Deshaun Davis didn’t know Tammy Bullard personally. They had never met face-to-face.
But Davis, like so many others across the state of Alabama and beyond, knew her voice from her many calls to the “Paul Finebaum Show.”
“Sometimes when we were getting on buses to travel, we would watch the SEC Network, and she’d come up and would always be getting on Finebaum for him talking about Auburn or downing Auburn,” Davis said last week. “She really loved Auburn. Even in some years when we weren’t good or when we came off a bad loss, she’d call in, and if nobody had Auburn’s back, she had Auburn’s back.”
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That’s why Davis, even though he didn’t have any sort of relationship with Bullard, wrote her first and last names across his forearm tape before his final game at Jordan-Hare Stadium last Saturday.
I don’t normally do this and never met her a day in my life but honestly SHE had our back when no one else did! R.I.P. Mrs.Tammy Bullard 💔 #WDE pic.twitter.com/n1smPAg0Og
— ⭐️Deshaun Davis⭐ (@_Davis_Boy12) November 17, 2018
A day earlier, Bullard — along with her 3-year-old granddaughter — died in a car accident on U.S. Highway 280 between Sylacauga and Childersburg, Ala. A truck carrying explosive material overturned and veered into oncoming traffic, where it collided with Bullard’s SUV.
Finebaum shared the news of Bullard’s death in the final hour of his show that afternoon, and it spread rapidly through social media.
Thousands of college football fans and media members tweeted their tributes to Bullard, who was known as “Tammy from Clanton” to those who watched or listened to the show. Finebaum turned the final hour into a memorial for her, with longtime on-air rival “Jim from Tuscaloosa” opening the time with a tearful and heartfelt message of love for the die-hard Auburn fan.
“There are no words right now to describe the impact and the importance that she had on this program and on so many people who were a part of it,” Finebaum said on the broadcast. “She was easily one of the most important and beloved callers in the history of this program.”
To anyone unfamiliar with Finebaum, the dynamics of the Iron Bowl rivalry in the state of Alabama or college football fandom, the massive response to Bullard’s tragic passing might seem surprising.
It’s understandable. That was even a slight shock to John Hayes, who has been the show’s producer since its move to Charlotte and the SEC Network in 2014.
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“She was a part of the fabric of college football in this country,” Hayes told The Athletic. “Maybe we didn’t realize it at this time last week, because everyone was just going on with their lives … we were so worried about rivalry games and the College Football Playoff and everything that is happening on the field. What we found out was that off the field, Tammy was a huge part of the sport, especially in the SEC. We didn’t know just how big of a deal she really was.
“When we lost her, it was very easy to see how much she meant to the people who love this sport.”
As Hayes said, “Tammy from Clanton” was a legitimate college football celebrity, especially for those fans in the heart of SEC territory.
And it was a reputation she built on pure volume and die-hard love for Auburn.
“She certainly could be loud, but that’s exactly who she was,” Finebaum said last week. “She was the most passionate caller that I’ve ever encountered — and the most passionate fan that I’ve ever known.”
“Part of my job is making sure that we have contributors on our phone lines that are entertaining, that are interesting, and that people want to hear from,” Hayes said. “Tammy was No. 1 on the list. She was the best. No one was even close.”
Bullard made her first call to the “Paul Finebaum Show” nearly a decade ago, when it was still based in Birmingham and primarily focused on Alabama and Auburn football.
In a 2016 interview, Bullard said she first heard the show when her FedEx driver — another Auburn fan — turned it on during a rant from a popular Alabama caller.
“I listened to it in his truck for a few minutes, and I said, ‘Hey, who in the world do these people think they are? These Alabama fans ain’t got nothing, not a clue!’ ” Bullard told Style Blueprint. “Well, I tell you what, that’s what made me call … ‘Shane from Center Point.’ He made me so mad talking about Auburn … and I just told my FedEx driver, “Do you know this number?” and we waited for him to say it over on the show, and I called in right then and there and responded to Shane from Center Point.”
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That call began what would turn into countless hours of major decibels and listener entertainment.
