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Hugh Freeze Refused To Take Accountability After Deleted Auburn Practice Video Exposed His Rage

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Hugh Freeze Clipboard Video Exposed Auburn Jackson Arnold
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Auburn head coach Hugh Freeze was not happy with Jackson Arnold during college football practice. He slammed his clipboard in rage.

However, the 55-year-old is not sure whether to blame his quarterback or his coaching staff.

Regardless of who is truly at fault, Freeze won’t take responsibility for any of his college football failures. It would be very easy to do so and move on but he will not.

Hugh Freeze coaches college football like a college football coach.

I am not going to pretend like this most recent meltdown is any different from what is going on at other programs across the country. Some head coaches get mad when their players do not execute.

It is not uncommon for a head coach to yell at his players. I cannot imagine this is the first time a head coach slammed his clipboard to the ground out of frustration.

Freeze did not act inappropriately. Nor should he be criticized for his reaction at football practice.

Jackson Arnold did not get the ball out of his hand in time to hit a wide-open wide receiver. The five-star Oklahoma transfer either would’ve been sacked or forced to throw the ball away in a live game. Or he would’ve backed himself into a corner and thrown an awful interception.

All three possibilities are less than ideal.

Hugh Freeze would prefer to see his quarterback deliver a strike to his open pass-catcher. When that did not happen, he lost his cool.

The heated interaction can be seen in the following video, which was quickly deleted by the original reporter:

It was certainly not ideal but, in the grand scheme of things, no big deal. A coach got mad.

Self-accountability lacks on the Plains.

Hugh Freeze was asked about the since-deleted video after Auburn football practice. He offered a completely fair explanation for why he got upset— Arnold did not do his job.

“When we have the right thing called, the expectation, and I think it’s a reasonable one, is we execute it,” Freeze said.

Fair enough! We would not have an issue if we stopped right there.

And yet, as you could imagine, Freeze kept talking. He continued on to question his quarterback staff in addition to his presumptive starting quarterback. Even though he technically used “we,” his comments were more of a “What did they do wrong?” The “I” part of “we” did not exist.

Hugh Freeze got mad at a bad play. His reaction was caught on camera. Fine. No big deal.

Just be sure to blame everybody else. If it was not Arnold’s fault, it was the quarterback staff’s fault.