Diplomacy And Bowl Games Today…

Eighty years ago today, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt declared that it would be “a date that will live in infamy” and that a state of war existed between the US and the Empire of Japan.  We know how that turned out…

Today news broke that President Biden will indeed enforce a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in China because of China’s actions with regard to human rights’ abuses.  Unfortunately, I believe we know how this will turn out too…

Yesterday, I focused on the CFP pairings.  The two semifinal games will be played as the Cotton Bowl and the Orange Bowl games this year.  However, there are forty other bowl games on the calendar which brings us to a minor math calculation.

  • 42 bowl games => 84 teams to take the field
  • There are 130 colleges that play Division 1-A college football.
  • Therefore, 64.6% of the teams make it to bowl games.

Please keep that simple math in mind when you hear someone bloviate about how important the regular season is in college football and/or how all those bowl games are important as “rewards” for teams not quite of the caliber of the CFP teams.  A large number of college bowl games are meaningless and are of only marginal interest to anyone other than the TV network that gets to put a live sporting event on the air for 3-4 hours.  I would not suggest that you tune into many of those games for more time than it takes to see a “crowd shot”; in most of the games, the number of fans interested enough to buy a ticket and show up in the stands is meager at best.

Let me present nine bowl games here – in alphabetical order lest anyone think that I have spent sufficient energy to come up with some sort of rank ordering – for which I think there is little potential interest:

  1. Alamo Bowl:  Oregon vs Oklahoma.  Oregon’s coach left to go to Miami and Oklahoma’s coach left to go to USC.  Even the head coaches of the two teams do not care about this game.
  2. Cheez-It Bowl:  Clemson vs. Iowa St.  This is a big comedown for Clemson who had become accustomed to a CFP slot as opposed to an assignment in afterthought bowl game.
  3. Citrus Bowl:  Iowa vs Kentucky.  This game will be the college football equivalent of an Ambien pill; you will not be able to stay awake from start to finish.
  4. Duke’s Mayo Bowl:  UNC vs S. Carolina.  Other than this being a “Border War Game” who cares?  UNC underachieved its lofty pre-season ranking, and S. Carolina surprised everyone by winning 6 games…
  5. Fenway Bowl:  UVa vs SMU.  Virginia’s coach resigned and will not be there for the game; SMU saw its coach leave for a nearby rival and too will have someone else at the helm.  Here are two more coaches who do not care about these bowl games…
  6. Hawaii Bowl:  Hawaii vs Memphis.  Hawaii is 6-7; Memphis is 6-6.  The two teams come to kickoff at a combined record below .500.  Moreover, it is a mathematical certainty that the two teams will leave the field at the end of the game with a combined record below .500.  How enticing is that?
  7. LA Bowl:  Oregon St. vs Utah St.  Let me go out on a limb here and make a prediction that “State” will win this game…
  8. Myrtle Beach Bowl:  ODU vs. Tulsa.  Both teams finished the season at 6-6;  ODU started the season at 1-6 and then won their last 5 in a row.  Note that this game has not attracted a “presenting sponsor” demonstrating the attractiveness of this event to the advertising/promotional mavens…
  9. Pinstripe Bowl:  Maryland vs Va Tech.  I am sure there are plenty of folks in the Bronx who care about this matchup.  By the way, the fact that Tech was invited to this “prestigious event” was not sufficient to save Tech’s coach’s job…

Lest I be accused of ignoring those few bowl games outside the CFP that might be interesting if not important, here are 4 games of that nature:

  1. Fiesta Bowl:  Notre Dame vs Oklahoma St.  Both teams had a chance for one of the CFP slots going into the final week, but both were “overlooked”.  Maybe this is the “Miss Congeniality” bowl game this year?  Notre Dame is a 2-point favorite in the game as of this morning.
  2. Peach Bowl:  Michigan St. vs Pitt.  These are two good teams; Pitt is the ACC Champion and Michigan St. defeated the Big-10 Champion.  Currently, Pitt is a 4-point favorite in the game.
  3. Rose Bowl:  Ohio State vs Utah.  These are two good teams; had they played each other early in the season, it might have been my Game of the Week.  They have a common opponent in Oregon.  The Buckeyes opened as 6.5-point favorites in this game.
  4. Sugar Bowl:  Baylor vs Ole Miss.  Baylor averaged 32.6 points per game this season; Ole Miss averaged 35.9 points per game this year.  There should be fireworks here.  Baylor is currently a 1-point favorite.

Finally, I apologize for repeating this observation as a closing but since today involved so much college football commentary, here is H. L. Mencken on the subject:

“College football would be more interesting if the faculty played instead of the students – there would be a great increase in broken arms, legs and necks.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

 

 

The CFP Field Is Set…

Well, we now know the participants in the College Football Playoffs.  I think the Selection Committee’s work was made a tad easier when Baylor beat Oklahoma St. on Saturday; had the Cowboys finished 12-1 as a conference champion, there could have been a debate with regard to Oklahoma St. or Cincy.  As things turned out, Cincy became the obvious choice.

The two most impressive showings by teams in the CFP last weekend were the ones seeded at the top.  Alabama scored 41 points on a Georgia defense that had been allowing less than 8 points per game and it was not some sort of fluky game that produced that scoring outburst.  Alabama gained 536 yards in the game and converted on 7 of 14 third-down situations.  I was surprised at the ease with which they moved the ball.

The other big-time performance was by Michigan.  I never thought that Iowa was going to win the game, but I thought the Iowa defense could keep it close.  Well, that didn’t happen.  When Michigan got 2 TDs in the first quarter on a 4-play drive covering 85 yards and then another on a single play for 75 yards, it was pretty clear that the Iowa defense was not up to the onslaught that was happening.

The first round of the playoff will be on New Year’s Eve.  The fact that there are three weeks until game time has not stopped the sportsbook oddsmakers from posting lines for the games.  In case anyone is interested this far in advance, here are the game times and the opening lines:

  • (3:30 PM EST) Cincy vs. Alabama – 14 (58):
  • (7:30 PM EST) Michigan vs Georgia – 8 (43.5):

There were two coaching departures relatively local to the DC area in the last several days and both were a surprise.  Bronco Mendenhall resigned as the head football coach at UVa.  He has been in that job for 6 years; he took over a program that was in tatters and had Virginia in a New Year’s Day Bowl Game in 2019 when Virginia also won the Coastal Division of the ACC.  Often when a coach “resigns”, that turns out to be either a face-saving announcement or possibly an indication of a slightly more generous buy-out than what was contractually called for.  If either of those situations obtain here, there was certainly no indication of it bubbling beneath the surface.

The other coaching surprise was that Maryland fired Mark Turgeon as the head basketball coach.  He has been in that job for 10 years and posted a 226-116 record which is not normally a “firing offense”.  Maryland fanboys will applaud the firing because Maryland fanboys have – – and have had for at least 50 years – – unrealistic expectations for their basketball team.  Turgeon only took the terps to the Sweet 16 once in those 10 seasons and that is a “firing offense” in the minds of the fanboys; they expect Final Four appearances to happen with some sort of regularity.  After Gary Williams won a National Championship at Maryland, the fanboys turned on him when there were no encore performances.

Danny Manning will take over the job at Maryland on an interim basis; he had been an assistant under Turgeon.  He has some ACC head coaching experience in his past; he was the coach at Wake Forest  for 6 seasons.

Making this change even more surprising is that Turgeon was given a contract extension through the 2025/2026 season back in April of this year.  Given the expectations of the fanboys, this is not an attractive job.

I am trying to blend in some college basketball viewing time as we get to that part of the college basketball schedule where there are real games and not scrimmages that count as official games.  I have not seen a whole lot of Duke big man, Paolo Banchero, but I have seen enough to say he is the closest thing to Zion Williamson I have seen on a Duke team since Zion went to the NBA.  Banchero is big and strong and amazingly “athletic”/”agile”.  They list him at 6’10” and 250 lbs.  I’ll buy the height listing, but I’ll take OVER on the weight.  I really like the guard tandem for Duke this year too; both Trevor Keels and Jeremy Roach are very good and fun to watch.

The only problem with watching Duke basketball this year is that this is Mike Krzyzewski’s final year and that ceremonial and maudlin overhang on the games has already been done to death.  Make no mistake, Mike Krzyzewski deserves a “Farewell Tour” in his final season as much as any coach in any sport deserves one; I have no problem with the concept.  My problem is that there are so many chapters in that book.  What needs to be said has already been said.

Gregg Drinnan was the sports editor of the Kamloops Daily News until that newspaper went to the great recycling bin in the sky; he now publishes a blog called Taking Note.  Recently he “took note” of the fact that the Cowboys/Raiders game on Thanksgiving this year drew an audience of 38.5 million folks.  Then he added:

“Just in case you were wondering why neither the NBA nor the NHL played any games on what was American Thanksgiving.”

