In the last two weeks, three Southeastern Conference coaches have been reprimanded by the league for making negative comments about the referees.
Arkansas' Bobby Petrino and Mississippi State's Dan Mullen spoke about what they believed to be blown calls after their losses to Florida, and Tennessee's Lane Kiffin complained after his team's loss to Alabama.
Vanderbilt coach Bobby Johnson doesn't remember a year where there were so many controversies with the referees.
"You have bad calls every year, but they are magnified because of the replay system, the amount of games we have television all the time and everybody sees them," Johnson said during the SEC coaches teleconference Wednesday.
Mullen's grievance stemmed from the refs not overturning Dustin Doe's touchdown to a fumble recovered by the Bulldogs after reviewing the play.
While the replay system has been met with complaints, Johnson is happy with the system in place but admits it is flawed.
"It works as well as humanly possible. People are going to make mistakes, but when you've got the number of cameras we have with the television exposure we have and you have a chance to run it slow and look at it, it gives us a chance to correct the obviously wrong call," Johnson said. "When they are so close that you can't tell, you just can't argue with it."
Early signing day: With recruits de-committing late becoming a more frequent practice, talks about an early signing day have picked up steam around the nation.
LSU coach Les Miles is in favor of implementing an early signing date to lock in commits before February as long as it doesn't affect the current calendar in place for the recruiting process.
"What I have always said is you have an early signing day," Miles said. "Currently, we have a bunch of guys committed to us. We're committing to them and they are committed to us. They should have the opportunity to solidify that in December or late November.
"If the decision is already made, why extend the decision signing day to February?"
Kiffin keeping quiet: In his first year as Tennessee's head coach, Kiffin has been ruffling people's feather with some of his comments and attacks on other SEC coaches.
Kiffin, whose recent comments about refs caused him to be reprimanded by the SEC, may be turning over a new leaf. When asked Wednesday about his thoughts on the replay system, Kiffin chose not to comment.
"I'm really not getting into that. I'm going to stay away from that," Kiffin said.
He repeated that sentiment when asked if he felt he was treated similarly by the conference as other coaches.
"I'm moving on from last week," Kiffin said. "I'm not getting into conversations about it and whether I feel we have been treated different than Florida or Alabama or Nick Saban or Urban Meyer, so I'm going to stay away from it."
