Still Plenty of B.S. in the BCS
Florida’s messy victory over Oklahoma in the BCS Championship game raised more questions than it answered.
- Would Utah have put up a better fight than Oklahoma did? How about USC?
- When will “Big Game Bob” Stoops win another BCS game?
- Was the Big 12 horribly overrated this season?
- Can Florida star Tim Tebow play quarterback in the NFL?
- Once pro teams take away the quarterback draw, how effective will Tebow be?
Here is what some of the nation’s leading pundits wrote after the spectacle:
Gene Wojciechowski, ESPN.com: “The Gators won a crystal trophy, but the victory over OU was as artistic as a finger painting. It isn’t the first time a BCS Championship Game didn’t live up to the hype. No shame there. The difference is that there are three other teams that think they deserved a confetti shower — or at least the chance to have played for a national title. So what would the Gators say to Utah, Texas and USC?”
Mark Kriegel, FoxSports.com: “Stoops, whose team became the first to score more than 700 points in a season, didn’t like hearing about the deficient defenses in his conference, or how Big 12 schools were scoring so much less in these bowl games. But again, that was the case. Oklahoma scored 40 points less than its season average.”
Bill Plaschke, Los Angeles Times, on Tebow: “For a couple of wonderfully antique hours Thursday, this is the perfect player who made us forget college football’s imperfect system. After Florida’s messy 24-14 victory over Oklahoma in the BCS national championship game at Dolphin Stadium, I’m still not sure I can name the nation’s best team. But I’m absolutely positive of its biggest star, that being the Gators quarterback who looks like a Four Horseman, acts like Seven Blocks of Granite, and talks like Knute Rockne.”
Dan Wetzel, Yahoo! Sports: “Tebow’s heart gets a lot of hype – too much for some. The television announcers are often over the top in their praise and the stories of Tebow’s off-field heroics as a devout Christian can be fatiguing. It’s a strange phenomenon of the modern media. Fans can find themselves rooting against a good guy just because they keep being reminded of how good he is. A little fallibility can go a long way. So at least Tebow earned a taunting penalty in the fourth quarter to prove he’s human after all.”
MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE
Questions to ponder while wondering if the Cardinals will jump in on the starting pitching sweepstakes:
- Wouldn’t Randy Wolf or Oliver Perez make you feel better about the Cards rotation?
- How much far did Thursday night’s debacle against Xavier set back Rick Majerus’ program?
- How could the Billikens be THAT overmatched against an A-10 opponent?
THE BEAUTY OF THE GMAC BOWL
Count Texas coach Mack Brown among those wondering if America needs so many bowl games.
“It is an exciting time,” Brown told The Dallas Morning News. “I see 7-5 teams throwing Gatorade on their coach.
“At Texas if we were 7-5 they would be throwing something on me, but it wouldn’t be Gatorade, I will tell you that.”
THE LEGEND OF BABY MANGINO
Once again, behold the power of the Internets.
THE HARD LIFE OF A NBA ROOKIE
This is what happened when Jason Thompson didn’t follow rookie protocol:
QUIPS ‘R US
Here is what some of America’s leading sports pundits have been writing:
Dwight Perry, Seattle Times: “Maple Leafs center Matt Stajan was sidelined with blurry vision after he was struck in the eye by an errant shot — while playing foosball. Team officials quietly suggested he stick to much less-dangerous pursuits like, maybe, ice hockey.”
Mike Bianchi, Orlando Sentinel: “Joe Paterno coached the Rose Bowl from the press box and didn’t even bother to come down to the locker room at halftime. Isn’t it only a matter of time before old Joe just stays home on game day and coaches from his recliner?”
MEGAPHONE
“I love to lead the team. I love to be in charge. I feel that is my personality.”
Tebow, talking to reporters after leading Florida to the BCS title.
Wow, what an awful production of a national championship game (or any game for that matter) by FOX last night. From the announcing, to the lack of replays, to that stupid between snaps clock for OU. Usually FOX does a good job but last night was just terrible all the way around. Utah gets my vote anyway.
Who could have guessed that at this point Ron Villone would be considered an upgrade to the Cardinals bullpen?
I agree with S.W., college football should be left to either ESPN or CBS.
