Take the rhetoric for what it is. When he is no longer there he will come out and say the UM line was the best, and the entire team was the greatest assembled. Right now it puts him in an awkward position, so he says his line is the best.
Say you are out with your old lady, and someone says she is good looking. You're not going to say thanks, but you should have see the woman I was dating a few years ago, now she was hot, this one is just okay.