated desire for honest reporting and writing: “Straight down the line. Let the chips fall where they may.”

Jerry from Mississippi, a former player, coach and educator, offered some compelling advice that, as a former part-time college journalism instructor, I especially appreciate: “The only thing I can say about journalism is, even if it is your opinion, do not use propaganda, hyperbole or omission of facts to make what you are writing look more truthful than it really is.”

Can’t promise that I won’t engage in occasional hyperbole to make a point, Jerry – see the first subject above – but your larger point is spot on. There is no substitute for good reporting and no exception to that rule for columnists. I learned that from legendary Birmingham News editors Wayne Hester and Tom Arenberg.

We’ll continue to talk about the often-ridiculed but absolutely necessary journalism profession as events warrant. Consider this space, as Tom put it, “a rare opportunity for adult conversation in this fractious era of calumny and spite.”

Can’t top that. Scarbo Knows when to stop.

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