Congratulations to the Gators, enjoy it for 36 more hours because it is only 27 days until National Signing Day! As Barry Switzer once said, “You’ve got to keep feeding the monster.”
Fox was also really bad with the Fiesta Bowl earlier this week S.W.
Thanks to Tipsheet for calling this game like it was - SLOPPY. (Several websites called this a great game…sorry but that simply isn’t the case). Although, as Really pointed out earlier this week, having about 7 weeks off between games is a good way to screw up a football team. I’m sorry for bringing this up again and beating it like a dead horse, but until we get a top-8 playoff system that starts a max of two weeks after the regular season we will never actually know who is the best team. The regular season ends, then these kids have finals and Christmas break, and then they are supposed to play in a title game? Stupid if you think about it…
As for the Big 12, I feel like we got exposed. The Big 12 South went 1-3 and didn’t score anywhere near their season averages. I was sure the Big 12 was the best conference in CF this year, but I can’t say that now that the dust has settled. The only bright spots were the play of OK defense (I thought they did a pretty good job considering all the bad talk about them) and the 3-0 bowl record for the North.
Oh, by the way, the “Big” 10 went 1-6, another banner year for THE most overrated conference. But you can bet they will still have 2 teams in the top 8 next preseason.
I think Utah should be #1. No one stands out and Utah is the only team that doesn’t have to explain a loss. And they crushed the team (Bama) that Florida was losing to for 54 minutes of the SEC Championship game. And beat the team that beat USC. And beat 6 bowl teams during the regular season. Utes=#1.
Damn I miss hockey…
FOX has never been good at broadcasting college football. Forget their A or B team broadcasters and directors, I think they use their Z team. Thank heaven ESPN bought the rights to the BCS games. Tebow’s behind ought to be mighty clean, because Brenneman spent all night licking it. I thought he was going to light candles to Tebow at one point.
Tim, I’m not sure an 8 team playoff would solve anything. How are you going to determine the best 8 teams? There’s too much of a chance that an excellent “mid-major” team like Utah will be left out, while some over-rated big conference team will get to go. Penn State, anyone? Pollsters simply refuse to believe that the college football landscape has changed, and that former power conferences are not as good as they used to be, and their teams are not as good. The NCAA scholarship limitations have significantly leveled the playing field.
Agreed with the poster who was lamenting how much he had to hear about how Tebow might just be the second coming of our Lord and Savior. Look, I know the guy seems like a genuinely good person and does great things for the community and all that stuff, but say it once or twice and then talk about the game. Between that and everything about how tough the guy is or what an amazing leader the guy is and I was about Tebow’d to death. People do realize there is more than one way to lead, right?
My wife actually looked at me a little funny when I finally had enough about halfway through the fourth quarter and started screaming obscenities at the TV, telling it to stop talking about Tebow……she muted the TV.
I hear ya Don, but at least Utah would have gotten a chance to prove themselves this year (they were #6 I believe in the final BCS rankings). And the best team in the land is going to be in the top 8 of the BCS. Maybe a team that is the 8th best won’t get in, but that doesn’t bother me nearly as much as doing it the way we do now and not knowing if Texas, USC, or Utah is better than Florida.
The BCS is nothing more than a money grab for the six BCS conferences (and which the ACC and Big East should be booted out in my opinion). Legally the talk about anti-competition rules being broken has some water to it from what I have read. Everything else is this country is decided by head to head competition - business, elections, all other sports, etc. So it too should be with college football.
A playoff system would be great…but quickly ruined by the money-hungry conference and network pigs who would institute some sort of “wild card” format.
Imagine a wild card team, which backed into a playoff system, peaking in December and/or January, winning the national championship with three losses.
That’s nepotism in broadcasting again. If Brennaman’s dad wasn’t a famous broadcaster, he’d be doing single A games in Montana. That was painfull to listen to last night.
Paterno doesn’t need to coach at this point, he just needs to recruit. He’s a legend, and when he talks - people listen, especially recruits.
UF’ers should hope that athletic director Jeremy Foley has plans to renegotiate a contract extension and salary increase for Urban Meyer. Urban is among the best head coaches in the nation, if not now THE best, and he deserves compensation alongside the top notch earners. Isn’t Urban worth that to the Gator Nation?
Cheers and Congrat’s!