Finally, apropos of nothing, here is a Tweet from humorist and culture critic Brad Dickson:

“Alec Baldwin now says he never pulled the trigger of the gun on the ‘Rust’ set. Maybe O.J. Simpson can help him search for the real trigger puller.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

 

 

Football Friday 12/3/21

Last week was a mini-Football Friday; this week’s version will be a tad bigger – – but not like they were during the main body of the college football season.  So, let’s just call this one the first of several midi-Football Fridays.  And as usual, let me begin with a review of last week’s Six-Pack.

  • College:  1-2-0
  • NFL:  2-1-0
  • Total:  3-3=0
  • Money Line Parlays:  0-1  Minus $100

That brings the combined results for the season to:

  • College:  14-15-0
  • NFL:  20-22-1
  • Total:  34-37-1
  • Money Line Parlays:  2-6   Minus $198.

 

College Football Commentary:

 

            The Linfield College Wildcats won their second-round game in the Division III football playoffs last week beating St John’s (MN) in a tight game 31-28.  This week, the Wildcats are on the road again heading off to Belton, TX to take on the Crusaders of  Mary Hardin-Baylor University.  The Crusaders come to the game with a 12-0 record and an explosive offense that has scored 72 points or more  three times this season.  Go Wildcats!

It is time to award the Brothel Defense Award for 2021.  The award goes to the college football defense that allows everyone to score at will.  This year the award goes to:

  • UMass:  The defense allowed 43.1 points per game in 2021.  This is the second time in 3 years that UMass has earned this “award”…

There has been a lot of coach-shuffling among a half-dozen big time programs this year but there is one coaching change at a Division 1-AA school that might be an interesting opportunity for a young coach seeking to make a mark.  The University of Delaware fired Danny Rocco as its head football coach earlier this week.  Delaware has a rich tradition in small college football over the years going back to the days when Tubby Raymond’s wing-T offense was a perennial winner.  Delaware is in the Colonial Athletic Association which has been dominated by James Madison University in recent years – – but James Madison is moving up to Division 1-A meaning there is an opportunity for Delaware to “reassert itself”.  This could be a real opportunity for a young coach…

Last week was a tumultuous week in college football with plenty of top shelf teams taking it on the chin…

Maryland 40  Rutgers 16:  Neither team is “top-shelf”, but the winner would be bowl eligible, and the loser would not.  Rutgers is not.

Michigan 42  Ohio St. 27:  The monkey is off Jim Harbaugh’s back.  This was a dominating win by the Wolverines; with 2 losses it is impossible to see how Ohio St. makes the CFP.  Michigan moves on to the Big-10 Championship Game against Iowa this week.

Baylor 27  Texas Tech 24:  With this win – and a win by Oklahoma St. – Baylor will play in the Big-12 Championship Game this week.

Wake Forest 41  BC 10:  Wake needed a win to play Pitt in the ACC Championship Game this week.

North Texas 45  UT San Antonio 23:  UTSA was 11-0 entering this game and North Texas was 5-6.  This was a shocker and may be characterized as a “look-ahead game” for UTSA as they will play W. Kentucky for the C-USA Championship this week.  Meanwhile, the Mean Green is bowl-eligible.

New Mexico St. 44  UMass 27:  With this result, the Aggies advance their record to 2-10 while UMass sits at 1-11 for the season.

Alabama 24  Auburn 22 (4 OT):  It took a minor miracle for Alabama to get this game into OT; the Tide trailed 10-0 and looked totally discombobulated for the first 3 quarters of the game.

Oregon 38  Oregon St. 29:  Oregon now gets a rematch with Utah for the PAC-12 Championship and that winner goes to the Rose Bowl Game.

Va Tech 29  UVa 24:  Both teams finish the season at 6-6; both will go to a meaningless bowl game; why not just stage a rematch?

LSU 27  Texas A&M 24:  Somehow, LSU salvaged bowl-eligibility out of this train wreck of a season…

Minnesota 23  Wisconsin 13:  That loss takes Wisconsin out of the Big-10 Championship Game.

Oklahoma St. 37  Oklahoma 33:  The Cowboys move on to play Baylor in the Big-12 Championship Game and keep some remote hope alive about a CFP invitation.  The Sooners lost the game and then lost their coach who jumped ship to go to USC…

Notre Dame 45  Stanford 14:  The Irish finish the season at 11-1 and their coach heads south to LSU.

Iowa 28  Nebraska 21:  That win puts Iowa in the Big-10 Championship Game against Michigan.  The Huskers end their season with a 3-9 record.

Cincy 35  E. Carolina 13:  The Bearcats finish the year at 12-0 and face Houston in the AAC Championship game this weekend.

Washington St. 40  Washington 13:  This rivalry game was never in doubt in the second half…

 

The SHOE Tournament Field:

 

The SHOE Tournament is a figment of my imagination.  What I would want to do is to take the 8 “worst teams” in the country and seed them from worst to least worst and then play them off in a bracket.  The difference here is that the loser must play on, and the winner can go home knowing they are not the SHOE Team of the year.  And the SHOE Team is not a label any team would want because it stands for Steaming Heap Of Excrement.

Here are my teams in seeded order and a short review of why they are where they are:

  • 8th Seed (the “Least Worst” of the Field): Temple – – 3-9  In their 3 wins (one over a Division 1-AA team), the Owls scored a total of 120 points (40 points per game).  In their 9 losses, Temple never scored more than 14 points in a single game.  Hard to win if you don’t score points…
  • 7th Seed:  Kansas – – 2-10  That win over Texas almost got them out of this tournament entirely but looking at the overall schedule, the other win was over a Division 1-AA team and 6 of the losses were by 25 points or more.
  • 6th Seed:  Arizona – – 1-11  The Wildcats have not been remotely impressive this year ranking 124th in the country in scoring offense (17.2 points per game) and 98th in the country in scoring defense (31.4 points per game given up).  They get a low seed here because they faced stiffer competition that other tournament invitees to come.
  • 5th Seed:  Arkansas St. – – 2-10  The two wins were over a Division 1-AA opponent and a not-very-good La-Monroe team.  In addition, the Red Wolves’ defense ranked 124th in the country in points allowed (38.6 points per game).
  • 4th Seed:  Akron – – 2-10  The two wins were over a Division 1-AA team and then over Bowling Green in early October.  The Zips lost their last 6 games – all against MAC opponents – and managed to lose to Temple earlier this season giving up 45 points to the offensively challenged Owls.
  • 3rd Seed:  Florida International – – 1-11  That win was over a Division 1-AA team back in Week 1 (September 2nd to be exact).  Five of their subsequent losses have been by 33 points or more.
  • 2nd Seed:  UMass – – 1-11  The winner of the Brothel Defense Award usually makes it to the SHOE Tournament field and UMass is no exception.  Five of those eleven losses were by 38 points or more.
  • 1st Seed (the “Most Worst” of the Field):  UConn – – 1-11  What separates the Huskies here is that their one win was by 5 points over an Ivy League opponent AND the Huskies provided the only win for UMass this season.  Ugh!  Moreover, seven of the eleven losses were by 31 points or more.

Let the worst team continue to lose…

 

College Games of Interest:

 

Baylor at Oklahoma St – 6 (46):  On October 2nd these two teams met on this field and the Cowboys prevailed 24-14.

Houston at Cincy – 10.5 (53):  This is the College Game of the Week even though the AAC championship is no big deal.  Houston is 11-1 for the year; Cincy is 12-0.  Cincy has a legitimate shot at breaking into the CFP – – but they need a convincing win here to retain that status.  Both teams can score; Cincy ranks 8th in the country in scoring offense and Houston ranks 9th.  On defense, Cincy ranks 3rd in the nation in points allowed per game while Houston ranks 19th .

Georgia – 6 vs Alabama (49.5):  This is a big game for Alabama; if they get blown out by 4 TDs or more, they will not be in the CFP.  Nick Saban tends to do well in “big games”.  This is also a big game for Georgia because it has been a while since Georgia beat Bama – – 13 years to be exact.  I see a defensive game here; I like the game to stay UNDER; put it in the Six-Pack.

Wake Forest vs Pitt – 3 (71):  If you like offensive fireworks, I suggest you tune into this game on Saturday night.  Wake is 3rd in the country in scoring offense (42.9 points per game) while Pitt is 4th in the country in scoring offense (42.8 points per game).  I think both teams will score early and often; I like the game to go OVER; put it in the Six-Pack.

Iowa vs Michigan – 11 (43.5):  This is a classic let-down game for the Wolverines after beating Ohio St. for the first time in forever last week.  The Hawkeye’s defense has been opportunistic all year long; Iowa is 3rd in the nation in Turnover Margin.  Meanwhile, the Iowa offense is vestigial; it ranks 123rd in the country; the Michigan defense should feast on this.  I think this game will be low scoring and I think that line is fat; I’ll take Iowa plus the points here; put it in the Six-Pack.

