Week 7 Pick-em Results. Shame Once Again.

I guess I shouldn’t have gotten used to the near-perfect weeks. This week I got embarrassed with a poor, poor record of 12-6. 109-30 is the count now and puts me back in the barely passing category of .78. This is the way the college football gods keep hotheads like me in check. The gods of this great game favored a few others today with some outrageous finishes and oddly upsetting outcomes.

The story of the day is Arkansas’ near victory over Florida… but I’ll get to that later. First, I must defend my most frustrating loss of the day. Texas squeaks by a Bradford-less Oklahoma 16-13. Last year it was the battle of the outrageously impressive offenses, now it was the battle of the outrageously overrated offenses. I guess some say great defenses, but it certainly seemed like underperforming offenses to me. I’m always against should-a, could-a, would-a, but Bradford is worth more than 3 points to his offense. He maybe only worth 4, but that’s one point more than their final deficit. I’m just saying, Bradford plays more than two series, Oklahoma wins the Red River Rivalry.

Now we get to the meat and potatoes, Arkansas Razorbacks v. the Florida Tebows. Oh wait, that’s not their name? I could have swore it was. Was this Tebow’s final push for the Heisman? That’s what the early blogroll is saying, but I actually say the opposite. I’ll root for the Razorback and have become somewhat of a Razorback apologist, but the Razorback defense comes into this game as one of the worst in the SEC. IF Tebow was all that EVERY SPORTS ANALYST/ANNOUNCER/SIDELINE REPORTER says he is, they should have won this game by 55 points. Instead, we see a terrible Arkansas defense look really good. For the most part, it was the fact that the Razorback D played really well, no one can take that away from them. But shouldn’t Tim Tebow, the Savior of us all (pictured above in all his glory, and yes, that is bacon coming out of his hand), light up a defense no matter what? Tebow didn’t play that outstanding until the final drive, and even in the final drive, he was okay. Not outstanding. I didn’t see anything that would make me jump out of my chair and agree with all those analysts. Everyone is saying that the last drive shows he should win the Heisman, but “the best player in college football” shouldn’t ever even be in that situation in the first place.

I have to get this in because it really was important. I never say this unless it is an absolute certainty that a call affected the outcome of a game, but two really bad phantom penalties affected the outcome of this game. I swear that I will blame my own mother for the loss of a game before I’ll point the finger at the official. It’s a tactic that’s overdone and almost always misused. If you saw the game, you know which two penalties I’m talking about. The pass interference and personal fouls against Arkansas that led to Florida’s tying touchdown. When Verne Lundquist goes against his bias for Florida and Tebow and says that the call was terrible, I’ve got to believe he’s right. They were so bad I had several friends (none Arkansas fans) who called me and tried to have me explain what just happened because they truly didn’t know. Unfortunately for Arkansas and Alabama, Texas, Boise State, and USC, the referees certainly handed the opportunity to the Gators on a silver platter. They did have to execute and Arkansas missed their opportunities yes, but at the end of the day, the difference is shown in a single stat: Hogs 10 penalties for 92 yards (3 of which were on key win-or-go-home drives for the Gators), and Gators, 3 penalties for 16 yards. Stats never lie.

ONE MORE TEBOW RANT: I am sick and tired of everyone talking about how “Tebow finds a way to win.” I’ve heard it said many times today about the end of that game. How about “the Florida offense finds a way to win?” Why is it always Tebow’s responsibility when they win, but never his responsibility when something goes wrong? I recently heard a college football analyst reflect on a short crossing pass where Tebow threw the ball behind his receiver by about 3 or 4 yards. His response was, “that receiver OVERRAN the route.” So apparently, Tebow threw the ball in the right location, but the receiver was wrong. Like’s like punching someone in the face and getting mad at them for running into your fist. It would have been about a 7 or 8 yard game against LSU last week. It’s absolutely ridiculous how much love this guy gets. The bummer is, I actually like the guy. I think he’s a great human being, but, like Brett Farve, announcers and analysts have this absolute love affair with him. It’s difficult to hear so much praise for one person. It’s time to stop looking at the man, and look at the team. Because the team’s pretty good. He helps it, but the TEAM is still in 1st. At least for now. Bama may jump you this week Gators.