In Alabama, the Crimson Tide have a clear numbers advantage over the cross-state Tigers in terms of fan support.
Naturally, Finebaum and his show have long been constant targets of criticism from Auburn fans who think there’s too much of an Alabama lean. More of the callers in the early days — the show has truly gone national now on the SEC Network — supported Alabama, so more of the conversation centered on what’s happening in Tuscaloosa.
Bullard wasn’t the only Auburn fan who became a popular caller on the show, but none of them quite reached her level.
When she talked about her Tigers and slung shade at Tide fans, she was speaking the language that many Auburn fans spoke — even if they might have never done it as publicly or passionately as she did on the air.
“Auburn needed a voice on Finebaum,” says Skye Underwood, an Auburn fan and blogger who said he first started calling Finebaum’s show 27 years ago. “Someone that wouldn’t take crap off of an Alabama fan and would defend the orange and blue at all costs. Enter Tammy. Tammy would call in and jump everyone talking negatively about Auburn and remind them that Auburn folks were not just gonna sit back and take it anymore.”
Bullard soon became a well-known figure across the state of Alabama. On a wild call-in show that frequently reminded listeners that “fan” is short for “fanatic,” her calls stood above the rest.
People in Alabama latched onto @finebaum because it was a show filled with sincere fan passion performed without irony. Tammy was one of the most colorful and memorable examples of that. Unforgettable personality.
— Matt Scalici (@MattScalici) November 17, 2018
Cecil Hurt, a longtime Alabama beat reporter at the Tuscaloosa News, has been a regular guest on Finebaum’s show for decades. While some listeners thought Bullard’s calls were an elaborate over-the-top act, Hurt saw them differently.
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“If you understood what was really being projected and what was being tapped into … you understood that for people in this state whose next-door neighbors were on the opposite side of the rivalry, they talked about this for 365 days a year,” Hurt told The Athletic. “Tammy was one of those fans, and they’re all over the state of Alabama. They’re behind their team 100 percent. If you knew and understood that dynamic, you didn’t think she was ridiculous or over-the-top. She was like somebody you knew.
“(Finebaum) knew when somebody was real and when somebody was just putting on an act for the radio. He knew who was going to connect with the audience and put on an entertaining product. … But it wasn’t going to be entertaining if it wasn’t genuine. That’s what separated so many of the prominent callers — I-Man, Jim from Tuscaloosa, Tammy.”
Besides, if Bullard’s passion for Auburn on the air was fake, she would have at least had an off call or two at some point. That never happened, according to those on the show.
“The reason why she was the best is that she brought it every single time,” Hayes said. “There was never a time when she called and it felt flat. The call was always either funny, entertaining or just wild. When Tammy was on the phone, it was an immediate #TammyAlert with the siren emojis on Twitter. We let people know that she was coming up, and then we sat back and just took it all in.”
Bullard was a voice for Auburn fans who — while they may have been outnumbered — wanted to show the love for their college football team ran deeper and fiercer than their Alabama co-workers, friends and even family members.
“She was Auburn’s defender,” Underwood said. “Every call was full of passion. If you were going to talk trash about Auburn on ‘Finebaum,’ you better be ready to be raked across the coals by a lady from Clanton who can literally roar like a tiger.”
Bullard wasn’t going to be drowned out by any rival fan. She would go toe-to-toe with any Alabama caller, never backing down from a challenge. Some of the most memorable moments in show history are lined with Bullard’s voice.
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“Any of the radio cage matches between Tammy and Jim from Tuscaloosa — if you heard them, you would never forget it, for better or worse,” Hurt said with a laugh. “In her prime, Tammy connected with the audience in a way that would make you simultaneously say, ‘Man, I’m glad I don’t live next door to her,’ and ‘Man, I wish I lived next door to her.’ ”
Her fiery rants had many targets, and Finebaum himself was often caught in the crosshairs.
https://twitter.com/HollyAnderson/status/1063626244397457408
“Yeah, I’m not going to say that we didn’t have some crazy screaming matches,” Finebaum said on the air last Friday. “But that’s who she was, and she did it with a smile.”