Utah St. vs. San Diego St. – 6 (50):  This is for all the marbles in the Mountain West conference.  San Diego St. has been winning with its defense and has compiled an 11-1 record so far.  In 6 of their last 7 games, the Aztecs have not scored more than 23 points – – yet they won 5 of those 6 games.

 

NFL Commentary:

 

Back before the season began, I listed 8 NFL coaches who might be on a hot seat in 2021.  I thought I would take a moment today to update that list; here are my original eight:

  1. David Cully (Texans):  Yes, it is his first year; and yes, the roster is sub-standard.  But the Texans are hard to watch even if they are giving good effort.
  2. Vic Fangio (Broncos):  I said he needed serious playoff contention to survive, and the Broncos are still in the picture.  His hot seat may be cooling off a bit…
  3. Kliff Kingsbury (Cards):  I said he needed a playoff appearance to survive, and it looks almost certain that he will get one.
  4. Matt LaFleur (Packers):  I worried about the apparent falling out he had with Aaron Rodgers but none of that seems to have shown up on the field.
  5. Mike McCarthy (Cowboys):  After running out to a huge lead in the AFC East, if the Cowboys spit the bit and sink to a wildcard in the playoffs, I still think McCarthy could be gone.
  6. Matt Nagy (Bears):  Fans in Chicago will help him pack his things and get them on a moving van out of town if given the opportunity…
  7. Zac Taylor (Bengals):  I said then that this was a longshot entry on my list.  Zac Taylor is secure in his position in Cincy.
  8. Mike Zimmer (Vikes):  He got a 3-year contract extension in September; he ain’t going anywhere…

I would want to put three other coaches on a watch list here:

  1. Pete Carroll (Seahawks):  The Seahawks are a major disappointment and Carroll seems overwhelmed by what to do to get things on the right course.
  2. Joe Judge (Giants):  The Giants were never serious Super Bowl contenders for 2021, but they have underperformed and underachieved.
  3. Matt Ruhle (Panthers):  All I can say is that owner, David Tepper, seems like a very impatient man and the Panthers are not playing well these days.

And I have two first-year coaches who will not be terminated this year because it is too early to do so but who have not shown impressive on-field results:

  1. Urban Meyer (Jags):  Like the Texans, that team is hard to watch…
  2. Nick Siriani (Eagles):  The team is inconsistent from week to week and his play-calling decisions are from somewhere in low Earth orbit…

 

Football Team 17  Seahawks 15:  Don’t laugh; the Football Team looks like a playoff team to me.  They are 2 games behind the Cowboys in the NFC East and have two game s against the Cowboys in the next 4 games.  The Seahawks are playing out the string.

Falcons 21  Jags 14:  The Falcons ran out to a 21-3 lead in the middle of the 3rd quarter and managed not to blow the lead in the 4th quarter.  Progress!!

Dolphins 33  Panthers 10:  The Cam Newton homecoming is not looking all that wonderful.  He was pulled from the game with this stat line:

  • 5 of 21 for 92 yards with 0 TDs and 2 INTs

Giants 13  Eagles 7:  The only saving grace for folks watching this game is that it was close all day long.  The quality of play, however, was a different story…

Bengals 41  Steelers 10:  The Bengals scored on their first 4 possessions.  After they punted on the fifth, Ben Roethlisberger immediately threw a Pick-Six to make the score 31-3 and turn this game into a laugher.

Jets 21  Texans 14:  The Texans led 14-3 in the middle of the second quarter and then the offense went silent.  The total offense for the two teams combined here was 468 yards.  Tyrod Taylor had the better stat line of the QBs in the game with this one:

  • 17 of 26 for158 yards with 2 TDs and 1 INT
  • Remember that was the better stat line…

Bucs 38  Colts 31:  This game was back-and-forth all day long.  Leonard Fournette gained 100 yards rushing in the game and scored 3 rushing TDS and he had a receiving TD too.

Broncos 28  Chargers 13:  Here is what you need to know about the Chargers’ running game here.  Their leading rusher was Justin Herbert, and he gained a total of 36 yards.

Pats 36  Titans 13:  The Titans were shut out in the second half.  Mac Jones had a good day with this stat line:

  • 23 of 32 for 310 yards with 2 TDs and 0 INTs.

Packers 36  Rams 28:  The Rams are 7-4 at this point and have not looked like a well-oiled machine on offense or defense for the last several weeks.  If the Rams do not find a way to stop the run, they could miss the playoffs.

Niners 34  Vikes 26:  The Niners outgained the Vikes by 100 yards in the game.  Moreover, the Niners ran the ball for 208 yards on the Vikes’ defense.

 

NFL Games:

 

Teams with a BYE Week are:

  • Browns:  It seems as if things are coming apart at the seams in Cleveland.  The Browns are 6-6; they are last in the AFC North and already have 2 division losses.
  • Packers:  Aaron Rodgers’ pinky toe gets a week off…  They still lead the Vikes by 3.5 games in the NFC North race.
  • Panthers:  Christian McCaffrey is hurt again and their QB situation is a hot mess at best.  They need a week to try to pull it back together; playoff hopes are dim at best.
  • Titans:  They have lost two in a row and lead the Colts by 2 games with 5 left to play.  The offense has to find a new identity without Derrick Henry; they have a week here to go and search…

Vikes – 7 at Lions (47):  No Dalvin Cook for the Vikes this week; he is out with a shoulder injury.  I don’t think that swings the tide in favor of the Lions by any means, but his absence keeps me from making a Six-Pack selection in favor of the Vikes.  This game is critically important to the Vikes if they want to have a ghost of a chance of catching the Packers.

Cards – 7.5 at Bears (43.5):  We know that the Cards are rested off their BYE Week last week; we think that Kyler Murray is back and ready to play; he practiced this week.  There is a big difference between a healthy Kyler Murray and Colt McCoy.  The Bears beat the Lions with Andy Dalton at QB; if Justin Fields is healthy, do the Bears go back to him now?

Bucs – 11 at Falcons (51):  The Falcons are 3 full games behind the Bucs in the NFC South; their aspirations now need to be limited to making the playoffs which is anything but a sure thing with their record at 5-6.  A loss here would make that goal much more difficult to attain.  The Bucs have too much talent; this game will not be fun to watch.

(Sun Nite) Broncos at Chiefs – 9.5 (47): This game was flexed into the Sunday nighttime slot.  The Total Line opened at 49 points; it dropped to 47.5 in less than 24 hours and then shed another half-point during the week.  The Broncos had a big win over the Chargers last week; the Chiefs had a big time resting up on their BYE Week last week.  I think the Chiefs are about to go on a run to the playoffs starting here; Andy Reid’s teams typically come back from the BYE Week on a tear.

Colts – 10 at Texans (46): This spread opened at 7.5 points; it then jumped from that number to 9 points without any intermediate stops on Monday morning; then it eased up to this level over the rest of the week.  Jonathan Taylor should have a huge day against the Texans run defense ranked 31st in the league.  Absent a couple of major brain cramps by Carson Wentz, this should put the Colts’ record above .500.

Eagles – 7 at Jets (45.5):  Will Jalen Hurts play?  Somehow, the Eagles’ offense built on running the ball and having a mobile QB who can improvise would be missing one aspect of that offense if Gardner Minshew II is the QB.  The Eagles can still convince themselves they are a playoff team; the Jets cannot do that without giggling.  It was a close call, but this is my Dog-Breath Game of the Week.

Chargers at Bengals – 3 (50):  Both teams need a win here.  The Chargers are a game behind the Chiefs in the AFC West, but a loss here puts them at .500.  The Bengals are a game behind the Ravens and do not want to lose any ground with the season already into December.  I think the difference here is Joe Mixon and the Bengals’ running game.  The Chargers have the worst run defense in the NFL allowing an average of 145.3 yards per game.  I like the Bengals at home to win and cover; put it in the Six-Pack.

Giants at Dolphins – 4 (40.5):  The Total Line here opened the week at 42; it eased on down to this level by Wednesday mid-day and has stayed at this level since then.  The Dolphins are 5-7 on the season but they have won 4 in a row.  The Pats have won 6 in a row; along with the Dolphins, the Chiefs have also won 4 in a row; those are the longest extant winning streaks in the NFL.  This should be a very low-scoring affair…

Football Team at Raiders – 2 (49):  The Football Team has won 3 games in a row to insert themselves into the playoff extrapolations; the Raiders may have exorcised some demons with their OT win over the Cowboys on Thanksgiving.  I think both offenses will show up here and play well; I’ll take the game to go OVER; put it in the Six-Pack.

