It used to be Daniel Moore prints commemorated events of championship or historical significance (Goal Line Stand, The Tradition Continues, The Coach and 315), or at least classic wins against historic powers (The Sack, Desperation Block).

Recently, we have a win against Texas Tech, a win against a highly overrated Georgia, and now a beatdown of a team that didn’t even make a bowl game. And while the catch was perhaps as spectacular a play as any in our storied history, the fact that it was against Southern Miss means that its importance was in avoiding a major upset rather than bringing home a championship, which in my mind makes its significance significantly less. And in my mind Daniel Moore’s (much like our beloved University) have always (or at least until recently) been about significance rather than the spectacular. Spectacular is air-it-out offenses, heisman trophies, and individual achievement. Significance is about defense, team play, and most importantly championships.

I know we’re all excited to break the streak, and the win against Georgia did look impressive at the time, and the Cotton Bowl in ‘05 is our only New Year’s bowl win since who knows when. And I know it’s not like we’ve done much of championship significance in quite a while for him to paint about. It just all seems to devalue what I thought a Daniel Moore print was about when I was growing up.

Anybody else feel that way, or am I alone in this?

Perhaps Daniel Moore has a mortgage or two to finance.

is the print from the Georgia game.

I don’t think there is any doubt that Moore is doing a bit much, but what can you say? He’s got to put food on the table, and these truly historical moments — the goal line stand, the kick, Prothro’s catch, etc. — are very rare. He can’t make a living off doing one painting every decade. And no one liked it when he did some paintings for other schools, so what do you do?

I look at it this way… he’s probably the best sports artist in the country, and the paintings he produces look great and represent the university well. Yes it may be a bit overkill, but so what? If you don’t like them, don’t buy them, and in the meantime people who are into that sort of thing can get some very nice Alabama paintings for relatively cheap. It’s a win-win situation.

And besides, other schools have artists like that who produce paintings just as often as Moore does, the only difference is they generally look like pure shit. Go browse some Jack Jaubert paintings if you don’t believe me.