Football

Sunday Night Football Flex Scheduling Watch: Week 4

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NBC’s Sunday Night Football package gives it flexible scheduling. For the last seven weeks of the season, the games are determined on 12-day notice, 6-day notice for Week 17.

The first year, no game was listed in the Sunday Night slot, only a notation that one game could move there. Now, NBC lists the game it “tentatively” schedules for each night. However, the NFL is in charge of moving games to prime time.

Here are the rules from the NFL web site (note that this was written with the 2007 season in mind):

  • Begins Sunday of Week 11
  • In effect during Weeks 11-17
  • Only Sunday afternoon games are subject to being moved into the Sunday night window.
  • The game that has been tentatively scheduled for Sunday night during flex weeks will be listed at 8:20 p.m. ET.
  • The majority of games on Sundays will be listed at 1:00 p.m. ET during flex weeks except for games played in Pacific or Mountain Time zones which will be listed at 4:05 or 4:15 p.m. ET.
  • No impact on Thursday, Saturday or Monday night games.
  • The NFL will decide (after consultation with CBS, FOX, NBC) and announce as early as possible the game being played at 8:20 p.m. ET. The announcement will come no later than 12 days prior to the game. The NFL may also announce games moving to 4:05 p.m. ET and 4:15 p.m. ET.
  • Week 17 start time changes could be decided on 6 days notice to ensure a game with playoff implications.
  • The NBC Sunday night time slot in “flex” weeks will list the game that has been tentatively scheduled for Sunday night.
  • Fans and ticket holders must be aware that NFL games in flex weeks are subject to change 12 days in advance (6 days in Week 17) and should plan accordingly.
  • NFL schedules all games.
  • Teams will be informed as soon as they are no longer under consideration or eligible for a move to Sunday night.
  • Rules NOT listed on NFL web site but pertinent to flex schedule selection: CBS and Fox each protect games in five out of six weeks, and cannot protect any games Week 17. Games were protected after Week 4 the first year of flexible scheduling, but are now protected after Week 5.
  • Three teams can appear a maximum of six games in primetime on NBC, ESPN or NFL Network (everyone else gets five) and no team may appear more than four times on NBC. At this writing, no team is completely tapped out at any measure, although the Colts have five primetime appearances and can’t be flexed out of any of them, which is a problem since three other teams also have five primetime appearances and can be flexed out of them. NBC appearances for all teams: MIN 2, NO 2, DAL 3 (1 flexible), WSH 2, NYG 3 (1 flexible), IND 3 (1 flexible), NYJ 1, MIA 1, CHI 1, PHI 3 (2 flexible), SF 1, GB 3 (1 flexible), PIT 3 (1 flexible), NE 2 (1 flexible), SD 2 (both flexible), BAL 1 (flexible), CIN 1 (flexible). All primetime appearances for all teams: MIN 4, NO 4, DAL 5 (1 flexible), WSH 3, NYG 4 (1 flexible), IND 5 (1 flexible), NYJ 5, MIA 3, CHI 4, PHI 5 (2 flexible), SF 4, GB 4 (1 flexible), PIT 5 (1 flexible), NE 4 (1 flexible), SD 5 (2 flexible), BAL 4 (1 flexible), CIN 3 (1 flexible), ATL 2, HOU 3, TEN 2, CAR 1, ARI 2, KC 1, JAX 1, DEN 1.
  • A rule that may have come to light late 2008 but that, given its restrictiveness and lateness in coming to light, I’m having trouble accepting, is that the balance of primetime games taken from FOX and CBS can’t go beyond 22-20 one way or the other. The current tally is FOX 18, CBS 17; with tentative games, the tally is FOX 21, CBS 20. With this rule in place, Weeks 12, 13, and 16 cannot be flexed away from NFC road games without making up for it in Weeks 11, 14, 15, and 17.

Here are the current tentatively-scheduled games and my predictions:

Week 11 (November 21):

  • Tentative game: NY Giants @ Philadelphia
  • Prospects: Both teams at 2-2, so could go either way.
  • If protections came this week: Packers-Vikings (FOX) and Colts-Patriots (CBS).
  • Other possible games: Jets-Texans, Chiefs-Cardinals, and Falcons-Rams, all very dependent on how everything shakes out. (Given how chaotic this year is shaking out to be, that goes for all of these weeks and goes double.) CBS would probably protect Jets-Texans based strictly on records.

