This could have been so easy.
If Oklahoma State hadn’t fallen in Iowa. If Boise had kicked that field goal. If the Cardinal didn’t fall to the Ducks, or fell 2 months ago. If Oregon didn’t fall to USC.

We are treated to a rematch. A rematch that nobody who lives more than 50 miles from an SEC college wants. If LSU wins, it is anti-climactic as they beat them already. If Bama somehow wins it’s ‘We split two games but won the second one’. This rematch doesn’t solve anything. While I don’t think a team should automatically be punished and blocked from playing a repeat opponent in a bowl game, this particular bowl game has no interest to me.

If only Georgia could cover punts or catch passes or take advantage of their chances.

It’s a sad anti-climax to what has been a fantastic bowl season. A national title game that will probably not rank among the top ten enjoyable bowl games to watch. Cotton, Fiesta, Rose, Sugar, Gator, Outback, Ticketcity, even the Champs Sports Bowl (whatever that is) all have more pull to me. Too bad. After LSU wins 37-9 the naysayers will claim Alabama didn’t belong in the building to begin with – and they have a good chance of being right.

If Arkansas manages to beat LSU at the season’s end and if Oklahoma manages to win a bedlam- Stillwater matchup, our choices for the National title game are …
Arkansas, with a loss but a win over LSU.
Oregon, with a loss to LSU but a win over Stanford.
Oklahoma, with a loss to Texas Tech (dropping like a rock) and a win over Oklahoma State.
LSU, with a loss to Arkansas but wins over both Oregon and Bama.
Alabama, with a loss to LSU and not even a division win (must less conference).
Stanford, with no premiere win and a loss in the spotlight to Oregon.
Oklahoma State, with wins over ranked teams but a loss to the Sooners in their biggest game.
Clemson, with a loss to GT, ranked wins early and nothing to speak of lately.
and
Houston, unbeaten, yet only playing mediocre teams and beating them all by 50.

VT’s loss to Clemson removes them, as does Boise’s loss to TCU.

I’m glad I don’t need to make this call. Would a Razorback win over LSU overcome both of LSU’s wins over the Ducks and Tide? Does the OU-OkSt winner automatically find a place in the big game? The BCS backers haters are going to have a hard time saying we don’t need a playoff if we finish with 7 qualified 1-loss teams and an unbeaten Houston. Looks like a good 8-team playoff to me!

Tim Tebow winning games for Denver is one of the worst things that could have happened to Elway, Fox and Broncos management. With the team near .500 the fans will have (shudder) hope of a possible playoff run. If Denver beats the jets this week they sit at 5-5. Of course, with games against the Patriots and Bills and Bears and a road game in San Diego there is no telling where the team goes from there.

Tebow, despite his leadership, seems to me to not be a quarterback of the future. In fact, he’s barely a quarterback of the present so all reference to Uncle Scrooge aside, the Bronco win streak put the front office in a bind.

If they started Tebow and the team went 0-6 under his command, they could have easily played Orton or Quinn to finish the season and looked for a free agent QB signing in the off-season. Instead, TT seems to be maintaining his fan support despite his arm. Let’s face it – he’s getting credit for the 60 yard bomb to clinch the game but fans are conveniently forgetting the 3 other times he had wide-open guys for touchdowns and either threw short or late. If Orton is QB on those plays Denver wins a laugher 38-10. Instead the balls hang like clay pigeons and the defensive backs yell ‘Pull!’ and close the gap.

As things stand Denver will likely finish 6-10 or 7-9 if they sneak up on someone. Not good enough to figure in the Luck stakes even if they wanted to and this isn’t the best year to draft a QB anyway. 7-9 would be just good enough to make people thing the TT experiment deserves another full season renewal. The TTE reminds me of most shows on NBC right now – not good enough to get good ratings or reviews but not bad enough to cancel immediately and nothing in the can to show from 8-9 pm in its place.

I am not rooting for Denver to lose, but I have for a long time been rooting for people to realize that no team in the NFL wins without something that vaguely resemebles a quarterback.

I can see students wanting to rally behind their coach if they think he is being treated unfairly.
I can’t see how setting fires, turning over cars and throwing rocks is a solution to anything. How mindless can someone be?
The University decided that this was an untenable situation, that it would affect them socially, financially, morally… and they made a decision to sweep everyone associated with this scandal out. Not unclear why we should be shocked by that.
And the team cheer from his front lawn? Tacky.

