Playoffs?
Not so much...
But, we do have our bowling season schedule set - and who would of thought....
Ohio State and LSU will face off in the national title game. You know it's been a crazy year when 2 teams who both lost their second-to-last game of the year are playing for the big game....and you can't really bitch about it. There could have been any combination of about 4 or 5 teams in this game and it would have been hard to argue with. Don't get me wrong, there will be PLENTY of bitching about the matchups (rightfully so...more on this below), but at the end of the day, there really is no consensus #1 and #2.
Man, I laid an egg in my predictions for last week. UNREAL how West Virginia imploded in their game - they clearly weren't prepared for an actual brawl. Just like Oregon, when your entire team is predicated on 1 player, you're going to eventually have some issues. And what the heck happened to Steve Slaton? All we heard about the last 2 years was the 2-headed monster in the offense - haven't heard that guy's name much at all this year. Take heart Mountaineer fans, it's a process - as an avid Longhorn fan, I've endured MANY seasons like you've had the past couple of years - winning a lot, but not having it mean a whole lot because you lose 1 game you're not supposed to. Ugh.
BCS Bowl Selections:
Let me echo something that Stewart Mandel wrote that I thought was very well put - the BCS had absolutely nothing to do with the parity (or mediocrity if you'd like) this year: they had nothing to do with LSU losing to Arkansas, nothing to do with Pitt dropping the bomb on W. Virginia and did not at all affect Missouri's game plan (or lack thereof) against Oklahoma. These and the teams/situations like these were not the result of the BCS system. BUT, what we can blame the BCS for is the lame BCS bowl matchups.
Georgia, who many were expecting/hoping to slip into the Rose Bowl to face USC - a matchup against two of the countries hottest teams - now gets relegated to entertain Hawaii? Virginia Tech, the winner of the ACC and a team whose 2 losses came from teams ranked #1 and #2 gets Kansas, the second best team....in the Big 12 North? And my gosh, forcing an Illinois/USC matchup to preserve the sanctity of the precious Rose Bowl? Give me a break. And finally, Oklahoma's reward for winning the Big 12 and beating the #1 ranked team in the country.....a date with an emotionally and mentally fragile West Virginia team.
These matchups could not have been more poorly picked. For as great as the season has been (the first real instance where, I believe, the regular season played like a playoff), we sure are getting hosed in the bowl games. In looking at the bowl schedule, I'm struggling to find a truly intriguing game.
We all know a playoff isn't going to happen (at least not in the near term), but I'd like to think that this year may push us closer to a plus-1 system - essentially a "final four" of college football. Tell me you wouldn't want to see Oklahoma, LSU, OSU and Virginia Tech duke it out - that would be great. Although they would never admit, I can't imagine the bowl committee folks are too pleased with the matchups. In the defense of the people making the calls, they are simply following protocol - Big 12 winner goes to Fiesta, Pac 10 winner goes to Rose, etc., etc. It's just too bad that we don't have a system that allows for innovation and flexibility in order to put the best matchups on the field. If you want to let Hawaii come in and play a major, BCS team, fine, but throw them in with an Illinois or Kansas - use common sense here. Can you imagine how pumped both Kansas and Hawaii would be (and are right now) to play in their first BCS game? Why not let them duke it out against each other. Look, I know Hawaii is undefeated and in this day and age, that's impressive (they're the only one who did it this year after all), but they struggled to beat some pretty mediocre teams (Louisiana-Monroe, San Jose State, Washington). The biggest fear here is that Mark Richt struggles to get his team motivated to play in this game. The same could be said for Frank Beamer and Peter Carroll.
Bottom line: great football year. Seemingly crappy bowl season - of course we'll wait and see how it plays out, but I'll tell you this, at the end of it all, I would bet my right arm that most of us are saying, "I wish we could have seen this team play that team instead" in a number of situations.
