Auburn Tigers football coach Hugh Freeze has had an uneven summer. To say the least.
On one hand, recruiting is finally turning the corner.four-star Greene County (MS) WR Jase Mathews's commitment on Friday, furthering a turnaround for a Tigers team that was in the FBS's bottom half of recruiting for the 2026 cycle.
Off the field, in the locker room, there's been several noticeable infractions that have made headlines. And Freeze has treated them dramatically differently.
Malcolm Simmons' domestic violence case is the biggest scandal Freeze has had during his Plains tenure. Simmons was charged with domestic violence by strangulation or suffocation by his girlfriend, and he's angling for youthful offender status, which can be applied for and granted by a judge to defendants under the age of 21, the details of his case would be entirely confidential, and there wouldn't be a jury trial, per the Montgomery Advertiser.
Simmons never received a suspension. Hollis Davidson III and D'Angelo Barber were after being pulled over and found with marijuana; Davidson with a Delta-9 THC vape in Georgia, and Barber with 2.5 pounds of flower and a firearm on Highway 280.
AL.com's Joseph Goodman called into question the stranglehold Freeze has on his team's culture with its recent happenings.
"Listen, Freeze might not be everyone’s favorite coach, but he’s worked pretty hard in between golf games putting together this team. I’m excited about Auburn football this season despite the Tigers’ recent crime spree," Goodman wrote.
"But the law is one thing, and football is another. It’s fair to question the discipline of this team after three arrests over the span of a month."
As Deion Sanders' locker room issues in Boulder, Colorado, showed us, winning cures all. While Athlon Sports' infamous "gun culture" article was scrubbed from the internet, there were obvious signs of dysfunction with Cormani McClain in 2023. There might have been other aspects of the report, like hazing, that were exaggerated, but true.
Once the CU Buffs went 9-3 in 2024, all of it was dropped.
Many fans will stay on Freeze even if the success is there, but the media will pivot to the Tigers' turnaround if they can make that happen. Just as they did with Coach Prime at Colorado.