The Swamp

So not sure how I just now realized that Kansas has the longest road losing streak in NCAA history (46 games and counting) and its first road game of the year is...at Central Michigan, which has never beaten a Power Five team at home*. Fuck.

* - It's a weird quirk since CMU has six Power Five wins in the last 10 years, but all on the road. Though only has played 8 or 9 Power Five teams at home ever.

Why does Kansas suck so bad? I get the second fiddle to hoops thing but there are several other middling big ten and big 12 schools that have way better programs and aren't better college destinations.

HaulCitgo wrote: ↑Mon Aug 20, 2018 4:30 pm Why does Kansas suck so bad? I get the second fiddle to hoops thing but there are several other middling big ten and big 12 schools that have way better programs and aren't better college destinations.

Kind of a perfect storm in Kansas' case. Mangino showed it's possible to win there, but after his scandal-tarred departure, they made a bad hire (Turner Gill), then doubled down on that bad hire with a heroically bad hire (Charlie Weis) and then just decided to hire someone in the Witness Protection Program (David Beaty) and here they are.

In a nutshell, it's not easy to win there under the best of circumstances but it's been a clown show for about a decade now and they still haven't corrected from the damage done. I do expect Kansas to be better this year. I think they'll probably beat Central and break their road losing streak and I don't think winning a couple Big XII games is impossible. So for Kansas a 4-win season is almost something to celebrate.

http://www.cjonline.com/sports/20180716 ... -situation

Beaty finally shed light on the specific details of the dire situation he inherited from predecessor Charlie Weis, revealing for the first time the number of scholarship athletes on his roster when he took over in December 2014. The Jayhawks had just 39 true scholarship players when Beaty walked in the door, only managing to increase that number to 54 for Year 1 following departures and a 24-player signing class.

The NCAA allows football programs to allot 85 scholarships, but that number can decrease for a number of reasons, including players being ruled academically ineligible, suffering health-related issues or simply leaving the team.

Long reluctant to get into specifics about the scholarship situation he inherited, Beaty changed course when directly pressed on the matter. Monday’s comment is in line with earlier remarks that the Jayhawks were about 30 scholarships down in his first season, and the program still hasn’t fully recovered from the mess — this year’s squad will be lucky to reach 70 true scholarship players, Beaty said.

MOAR Big XII content!

Seriously, this is pretty awesome. Behind the scenes of Barry Sanders' historic 1988 season.

The numbers from that season are still dumbfounding.

Clemson student to play QB against Clemson on Saturday.

Yes, you read that correctly.

Best bets this week:

Syracuse-Western Michigan OVER 65.5
Michigan over Notre Dane PICK
USC -25.5 over UNLV

If you can somehow get an prop/alternate line on Michigan -9 or so take that. They’re gonna stomp Notre Dame’s offense unless something weird happens.

Yeah, the QB and RB situation at ND is really wonky and MI's D returns most of what was one of the better squads in the country last year. Not a good situation for the Irish.

BUT... These games almost never go to plan.

I see they're still trotting the corpse of Lee Corso out for GameDay.

Also, obligatory:

Drysdale in tennis. Vitale in basketball.

These personalities never die off.

Lane Kiffin getting 75 hung on him would be so sweet.

Gonna be too much MAC speed for Kentucky today.

Just saw maybe the worst targeting ejection ever in this CMU-UK game so CFB is officially back.

Not the second one, that was legit. The first one.

So the ref that took out the WR in the OU game is my buddy Joe. He did play DE in college.


http://bleacherreport.com/post/big-12-f ... e35cd37f10

Here are the 10 FBS schools I just missed on Sporcle:

Buffalo
Coastal Carolina
Louisiana Tech
Middle Tennessee State
TCU
Temple
Texas State (sorry!)
UAB
UMass
UTSA

So, today I read an article that the SEC West is the best division in College football.

My alma mater Colorado State was coming off losses to Hawaii and Colorado. Today they beat Arkansas 34-27. SEC! SEC! SEC!

Well no one included Arkansas football in sec west power rankings.

Unlike new perennial powerhouse uk which hasn’t lost to Florida in over 11 months.

sancarlos wrote: ↑Sat Sep 08, 2018 11:55 pm So, today I read an article that the SEC West is the best division in College football.

My alma mater Colorado State was coming off losses to Hawaii and Colorado. Today they beat Arkansas 34-27. SEC! SEC! SEC!

