Cocktail Thursday: Tennessee Edition

If your Georgia Bulldogs are headed into an SEC East matchup against a head coach who recruited many of them, and knows them as well as anyone, you could probably use a drink. I can help you with that.

Jeremy Pruitt is a bit of a complicated character. Those who've worked with him say he's a brilliant x’s and o’s coach, a phenomenal teacher of the fundamentals, a relentless recruiter, and a master motivator. He’s also reputed to be a crusty SOB who polarizes those around him and may or may not be part of the reason Mark Richt isn't in Athens anymore.

Pruitt’s involvement with the Georgia football program was a gestalt shift, changing the way fans and decision makers viewed their good, but not great, football program. One could make the argument that Bulldog fans who basked in a Rose Bowl victory and Mark Richt, cashing big checks while tanning on the South Florida beaches, should all thank him.

Pruitt now finds himself in need of something he is famously short on: patience. The Tennessee program he inherited is not a fixer upper. It's a total gut job. A rebuild. And he's doing it all under the watchful eye of the most successful former holder of his current position. I'm not saying Phil Fuller has designs on the Tennessee head-coaching job again. I will say at a certain point I suspect he will measure Pruitt's progress versus his own.

Now that I think about all this, Jeremy Pruitt needs a drink way worse than you do. So what drink should you enjoy while thanking your lucky stars your job isn't to clean up Kiffin/Dooley/Jones’s mess on Rocky Top?

The Orange You Glad You Aren't Pruitt. Mix one and a half ounces of vodka, one and a half ounces of Southern Comfort, and five ounces of orange juice over crushed ice, then drink it before another of your players quits mid-game.

This drink is also more commonly known as a “Southern Screw.” No, no subtext here. Just enjoy your beverage and move along. And...

Go ‘Dawgs!!!