Tough decision

I was going to post this column on Sunday afternoon, but then my laptop died and I wasn’t able to finish. So now I will start all over again, hoping that I can recreate the magic of what I had typed (Don’t worry, it probably wasn’t that good. I started it at about 11:30 at night, after the Bears finished off the 49ers and the Cubs refused to hit in Arizona.)

Anyways, there was an interesting online argument over the weekend between Sports Illustrated’s college football writer Stewart Mandel and their NFL editor Andrew Perloff. They were debating which type of pigskin was the best; the game played on Saturday’s with the marching bands, pageantry and tradition, or Sunday’s version, with the paid players and constant Fantasy implications. (You can check out the argument here )

I thought both arguments were valid ones, but what is most unusual about both types of football is that their worst qualities are directly connected to their best ones.

For college, its greatest aspect is that every regular season game means so much. To win a National Title, like my beloved Florida Gators did a season ago, a team must be focused and play 100 percent from the opening kickoff of game one to the final whistle of game twelve. There can’t be any mistakes, and if a team is to lose a game, like Florida did last season, and still want a chance at a title, they better lose to a good team, (The Gators lost at number seven Auburn, not a bad loss in anybodies mind.), the loss better be early in the year so that the team has time to move back up the polls, and the teams ranked higher also have to lose. (All of this worked out so perfectly for Florida last year, I still really am in shock that they even made it to the Title game.) That aspect of the system makes every game more intense and important. Any so-called ‘expert’ can look at USC this season and say that they should win every game by twenty points, but if they do slip up and fall somewhere, they will need a lot of help in order to get back in the National Title picture.

The counter of that, obviously, is that when the regular season is done, the system decides to take a vacation and college football fans are left with the mess known as the BCS. Sure, maybe it is better than it was before, when conference’s forced their teams to certain bowls and fans never got the chance to see two top teams going at it with the crystal football on the line. And to be fair, it did work in 2003 and 2005 when the BCS matched up Ohio State and Miami, then Texas and USC in maybe two of the greatest college football games of all time. But usually the system fails. It tends to spit out un-fair matchups that leave the most deserving teams on the couch watching instead of the field playing. (See Miami in 2000, Oregon in 2001, USC in 2003 and Auburn in 2004.)To many, the best case scenario would be a playoff, where the county’s top eight teams (regardless of conference) played a single-elimination tournament, similar to what happens every March in college basketball. But this will never happen, for two reasons. One is what the RZA, GZA, Method Man and the rest of the Wu-Tang Clan preached, C.R.E.A.M. Cash Rules Everything Around Me. The conference commissioners, university presidents, and large corporate sponsorships make so much money from the bowls that they would never eliminate them. And two is that if a tournament was put in place for the top eight teams, there wouldn’t be that same type of intensity and passion in regular season games like there is now. Last season’s Michigan versus Ohio State game on November 18 was the most anticipated college game of the season, because fans, players, and media members all knew that the winner would play for the National Title and the loser most likely would not. If the top eight teams in the country all were entered into this playoff, and both the winner and loser of the game still had a chance at a championship, then the level of intensity of that game would not been nearly as high as it actually was.

The NFL’s problem is similar, but at the same time completely different. The best quality the league has is that at the start of every season, all thirty-two head coaches can look at their teams and tell them that they have a chance at making it to the Super Bowl. Every year, it is guaranteed that at least five of the twelve playoff teams from a year ago will not make it back to the post-season, and it is usually more. (For example, the Chargers, Ravens, Chiefs, Jets, Saints, Cowboys and Eagles all made the playoffs in ’07 but not in ’06.)This year, previews are already calling off the Raiders, Lions, Browns, Redskins, Falcons, Bucs and Texans, but it wouldn’t surprise me if as many as three of those teams played post-season football. Any given Sunday, the mantra goes, anything can happen. Going undefeated is all but impossible, and one bad injury can turn a team from Super Bowl bound to top-five draft pick. The NFL is the highest earning, most watched and best run league every year because every fan starts out the season saying that this year is the year.

Of course the problem with that is the NFL’s regular season can get long and tiresome. The last two season’s there has been almost daily talk of Terrell Owens and his ridiculous antics, mainly because the games in September and early October really don’t mean a whole lot. As long as a team doesn’t start out 0-6, 1-5 or 2-4, they have a chance at a playoff spot. Once November hits, then it is clear which teams are for real and which teams really suck. But because the season is so long, by week nine many fans are more interested in their Fantasy teams than their real ones. Having every team with a realistic title chance is a good thing, but it can get pretty boring if the team is out of the race before Halloween.