Sentence 1 has little to do with paragraph 2

Brontoburglar wrote: ↑Sun Sep 09, 2018 12:23 pm

sancarlos wrote: ↑Sat Sep 08, 2018 11:55 pm So, today I read an article that the SEC West is the best division in College football.

My alma mater Colorado State was coming off losses to Hawaii and Colorado. Today they beat Arkansas 34-27. SEC! SEC! SEC!

Sentence 1 has little to do with paragraph 2

A conference division that includes a team that lost to Colorado State cannot be the best division in college football. See?

With my daughter going to UW, I now have five college teams I root for (Colorado State, Colorado, Cal, Stanford, and Washington.). Given that three of them often lose, that’s a five-game parlay that I would rarely win on any given Saturday.

But it did happen this past weekend!

sancarlos wrote: ↑Mon Sep 10, 2018 12:36 am

Brontoburglar wrote: ↑Sun Sep 09, 2018 12:23 pm

sancarlos wrote: ↑Sat Sep 08, 2018 11:55 pm So, today I read an article that the SEC West is the best division in College football.

My alma mater Colorado State was coming off losses to Hawaii and Colorado. Today they beat Arkansas 34-27. SEC! SEC! SEC!

Sentence 1 has little to do with paragraph 2

A conference division that includes a team that lost to Colorado State cannot be the best division in college football. See?

Exactly. Just like a lot of folks would like to excommunicate Maryland and Rutgers from the B1G East... Still a brutal division, but you can't ignore the patsies.

I know Western MI isn't all that good. I know that.

But having watched the replay of the game twice... Shea Patterson is such a huge leap forward at the QB spot, it's ridiculous. They hadn't had a TD from WR in almost a full calendar year. They had 2 on Saturday.

And one was on a deep double-move post route that I'm pretty sure didn't happen once all last season. And I don't mean a TD pass, I mean hitting anything on a post or fly route over 20 yards. I'm sure I'm forgetting a few plays, but still... Very encouraging.

Western's D is pretty awful so I wouldn't take away anything from that side of the ball, but holding them to only 3 points is pretty impressive. Western hung 40+ on Syracuse (which isn't a great D, but still Power Five) and will do it to a few other teams this season yet.

I haven't seen anything too impressive out of Patterson yet, but you have to assume he'll get better every week if he stays healthy.

brian wrote: ↑Mon Sep 10, 2018 10:08 am Western's D is pretty awful so I wouldn't take away anything from that side of the ball, but holding them to only 3 points is pretty impressive. Western hung 40+ on Syracuse (which isn't a great D, but still Power Five) and will do it to a few other teams this season yet.

I haven't seen anything too impressive out of Patterson yet, but you have to assume he'll get better every week if he stays healthy.

See, you're talking about "impressive" and I'm just looking for "competent."

Hitting a wide open Nico Collins on a post route isn't impressive, but is sure as shit didn't happen last year. Hitting him in the back corner on a play he had to adjust the route and Patterson had to make a quick read isn't necessarily impressive (I mean, I'd argue that was a pretty impressive throw made to look easy, but whatevs.)

Speight was competent in '16 and MI was a wrecking ball until he got hurt against Iowa and things got iffy. Even with a not so great O'Korn and then an injured Speight, the losses down the stretch were by 1, 3 and 1 point margins.

Ruddock was decent after a very shitty start in '15 and that team went 10-3.

Last year was a shit show, despite having a top 5 defense.

My point is that with a Don Brown defense, we just need an offense that doesn't shit the bed. Competent offense and Don Brown wrecking crew is enough to win most of the games on this year's schedule. The reason they lost to ND (fuck you Brandon) is the D allowed 14 points before anyone realized there was a game being played (apparently? I guess?)

sancarlos wrote: ↑Mon Sep 10, 2018 12:36 am

Brontoburglar wrote: ↑Sun Sep 09, 2018 12:23 pm

sancarlos wrote: ↑Sat Sep 08, 2018 11:55 pm So, today I read an article that the SEC West is the best division in College football.

My alma mater Colorado State was coming off losses to Hawaii and Colorado. Today they beat Arkansas 34-27. SEC! SEC! SEC!

Sentence 1 has little to do with paragraph 2

A conference division that includes a team that lost to Colorado State cannot be the best division in college football. See?

if the best division in college football conversation was limited to divisions without teams that are bad then there would be no best division in college football

Two comfortable wins with a competent level of play in multiple facets of play plus FSU's early struggles have some locals suddenly thinking very, very highly.

