Now that we are only hours away from the beginning of the college football season, many of the talking heads on the different networks are making their pick for who is going to be playing in South Florida for the NCAA FB NC. While watching and listening to some of the coverage, I noticed that no one was picking all the BCS title games except the writers who exclusively cover the game.
So, I decided to, because I have way to much time on my hands, I decided to pick all the games that are apart of the BCS.
Yes, Yes I know, I need to find a life. But here we go.
Fiesta Bowl Normally they have the conference winner from the Big 12 and an at-large team. I went to this game last year, it was my first college football game live I went to. I loved the atmosphere and had a ton of fun. I think the Big 12 has a chance to put two teams in the BCS. I think the teams playing in the game... Mizzou vs Ball State or BYU.
Sugar Bowl This is one of the easiest game to pick because you take the team that loses the SEC Championship game. Since the SEC is the best conference, they will probably send the team that wins the conference to the National Title game, like they have done for the past two years. Then they throw a non-BCS team to face them, like Hawaii last year and then the SEC has some fun playing thier second string against the best the WAC has to offer. This year the SEC finally gets some good competition. Georgia vs Oklahoma.
Orange Bowl Probably the most boring game of the entire BCS series, sorry to say but it is. Last year it was a Virginia Tech team that couldn't decide who their quarterback was and a Kansas team that will have a tough time repeating their latest bowl appearance. This years game will be a little more interesting than previous years, but is bringing up the rear on the intereesting scale. Wake Forest vs West Virginia.
Rose Bowl The Grand Daddy of them all. This game is usually the one that offers up the best game of the year outside of the National Championship game. It usually involves USC and some bad Big Ten team that will get trounced like it always does against good competition. Since I believe that USC will be playing in the National Championship game, I think that it will be... Arizona State vs Ohio State.
National Championship This will be another good year that will offer a great game between teams that will go 1-2 throughout the entire year, similar to when TExas and USC played in the Rose Bowl a few years ago. The teams I pciked are probably the most talented teams in all of college football, and Georgia could sneak in but their schedule is just way to difficult. My choice for BCSNC is........ USC over Florida.
With the countdown getting under 12 hours before Kick-Off, and a few days away from Lee Corso's selection of the first Mascot Head of the year or Kirk Herbstreit breaking a story that is completely false, the calender has finally turned.
I was looking at my calendar earlier this week and I occurred to me that we are only less than a week away from the beginning of the season. I have been putting off my preview for a couple of weeks, but there were three angry looks from my loyal readers across the dinner table. So to appease everyone here is my preview.
On with the Extravaganza
Big Ten
The best in the Big Ten no question is the Buckeyes from An Ohio State University and they are my prediction for the Big Ten conference champions. With a great offense and an absolutely loaded defense, they could be looking at a potential third straight National Championship bid. The Bucks will have a large chip on their shoulder after being spanked twice by SEC teams and will very good this year.
The team to watch will be the Wisconsin Badgers who have been steadily improving ever since Bret Bielma took over for Barry Alvarez. They have the potential to challenge the Bucks for the Big Ten title and a chance at a BCS bid.
Player to see at least once is the great RB Chris “Beanie” Wells who is a front-runner for the Heisman and could provide a great compliment to the good passing game of Todd Boeckman. He will be a lot of fun to watch.
Big East The team that will win will be the West Virginia Mountaineers under first year head coach Bill Stewart. They run the option so well, that teams have difficulty defending it, and now the Stewart says QB Pat White will be throwing the ball much more. Now teams will have to respect White’s arm as well as his legs with great RB Noel Devine they could be a potential national title contender.
A team to watch will be South Florida who will be an excellent team and potentially be undefeated going into their game with West Virginia. They made improvements last year and will continue to build on that success.
Player to watch will be South Florida DE George Selvie along with West Virginia QB Pat White. Both players a freakishly athletic and can make plays at will. When they line up opposite each other on that Saturday in Morgantown, look for some fireworks.
ACC My pick to win the ACC goes against what all the experts are saying, I am taking Wake Forest to win a down ACC. Clemson seems to be the trendy pick, but with senior QB Riley Skinned running the show at Wake, he has the potential to bounce back from a bad year last year and return to his excellent play from two years ago. Wake looks poised and I think they can prove a lot of people wrong.
The team to watch is Clemson because they are going to be a great running team with their two-headed monster in CJ Spiller and James Davis, who could re-kindle thoughts of the old thunder and lightning combination that USC used a few years ago. Especially in a game of attrition they will be able to run all over teams when the have two semi-fresh backs late in the game.