Rose Bowl:
I think I'm growing to hate these guys more and more....possibly more than the BCS. Let me remind you all of something - unlike the Fiesta, Orange and Sugar bowls, the Rose Bowl is not exactly part of the BCS. Normally, most of us would smile upon that...but not in this instance. The sole reason is that the Pac 10 and Big 10 (and Big 10 commissioner Jim Delaney is the primary driver) want to "preserve the essence of the Rose Bowl". As a matter of fact, Delaney is the single most outspoken opponent to a playoff. Some could argue he is the primary obstacle to any sort of real discussion. Give me a freaking break.
What I'd like to see is the other bowls get together and say, F it, we're doing a playoff and if you don't want to participate Rose Bowl, fine, we can easily do it without you. I wonder, do you think Ohio State, Michigan or USC would rather play in their precious Rose Bowl, or compete in a national playoff? Yea, me too.
Other College Football Notes:
And how about those Running Horns??? HUGE win for them at UCLA on Sunday night. Unfortunately, I saw none of it as I was on an airplane. But, I will say this, 2 big wins away from home with significant contributions from the entire team. I think we all miss Kevin Durant, but I'll argue that this is a much better TEAM than last year. Not only did they have a nice lead at halftime, but they lost the lead (memo: in basketball, the team that's down will ALWAYS make some kind of run) in the second half only to battle back late in the game to take the victory. Big, BIG win. It's early, but these guys could do some big things this year. That Tennessee game, along with the UCLA game, are ones which Texas would have easily lost in past years - especially this early in the season. Big win and big game by everyone. Look out Kansas....
NFL Notes:
But, we do have our bowling season schedule set - and who would of thought....
Ohio State and LSU will face off in the national title game. You know it's been a crazy year when 2 teams who both lost their second-to-last game of the year are playing for the big game....and you can't really bitch about it. There could have been any combination of about 4 or 5 teams in this game and it would have been hard to argue with. Don't get me wrong, there will be PLENTY of bitching about the matchups (rightfully so...more on this below), but at the end of the day, there really is no consensus #1 and #2.
Man, I laid an egg in my predictions for last week. UNREAL how West Virginia imploded in their game - they clearly weren't prepared for an actual brawl. Just like Oregon, when your entire team is predicated on 1 player, you're going to eventually have some issues. And what the heck happened to Steve Slaton? All we heard about the last 2 years was the 2-headed monster in the offense - haven't heard that guy's name much at all this year. Take heart Mountaineer fans, it's a process - as an avid Longhorn fan, I've endured MANY seasons like you've had the past couple of years - winning a lot, but not having it mean a whole lot because you lose 1 game you're not supposed to. Ugh.
BCS Bowl Selections:
Let me echo something that Stewart Mandel wrote that I thought was very well put - the BCS had absolutely nothing to do with the parity (or mediocrity if you'd like) this year: they had nothing to do with LSU losing to Arkansas, nothing to do with Pitt dropping the bomb on W. Virginia and did not at all affect Missouri's game plan (or lack thereof) against Oklahoma. These and the teams/situations like these were not the result of the BCS system. BUT, what we can blame the BCS for is the lame BCS bowl matchups.
Georgia, who many were expecting/hoping to slip into the Rose Bowl to face USC - a matchup against two of the countries hottest teams - now gets relegated to entertain Hawaii? Virginia Tech, the winner of the ACC and a team whose 2 losses came from teams ranked #1 and #2 gets Kansas, the second best team....in the Big 12 North? And my gosh, forcing an Illinois/USC matchup to preserve the sanctity of the precious Rose Bowl? Give me a break. And finally, Oklahoma's reward for winning the Big 12 and beating the #1 ranked team in the country.....a date with an emotionally and mentally fragile West Virginia team.
These matchups could not have been more poorly picked. For as great as the season has been (the first real instance where, I believe, the regular season played like a playoff), we sure are getting hosed in the bowl games. In looking at the bowl schedule, I'm struggling to find a truly intriguing game.