Week 12 (November 28):

  • Tentative game: San Diego @ Indianapolis
  • Prospects: Another battle of 2-2 teams, but the Chargers always start slow. But there are some ominous signs in the Colts’ losses…
  • If protections came this week: Packers-Falcons or Bucs-Ravens (FOX) and Titans-Texans if anything (CBS).
  • Other possible games: Thanksgiving Weekend, paucity of good games. Besides the potentially protected games, Chiefs-Seahawks, Eagles-Bears, and who knows, maybe even Vikings-Redskins or Jags-Giants.

Week 13 (December 5):

  • Tentative game: Pittsburgh @ Baltimore
  • Prospects: 3-1 v. 3-1, potentially deciding the AFC North. Extremely good chance of keeping its spot.
  • If protections came this week: Falcons-Bucs or Cowboys-Colts (FOX) and Chiefs-Broncos if anything (CBS).
  • Other possible games: Saints-Bengals, Jags-Titans, Redskins-Giants, Rams-Cardinals, or the potentially protected games. Because of the paucity of good games Week 12 I suspect CBS will still protect this week.

Week 14 (December 12):

  • Tentative game: Philadelphia @ Dallas
  • Prospects: 2-2 v. 1-2, but an NFC East game always = ratings, so Fox would still be happy to take this game; this is their likeliest spot for an unprotected week.
  • If protections came this week: Patriots-Bears (CBS) and Giants-Vikings if anything (FOX).
  • Other possible games: Chiefs-Chargers, Bengals-Steelers, Rams-Saints, or Bucs-Redskins.

Week 15 (December 19):

  • Tentative game: Green Bay @ New England
  • Prospects: 3-1 v. 3-1 means a good chance of keeping its spot.
  • If protections came this week: Jets-Patriots (CBS) and Saints-Ravens or Redskins-Cowboys (FOX).
  • Other possible games: Texans-Titans, Chiefs-Rams, or Jags-Colts.

Week 16 (December 26)

  • Tentative game: San Diego @ Cincinnati
  • Prospects: Both at 2-2, and the Bengals will have trouble catching up to the Ravens and Steelers.
  • If protections came this week: Jets-Bears (CBS) and Vikings-Eagles (FOX).
  • Other possible games: Texans-Broncos, Chiefs-Titans, Giants-Packers, or Seahawks-Bucs.

Week 17 (January 3):

  • Playoff positioning watch begins Week 9.

Adventures in crazy lineal titles

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Most of the time, the college football lineal titles don’t change hands the first few weeks as all the good teams play cupcakes. Someone forgot to tell the 2006 Boise State title.

It freakily ended the season in the hands of non-bowl-eligible Washington, so perhaps an early change is to be expected, but it has changed hands every single week this season. Hopefully now that it’s in the hands of big-boy Oklahoma it’ll stay in place the next several weeks, at least until the Red River Rivalry.

All lineal titles are now properly updated.

Belated remarks on BYU going independent in football

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The biggest loser in the Not-So-Great Conference Shakeup of 2010 may be the Mountain West, who got screwed through no real fault of their own whatsoever.

Yay, the Pac-10 may singlehandedly destroy the Big 12! We could wind up with the Kansas schools or even more, and then the BCS would HAVE to let us in to the party! Oh wait, they called off the dogs – well, at least we got Boise State out of the deal, although now that’s a wash because the Pac-10 is adding Utah to complement Colorado and become the Pac-12. Oh well, at least it’s a wash…

…except BYU has just lost its biggest link to the Mountain West and wants to go independent in football and join the WAC in other sports! But wait, we’re adding Nevada and Fresno State to effectively destroy the WAC! But wait, BYU is STILL leaving, only they’re joining the West Coast Conference in other sports instead of the WAC! Nooooooooo!!!!!!!!!

(Incidentially, the one underplayed angle in all this is the surely-salivating-to-ESPN-execs-tongues prospect of regular BYU-Gonzaga games in the West Coast Conference. Though BYU is rarely if ever the best team in the Mountain West, it is one of the Mountain West’s stronger teams in basketball, and Gonzaga has to like the prospect of having a legitimate playing partner other than St. Mary’s.)

