Until Then...
Aaaaaaand we've got a bye week. Thanks a pant load mother nature. But that's OK - we'll get you Razorbacks....on September 27th where fans will be shuttling back and forth between the game and Widespread Panic on the Heineken stage. I'd like to have a penny for every dollar spent by folks NOT from Austin on that weekend.
Quick note - as you read this tomorrow I'll be dropping the wife off at her mom's for the big trip...it begins. Oh, and just so you know that the Good Lord is aware of this and taking an opportunity to teach me a lesson, Ella J woke up with snotty cold/bug this morning.......so I've got that going for me...which is nice.(copyright Carl Spackler, 1980)
In all seriousness, if you're reading this from Houston, Galveston or the surrounding areas, for the love of God get the hell out of dodge!! It's easy to joke when you live in Austin where the slightest movement in this storm is the difference between 6 inches of rain and partly cloudy and breezy - but either way some part of the Texas coast is going to get hammered. Don't be dumb - take care of yourselves. But before you do....let's take a quick look at the games that weren't prematurely canceled (I'll get to those Razorbacks in a couple of weeks..and why I'm ecstatic this game didn't get move to the end of the season)
Ohio State at Southern Cal:
Latest I heard is that Beanie Wells is doubtful for this game. I'll be honest, I know he had a great freshman year, but I really never saw this guy as THE guy on this team. I mean, wasn't all the hype around these guys centered around the number of returning starters? Don't get me wrong, not calling him "bad" or "mediocre", but I personally don't think it's the difference between them having a chance and not having a chance. That aside there's no doubt that USC has the edge playing at home in front of what should be a jacked up crowd. At the end of the day, I think the edge here will come down to the speed and athleticism - as it was in their losses to Florida and LSU. I don't see a blowout here as I think USC will have to adjust to the level of competition compared with their home opener at Virginia. They have had a week off to prepare, but I firmly believe that this early in the season the game experience is more valuable than time off - you want that week off in late October or November. But, that just means lower and tougher points - Trojans still pull this one out though.
Southern Cal - 27
Ohio State - 13
Kansas at South Florida:
I'm actually looking forward to this one on Friday night - this is a great game for a Friday night. This could be the dark horse game of the weekend and I believe an upset could be in the making...sort of given that they are pretty close to each other in the rankings. This would really be a good win for the Jayhawks. They had a great year last year, but had questions about their schedule. Everyone knew they would be tested this year drawing the big 3 of the south division (Tech, Horns and at the Sooners) as well as make a trip to Lincoln. You know what, this wouldn't be a good win, this would be a huge win for Kansas and one that would likely give them tremendous confidence going into that conference schedule. On the flip side, the Big East really needs South Florida to win this game and if they do, it will be the lone glimmer of hope for that conference as that will certainly be a quality win. I do like South Florida in the Big East, but I'm not thrilled with the way they struggled with Central Florida. I'm going Kansas in a close, offensive game.
Kansas - 41
South Florida - 31
Michigan at Notre Dame:
If you need any more evidence to the cyclical nature of college football just look at the irrelevance of this game on the national picture. This could be one of the tougher games to pick, but I'm going with Michigan on the road (would that be an upset? no, can't be).
Michigan - 22
Notre Dame - 20
Other College Football Notes:
Soooo, where do I begin on this??? What a crazy turn of events the last few days has been for Vince. I'll say this, after the game on Sunday I was starting to think that this may not work out for Vince (the NFL that is). And now this? In all honesty I think this whole thing has been blown out of proportion just a tad. At the end of the day, this all started with the fact that he left his home "abruptly" and forgot his phone.
First and foremost, he's got a leg injury that he needs to heal - which could be from 2-4 weeks as I've read. But what I really think is that VY needs to grow up a little bit. I don't doubt that it's hard as hell to going from king of the world to a middle of the road QB. He's still young and can certainly be a very good quarterback, but he's got to get better, faster. He needs to work on his passing, he needs to study film more and he most of all, he needs to stop pouting on the side lines. There's a very good chance that he's lost this team, but who knows. You also have to wonder if Tennessee is just a bad fit for him - they've never been too eager to go out and get a top tier receiver or two and their favorite thing to do on draft day is pick a running back no matter what. Who knows, but I do know this - VY needs to *prove* he's committed to this game and his teammates. He needs to grow up and act like a professional.
Other NFL Notes:
Quick note - as you read this tomorrow I'll be dropping the wife off at her mom's for the big trip...it begins. Oh, and just so you know that the Good Lord is aware of this and taking an opportunity to teach me a lesson, Ella J woke up with snotty cold/bug this morning.......so I've got that going for me...which is nice.(copyright Carl Spackler, 1980)
In all seriousness, if you're reading this from Houston, Galveston or the surrounding areas, for the love of God get the hell out of dodge!! It's easy to joke when you live in Austin where the slightest movement in this storm is the difference between 6 inches of rain and partly cloudy and breezy - but either way some part of the Texas coast is going to get hammered. Don't be dumb - take care of yourselves. But before you do....let's take a quick look at the games that weren't prematurely canceled (I'll get to those Razorbacks in a couple of weeks..and why I'm ecstatic this game didn't get move to the end of the season)
Ohio State at Southern Cal:
Latest I heard is that Beanie Wells is doubtful for this game. I'll be honest, I know he had a great freshman year, but I really never saw this guy as THE guy on this team. I mean, wasn't all the hype around these guys centered around the number of returning starters? Don't get me wrong, not calling him "bad" or "mediocre", but I personally don't think it's the difference between them having a chance and not having a chance. That aside there's no doubt that USC has the edge playing at home in front of what should be a jacked up crowd. At the end of the day, I think the edge here will come down to the speed and athleticism - as it was in their losses to Florida and LSU. I don't see a blowout here as I think USC will have to adjust to the level of competition compared with their home opener at Virginia. They have had a week off to prepare, but I firmly believe that this early in the season the game experience is more valuable than time off - you want that week off in late October or November. But, that just means lower and tougher points - Trojans still pull this one out though.