Ravens – 4 at Steelers (44):  I said earlier this week that the Steelers were a team in free-fall.  The only saving grace for them here is that the Ravens have looked out of sync for the last couple of games too.  The Steelers need this game desperately; a loss would all but eliminate them from winning the AFC North and would make a playoff push very difficult.

Jags at Rams – 13 (48):  The Rams have lost 3 in a row and have not looked good doing that.  The Jags have lost 3 in a row – – and the Jags rarely look good doing anything at all.  This is a must-win game for the Rams; moreover, this is a must-win-and-look-good-doing-it game for the Rams.

Niners – 3 at Seahawks (45.5):These are teams headed in different directions; the Niners have won 3 in a row and have been dominant running the ball.  The Seahawks have lost 3 in a row and have been unimpressive in all those losses.  The Seahawks give up 124.9 yards per game on the ground; I think the Niners will run the ball down their throats this week.  I like the Niners to win and cover on the road; put it in the Six-Pack.

(Mon Nite) Pats at Bills – 2.5 (42):  The Total Line opened at 45 points; there have been no precipitous drops as the week unfolded but a steady erosion down to the current level.  One Internet sportsbook has it at 41.5 points this morning  This is the Game of the Week; the winner will be in first place in the AFC East; that is important for seeding and home field advantage in the playoffs but both teams look to be shoo-ins to make the playoffs.

So let me review the Six-Pack for the week before I give you 2 Money Line Parlays:

  • Georgia/Alabama UNDER 49.5
  • Wake/Pitt OVER 71
  • Iowa + 11 vs Michigan
  • Bengals – 3 over Chargers
  • Niners – 3 over Seahawks
  • Football Team/Raiders OVER 49

And here are two Money Line parlays for this week:

  • Bengals @ minus-160
  • Niners @ minus-150
  • $100 wager wins $171

Second parlay:

  • Bengals @ minus-160
  • Niners @ minus-150
  • Football Team @ +115
  • $100 Wager wins $482

Finally, here is an entry from The Official Dictionary of Sarcasm:

Intellectual:  Somebody who actually thinks about stuff.  These dangerous subversives are notoriously good at blending into normal society, but as a general rule, if the person next to you wears glasses and has never slopped a five-dollar tip into a pole dancer’s G-string, call your local authorities immediately.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

 

 

Lockout!

Well MLB has entered lockout mode.  The League says that the union has never wavered from its original positions demonstrating an unwillingness to bargain for a new CBA.  The Union says that the league wants the players to relinquish currently held rights and benefits.  And the beat goes on…  As is always the case, this confrontation is about money first, money second and everything else after that.  Here is how all this boils down:

  • MLB is a business enterprise that generates approximately $10B per year in revenues.
  • MLBPA wants a greater fraction of that money to flow to its members.

Until that gulf is bridged, this lockout will continue and according to reports that means:

  • No free agent signings
  • No trades
  • No Rule 5 Draft
  • No arbitration figures exchanged ergo, no arbitration hearings
  • No players allowed in team facilities
  • No Spring Training
  • No start of the regular season on time

There will be crafted messaging from both sides of this matter over the next days/weeks/months; try not to take them literally and do not believe that either side will be expressing the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth in their messaging.

Next up …  The USFL will come back from the dead and begin play again in April 2022.  Initially, this will be an 8-team league with franchise names that will be familiar to football fans who were around in the mid-1980s when the original USFL was alive and well.  Folks may not remember the fortunes of and many of the players for teams like the Philadelphia Stars or the Tampa Bay Bandits or the New Jersey Generals, but they should recall the team names.

There is an interesting planning aspect for the first season of the USFL’s relaunch that I do not fully understand.  The league will play all its games in Birmingham, AL; there are 8 teams, and the season will be 10 games long so that means 40 games will take place there.

The league plans to put on games on Saturdays and Sundays in the Spring; that means there will need to be multiple game venues in the Birmingham area to stage these games.  I have never been to Birmingham so I am abjectly ignorant as to the football facilities there, but I wonder if some of the game venues will be held in the moral equivalent of a high school football field.  We shall see…

Another aspect of putting all the games on in Birmingham confuses me.  The idea would be to have some or all of the USFL teams play their 2023 home games in the cities that match the team names.  That makes a lot of sense – – but how are fans in those cities supposed to develop a meaningful attachment to a team that never plays “at home” in 2022?

The USFL has a “broadcast partner” in FOX.  In fact, two folks who are prominent in FOX football telecasts – – “Moose” Johnston and Mike Pereira – – have positions in the USFL league office.  [Aside:  Johnston has been involved in Front Office duties with teams in the AAF and XFL 2.0 in the past.]  From the outside, it seems that the folks at FOX and FOX Sports may be more than merely “broadcast partners”.

There has been a recent blossoming of “Spring Football Leagues” in the US.  Two years ago, the AAF launched and folded its operations about halfway through the season.  Last year we saw the XFL come back from the dead only to cease operations after a few weeks thanks to COVID-19.  Interestingly, XFL 2.0 as a business entity still exists; it was purchased at auction by a consortium led by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson; and if you believe the statements coming from whatever exists as a management structure there, XFL 3.0 will start up in 2023.

The original USFL had a practice that increased its local popularity and one that has not been replicated in any of the other Spring Leagues that I am aware of.  Back in the 1980s, the USFL had a territorial aspect to its player draft; that let various teams seed their roster with players that local fans already had some familiarity with.  Obviously, the league cannot make the draft entirely territorial; that would give teams in Alabama, Florida, Texas and Michigan a significant advantage over a team in Northern New Jersey.  However, the idea of seeding the Michigan Panthers’ roster with a couple of players from Michigan and/or Michigan State is a good promotional idea to assemble a fanbase.  I have not read any report that the relaunched USFL will do the same thing.

From a promotional standpoint, the USFL should try to entice Steve Spurrier to return to the USFL and coach the Tampa Bay Bandits as he did back in the 1980s.  Spurrier is a colorful and charismatic guy who will draw attention to the league; in the early days of a relaunched USFL, public attention is a very good thing.  The barrier here is that Spurrier is now 76 years old and may not want to reassume his public persona as “The Ol’ Ball Coach” – – but if he is willing…

One of the team names in the USFL next spring will be the New Orleans Breakers.  I think that is a bad team name.  The last time New Orleans experienced “breakers” was when Hurricane Katrina did a number on the city.  There are so many other images one can associate with New Orleans; is coastal flooding the one you want for your new league?

Finally, Dwight Perry had this observation in the Seattle Times regarding new revenue streams opening in the sports world:

  • “The Washington Capitals became the first NHL team to sell advertising on their jerseys, and now the door is wide open:
  • Molson Canadiens?
  • STP Oilers?
  • Bud Light Sabres?”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

 

 

Bits And Pieces…

Fans of the LA Dodgers cannot be thrilled at losing Max Scherzer to the Mets in free agency and at losing Corey Seager to the Rangers in free agency.  Scherzer – even at 37 years old – was probably the most valuable pitcher the Dodgers had on the roster given that Trevor Bauer is in baseball limbo for now.  Seager was at least the third best bat in the Dodgers’ lineup and probably higher on the list than that.

Do not cry crocodile tears for those Dodgers’ fans, however.  The pitching staff still has Walker Buehler, Daniel Hudson and Julio Urias and the position players still include Mookie Betts, Justin Turner, Trea Turner and Cody Bellinger.  An important objective for the Dodgers would be to retain the services of Chris Taylor and not to have him sign on with another team in free agency this off-season.

Speaking of MLB free agents signing with teams, the existing CBA expires at midnight tonight Eastern Time.  All the reports say that the owners will lock out the players and proceed with negotiations under those circumstances.  Most likely, that will put free agent signings on hold until the new CBA is hammered out and it should also make player trades between teams impossible.

I read somewhere – and did not make a note of where it was so I cannot link to it here – that this lockout only applies to members of the MLBPA.  That means that if this lockout extends into the spring of 2022, the only professional baseball that might be available would be minor league baseball.  Minor league teams had a tough year in 2020 without games; if they are the only game in town in 2022 when it comes to baseball, perhaps they might recoup some that lost revenue?

Moving on …  The CFP Selection Committee has issued its penultimate rankings; next week at this time we will know the field for the CFP.  Here is the current list:

  1. Georgia – – 12-0
  2. Michigan – – 11-1
  3. Alabama – – 11-1
  4. Cincy – – 12-0
  5. Oklahoma St. – – 11-1
  6. Notre Dame – – 11-1
  7. Ohio St. – – 10-2

Using the eyeball test, I think Georgia is indeed the best team I have seen this season.  I understand the Committee’s reason for putting Michigan above Ohio St. based on the results of their head-to-head game, but I am not so sure the difference is a stark as shown there.  I saw Michigan lose to Michigan St. and I also saw Ohio St. squash Michigan St.  Here is an interesting possibility that would reveal something about the CFP and its motivation(s):

  • Georgia and Alabama take each other to OT and the margin of victory is 2 points.  That keeps both SEC teams in the top four.
  • Michigan beats Iowa
  • Cincy loses in a close game to Houston
  • Oklahoma St. loses to Baylor
  • Notre Dame does not play anyone this week; they finish at 11-1.