The Mountain West is left with 10 teams, one more than before, but only two BCS-caliber programs instead of the present three: TCU and Boise State. Nevada and Fresno State are good teams in football, by non-Boise WAC standards, but at best they’re on the level of an Air Force: they’ll sneak into the Top 25 sometimes, but they’ll rarely make true national headlines. (Air Force knocking off BYU being an exception.) That won’t help the Mountain West’s case for becoming a BCS conference or dissolving the system. In fact, BYU’s move by itself could make the system stronger than ever, especially if they get a BCS auto bid (which could be a smarter move than you might think precisely for that reason).

But why would BYU make the move? Notre Dame is under heavy pressure to join a conference at some point, so BYU is bucking the trend by leaving one. Of course they weren’t getting much help getting into the BCS by staying in the Mountain West. But the big thing BYU is banking on is its status as the Mormon university. They are banking on becoming the new Notre Dame, Notre Dame West, with every game getting national coverage and a truly national following. They want to leverage their BYU network and turn it into a national powerhouse. (It’s unlikely any football games would air on BYU TV, but the mtn. deal prevents even non-football sports from airing on BYU TV.)

The success of BYU’s declaration of independence depends heavily on whether or not BYU can put together a schedule at least as good as what they had in the Mountain West, and the outlook is staggering. If you’re going to set yourselves up to be the new Notre Dame or Notre Dame West, it makes sense to set up a rivalry with the real Notre Dame. Throw in Texas, Oregon State, and Utah, and that’s four games against teams in BCS conferences, with an eye for more. Good luck getting that in the Mountain West. And BYU has signed a deal with ESPN, which means the full ESPN hype machine will be in full effect and BYU games will regularly be on a platform with wider availability than Versus. All that’s left is recruiting.

If BYU can continue to recruit and play at the same level that they have been in the Mountain West, and regularly play in BCS games, independence will suddenly look like a viable prospect and Notre Dame can start saying “I told you so”. This could be the move that ultimately sets up the next great conference shakeup and finishes off the Big 12. The Pac-10 and Big 10 are too tightly-knit to lose any teams to independence, but they and the SEC may be the only reasonably invulnerable conferences, and even then Nebraska and Penn State have to consider the possibility (though the Big Ten Network revenues may be too much to resist).

(USC will definitely be tempted if probation and Lane Kiffin don’t prevent the program from maintaining its Carroll-era heights, especially compared to the rest of the Pac-10 – and if a team that lost its upperclassmen and can’t go to a bowl is still ranked in the polls and that ranking is warranted, I guarantee USC will win a national championship the first year off probation.)

If Texas decides the outlook is right, they could jump to independence in a heartbeat (just look at how much more money it makes in all sports than the next non-Big 10, non-SEC, non-Notre Dame school), with Oklahoma following (though the Big 12 could stay together after all if enough other teams follow suit). Other teams that were once both independent and powerhouses before the 90s shakeup – Florida State, Miami (FL) – could bolt as well, which is bad news for the ACC. With ten members, the ACC could stay alive, if not taken very seriously and looking like the new Big East (though Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech, Boston College, and a few others are good teams), but the Big 12 would be down to eight pissed-off members, who might start looking at other conferences or at independence themselves.

But that’s trying to predict the unpredictable. Right now the future involves the impending destruction of the WAC, which is down to six teams and couldn’t even field a conference if Hawaii leaves. If the WAC can keep Hawaii in the fold they will try to replenish their numbers, probably with potential playing partners for Louisiana Tech from Conference USA and possibly the Sun Belt, but if it can’t a lot depends on what the Mountain West decides to do next, and whether they want to go straight to a football championship game or wait for better options than the WAC’s castoffs (like the Kansas schools should BYU’s defection eventually cause the Big 12 to implode).