When Hayes took over producing of the show a few years ago, he made sure Finebaum wasn’t able to get away from his star caller’s attacks.
“Paul has the ability to put callers on and off the air,” Hayes said. “Usually when Paul and Tammy were getting into it and he wanted to hang up, I would lock Tammy’s call into the system so that Paul didn’t have the ability to dump out of the phone call. And that’s because the end of her calls were always gold. Before she hung up the phone, no matter what she or Paul got into, she would always start muttering under her breath like, ‘Paul Finebaum, you make me so mad, I just want to rip your ears off.’ You could literally hear her clenching her teeth when she said that.
“She was always good for that. If we left Tammy on, I could guarantee she would give us something gold in the end. That’s the one thing that I will always remember about her and her calls. Her parting shots, like calling him ‘Paul Fine-Bam’ or roaring like a tiger, were always the best.”
For the first half of her call-in career, Bullard’s popularity was mostly inside the Alabama state borders.
Then came the arrival of the SEC Network, the show’s move to a television simulcast and a truly national audience. Auburn and Alabama weren’t the only major topics anymore.
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But instead of that limiting Bullard’s reach, it took it to the next level. Now people all across the country could hear her passion for all things Auburn.
“Before the show went national, the rest of the country was probably fascinated by the hate shared in the rivalry,” Underwood said. “Many outsiders never understood why Southerners were so crazy about their college football, but I believe Tammy’s passion for Auburn and her heated exchanges with ‘Bams’ helped pull back the veil.”
Viewers from all over could also put a face to “Tammy from Clanton,” as she sent the show a photo that it could display when she called. The show even had an “Intensity Meter” for some of her calls.
https://youtu.be/UFcppEsTpHA?t=34
“What made her so relatable was that anyone who viewed the show who loved their teams passionately, they saw some of themselves in her,” Hayes said. “People could connect with her based on their own love for their team. If you’re a die-hard Mizzou football fan or you live and breathe Arkansas or Texas A&M and you’re watching the ‘Finebaum Show’ on the SEC Network, you’re seeing someone who feels the same way about Auburn. All of a sudden, you can relate to that, because you feel that way, too.”
Bullard’s unexpected fame grew from there. On several occasions, Finebaum would have remote broadcasts of the show during football weekend Fridays, Bullard was a part of the action in person.
“She was a very genuine person, and I think she was really surprised that she was a celebrity,” said Hurt, who met Bullard in person at a Finebaum broadcast. “People really knew her all across the South for her passion about Auburn.”
That passion stood out to Davis, who had never written any other tribute on his equipment during any of his 49 previous games.
So when he, like so many people inside and outside the Auburn fan base, found out about the deaths of Bullard and her granddaughter deaths last week, he knew what he had to do.
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“If you love Auburn, you’re family to me,” Davis said. “I know what this program means to me, and everyone else knows what it meant to her. A lot of people were struck by her death. It’s kind of catastrophic with how it happened and with the little girl, man, it happened out of the blue. … So I had to pay homage to her.”
The 2018 season hasn’t been an easy one for Davis, his teammates and those who support them. Auburn will enter the Iron Bowl on Saturday as a three-touchdown underdog with a lackluster 7-4 record in a year in which Alabama is 11-0 and looking practically unbeatable.
But one couldn’t tell that from the tone of Bullard’s last few calls to the “Paul Finebaum Show.”
She had the same message of unwavering support throughout the season. She even closed what would be her final call to the show with a tiger roar directed at Finebaum.
And that’s what turned a loving grandmother from central Alabama into one of the most famous college football fans in America.
“Her calls in the bad times and the good times were always about backing her team,” Hayes said. “When Auburn is having a tough year and the fans aren’t as loud and proud, Tammy made sure she was because she needed her team to know that she was going to be there with them no matter what. That’s what made her special. She was the farthest thing from a fair-weather fan.
“She was an Auburn woman who loved her team and wanted to show it 365 days a year, no matter what anyone else thought.”
(Top photo of John Hayes (left) and Tammy Bullard by John Hayes / SEC Network)
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