So, if the top three teams are going to stay there in the same order – – or a jumbled order; it makes no difference – – that would put Cincy and Notre Dame in juxtaposition with each other.  Now, the Committee can consider:

  • Invite Cincy since Cincy beat Notre Dame in South Bend back in September – – OR – –
  • Invite Notre Dame because TV ratings with Notre Dame playing will be significantly higher than with Cincy playing.

That would be interesting and possibly revealing…

Switching gears …  I think I could convince most NFL fans that the four worst teams in the league are – in alphabetical order to avoid trying to rank the stinkitude here – the Jags, Jets, Lions and Texans.  [Aside:  The Jags still have the Jets and the Texans on their schedule so rank ordering may sort itself out.]  But I would like to posit here that a team in freefall that might not be much better than any of those four bad teams is:

  • The Pittsburgh Steelers

The defense is good when fully healthy – – but it is not fully healthy; the Steelers have yielded 41 points in each of their last two games.  The offense is simply bad; there is no deluding oneself on that issue.  Ben Roethlisberger is playing as if he is 59 years old instead of merely 39 years old.  Here is the rest of the Steelers’ schedule:

  • Ravens at home
  • Vikings in Minnesota
  • Titans at home
  • Chiefs in KC
  • Browns at home
  • Ravens in Baltimore

There are no “gimmees” on that list; the game against the Browns in Pittsburgh on January 3rd looks to be the “easiest game”.  The Steelers have 5 wins  “in the bank” for 2021 so they are never going to challenge the Bottom Four for worst record – – but the Steelers have significant problems and not a lot of answers to those problems.

Finally, I’ll close here with an entry from The Official Dictionary of Sarcasm:

Interesting:  A word meaning ‘ I have no idea what the hell I’m supposed to say.’”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

 

 

Two Big College Coaching Changes

The college football coaching game of musical chairs is in full swing even though the conference champions have not yet been decided.  Normally, the early movement of coaches involve schools that have done poorly over the past couple of years who are hoping to get their new coach a bit of a head start in the recruiting business over the winter.  Normally, the big jobs do not get filled with top-shelf candidates so early in the game.  Not so this year…

Already, there are two blueblood programs that have “poached” head coaches from two other blueblood programs.  The first one I want to consider this morning is Lincoln Riley who will be leaving Oklahoma to take over the program at USC.  Anyone who follows college football recognizes that both schools have a rich history in the game; over the past five to ten years, Oklahoma has been the better program, but USC has had plenty of time in the college football spotlight over the years.

Lincoln Riley is 38 years old and has been the head coach at Oklahoma for the last 5 seasons; that is the entirety of his head coaching résumé. His time at Oklahoma has been very successful; the Sooners’ record in his time there has been 55-10.  Riley has had a highly successful start to his coaching career, and I think it is important to emphasize that this is the start of his career.  And even though Riley has said it was “no factor” in his decision, I suspect that the impending move of Oklahoma from the Big-12 to the SEC played at least a small part in his decision to “go west”.

As I said, USC is a big-time program that has been a bit threadbare the last few years.  In the same 5-year span that Riley was going 55-10 with the Sooners, USC’s record was 33-23.  Putting USC back in the “national discussion” would be a major part of a coach’s legacy.  Moreover, the PAC-12 as a whole has been in a downward phase in the last 5 years so taking one of the blueblood programs and elevating it would appear to be very possible given the opposition to be faced.

Comparing the opposition in the PAC-12 – South Division and North Division – to the competition in the SEC is like comparing the damage you can do to your hand with a butter knife to the damage you can do to your hand with a meat grinder.  I have not seen any definitive statement by the SEC regarding the new division structure once Texas and Oklahoma are added to the mix, but even with the rotating schedule of conference opponents from the “other division”, the SEC schedule has plenty of tough games facing any of its members.  That is simply not the case in the PAC-12.

Let me be clear.  I am not saying – or even hinting – that Lincoln Riley bailed on Oklahoma because he did not want to have to deal with SEC competition.  What I am saying is that as a young coach with at least 25 years left in his career, he took an opportunity to make a significant mark on the status of college football at a time when rapid improvement of a former giant of college football appears to be very feasible.  If in fact Riley saw this opportunity and jumped to take it, he should be lauded for his insight and not scorned for his aversion to the SEC.

The other major coaching move of the week came yesterday when LSU hired Brian Kelly away from Notre Dame.  I must say that I do not understand this move from either LSU’s perspective or from Brian Kelly’s perspective.  That is not to say this was a bad move; it merely means I do not see why it happened as it did.

Brian Kelly is 60 years old, and he has been a head coach in college football since 1991 at 4 schools counting Notre Dame.  Unlike Lincoln Riley, he is not looking ahead to another 25 years in the head coaching business.  Kelly has been highly successful at Notre Dame posting a 92-39 record there even after more than a dozen wins were vacated after the fact because a trainer provided “impermissible assistance” to some players in the 2013 and 2014 seasons.  There have been no rumors that administrators at Notre Dame or big-time boosters there wanted Kelly out; from my perspective, he probably could have stayed there for the rest of his career, and everyone would have been happy.

Reports say that Kelly got a 10-year contract worth $95M PLUS incentives that would make the total value potentially worth “nine figures”.  Maybe that is the reason he took the plunge; maybe he thinks that if he can put LSU back in the college football spotlight and keep it front and center there for the next 10 years, he can retire with “a legacy”.

From the LSU perspective, the big-money folks there had better hope that this is not purely a mercenary move.  They are already paying off a big contract extension they gave to Ed Orgeron and this contract has a long way to go before it makes any sense to think about “going in another direction”.

So, the questions now devolve to:

  • Who gets the Oklahoma job?
  • Who gets the Notre Dame job?

The Big-12 has a handful of young coaches who have had plenty of success at schools with less “prestige” than Oklahoma.  The Sooners could “poach” Dave Aranda (from Baylor) or Matt Campbell (from Iowa St.).  If the administrators there think they might want to hire someone with some experience in the SEC, the peripatetic Lane Kiffin might show up on their radar screens.  If the administrators want to look for a young head coach who is “part of the Sooner football family”, they could take a look at Josh Heupel (at Tennessee) who was a QB for the Sooners and an assistant coach there too.

And now, I have a bold idea for the Notre Dame job.  I think this scratches several itches at the same time:

  • Notre Dame’s next coach should be – – Urban Meyer.

Hear me out…  There are lots of reports out there saying that Meyer’s transition to the NFL has not gone smoothly at all.  There are reports of problems with players and with assistant coaches.  The owners cannot possibly be thrilled with the on-field product this season – – although they ought to be  used to disappointing on-field performances by now.  So, imagine the scenario where Meyer and owner Sahid Khan mutually agree to go their separate ways freeing up Meyer to return to college coaching AND to take a job that he has said was a “dream job” in the past.

If that one is too outlandish for you to swallow, let me offer up one other Notre Dame possible option that would demonstrate continuity in the football universe.  When Notre Dame hired Brian Kelly, he had been the very successful coach at Cincinnati.  Today, the very successful coach at Cincinnati is Luke Fickell; the Bearcats may just be the first team from outside the Power 5 conferences to make it to the CFP; even if they do not, they are certainly the “outsiders” that have come closest to that stature.  So, maybe Notre Dame’s next coach is another former coach at Cincinnati?

Finally, football coaches at just about any level are most highly motivated by enlightened self-interest; it is not necessarily a profession filled with highly principled people.  In that vein, let me close with this observation by Oscar Wilde:

“I like persons better than principles and I like persons with no principles better than anything else in the world.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

 

 

St. Louis $790M – – NFL 0

Back in 2015, Stan Kroenke – owner of the NFL Rams franchise – got the approval to build what is now SoFi Stadium and to develop the surrounding acreage. That approval set in motion a multi-billion dollar building project and it also set in motion the need for the St. Louis Rams to become the LA Rams once again.  Obviously, the folks in St. Louis were not pleased with losing their team – and just as importantly their tenant in their stadium, the Edward Jones Dome.  There was an interesting clause in the Rams’ lease of the Dome:

  • The stadium was required to be in the “top tier of NFL stadiums” or the Rams could just break the lease without even saying, “Three, six, nine; I resign.”