If they do decide to go for a championship game, they will and should take Utah State and New Mexico State (the former is already rumored to be Mountain West-bound). Both, along with MWC-bound Nevada, are among the WAC’s best teams in basketball (when all is said and done the Mountain West’s new lineup would have had five teams in the NCAA Tournament last year), New Mexico State brings New Mexico’s in-state rival in-house, and while Utah State’s potential playing partners are both gone it does re-establish the Mountain West’s foothold in the sizable Utah market. That leaves Idaho, San Jose State, and Louisiana Tech. LA Tech likely joins Conference USA; Idaho and San Jose State, two of the worst college football programs in the nation, may have no choice but to go to FCS or shutter their football programs entirely. Perhaps the Big Sky or Summit League will take Idaho (although most of the Summit’s schools don’t play football so if Idaho keeps the football program the Big Sky may be the only option). The Big West may be the only geographic and cultural fit for San Jose State, and most if not all of their schools don’t play football, so their football program may be screwed unless they or Idaho want to go to the Great West.

Then begins the process of keeping a close eye on how BYU does financially and athletically over the next decade, as the future of college football may lie in their hands.

A new set of college football rankings for us to play with!

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That feeling is in the air… it’s college football time again, and with it comes the return of all-out obsessive coverage on Da Blog. Both lineal titles (college and NFL) have been belatedly updated, including the new 2009 Boise State title and Super Bowl XLIV title. (I’ll have a post on the new holder of 2006 Boise State coming soon.) Although my Da Blog Poll came out to two votes to keep the College Football Schedule to one to junk it, I’m getting rid of it anyway. I need all the free time I can get to work on other things, and along with the College Football Rankings, starting Week 3 I’ll be premiering a new college football concept that has a lot more reason to premiere at the point any two teams can be connected to one another through a series of games… and one that could prove to be a lot more time-consuming than the Schedule ever was.

I started thinking about this with regards to combat sports like boxing and MMA, which I may extend this concept to eventually. If any sport has a more confusing title situation than college football, it’s those two (and horse racing), with all the different weight classes, not to mention all the different sanctioning bodies in the former. But for all the confusion over who the champ is, how the champ is determined is fairly straightforward: to be the man, you have to beat the man. So long as the champion does not lose, that person will remain the champion. This is taken to the point where lists of rankings will actually separate out the champion from the ranked fighters. No matter how strong a record you may rack up, to be the man, you have to beat the man. The championship system in combat sports is predicated on the notion that the result of a single fight is representative of which fighter is better overall. The same principle should be in play for ranking fighters below the champion.

Now, in what other sport is this the case? I don’t just ask this rhetorical question because I already created the college football lineal title on the same notion. You regularly hear the argument that Team A is better than Team B because Team A beat Team B, even if it was by one point in overtime at home. In a sense, this is the philosophy behind the BCS Title Game, as well as, to a lesser extent, the Super Bowl. (In most other sports a series of games determines the champion, removing some of the uncertainty and ambiguity of a single game.) You take what you think is the top two teams, pit them against each other, and the winner is the champion, as well as considered “better”.  As I pointed out last year, 2005 USC may well have been as good as ESPN said they were when they infamously started comparing the Trojans to all the great teams of the past, but we take it as given that Texas was the better team, because they beat USC. And BCS arguments are regularly settled by comparing whether one of the teams under discussion beat the other.

So I’m introducing what I call the line-of-sight rankings, to bring if not objectivity, at least consistency to the criteria we already use to argue about college football. Every team is situated below all the teams it lost to and above all the teams it beat. Obviously, there will be contradictions in the rankings, and in those cases we’ll have to throw out some games. We’ll determine what games to throw out in this order:

  • If two or more different contradictions can be resolved by throwing out a single game, throw out that game. Throw out the game that resolves the most contradictions, except that if a game is the most recent game for at least one team, it is considered to resolve one fewer contradiction than it actually does.
  • Otherwise, always eliminate home-team victories before neutral-site games, and neutral-site games before road-team victories.
  • Among games of similar siting, for every full 10 points of the margin of victory, add one to the week number. Then eliminate the game with the lowest week number, but do not eliminate a team’s most recent game. In event of a tie, eliminate the game with the smaller margin of victory. If there is still a tie, add the total number of losses for the winning team to the total number of wins by the losing team, and eliminate the game where that number is higher. If there is still a tie, remove the prohibition on eliminating a team’s most recent game, and if that does not help, subtract the losing team’s C Rating from the winning team’s C Rating, and eliminate the game where that number is lower.

