Coffee and Magnolia: July 28th

Good afternoon, Auburn fans. I hope you all had impeccable weekends.

Frank Thomas and his family sure did. The Big Hurt went into Cooperstown's National Baseball Hall of Fame yesterday, and gave one of the more memorable induction speeches in recent years.

It ran almost twice as long as the Hall officials wanted speeches to go, mostly due to Frank's thanking basically every player he ever played with by name.

Tearing up at multiple points in his address, the former American League MVP got most emotional when he talked about his parents.

His voice also broke a few times while thanking Pat Dye and Hal Baird for their parts in his time at Auburn. We even got a "War Damn Eagle" out of him.

He also didn't leave out former coaches and teammates from Columbus.

Still, of course, a large figure in Auburn athletics, Frank's weekend in New York brought some reps from the athletic department who filmed a good bit of video from the festivities, including some interviews with other Hall of Famers about the Big Hurt's career.

In Auburn football news, the Tigers got a huge commitment from a c/o 2015 linebacker, Charles Henderson High's Richard McBryde. Our C&M overlord did a write up on McBryde's announcement you should read if you haven't already.

Ryan Black's check of SEC team's potential highs-and-lows chugged on with his Nos. 8 and 7, respectively, Missouri, who he has between East champs and 6-7, and Mississippi State, who he says could wind up somewhere in the middle of double-digit wins and just barely scraping out a .500 record.

AL.com's Joel Erickson has a few stories posted about the FCA golf event at University Club that honored Philip Lutzenkirchen. Both are nice reads for some quotes from his family members and a few notable Tigers who showed up to play.

You all have a wonderful rest of the afternoon. War Eagle.