Clay Travis: “What I was really surprised by is nobody was able to say anything other than ‘this is the greatest moment in the history of college football!’ That’s what it felt like on social media. Nobody pointed out that Vanderbilt had their starting punte who was able to play, and there were no issues whatsoever with him. Vanderbilt’s offense was so bad that you can probably argue that this player, Harrison Smith, was the best player that Vanderbilt had on the field for the entirety of the game. He kicked 7 punts. If you kick the ball 7 times, and you do an average of 43.3 yards per punt, two of those being 50+ yards, you’re a pretty good kicker. Everyone out there would agree that it’s tougher to punt than it is to kick off a football. Why was the punter not the choice to kick off?? Why was this idea that Vanderbilt didn’t have a kicker allowed to take root, and nobody said ‘wait a minute, they’ve got a punter’?... If that had happened with a male kicker, people would have said ‘man, that was an awful kick.’ This felt like a stunt that was designed by Derek Mason to make it more likely that he was able to keep his job. This idea that Vanderbilt had nobody else who could kick is just transparently false. They had a punter who is a pretty good punter, and able to punt the ball 7 times, and you’re telling me that this punter couldn’t have walked out and popped the ball up in the air on a kickoff to start the second half? You’re telling me that he was unable to kick the ball 35 yards into the air and do the exact same thing that this female kicker did? That’s just not true. Some people are going to be like ‘omg, how dare you say anything negative about this story at all, that’s sexist of you!’ I don’t buy into that at all. If you are a fan of college football or the NFL, you question everything that coaches and players do, particularly if they lose a game. I’m not blaming Sarah Fuller or saying she did anything wrong, but this clearly feels like a stunt.”
Listen to Clay Travis explain why he thought Sarah Fuller’s historic appearance for the Vanderbilt Commodores football team was nothing more than a PR stunt in a desperate attempt to save head football coach Derek Mason’s job.
Fuller became the first female player in Power 5 college football history to not only dress for a game, but take the field as well, as Fuller, a goalie for the women’s soccer team, made the kickoff to begin the second half.
Vanderbilt said they asked Fuller to try out for the team in an emergency role on account of their starting kicker missing the game because of COVID-19.
Fuller sent a directional kick 30 yards towards the sideline that was downed at the opponent’s 35-yard-line with no return.
Fuller was later named SEC Special Teams Player of the Week, however, Vanderbilt head coach Derek Mason was fired on Sunday, after going 27-55 in 7 years at the historically horrific football program.
Check out the video above as Clay is not buying that Fuller was ‘needed’,for the game, saying that Vanderbilt’s punter, who had 2 punts for over 50 yards on Saturday in a 41-0 loss to Missouri, could have easily done the kickoff duties for a Vanderbilt team who wouldn’t have kicked off often to begin with behind an offense that ranks 137th in FBS in scoring.
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