ATLANTA — That’s all she wrote.

SEC Media Days came and went. We didn’t have a massive headline or a Nick Saban vs. Paul Finebaum battle. But make no mistake, the week was still eventful.

We learned a lot of things about SEC players and coaches (I still can’t believe LSU linebacker Devin White just bought a horse and that he rides 7 (!) of them).

I did find a few other interesting little nuggets from the final day here in Atlanta:

Coaches react to Larry Fedora’s wild take

In case you missed it, Fedora went crazy Wednesday at ACC Media Days. Like, legit crazy.

These quotes was all sorts of bizarre:

“Our game is under attack. I fear the game will be pushed so far from what we know that we won’t recognize it in 10 years. And if it does, our country will go down, too.”

“I’m not sure that anything is proven that football, itself, causes (CTE),” Fedora said. “My understanding is that repeated blows to the head cause it, so I’m assuming that every sport we have, football included, could be a problem with that as long as you’ve got any kind of contact. That doesn’t diminish the fact that the game is still safer than it’s ever been because we continue to tweak the game to try to make it safer for our players.”

Yeah, so that made national headlines. On Thursday, I asked Will Muschamp and Derek Mason what they thought about that as defensive-minded coaches.

Here’s what Muschamp had to say:

“I don’t think our game is under attack,” Muschamp said. “I don’t know a whole lot about Larry’s comments. As far as CTE and concussions and all of those things we’re talking about, I feel very comfortable with the policies and procedures we have at South Carolina. We have a neurologist on the field, we have a neurologist in the box on game day, we have a neurologist at practice … I think that the more research we do, the better off we’re gonna be.

“The No. 1 point of all of this is the health and safety of our student athletes. That’s No. 1, and I feel very comfortable about our policies and what we have in place at the University of South Carolina.”

Mason didn’t really want to take a swing a Fedora’s take, either. At the very least, they acknowledged the dangers of the sport and what’s being done to make sure that players are as safe as can be.

“For me, I worry about my team. I worry about where I’m at. Obviously my SID talks to me about hot button topics. For me, I look at coach Fedora and everybody’s got a right to an opinion,” Mason said. “I stay in my lane, I understand what my team needs. I feel like right now, football is the greatest game going. So for me, we’re going to protect our student athletes, we’re gonna make sure that we can to whatever we can to ensure their safety, and that’s part of our jobs as head coaches, part of the NCAA’s job, part of the institution’s job to make sure our players are safe, and we’re doing that.

“With that being said, I don’t have much commentary on it.”

Alrighty then. Let’s move on.

Derek Mason ain’t scared of Notre Dame

Speaking of Mason, the Vandy coach was offered up a question about traveling to face the Irish in nonconference play. His answer was honest, and bulletin-board material.

“We play in the SEC. I’m not worried about going to South Bend,” Mason said.

Credit: Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports

I get what he’s saying. After all, there will probably be a handful of SEC teams ranked ahead of Notre Dame. Why should Mason suddenly be terrified to play at Notre Dame when he’s had to play at Georgia, at Auburn and at Mississippi State in 2014 when the Bulldogs were ranked No. 4 in the country?

The problem, obviously, is that’s coming from a coach who’s 6-26 in the SEC who was 1-7 in conference play last year. Pretty much everyone should worry Vandy fans at least.

You know who Mason is focused on? Middle Tennessee … because that’s the season opener.

That seems more appropriate for Vandy than talking about Notre Dame.

Jake Bentley is no longer in high school

Rest in peace, “Bentley should still be in high school jokes.” They’re dead. I killed them Thursday. You’re welcome.

I wanted to know if the South Carolina quarterback hears that worn out narrative about how he started college early. For what it’s worth, he laughed when I asked him about that.

“When I watch a game, I hear it,” Bentley said. “It’s a cool storyline, I guess. It’s not that big of a deal to me. It’s something for media people to talk about. It’s over and done with now. Might not hear much about it this year.”

We only heard about it Thursday because I thought it was hilarious that people still made that point about last year after he already had a full season under his belt. The guy will be 21 this year.

South Carolina’s D.J. Wonnum confirmed that anyone talking about Bentley’s early college entry still is foolish. 

“No, that joke has been gone,” he said. “It died when he stepped foot on campus, but it really died when he played in his first game. That boy ready for college.”

And I’m ready to never hear it brought up ever again. That includes me.

Jarrett Stidham makes himself and the rest of us feel old

I thoroughly enjoyed getting to talk to Stidham. It seemed like he was as relaxed as can be. He talked about his engagement, his time at the Manning Passing Academy, the Iron Bowl and oh, yeah, “The Lion King.”

That’s right.

I asked about how spending a year in the SEC aged him. He answered with this gem.

“No, I feel really old, especially when we have guys on the team now that were born in the 2000s. It makes the ’90s babies feel weird,” Stidham said. “I mean, I don’t even know if they know what ‘The Lion King’ is.”

Credit: Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports

For what it’s worth, Stidham was born 2 years after “The Lion King” came out. That makes me feel old and I’m with Stidham in the club of “1990s babies.”

Stidham is basically a 28-year-old guy, though. Soon, he’ll be married. He has already graduated from college. He can talk about beating Alabama like a has-been if he wanted to.

But I came away extremely impressed with the Tigers quarterback. I absolutely believed Gus Malzahn when he said how excited he was to have Stidham back and leading the offense.

And hey! Malzahn is even going to let Stidham check at the line of scrimmage this year.

Gus Malzahn had to sign what?

It got weird on the final SEC Media Days. Real weird.

Malzahn talked to the SEC Network crew about all things SEC Media Days. He talked about his love for 9-game conference schedules, Stidham and others.

Oh, and he also happened to tell the story about the most awkward thing he has ever signed before. It turns out that it was … a picture of fan’s colonoscopy X-ray.

Really:

Ok. I think we’ve had enough fun for one week.