Southern Cal - 27
Ohio State - 13
Kansas at South Florida:
I'm actually looking forward to this one on Friday night - this is a great game for a Friday night. This could be the dark horse game of the weekend and I believe an upset could be in the making...sort of given that they are pretty close to each other in the rankings. This would really be a good win for the Jayhawks. They had a great year last year, but had questions about their schedule. Everyone knew they would be tested this year drawing the big 3 of the south division (Tech, Horns and at the Sooners) as well as make a trip to Lincoln. You know what, this wouldn't be a good win, this would be a huge win for Kansas and one that would likely give them tremendous confidence going into that conference schedule. On the flip side, the Big East really needs South Florida to win this game and if they do, it will be the lone glimmer of hope for that conference as that will certainly be a quality win. I do like South Florida in the Big East, but I'm not thrilled with the way they struggled with Central Florida. I'm going Kansas in a close, offensive game.
Kansas - 41
South Florida - 31
Michigan at Notre Dame:
If you need any more evidence to the cyclical nature of college football just look at the irrelevance of this game on the national picture. This could be one of the tougher games to pick, but I'm going with Michigan on the road (would that be an upset? no, can't be).
Michigan - 22
Notre Dame - 20
Other College Football Notes:
- What the hell happened to that stable of running backs at Florida? So far it's business as usual with Tebow and Harvin with very little else from the RBs. Hmmm....
- Seriously ESPN, May and Holtz is brutal...it's like torture sometimes.
- I don't think I like the fact that there is more and more high school football on television these days. I just don't think it's a good idea to put that kind of spotlight, pressure and exposure on high school kids. It's been on ESPN a lot lately. Crazy.
- This has nothing to do with football, but this just came to me and I had to put it out there - do you think there's a team of folks in some bunker working on a myriad of Hurricane Ike/Ike Turner jokes?
- Georgia, don't blow this at South Carolina this weekend.
- Check out the recap from Tech's last game at Nevada and preview their upcoming scrimmage against SMU: http://fannation.com/blogs/post/250057
Soooo, where do I begin on this??? What a crazy turn of events the last few days has been for Vince. I'll say this, after the game on Sunday I was starting to think that this may not work out for Vince (the NFL that is). And now this? In all honesty I think this whole thing has been blown out of proportion just a tad. At the end of the day, this all started with the fact that he left his home "abruptly" and forgot his phone.
First and foremost, he's got a leg injury that he needs to heal - which could be from 2-4 weeks as I've read. But what I really think is that VY needs to grow up a little bit. I don't doubt that it's hard as hell to going from king of the world to a middle of the road QB. He's still young and can certainly be a very good quarterback, but he's got to get better, faster. He needs to work on his passing, he needs to study film more and he most of all, he needs to stop pouting on the side lines. There's a very good chance that he's lost this team, but who knows. You also have to wonder if Tennessee is just a bad fit for him - they've never been too eager to go out and get a top tier receiver or two and their favorite thing to do on draft day is pick a running back no matter what. Who knows, but I do know this - VY needs to *prove* he's committed to this game and his teammates. He needs to grow up and act like a professional.
Other NFL Notes:
- I think New England is still going to win 10 games this year and make the playoffs. I think this Cassell guy will be just fine.
- Funny note: Cassell backed up Carson Palmer at USC and was "supposed" to be the next guy in line until Matt Lineart beat him out. Now Cassell is starting for the all-world Pats and Lineart is backing up AARP member, Kurt Warner. Weird.
- I don't know why everyone was so shocked at how the Cowboys kicked the Browns' asses - just because the media was all excited about the Browns dark horse prospects doesn't mean they are actually any good. We know the Cowboys are good, especially on offense - we've seen it the past two (regular) seasons. And the Browns aren't.
- Speaking of, I really love Marion Barber - I'll say it again, Felix Jones could not have fallen into a better situation. I think those guys could be dangerous together.
- Surely Peyton Manning and company will bounce back this weekend - game 1 just goes to show you that everyone gets rust when they take a snap for the first time in about 30 months.
- Wow - did I really pick Jim Zorn as my coach of the year??? Eek.
- I don't think anyone slept better on Monday night than Aaron Rogers - great, great game by Rogers. That Packer team looked very, very good.
- I'm not a Pats fan and never been a Brady fan, but I do feel for him - that's a terrible thing to happen, especially so early in the season.
- ...with that said, I'm very excited about how wide open this NFL season is. I mean, try picking the conference champs right now. Of course you few can ever really pick them after one week, but this sort of "leveling of the playing field" is kind of cool.
- I picked Vikings and Pats in the Super Bowl - if I could I would change that to Steelers and not the Vikings....hey, why can't I change it?
- I see the Shawn Merriman on a shredded knee experiment has come to and end - good thing for him.
- One more thing on the Patriots - it will be very interesting to see how Moss reacts to this situation. I think he's got an opportunity to erase a lot of the lingering stigma of his past reputations. Sure, it's easy when you're going 16-0 and catching 236 touchdown passes a year, but this is quite a wrench. We'll see, but if he can step up and be a real leader for Cassell and this team it will speak volumes of him during what's sure to be his final years. Will be interesting to watch.
posted by The Bearden Wonder at 10:43 AM
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