How one would go about determining what the “top tier of NFL stadiums” might be and then how one might measure various aspects of the Edward Jones Dome as compared to the somehow identified “top tier stadiums” was left as an exercise for the reader.  However, even St. Louis fans were not thrilled by the Dome’s ambience and space for tailgating.  So, the Rams upped and moved to LA and played  home games in the LA Coliseum for a couple of years while SoFi Stadium was under construction.  And that would be the simple end to the story had not the folks in St. Louis filed a lawsuit claiming that the move was unjustified and that the NFL “fraudulently ignored their own Relocation Guidelines” in granting the Rams permission to move.

That case has been through all the early phases of a mega-lawsuit and was slated to go to trial until last week when the matter was settled out of court.  Reports say that the NFL and Kroenke will pay St. Louis $790M.  That is a whole lot of cheese, and the magnitude of the settlement says the following to me:

  1. The NFL and Stan Kroenke think that they will earn additional profits in LA – as compared to profits they would have earned in St. Louis – that are comfortably in excess of $790M.  In fact, those anticipated long-term profits from Kroenke’s standpoint would have to exceed this settlement amount PLUS the approximately $500M relocation fee that he paid to the league for the approval to do so.
  2. The NFL and Stan Kroenke must have believed that there was a better than 50/50 chance they would lose the lawsuit to a jury of St. Louis citizens and that a jury award could well have been more than $790M.
  3. There may have been some shenanigans in the NFL’s approval process – or maybe in the “Relocation Guidelines” themselves – that the league would prefer not to have presented as evidence in open court.

Weep not for Stan Kroenke whose balance sheet will take a significant hit with this settlement.  Forbes pegs his net worth at $10B and Stan Kronke’s wife is a Walton heiress – the daughter on one of the founders of Wal-Mart.  You will not be seeing any of these folks in line at a soup kitchen any time soon…

There was a strange NFL-related story from off-field events last week.  Minnesota Vikings’ defensive end, Everson Griffen, got into a stand-off situation with the police at Griffen’s home after Griffen made “a series of disturbing posts on Instagram earlier Wednesday morning claiming that someone was in his home trying to kill him.”

This is not the first time Everson Griffen has shown some odd behaviors.  Several years ago, the Vikes directed him to take some mental health exams and Griffen wound up hospitalized for a short time after those examinations.  I do not recall all the details of that previous event, but this time, there is at least one gun that was involved.  In one of Griffen’s Instagram posts, Griffen says that he has a “.45 Wilson Combat” with clips (plural) and plenty of bullets in his house – – where he was supposedly in danger of being killed by someone the police could not find or identify.

Fortunately, that situation ended in a much better place than it could have.  Armed confrontations with police officers often end with a chalk outline – or two – being drawn on the ground.  In this case, Griffen came out of his house “without incident” after about 12 hours in standoff mode and reports from the police and the Vikings said that Griffen was then taken to a mental health facility where he was being evaluated.

Moving on …  I have never tried to hide the fact that I don not like deciding the winner of a soccer game on penalty kicks for the simple reason that the decision is made by a series of events that probably had nothing at all to do with the fact that the score in the game is tied.  To me, it is like taking a basketball game that is tied at the end of regulation and settling the outcome with a couple of games of H-O-R-S-E.  Notwithstanding my dislike for penalty kicks or any other contrived way to break ties and determine a winner, there was an interesting circumstance in an MLS playoff game yesterday.

The Philadelphia Union and the Nashville SC ended regulation time and then extra time with the score tied at 1-1.  That moved things along to a penalty shot finish where something unusual happened:

  • Nashville SC took 4 penalty shots and none of them were successful.
  • The first two were blocked by the Union’s goalkeeper; the next two missed the net all by themselves.

According to the good folks at instatsport.com, data from 2009 until last  year involving over 100,000 penalty kicks worldwide resulted in 75% winding up as scores.  Using that as a metric, the probability of missing 4 penalty shots in a row is .004.

Finally, let me close today with this entry from The Official Dictionary of Sarcasm:

“Income:  Money that your employer should just hand over to  your creditors, thereby cutting out the middle man.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

 

 

A Mini Football Friday 11/26/21

Welcome to a mini version of Football Friday.  I have managed to sleep off my stupor that was induced by an amazing intake of l-tryptophan yesterday combined with wall-to-wall football until late in the evening.  I will begin with a review of last week’s Six-Pack:

  • College:  3-0-0
  • NFL:  1-2-0
  • Total:  4-2-0
  • Money Line Parlays:  1-1  Net profit = $15

These results bring the totals for the season to:

  • College:13-13-0
  • NFL:  18-21-1
  • Total:  31-34-1
  • Money Line Parlays:  2-5   Net loss = $98

 

College Football Commentary:

 

            The Linfield College Wildcats advanced to the second round of the Division III football tournament beating Redlands last week 44-10.  Linfield is now 10-0 for the season and will travel about 1700 miles to Collegeville, MN to take on the Johnnies of St. John’s University.  The Johnnies are 11-0 in 2021 and won their first-round game by a score of 41-14.   Go Wildcats!

Taking a quick look at the teams in contention for the Brothel Defense Award – given to the team that allows anyone and everyone to score at will – here are the contenders late in the season:

  • New Mexico State allows 41.6 points per game
  • Kansas (the winner of this award in 2020) allows 42.9 points per game
  • UMass (winner of this award in 2019) allows 43.0 points per game

[Foreshadowing:  Please look at that list again and keep it in mind…]

Instead of talking about college coaches getting fired this week, let me start today with two coaching contract extension stories.  The first involves James Franklin at Penn State; this week, Franklin signed a 10-year contract extension which – with incentives – could be worth as much as $85M.  Reports said that Franklin’s current salary at Penn State is $5.5M.  Perhaps one motivation for the Penn State administrators to extend Franklin’s contract is that he has been mentioned as being a possible candidate for the USC job that is open this year.

Franklin did a magnificent job in his first head coaching stint at Vandy.  In three years there, he took the Commodores to three bowl games and compiled an overall record of 24-15 at Vandy playing a full SEC schedule.  At Penn State over the almost 8 full seasons, his record is 67-32.  Obviously, Franklin is a successful recruiter and coach, but I wonder about the value of the contract.  Penn State has never won the Big-10 East outright in his time there; and this year, the Nittany Lions lost to a bad Illinois team in 9 overtime periods.  We shall see…

The other contract extension story involves Mel Tucker at Michigan State.  Four weeks ago, Sparty rallied to beat arch-rival Michigan and then kept its undefeated season going until surprisingly losing to Purdue two weeks later.  Plenty of reporting had it that Michigan State and Tucker were on the verge of signing a 10-year contract extension which – with incentives – could be worth as much as $95M.  Reports said that Tucker’s current salary at Michigan State is $5.5M.  Like Franklin, Tucker’s name had been linked to major job openings in college football this year including USC, LSU and Florida.

Those talks were supposedly put on hold after the loss to Purdue and early last week there were reports that the contract may have been pulled off the table by the administrators at Michigan State after Ohio State demolished Sparty last week 56-7.  Those negative reports turned out to be a large pile of over-reaction because this Wednesday the deal was struck.  Tucker was previously the head coach at Colorado for a season and went 5-7 with the Buffaloes.  He has been at Michigan State for most of two seasons and has posted an 11-7 record there.

I cannot completely avoid talking about coach firings because last week I made a prediction that if Missouri beat Florida, that Dan Mullen would be fired at Florida.  Well Mizzou did beat Florida and indeed Dan Mullen was fired less than 48 hours after the fact.

I am going to root to see Ohio State’s offense against Georgia’s defense somewhere in the CFP.  Ohio State did not merely beat Michigan St. last week; it was a rout from start to finish.   Michigan also won in a rout over Maryland last week setting up The Big Game this weekend.

Oregon suffered a big loss – to Utah – by 31 points.  That simply must eliminate Oregon – – and probably all of the PAC-12 from any possible CFP consideration.  Interestingly, Oregon and Utah could meet again in the PAC-12 Championship Game where the winner goes to the Rose Bowl.

Clemson seems to have found its stride late in the season and the Tigers beat Wake Forest by 3 TDs last week.  Wake needs a win this week to be in the ACC Championship Game.

