It never ends, and it probably never will. As the 2026 season rapidly approaches, college football analysts like Paul Finebaum will have more things to say about interesting teams from around the country. While he is an Alabama guy at heart, Finebaum's repeated disdain for the Clemson Tigers program is nothing new. It has been a constant verbal assault from him at Clemson for over a decade.
His latest criticism of Clemson was all about why he is never going to trust the Tigers ever again.
"[Clemson fans are] living in a finite period of time between 2015 and 2021 when Clemson was relevant," Finebaum said during Tuesday's airing of his show. "They're not anymore. They just can't get past it. Last year, I bought into the revival. [Cade] Klubnik, all of these great defensive (players). I had a friend who was connected to the program, and he said the defense was going to be the best in the country. I believed it. They were terrible. Nothing about that program is really worth promoting."
No doubt about it, last year was a painfully frustrating season for the Clemson family. Expectations were not even close to met. However, if Finebaum is truly the greatest Clemson hater of all time, then why was he willing to put his eggs into the basket of last year's team? He admitted to buying into the hype surrounding Cade Klubnik and the best Clemson defense in a while that never fully manifested.
With everything that has transpired over the last decade, Finebaum will never leave Clemson alone.
Paul Finebaum remains forever firmly entrenched in his Clemson hatred
Over the last few weeks, Finebaum has really kicked it up a notch with his never-ending disdain for all things Clemson and Dabo Swinney. He used a fast food chain to disparage the Clemson head coach. That was during ACC Media Days. Only a week later, Finebaum left no stone unturned in how he felt about Swinney and the Tigers. His comments to Brooks Austin about Clemson fans were uncalled for.
And just when we thought that was enough, he called Clemson "an average program" and dismissed his dig at Clemson fans as "a throwaway line." It is almost as if he is going through a thesaurus to find every negative word in the English language available to him to put down Clemson. Whether or not this is bullying, it is getting old. The worst part is that he will get louder once the Tigers start winning.
Right now, Clemson players and fans can use his repeated commentary about the team in one of two ways. They can choose to ignore it, or put it on the back burner to be saved later. Keeping receipts can be an exhausting exercise, but Swinney and his ACC program have so many of them these days. Regardless, the Tigers have an ACC Championship to contend for. They need to make the playoffs.
Overall, Finebaum has been at this too long to ever possibly consider turning a new leaf on Clemson.
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