We all know a playoff isn't going to happen (at least not in the near term), but I'd like to think that this year may push us closer to a plus-1 system - essentially a "final four" of college football. Tell me you wouldn't want to see Oklahoma, LSU, OSU and Virginia Tech duke it out - that would be great. Although they would never admit, I can't imagine the bowl committee folks are too pleased with the matchups. In the defense of the people making the calls, they are simply following protocol - Big 12 winner goes to Fiesta, Pac 10 winner goes to Rose, etc., etc. It's just too bad that we don't have a system that allows for innovation and flexibility in order to put the best matchups on the field. If you want to let Hawaii come in and play a major, BCS team, fine, but throw them in with an Illinois or Kansas - use common sense here. Can you imagine how pumped both Kansas and Hawaii would be (and are right now) to play in their first BCS game? Why not let them duke it out against each other. Look, I know Hawaii is undefeated and in this day and age, that's impressive (they're the only one who did it this year after all), but they struggled to beat some pretty mediocre teams (Louisiana-Monroe, San Jose State, Washington). The biggest fear here is that Mark Richt struggles to get his team motivated to play in this game. The same could be said for Frank Beamer and Peter Carroll.
Bottom line: great football year. Seemingly crappy bowl season - of course we'll wait and see how it plays out, but I'll tell you this, at the end of it all, I would bet my right arm that most of us are saying, "I wish we could have seen this team play that team instead" in a number of situations.
Rose Bowl:
I think I'm growing to hate these guys more and more....possibly more than the BCS. Let me remind you all of something - unlike the Fiesta, Orange and Sugar bowls, the Rose Bowl is not exactly part of the BCS. Normally, most of us would smile upon that...but not in this instance. The sole reason is that the Pac 10 and Big 10 (and Big 10 commissioner Jim Delaney is the primary driver) want to "preserve the essence of the Rose Bowl". As a matter of fact, Delaney is the single most outspoken opponent to a playoff. Some could argue he is the primary obstacle to any sort of real discussion. Give me a freaking break.
What I'd like to see is the other bowls get together and say, F it, we're doing a playoff and if you don't want to participate Rose Bowl, fine, we can easily do it without you. I wonder, do you think Ohio State, Michigan or USC would rather play in their precious Rose Bowl, or compete in a national playoff? Yea, me too.
Other College Football Notes:
- I'm still trying to figure out how West Virginia lost to Pittsburgh - I don't care if Pat White is out, that's ridiculous.
- Nice game plan and play calling Pinkel - looks like you took a page from the book of Mack Brown in this game. Most conservative play I've seen from Missouri in 2 years. First and goal on the 1 inch line and you put your QB in shotgun...ON 3 STRAIGHT PLAYS???? Dumb, dumb, dumb. And that was just 1 example from that game.
- Can we just hand the freaking Big 12 title to Oklahoma every single year going forward? How can Texas match OU "pound for pound" in recruiting every year (according to the experts) and win a single Big 12 title in 9 years? How is that possible???
- Texas vs. Arizona State in the Holiday Bowl - can you think of any 2 other teams that deserve each other more this year? These guys are carbon copies of each other - mediocre, don't play complete games and grossly overrated this year.
- I'm going to make this call right now - no more talking about how good Cal is going to be any other year until they actually go a full year and do something....anything. Tedford had better take a higher-profile job now while his stock is still so high.
- If you saw the Oregon/Oregon State game then you saw a textbook example of a QB having an enormous brain fart - when you're out of timeouts and are trying to get your kicker on the field to kick a game-winning chip shot, YOU'RE ALLOWED TO SPIKE THE BALL TO STOP THE CLOCK!!! Some pretty idiotic decision making there...and the replay showed Belotti telling his QB to spike it after they run the play.
- Heisman Update: Daniel has to be out of the discussion. It's a tossup between Tebow and McFadden with Crabtree coming in third. Argument for McFadden: best running back in the country by a mile. Argument for Tebow: take him off that Florida team and they lose at least 2 more games...at least. And Crabtree? He's shattered freshman receiving records. My guess is Crabtree gets hosed and doesn't even get the invite to New York - further reinforcing my theory that the Heisman Trophy is a complete and utter joke.