Players to watch are the two I mentioned before, the RB’s Spiller and Davis simply because both of them are so good. In football you have to be able to run the ball, and these two will probably do it better than anyone else in college football, outside of USC.
Big 12 The conference champions will be the Oklahoma Sooners and the improved Sophomore QB Same Bradford. Oklahoma was excellent last year and with Bradford learning more of the system in the off-season, he will be a much more polished passer. I doubt he will come near the TD total he put up last year at 36, but he will come close and that will be good enough to win the Big 12. Mizzou has the potential to win it but I think Oklahoma is just to good.
The team to watch will be Texas Tech for two words and one letter… Run n Gun. This team could set records and will be the most entertaining team to watch in all of college football because they rack up points and yards. The combination of Graham Harell and Michael Crabtree will be the most interesting QB to WR tandem and make for great television. A great offense but will fall just short of a BCS bid.
A player to see once is Michael Crabtree, Texas Tech WR because he is probably the best athlete in all of college football. With his combined speed, jumping and ability to catch the ball will make him a head ache for every corner who tries to line up against him. He set records as a freshman as has the potential to set a few more.
Pac 10 There is a simple answer for the question of who will win the Pac 10 and it begins and ends with USC. They have 5 star recruits sitting at third and fourth on their depth chart. These are players who would start on most college teams and even a few NFL teams. Their defense is amazing, and quarterback Mark Sanchez has the potential to build on some solid performances from last year. This team is scary good.
A team to watch will be UCLA under new head coach Rick Neuheisel. There will be some growing pains as there always is when a new system is installed and a new team philosophy is used, but the fact that UCLA has a good coach leading them could lead to a great end of the season. The first few weeks, they will struggle, but when they start to get rolling, this team could be dangerous.
There are two players to watch in this conference, USC LB Rey Maualuga and Washington QB Jake Locker. Maualuga is just a freak of nature and will be an excellent LB at the next level. Not many LB have to potential to make big plays everytime the ball is snapped. Maualuga will be the only thing going through opposing QB’s heads when teams play USC, both figuratively and literally.
Locker is an interesting player because he possesses all the talent of Florida’s Tim Tebow, but doesn’t get as much coverage. I know he doesn’t because he plays on a bad team, but if Washington is playing an early game on the east coast, you may want to check out how good he is.
Finally, the SEC This is probably the strongest conference in the college game. There are two teams potentially who could win it and the winner of the head-to-head game in Jacksonville will determine the winner of the conference. I think Florida will win it only because Georgia’s schedule is absolutely brutal. Every game of theirs is tough after week 3 of the season except for Vandy. I believe that Georgia will be competitive but will not win the SEC
One team to watch is Georgia simply because of the talent that they have on both sides of the football. They have an excellent QB in Matthew Stafford, a killer RB with Knowshon Moreno and a very scary defense. This team has the potential of getting to the BCS Title game as long as they can get by their murder schedule. I think they have a shot at winning if they do two things. One is stay healthy, but that goes for every team. The other is keeping their player from going Pac-Man Jones in local scrip clubs.
One player to watch aside from Tim Tebow is going to be the person I mentioned before. Georgia RB Knowshon Moreno is built in the mold of home run hitter, similar to Darren McFadden who can take the ball to the house any time he touches it, but he can also be the every down back that run between the tackles. He will be one person to keep your eye on every week.
So there are my conference picks, let me know what you think.
Tuesday, the EXTRAVAGANZA continues with my selections for Heisman
According to Harris Interactive, when 100 million people watch the game, people tend to notice.
Harris Interactive released a poll on Feb. 5 about Americas favourite sport. A link to the poll is here. The only people surveyed in this entire survey are Americans. Some of you may surprised at the number 5 entry, because I know I was:
Pro Football (DUH!!!!)
Major League Baseball (I thought it would be number 3)
College Football (Thought it would be number 2 if not number 1)
Auto Racing (NASCAR's marketing make it viable)
Hockey (WHAAAAAA!!!!)
Number 5 really surprised me because I thought that most Americans cared more about about professional or college basketball which ranked which were 6 and 7 respectively. Also, men's golf ranked 8. Another thing that shocked me was that bowling at number 11 beat boxing at number 14.
They also mention the change in percentage of followers has risen in pro football, college football, auto racing and hockey. Each rose 6%, 2%, 5% and 3% respectively.
What shocked me was that even though baseball has recorded record revenue, they dropped 8% and pro and college basketball each dropped 2%.
This poll is only measured a certain number of Americans, this isn't a concensus of the general population.
There were a lot ofsurprises this weekend from the NFL, only one game went the way most people predicted it, including my self.