Week 4 Pick-em Results. Even more shame.

Another crazy week in college football is in the history books. I’m not necessarily sure what history books those might be, but they might be titled “Why College Football is the Most Exciting Time of Year.” So far, a major top 5 upset has happened each week. Oklahoma in Week 1, Oklahoma State in Week 2, USC in Week 3, and now Penn State in Week 4. Who’s the next loss on the list? Well, it’ll either be LSU or Florida because they play each other in week 6 in what will be one of the biggest college games of the year. Assuming LSU can make it past current No. 18 Georgia (not a given), it will be the first top 5 matchup of the year, it will also be Florida’s first REAL test, considering they’ve only been playing High School teams up to this point. Florida has a bye this week, giving a recovering Tebow a chance to shake off a concussion, so I’m guessing that LSU will probably not have much of a chance. But as my 14-8 record shows this week, you never really know.

It looks like we’re going to have another playoff controversy this year as it seems that Boise State has a pretty good chance to run the table. Considering they’ve only faced and will only face one ranked team this year, there’s a pretty good shot that they’ll make it through. All of the little guys will have more fodder to feel like they should be a part of the big game and that a playoff system is the only real solution. I personally don’t like the idea of a playoff, which I can expand upon later, (quickly though, I feel it would devalue the regular season that we all love so much), but what a playoff would do would obviously put teams like 2008 Utah and Boise State against the big boys. On those regards I’m all for the playoff. It would get the “this isn’t fair” whining monkey off of our back and I don’t think it’d really affect who would wind up in the BCS National Championship game anyway (unless Ohio State is slotted to go to the big dance, even the little guys could beat up on them). If Utah and Boise State have to go through the likes of USC, Texas, Florida, and Alabama just to get to the Championship game, there’s no way we see blue and orange broncos dancing around in the End Zone anyway.

My season-to-date total is now 66-20, putting my winning percentage at a solid C (.77). Although for the record 3 of my 8 losses were losses that every analyst was surprised by. Who knew we’d have three top ten teams fall in one week? It still doesn’t excuse my 5 other bad picks. Shame, terrible shame falls on me like a dark cloud of self doubt.

Week 3 Pick-em Results. Shame.

Well, I’m astounded at how poorly I picked last week. The upsets that I picked didn’t happen and the surprises that did happened surprised me more than anyone. After a not-so-respectable week, I declare shame on myself for only going 15-7. I didn’t post my first two weeks, but here is my honest record from the first two weeks so we can get caught up: Week 1: 17-3; Week 2: 20-2. Making my grand total a much more respectable 52-12.

The biggest story of the week of course is USC going down at the hands of a much underrated University of Washington. Or was the USC offense just really OVERrated? It certainly didn’t help that they’re starting QB and best defensive player were sidelined with injuries. Matt Barkley and Taylor Mays certainly count for more than 3 points, but this game was not decided from the QB standpoint or a lack of defense (even though Jake Locker may be the best all-around QB in the nation). The Trojans stayed away from the pass like it was the Ebola virus even after picking up 20 quick yards in the air on the first two plays of the game. USC never threw deeper than about 15 yards.

USC isn’t out of the national championship picture quite yet, after BYU went down, it doesn’t seem like anyone is going to run the table this year, but I still think that USC has one more loss left in them. For the fourth straight year USC goes down on a “gimme” game. In the last seven years, 5 out of 6 USC losses have come against unranked PAC-10 opponents. With a true freshman QB and a new coaching staff, the PAC-10 Championship may be up for grabs more than it has ever been in the 7-year Pete Carroll domination era. USC’s frequent unexpected losses states that either Pete Carroll can’t make it through without a hiccup, or that the PAC-10 deserves more respect that it gets. One things for sure, no conference schedules tougher out-of-conference games than the PAC-10, and that has got to count for something.