I’m not going to decide which type of football I like better, because I am a fan of both. But if you have an opinion on the matter, please leave me a comment, I’m very interested in what others think about this argument.


Since college football kicks off later this week, I will do a mini, two-minute preview, similar to what I did last season. Here are three games, two players and one team to keep an eye on, followed by a National Title pick.

GAMES
3-Michigan at Wisconsin, Saturday November 10
Usually the game of the year in the Big 10 is the Wolverines and the Ohio State Buckeyes, but this year it’s with Bucky Badger. Wisconsin is absolutely loaded on defense, and their offense is led by one of the best backs in the country, PJ Hill. Michigan has only one tough road game, and this is it. If Lloyd Carr’s crew can get past this game at Camp Randal, they should be ready for the big showdown the following week versus OSU with the Big 10 title, and possibly a trip to New Orleans, on the line.

2-Louisville at West Virginia, Thursday November 8
Last season, both these teams were unbeaten when they met on a Thursday night. This year it should be no different. The two best quarterbacks in the country in my opinion, Brian Brohm of UL and Pat White of WVU, will put on an offensive show, but the key will be which teams defense can step up and makes some key stops. The game is in Morgantown, so expect some hostility and craziness all night long.

1-Florida at LSU, Saturday October 6
The same day as other big games such as Oklahoma-Texas and Georgia-Tennessee, but nothing will be bigger than the defending champs coming into Death Valley to take on the Bayou Bengals. This game will not be decided by speed, since both teams have a surplus of it. Instead it will be decided by who can be the most physical, especially on the offensive line. If LSU allows Gator defensive end Derrick Harvey to get in the backfield all day long, they will be in trouble. And if UF doesn’t block Tiger D-tackle Glen Dorsey, Tim Tebow might leave Baton Rouge looking like a pancake.

PLAYERS
2-Patrick Turner, wide receiver, USC
Three years ago, the question was who would replace Mike Williams in USC’s offense. The answer was Dwayne Jarrett. Now it comes the time to replace Jarrett, and the burden falls on Turner. The former number one recruit in the country, Turner stands 6 foot 5, weighs 220 pounds, and has great hands. His biggest problem though is consistency. To become the next in the Williams-Jarrett line, he needs more games like his 12 catches for 129 yards and a touchdown performance last season week five against Washington than his one catch for two yard showing the following week versus Arizona State.

1-Anthony Morelli, quarterback, Penn State
A bunch of people, such as ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreet, think that the Lions are the team to beat in the Big 10. That will depend a lot on Morelli. The senior quarterback started in all of Penn State’s games last season, yet only through for 11 touchdown passes. Without running back Tony Hunt, who graduated, the QB will have to be a lot more explosive. It shouldn’t be too hard with receivers Derrick Williams and Deon Butler returning, but if JoePa’s team is going to be a National Title contender, they need more production from Morelli.

TEAMS
1-Virginia Tech
Everybody out there, even die-hard Virginia Cavalier fans, will be standing and cheering when the Hokies take the field on September 1. After what happened on the Blacksburg campus on April 16, VaTech has suddenly become the nation’s team. They also are a team with championship dreams, possessing maybe the country’s top defense. Despite having a question mark at quarterback and a schedule that takes them to LSU, nobody is doubting that Tech has what it takes physically to make it to New Orleans. But will the burden and pressure of being America’s team take a toll on the Hokies mentally?

CHAMPIONSHIP PREDICITON
I think that the number one team in the land, USC, will lose a game this season.

I think Wisconsin will fall at Ohio State, while Ohio State will fall at Michigan, while Michigan will fall at Wisconsin, meaning no title for the Big 10.

I think the SEC is just too loaded to run the table, meaning that Florida, LSU, Georgia, Tennessee, Auburn, and Alabama all will have at least one loss at the end of the season.

I think the winner of the Red River Shootout will face the winner of the Louisville-West Virginia game for the National Title, meaning it will be Texas and West Virginia on January 7, with the Mountaineers taking home the crystal trophy.

I also think that I have little to no confidence in my pick, just like nobody should with a pre-season choice.