“Murder Smurfs” as a nickname for this years Boise State team is the best nickname for any team ever and I won’t debate it.

Sabo, are you watching this UVA-Ohio game, son? It's been pretty crazy so far.

Shirley wrote: ↑Sat Sep 15, 2018 4:04 pm Sabo, are you watching this UVA-Ohio game, son? It's been pretty crazy so far.

Afraid so. Not the Bobcats best defensive effort.

Florida State's offensive line is worse than advertised.

DSafetyGuy wrote: ↑Sat Sep 15, 2018 8:14 pm Florida State's offensive line is worse than advertised.

FSU has looked like a really poorly coached team, but it feels like Jimbo isn't getting enough credit/grief for the lack of talent on the roster.

Tua is ridiculously good. Considering that Saban won titles with guys McElroy, McCarron and Coker, it's borderline unfair that he now has a QB that talented.

Man, I wouldn't have believed it, but Oregon is kicking the hell out of Stanford. The Oregon QB Justin Herbert is going to be playing on Sundays next year.

4-0. 3-0 if you don’t count shitty teams like central Michigan.

sancarlos wrote: ↑Sat Sep 22, 2018 9:19 pm Man, I wouldn't have believed it, but Oregon is kicking the hell out of Stanford.

Heh. I wrote the post above as Oregon scored to make the score 31-7. But, on replay, they decided (I disagree) that the Oregon guy was out of bounds at the one yard line, so they took the score off the board. Two plays later, Stanford picked up a fumble and went 90 yards to make it 24-14. Oregon has clearly been the better team all night, but since I made my original post, they've stepped on their dicks a few times, and amazingly, now it is going to overtime at 31-31!

eta: and, Stanford wins in OT. Unbelievable!

sancarlos wrote: ↑Sat Sep 22, 2018 10:25 pm

sancarlos wrote: ↑Sat Sep 22, 2018 9:19 pm Man, I wouldn't have believed it, but Oregon is kicking the hell out of Stanford.

Heh. I wrote the post above as Oregon scored to make the score 31-7. But, on replay, they decided (I disagree) that the Oregon guy was out of bounds at the one yard line, so they took the score off the board. Two plays later, Stanford picked up a fumble and went 90 yards to make it 24-14. Oregon has clearly been the better team all night, but since I made my original post, they've stepped on their dicks a few times, and amazingly, now it is going to overtime at 31-31!

eta: and, Stanford wins in OT. Unbelievable!

it was right via the rulebook, which is different in college than it is in the NFL. learned that tonight too.

Joe K wrote: ↑Sat Sep 22, 2018 4:24 pm Tua is ridiculously good. Considering that Saban won titles with guys McElroy, McCarron and Coker, it's borderline unfair that he now has a QB that talented.

People here are absolutely giddy. They don’t even know how to react. Now they are only left with bitching about kickers. Honestly, the Alabama fanbase I know are great, and they recognize how lucky they’ve been the during the saban years. That said, watching games for them is different, as they watch with a sense of angst that something bad is due to happen and they will win ugly. They LOVE to bitch that things don’t look right and this team just isn’t as good as previous versions. They don’t have that right now and it’s a little uncomfortable for them. Tua’s drive charts since he took over in the CG last year are insane. Something like 40tds, 8fgs, 4tos, to 5 punts. And the TO’s were fumbles by people other than him. He is a special special talent.

I like Saban, a lot, but get 100% the criticisms against him. That said, I think he really really cares for Jalen Hurts. As in, he’s one of his favorite players he’s ever coached. It’s the only explainable reason for why Tua wasn’t starting by week five last year. Hurts has been a great player, and a great leader, but he is not a top level passer. With him this team would still be 4-0, but would have scored roughly half as many points. And the game yesterday would have been a squeaker.

Man. Clemson QB Gets demoted, announces plans to transfer. Kinda shitty. Why would a coach want a guy who's clearly about himself more than team? Oh right...talent.

A_B wrote: ↑Wed Sep 26, 2018 9:38 am Man. Clemson QB Gets demoted, announces plans to transfer. Kinda shitty. Why would a coach want a guy who's clearly about himself more than team? Oh right...talent.

Or maybe Bryant knows he’s not an NFL prospect and that he only has one more year to play competitive football and would rather actually play somewhere for that year than hold a clipboard? In no other context would it be viewed as a moral failing for someone who gets demoted to seek happiness elsewhere.