Is Hugh Freeze really on the hot seat? No, AL.com thinks he's just a master strategist

Hugh Freeze's specific selection of words like "gutted," "restoring “the glory,” and "the need to build up Auburn men," felt like too little too late.

Freeze's confession that his QB's are not good enough was a throw-'em-under-the-bus moment, leaving Tiger fans enraged.

So much so that some demanded him to be fired; something that reportedly won't happen even if Auburn went 4-8.

Another reason it won't happen? Freeze's buyout starts at $5 million, per The Athletic.

So why all the drama? What if it was all part of Freeze's master plan? Perhaps it's a textbook strategy to divert the fans from the important stuff by luring them towards the shiny object. But how exactly is throwing his own QBs under the bus a shiny object?

Michael Casagrande of AL.com explained how in an opinion column.

"Steal the headlines saying a bunch of things dumb media guys—like this one—will leech onto, and we’ll leave the players alone," he wrote.

All the insults to the injury might as well be to save his players. And his team in general.

But what truly makes Freeze a master strategist is the fact that he communicated the important stuff soon after dishing out the 'shiny object', insults for his own QBs which kept the media occupied.

Although he did not name any names, Freeze started his case by pulling out some numbers from his holster before he took over Auburn football.

"I think you all are aware of what we inherited,” he prefaced before continuing, "Our AD has done a marvelous job of explaining that."

"He did to me before I took the job, with the previous recruiting classes not being what you need to compete at a high level. And 57 transfers out in the previous three years before my arrival.”

The point here? Freeze was just coming to that.

"So building takes time," he said. “But our process, when complete, is going to make everyone very, very proud to wear the orange and blue. It’s making ground, the process is. I see it."

Hugh Freeze, the master manipulator?

So all of it for just buying some more time? If so, then Freeze is doing a mind-boggling job of diverting attention, a skill so devious that it almost sounds manipulative. Is it, though?

We'll only know that once Freeze can confidently say that he has "built" his team.