- Memo to sports media: Just because you cover sports doesn't mean you shouldn't have some bit of integrity. Saturday morning, I see this running across the screen: Les Miles expected to be announced as UM head coach next week. Then, a few hours later, they report that LSU and Les Miles have reached an agreement on an extension. If you don't have confirmation, don't report it.
- I think Virginia Tech will beat Kansas by at least 3 touchdowns. At least.
- And speaking of - how does Kansas get a BCS invite over Missouri?
And how about those Running Horns??? HUGE win for them at UCLA on Sunday night. Unfortunately, I saw none of it as I was on an airplane. But, I will say this, 2 big wins away from home with significant contributions from the entire team. I think we all miss Kevin Durant, but I'll argue that this is a much better TEAM than last year. Not only did they have a nice lead at halftime, but they lost the lead (memo: in basketball, the team that's down will ALWAYS make some kind of run) in the second half only to battle back late in the game to take the victory. Big, BIG win. It's early, but these guys could do some big things this year. That Tennessee game, along with the UCLA game, are ones which Texas would have easily lost in past years - especially this early in the season. Big win and big game by everyone. Look out Kansas....
NFL Notes:
- Finally nice to see old VY have a solid game. AGAIN, an interception occurred because the receiver let up. Good win for them....and guess who was back - Albert Haynesworth. Unreal what this guy means to this team.
- I swear this is a true story: In Vegas this week for a conference and I almost took $50 and put it on Baltimore to beat the Pats (money line, not points line - flat out win). My thinking was, it probably won't happen, but if it does, I'm sitting pretty. Glad I didn't do it, but man that was close.
- Looking at the Patriots' remaining schedule, I think next week's game against Pittsburgh is the best "chance" for a loss.
- Weren't the Saints and Bears in last-year's NFC championship game? Both are 5-7 and in very real danger of missing the playoffs altogether. With Grossman in a "contract year", here's betting he's not wearing a Bears helmet next year. And is anyone more eager to have Duece McCallister back than Reggie Bush?
- Say what you will about the officiating in the Ravens/Pats game on Monday night, but Baltimore seemed to want the Pats to win just as bad as they claim the officials did.
- Based on reports, it would appear the shooter in the Sean Taylor incident is 17. Unreal.
- I'm afraid I'm changing my tune - Miami is going winless....and that's HUGE in this league. How does a coach even begin to gain the trust and respect from his team...when they go winless in his first year. Tough situation for Cameron, but not his fault entirely (they have no QB and no RB).
- Putting out an APB for Drew Brees.
- Could be an interesting situation for the Patriots at year's end - Randy Moss is a free agent. I don't think they necessarily need him to continue to win, but more interesting is how Moss will play ball - in negotiations I mean.
- It's amazing to me how so many NFL writers I've read in the last 2 days 1) like the college football bowl system as it is, and 2) who are excited about Hawaii playing Georgia.
- Exciting news at the Bearden house this past weekend - Ella is now walking. Check out this short video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iogsMx6M97g
- I'm making an addition to my list of "biggest rackets". Previously it consisted of college textbooks and cable. I'm now including event management groups - specifically those groups that rent out equipment for tradeshows and conferences. Attended an analyst conference in Vegas this week and needed to rent 3 keyboards and 2 mice to run our demos. The cost? $167. I could have purchased the same equipment at an OfficeMax for less than that.
- I think that if you're running for president, you shouldn't be allowed to say anything, ANYTHING, about your opponents - good or bad. I have no stats whatsoever to back this up, but I would venture to guess that presidential candidates spend more time criticizing other candidates than talking about why they should be elected. Is it me, or has the entire election process become one giant publicity stunt?
- And speaking of elected officials, looks like our wonderful intelligence community has stepped on their you-know-whats....again. Does this country have one ounce of credibility anymore?
posted by The Bearden Wonder at 12:49 AM
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