Cincy did what it had to do against a team with a strong record; they disemboweled SMU 48-14.  The Bearcats just made life a bit more difficult for the CFP Selection Committee.  Cincy is ranked 4th this week; Michigan is ranked 5th and Notre Dame is 6th.  Guess which teams on that list would bring the biggest TV ratings…

Cal beat Stanford 41-11.  Stanford beat Oregon many moons ago, but the season fell apart for Stanford since the calendar flipped over to November.  In its three games in November, Stanford has been outscored by opponents 128-32.  The Cardinal host Notre Dame this week…

As the college football season draws to a close, I can narrow down the potential field for my imaginary SHOE Tournament where we might determine on the field which team is the worst team in the nation in 2021.  Next week, I will have the field of 8 ready and seeded to present to you; at this point, I think I have 12 teams that deserve serious consideration for the ignominy of an invitation:

  1. Akron  2-9
  2. Arizona  1-10
  3. Arkansas St.  2-9
  4. Florida Int’l  1-10
  5. Indiana  2-9
  6. Kansas  2-9
  7. New Mexico  3-8
  8. New Mexico St.  1-10
  9. Temple  3-8
  10. UConn  1-10
  11. UMass  1-10
  12. Vandy  2-9

 

 

College Football Games of Interest:

 

(Fri Afternoon)  Iowa at Nebraska – 1 (41):  Interesting line here.  Iowa is 9-2 overall this year; Nebraska is 3-8…

(Fri Afternoon) UNC at NC State – 6 (62):  In the pre-season polls, UNC was ranked in the Top Ten; the Tar Heels have lost 5 times this year and are 0-3 on the road.

(Fri Nite)  Washington St. – 1 at Washington (45.5):  This is the Apple Bowl rivalry game. Washington St. is bowl eligible; Washington will not be participating in a bowl game this year other than this “Apple Bowl.”

(Fri Afternoon)  Cincy – 14 at East Carolina (57):  Cincy must win convincingly here if they want to continue to be part of the CFP discussion.

Ohio St. – 7 at Michigan (65):  The winner of this game will be in the CFP save for an upset loss in the Big-10 Championship Game against either Iowa or Wisconsin.

Pitt – 13.5 at Syracuse (58):  Pitt is 9-2 and is one of the participants in the ACC Championship Game.  Syracuse is 5-6; this is their last chance to achieve bowl eligibility.  Based solely on motivation here, I like the Orange to put up a real fight here; I’ll take Syracuse plus the points; put it in the Six-Pack.

Navy – 13.5 at Temple (43):  These are two bad teams; Temple may be a very bad team.  Navy averages 18.6 points per game this year; Temple only scores 16.5 points per game.  There may be a lot of punting here.

Wake Forest – 6 at BC (65):  Wake needs to win this one to play Pitt in the ACC Championship Game.  BC is bowl eligible at 6-5 but all 5 of their losses have been in game against ACC opponents.

Maryland – 2 at Rutgers (53):  The reason this game is interesting is that both teams are 5-6; the winner will get a minor bowl bid.

Wisconsin – 7 at Minnesota (39.5):  This will be a defensive game from start to finish.  Wisconsin needs a win here to face the winner of the Michigan/Ohio St. game in the Big 10 Championship Game.

Arizona at Arizona St. – 20 (53):  This is a big rivalry game but the fortunes of these two teams have been very different this year.

Oregon St. at Oregon – 7 (61):  They call this rivalry game “The Civil War”.

Oklahoma at Oklahoma St. – 4.5 (50):  This rivalry game is known as “Bedlam”.  Both teams are 10-1 overall; both are 7-1 in Big 12 Conference games; the winner will try to convince the CFP Selection Committee to look favorably on their season.  On average, the Sooners score 8.5 points per game more than the Cowboys.  On defense the Cowboys enjoy an even larger advantage; Oklahoma St. ranks 3rd in the nation in Scoring Defense giving up only 14.9 points per game.  I like the Cowboys at home to assert themselves on defense here; I’ll take Oklahoma St. to win and cover at home; put it in the Six-Pack.

Alabama – 20.5 at Auburn (57):  The SEC Championship Game is set; Alabama and Georgia will square off.  Unless that Championship game is a blowout loss by either team, I think both teams should be in the CFP.  Yes, I know that if Georgia wins that game by a TD, it will be Alabama’s second loss in 2021; I still think they are one of the four best teams I have seen this year.  Having said all that, I think this line is fat for such a rivalry game; I’ll take Auburn plus the points in this “Iron Bowl” game; put it in the Six-Pack.

Penn St. – 2 at Michigan St. (52):  Two coaches with big contract extensions (see above) square off here…

Florida St. at Florida – 3 (59):  Over the last several weeks, the Seminoles have been improving; over the last several weeks, the Gators have been horrible – – and their coach just got fired.

Texas A&M – 6.5 at LSU (47):  If LSU wins here, they are bowl-eligible…

UMass at New Mexico St. – 6.5 (59):  I said above that the Brothel Defense Award stats would show up again.  Well, here they are; two of the three worse scoring defenses in the country face off.  Both of these teams are on the SHOE Tournament list too.  Since this is Thanksgiving Weekend, you should give thanks that you are not forced to watch this hot mess of a game.  Label this one an Avert Your Eyes Special.

 

NFL Commentary:

 

The Jets lost to the Dolphins last week 24-17.  Is that an indication that the Jets’ defense woke up from a 4-week snooze?  In the 4 games prior to last week, the Jets had allowed a total of 175 points – almost 44 points per game.

Tyler Huntley subbed in for Lamar Jackson and the Colts eked out a win over the hapless Bears who had to go with Andy Dalton after Justin Fields was injured.  You are excused if you do not recognize Huntley’s name or recall where he played college football…

The Browns got a real scare from the Lions who also had to go with a backup QB.  Tim Boyle was the Lions’ QB last week and you are excused if you do not recognize Boyle’s name or where he played college football.   I went to the Internet to satisfy my curiosity and found these stats for Tim Boyle at UConn:

  • 133 of 275 for 1237 yards with 1 TD and 13 INTs

Now I am curious how he ever got an invitation to an NFL Training Camp let alone how he made an NFL regular season roster…

It looks to me as if Baker Mayfield is regressing – – or maybe his shoulder injury (to his left shoulder not his throwing shoulder) is more serious than the Browns are letting on.

The Titans lost last week to the Texans in a classic trap game; Ryan Tannehill threw 4 INTs.  The Titans’ record is 8-3; the three losses are to the Cards (OK), the Jets (say what?), and the Texans (Are you bleeping kidding me?!).

There were big wins last week by the Vikes (over the Packers) and the Eagles (over the Saints) as those teams eye wildcard possibilities.

The Football Team spoiled Cam Newton’s “homecoming” – – then again it was also Ron Rivera’s “homecoming” so that one was not ruined.

The Chiefs looked good on offense and on defense against the Cowboys.

The Chargers/Steelers game was an entertaining game; that was a big win for the Chargers.

Regarding yesterday’s Triple Header, the Lions/Bears game was a bumble-fest from start to finish.  Early in the second quarter, Troy Aikman said that he had figured that the first team to score 17 points would be the winner.  He was right; the Bears won the game 16-14.

The Cowboys/Raiders game was a penalty-fest from start to finish.  Each team was flagged 14 times in the game.  Cowboys’ DB, Anthony Brown committed 4 defensive pass interference penalties in the game; all 4 of those penalties came on third-down plays where the pass was incomplete; that means Anthony Brown converted 4 third-down situations for the Raiders.  The Cowboys maintain a 2-game lead in the NFC East and the Raiders managed to remain only a game behind the Chiefs in the AFC West.

The Bills/Saints game was no contest.  The Saints were short-handed on offense and the Bills’ defense never let the Saints develop any sort of offensive rhythm.  That is 4 losses in a row for the Saints; the Bills are tied with the Pats atop the AFC East pending the results of Sunday’s games.

 

NFL Games:

 

Teams on their BYE Weeks this week:

  • Cards:  They have survived without Kyler Murray for the last 3 games and are still a game and a half ahead of the Rams in the NFC West.
  • Chiefs:  They have looked much more like a serious playoff team over the past couple of weeks.

 

Titans at Pats – 7 (43.5):  The spread on this game opened at 4.5 points; it was up to 7 points by Tuesday night and has remained there for the rest of the week.  This is my Game of the Week; both teams are at the top of their division in the AFC.  The Pats have won 5 in a row; the Titans looked awful last week (see above).

Jets at Texans – 2.5 (44.5):  If  you thought yesterday’s Lions/Bears game was bad, try not to watch this one.  Both teams arrive with 2-8 records for the season.  This is my Dog-Breath Game of the Week.

Eagles – 3.5 at Giants (46):  The Eagles are in the wildcard chase in the NFC.  The Giants are in disarray.

Bucs – 3 at Colts (53.5):  This was my runner-up for Game of the Week.  The Colts have won 3 in a row and are squarely in the wildcard picture in the AFC.

Falcons – 2 at Jags (45.5):  Put this game in the same category as Bears/Lions and Jets/Texans; it is meaningless, and it should be as exciting as tofu.

Panthers – 2.5 at Dolphins (42):  I like the Panthers defense to carry the day here.  I’ll take the Panthers on the road to win and cover; put it in the Six-Pack.