I thought the Seattle was largely underrated this season, even though they play in the worst division in all of the NFL. For any team to go into Seattle and win is always a tough thing to do. Seattle was 7-1 at home during the regular season, 8-1 overall. There are a lot of things that come into play with playing in Seattle, like the weather and the crowd. Now that Seattle has moved on in the playoffs, maybe they will get some respect going into their game with Green Bay...Let's hope Matt Hasselbeck doesn't predict that "We want the ball, and we're going to score" My Pick: Green Bay, but close.
The New York Giants will travel to Dallas to play the Cowboys for the third time this season, and Eli Manning showed some flashes of brilliance this weekend. He finally impressed me, and I know my opinion doesn't really matter about how good Eli is. But now the Giants have to go into a hostile environment in Dallas, with a better team on the other side of the ball, and a better pass rush coming at him this weekend. My Pick: Dallas wins going away.
The best game of the weekend, didn't really start until the fourth quarter. When the Steelers finally woke up and made it a game, they couldn't do what they normally do, get pressure on the quarterback. David Gerrard looked impressive, and I know he ws largely impressive during the year, but I think Jacksonville is a little to over matched when it comes to facing New England. My Pick: New England big.
The most uninteresting game of Wild Card weekend was the Chargers vs Titans game. This game was borderline, similar to the NBA--- unwatchable. The game had no cache, it had no flair, even thought we had probably the most potent offensive player in the game in LaDainian Tomlinson, he was largely shut down. He averaged 2 yards a carry, and was a minimal impact in the passing game. I love watching LT play, but yesterday was absolutely disgusting---and not in the good way. It as a boring game from start to finish, and I found myself changing channels between a movie and golf. SD will get a rude awakening this weekend when they play in Indianapolis. My Pick: indianapolis big.
Also, here is my pick for the CFB National Title Game tonight. A close game after OSU takes and early quarter lead. Les Miles will then fire up the troops at half-time, and LSU comes from behind to win the game. Final Score: 28-21 LSU.
No surprise in what happened in the Sugar Bowl with Georgia's demolition of Hawaii. They were an overhyped team who played a weak schedule, that contained the powerhouse football programs of Northern Colorado and Charleston Southern.
It was clear to me that before the game, Hawaii was a good mid-major program, but when you play teams that don't even have a shot at the Poinsettia Bowl, or any other useless bowl, you tend to be a little overhyped and over matched.
Also, Hawaii may have come in with a sense of entitlement thinking that the speed they faced last night was a little over blown, and that no team could be that fast. Well, they learned the hard way that a team can be that fast.
If Hawaii had played a better out-of-conference schedule, they may have actually lost a game and been moved to a bowl they were more suitable for, like the Hawaii Bowl.
When you are a small program like Hawaii is, and according to the Sugar Bowl broadcast, who hasn't been on a mainland recruiting trip in three years, you will not be able to compete with schools like Georgia, Ohio State and Oklahoma.
Hawaii was an excellent offense against lesser competition, but when facing a great team and program like Georgia, they looked ordinary. That proved that Boise State last year was the exception, not the rule.
Well, the college football season is done and now it is time to take a look back at some of the best and worsts of the season,
My Picks: All of my picks for conference winners were correct except for the Big 10, but who knoew that Ohio State would be good after loosing half of thier offense. I picked Michigan, but looked like an #### after the loss App. State. My National title game was only half correct as well, with LSU making it into the game, and USC missing it. Pretty good year.
Worst Loss: App. State beats Michigan. App. State may be a good Division 2 team, but they are still a Division 2 team. Michingan is a Division 1 powerhouse, or so we thought until that game. USC'a loss to Stanford was shocking, but Stanford is in the same conference as SC. Not that big of a loss, it only hurt thier National Title hopes.
Best Win: Illinois over Ohio State. This win shows you how good the Illini can be when during the 4th quarter, Ohio state only ran three offensive plays. Look the hell out for Illinois in the next few years.
Best Bowl: Oklahoma vs West Virginia. Talk about your classic matchup. A team that throws it like nobody's business and a team that looks like they are in a track meet every time they play. This will be fun to watch, and I am thankful I have tickets to the game.
Heisman Trophy: Chase Daniels, QB Mizzou. Simple, would Mizzou have been in the hunt for the National Title without this guy? The short answer is no. I know people are saying Tim Tebow, but Florida without him is still pretty good. I know he set records with rushing and throwing for more than 20 TD's in one season, but Florida without Tebow, is still a pretty good team.
Also Darren McFadden had an amazing season and will likely be the number one pick in the NFL draft. But his team didn't win as many games as Daniels did, to win the heisman, you gotta be on a winning team. Daniels is the Heisman winner because he was able to make Mizzou, a non-traditional football school, a viable force this.