Is it totally offensive of me by Ok State fans to say that I still think that LSU and Alabama should be ranked #1 and 2 in the country? I would still take either of them against an unbeaten Cowboys team on a neutral field. I’m not as sure about Boise though. I’d rank them LSU, Bama, Boise, and then OkSt.

And don’t think that everyone who wants a playoff or hates the current system isn’t rooting for Georgia to win out and make the Boise win seem that much better. If Georgia wins the SEC, Boise goes to the national title game – the voters won’t have a justification not to do it.

Someone needs to tell USC head coach Lane Kiffin that the officials can’t automatically call a time out for you whenever you want one, just because you mentioned you might want one even if you think there was 1.0001 seconds on the clock. Instead, Coach Tennessee Trojans should have told his player “Hey, in case you get stuck just dive on the ground and all time out yourself.” Don’t blame the refs Laneyboy; it’s called a mirror, try looking into one.

The Raiders traded a 1st round pick and a 2nd rounder (that could turn into another #1 with .0014% probability) to get Carson Palmer from Cincinnati. Thus, Oakland has not only gone in whole hog but whole hog, bacon, flank steak and a couple of piglets for garnish.

Carson Palmer is the best Oakland QB since Rich Gannon. The only problem is that 2011 Carson isn’t the same as 2004 Gannon. The only reason to make this move is that Oakland thinks they can be a playoff team this year. Oakland sits at 4-2, still has games with Green Bay, Detroit and San Diego twice. Even if the Raiders win every other game but those four and finishes 10-6 they might not get the WC – and that is an if the size of the bay itself.

The Raiders need not send a team rep to next April’s draft as they have no picks above 200.

Oakland is a running team in a passing league. They just needed a court jester to manage the team and instead paid a king’s ransom for a gunslinger who can’t sling it like he used to and has no one worthy to catch those slings.
If taking Palmer means the Raiders throw the ball 25+ times from now on, that’s good for his stats and bad for their won-less record.
If taking Palmer means you run the ball more, why did you spend so much?

Mistake trade, gave too much, won’t get them into the playoffs. And it’ll hurt them for two more years as well.

The Bengals? They will come out of next year’s draft with a brand new first-round pick in the secondary or a brand new running back to be the symbol of the franchise’s running game. A- for Cincy, C- for the Silver and Black.

This move has Al Davis’ ghostly fingerprints all over it – which is in part why they have been a non-factor for the last decade.

Every box score for Tim Tebow for the rest of the season will be :

8 for 23 passing for 97 yards and 1 INT

.
On the plus side, he’ll be running the ball a lot so the game will be shortened and that’ll spare the bad defense the embarrassment they suffered in Green Bay when they couldn’t cover anyone with a pulse and two corpses also caught passes from Rodgers for first downs.

Denver only has 1 more win than the Colts. If the Colts somehow find a way to win more then Denver and the Broncos get the #1 pick, what will the fans do if ElWay wants to draft Luck from his Alma Mater? The fans will revolt and still want Tebow and then Elway will get annoyed that his minions won’t simply eat up every move he makes like manna.

If Denver was smart and had the first pick they’d trade it for a king’s ransom.

Best move for the Colts? Peyton’s doctor tells him not to be a dumbass and retire before he can’t move his head for the rest of his life. Peyton joins on for one season of SNL, the Colts get a Stanford QB with the #1 pick and keep him three decades too late and Indy looks just the same as it was 3 years ago. In reality I think the Colts are just good enough not to lose as many as the terrible Seahawks and the entertainment-challenged Dolphins, last Sunday against the no-show Giants ignored for comedic purposes.

Denver’s best move? Tebow plays all year and confirms what apparently only 7% of us can admit openly –

he can’t throw

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After that the Broncos sign a veteran QB – clearly not Orton since the fans have sailed that ship on him even if he changed his name to Unitas. Denver spends all of it’s draft picks on defense again and tries not to finish dead last in every category – again.

And Tebow’s jersey still sells in the top ten.

No more Yankees and no Red Sox?

I can’t imagine a post-season I would enjoy watching more.

You gotta feel for the Phillies. They have a rotation that makes other teams salivate, they cruise to the division title and act like a team ready to roll.

And then all but two guys on the team bat .100 in the post-season. Seriously, Ryan Howard -really- really really needs to figure out how to cut down on the Ks.