Steelers at Bengals – 4 (45):  This is a big game in the AFC North; the Bengals are 6-4; the Steelers are 5-4-1.

Chargers – 3 at Broncos (48):  The Chargers can tie the Chiefs on top of the AFC West with a win here.  The Broncos are in last place in that division and cannot afford another loss.

Vikes at Niners – 3 (49):  The Niners will want to run the ball against the Vikes’ run defense that ranks 28th in the NFL.  I think they will be very successful in that endeavor; I like the Niners to win and cover; put it in the Six-Pack.

Rams – 1 at Packers (47):  The spread here opened with the Packers as 1.5-point favorites.  The line “flipped” on Wednesday and has stayed here for the past two days.  The Packers have a 2.5-game lead over the Vikes in the NFC North race; the Rams need a win to keep pace with the Cards in the NFC West.

(Sun Nite) Browns at Ravens – 3.5 (47):  Neither team has looked in sync for a couple of weeks now, but the Browns look worse to me.

(Mon Nite) Seahawks at Football Team – 1 (46.5):The Football Team is in the wildcard picture in the NFC; the Seahawks are not mathematically eliminated from the playoffs but given tiebreaker situations, they are eliminated from possibly winning the NFC West.  I think the Football Team is starting to find itself on offense and the Seahawks defense is not good.  The Seahawks give up 401.8 yards per game; that ranks them 31st in the NFL in Total Defense; only the Jets are worse.  I like the Football Team to win and cover here; put it in the Six-Pack.

So, let me review the Six-Pack:

  • Syracuse +13.5 against Pitt
  • Oklahoma St. – 4.5 over Oklahoma
  • Auburn +20.5 against Alabama
  • Panthers – 2.5 over Dolphins
  • Niners – 3 over Vikes
  • Football Team – 1 over Seahawks

And here is a two-team Money Line parlay for the week:

  • Eagles at minus-180 against Giants
  • Football Team at minus-110 against Seahawks
  • A $100 wager here would yield a profit of $197.

Finally, let me close with an email from a reader:

“Since you often close your columns with obscure quotations here is one you may want to use.  It comes from Delmore Schwartz who was a prize-winning poet in the 20th century.

‘Existentialism means that no one can take a bath for you.’

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

 

 

MLB Hall Of Fame Ballot 2022

            The MLB Hall of Fame ballot for next year is out.  There are 13 new names on the ballot for the first time and only four of them are worth more than even a passing glance:

  1. Ryan Howard
  2. Tim Lincecum
  3. David Ortiz
  4. Alex Rodriguez

Howard and Lincecum had their moments in the spotlight during their MLB careers, but I truly do not think of them as “HoF material.”  The candidacies of both Ortiz and Rodriguez will be interesting to track – – because there are two players who will be on the Hall of Fame ballot for the tenth and final time this year:

  • Barry Bonds
  • Roger Clemens

Bonds and Clemens have provided us with a decade-long debate about what it means to put a player in the Hall of Fame.  Neither player has been ”proven beyond a reasonable doubt” as a steroid user; nonetheless, many people – me included – think that they did indeed enhance their longevity and their statistics with some “biochemical assistance”.  Make no mistake here; my opinion on that matter is not relevant because it is nothing more than an opinion, but it has been a sticking point for many of the folks who vote for Hall of Fame inductees.

If you look purely at “the numbers”, there is no question that both Bonds and Clemens belong in Cooperstown.  If you want to “downgrade” some of those numbers because you think they are “chemically enhanced”, go right ahead and I still think Bonds and Clemens belong in the Hall of Fame with whatever reasonable degradation you might apply.  But the voters have looked beyond the numbers for these two players for the last ten years.

Now onto the ballot come David Ortiz and A-Rod.  There are more than a few whispers out there that Ortiz was “a user”.  There is no good evidence, but the whispers persist.  A-Rod is a different story; basically, he was caught twice with positive tests and served a full year’s suspension from the Commissioner.  Here is the question:

  • Will the “behavioral component” of the voting that has kept Bonds and Clemens out of the Hall of Fame and on the ballot for a decade be applied to either Ortiz or Rodriguez – – or both?

Interestingly, the “behavioral component” I referenced above is also a significant part of why another player is on the ballot for the tenth and final time this year.  Curt Schilling’s numbers – particularly in the playoffs and in the World Series – clearly tell me that he belongs in the Hall of Fame.  However, Curt Schilling is a wing nut who has espoused publicly more than a few off-center views of the world and the US political scene.  [Aside: I have no interest in discussing/debating some of his stated positions so let me leave it that I consider many of them to be “off-center”.]

Here is my suggestion:

  • Recognize that all five of the “controversial candidates” here (Bonds, Clemens, Ortiz, Rodriguez and Schilling) belong in the Hall of Fame when you consider their accomplishments on the field.
  • So, put them in there.  And also add a small second plaque to the standard one that is there for other great players like Aaron and DiMaggio and Mays and Ruth and Williams where the small added plaque says to visitors, some of the stats that got these guys admitted here may have been “chemically enhanced”.  [I will leave it to the baseball poets to come up with more acceptable prose here.]

Finally, since three of the five players (Clemens, Ortiz and Schilling) I have mentioned here as being at odds with the “behavioral component” of Hall of Fame voting played for the Boston Red Sox, let me close with this observation about Boston by comedian, Fred Allen:

“I have just returned from Boston.  It is the only thing to do if you find yourself up there.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………

 

 

Boycott The Winter Olympics? Who Cares?

Since I am about to embark on a topic this morning that is laden with political nuances and sentiments let me declare my personal politics in a generic way:

  • I am not a Democrat.
  • I am not a Republican.
  • I am a Pragmatist.

I have not been able to buy into the ideologies or whatever passes for the guiding principles of either of the major US political parties for all of my adult life and both parties fail to attract me to their way of thinking because neither party can accomplish what they say they want to accomplish when they are “in power”.  What I care about in politics is successful achievement of new laws and new policies and new procedures that make life better.  To say that for the most part I have been “politically disappointed” over the last 50 years or so would be an understatement.

It is with that admittedly jaded attitude that I read last week that President Biden said he was “considering” a diplomatic boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics to be held in Beijing as a way to protest and to put pressure on the Chinese government to amend their human rights policies and practices.  The President is only considering preventing US diplomats and functionaries from attending the Games; the US athletes would be there to compete.

Since I am a political Pragmatist, it should not be much of a surprise that I think the US President should not “consider” such a thing for more than about a nanosecond because keeping US diplomats somewhere other than in Beijing during the Winter Olympic Games is not going to cause any change in behavior on the part of the Chinese government.  It just isn’t.

Even worse than pretending that such a symbolic gesture will cause even a minor change is the fact that we have empirical evidence that Olympic boycotts do not work.

  • In the late 1970s, President Carter was mightily miffed by the audacity of the Soviet Union to send army troops into Afghanistan.  The 1980 Summer Olympic Games were going to be held in Moscow and President Carter kept the US athletes home and out of the competition.
  • That boycott changed the behaviors of the Soviet leaders and the Soviet army not even a little bit.  It was not until the end of the 1980s that the Soviets pulled their troops out of Afghanistan – long after everything about the 1980 Summer Olympic Games had faced from memory.
  • Then in 1984, the Soviets chose to boycott the Summer Olympic Games that were held in Los Angeles.  About a dozen countries generally aligned with the Soviet Union joined that boycott which had no discernable effect on the Los Angeles Games.

An Olympic boycott is feckless; a diplomatic boycott of Olympic games is an expression of impotence.  And on another plane of thinking, would the US government change any of its fundamental behaviors based on our precepts because a foreign government made it clear to us that they think we are doing the wrong things within our borders?  I doubt it.  And so, we need to step back and be sure that we are not carrying a burdensome load of hubris when we take such positions.

When I read about this action being “under consideration”, I had to check and see what it meant to have diplomats boycott Olympic Games since I was certain that there were no athletic competitions reserved for members of the diplomatic corps of various countries.  If you did not know, First Lady, Jill Biden led a US diplomatic delegation to the Tokyo Games earlier this year.  Until this weekend, I was unaware of such a delegation, and I am still unaware of its purpose or its achievements.  But, now you know…

And while I am on the subject of useless and unproductive things, let me propose a Quick Quiz.  We have not had one of these in quite a while around here so let me pose the question and the form of the response:

What is the most useless and why:

  • Weekly NFL “Power Rankings”
  • Weekly College Football Rankings
  • “Bracketology” columns written in November?

Fifty words or less…

Finally, Dwight Perry had an interesting comment on another possible intersection between sports and politics in the Seattle Times over the weekend:

“House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy spoke for 8½ hours into the early hours Friday morning in futile opposition to President Biden’s social spending bill.

“Veteran observers say it was like watching a Yankees-Red Sox doubleheader.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………