Because every team doesn’t play every other team in college football, there will still be ambiguity in the rankings. If a team’s worst relevant loss is to the team, and their best relevant win is to the team, where between those two numbers is the team itself ranked? I settle these situations as follows:

  • If there is a “pod” of only one team as described above, including undefeated teams, rank the team directly ahead of the best team beaten in a relevant win. Winless teams are ranked directly behind their worst relevant loss. The team in question will have the rank of their worst relevant loss in parenthesis or, if undefeated in relevant games but not , have their entry boldfaced.
  • If there are two or more “pods” of multiple teams each that can be ranked a certain way between any two teams (or at the top or bottom of the rankings), or if there are two individual teams that can be ranked between another two teams but whose ranking vis-a-vis one another is unclear, break them up and rank them separately, within their own pods. Each team’s rank is listed as their best possible ranking except at the top of the rankings, when it is their worst possible ranking. In the case of the individual teams, they are listed as tied and in C Rating order unless one has a lineal title.

I’ll whip out the first rankings Week 3, when they become meaningful, and we’ll see how they play themselves out over the course of the season, and how much work they add to my already heavy workload.

As the Realignment Turns

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I’ve stayed out of the ongoing talk of conference realignment in college football, in part because there wasn’t really anything concrete to talk about and anything could happen, and in part because of what I’ve had to deal with in my own life. But there is something concrete now, with Colorado joining the Pac-10, Nebraska joining the Big 10, Boise State joining the Mountain West, and apparently, Texas, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State all jumping ship to the Pac-10.

I have to say, I was surprised when I heard this last rumor. The Pac-10 seemed to be the most likely candidate not to expand at all; it’s quite possibly the most tight-knit group in college sports, any expansion would require a unanimous vote (so if one school had a problem with a potential addition it could scuttle the whole deal), and right now it’s neatly organized into five natural geographic rivalries. (This proposed expansion actually comes pretty close to preserving those geographic rivalries; the only inconsistency is in the Texas schools and Colorado, and even that can be divided into Texas/Texas A&M and Texas Tech/Colorado.) 16 teams is an unwieldy size for a conference, as the non-football Big East has shown, and as demonstrated by the convoluted “pod” systems proposed for a 16-team Big 10. And taking a whole bunch of teams from a single conference can result in those schools forming cliques. I could easily see the “original” 10 becoming the equivalent of the old Big 8 schools vis-a-vis the newcomers from the Southwest Conference, er, Big 12.

I knew the Pac-10 had interest in Texas – any conference would, and Texas had come calling when the old Southwest Conference broke up – but I didn’t anticipate them gobbling up basically the entire Big 12 South. This tells me one of two things:

  • The Pac-10 is deliberately destroying the Big 12 to erase competition when the TV contracts come up for renewal next year.
  • The Pac-10 wanted Texas, but was told they needed to bring along Texas A&M and Texas Tech as well. (Recall that when Texas finally joined the Big 12, Texas politicians forced the Big 12 to take Texas Tech and Baylor over the objections of basically everyone else.) They then added Oklahoma and Oklahoma State for the hell of it and/or to preserve the Red River Rivalry.

If the latter of these is true, that suggests the price for adding Texas may have been too much for the Big 10 to take – they were willing to add Texas, but not Texas A&M and Texas Tech as well (and Oklahoma and Oklahoma State would have been a non-starter, especially if the Big Ten still wanted to add Notre Dame). Otherwise, for Texas to pass up the Big Ten would seem to suggest that the proposed Texas Longhorns Sports Network would make so much money it’s a better bet than having to split the gerbonkers money from the Big Ten Network. Nebraska would probably be the Big Ten’s third choice for expansion behind Notre Dame and Texas in some order, bringing a fantastic football program, a great volleyball program, but not much else and a small immediate market (though it will help the BTN in other areas); certainly the Big Ten won’t take kindly to the Pac-10 stealing their thunder, and they won’t just sit idly by and let the Pac-10 steal their 16-team idea.

Regardless, if all this happens as planned, the remaining pieces fall into place rather easily. Start with the “orphaned” members of the Big 12: Iowa State, the Kansas schools, Missouri, and Baylor. They would like to think the Big 10 would swoop in and save four of them, but Iowa State and Baylor in particular are weak links (despite Baylor’s basketball program and the potential of Iowa State-Iowa being an intraconference rivalry), and the Big 10 isn’t particularly interested in grabbing a bunch of schools just because they’re available. The Big 10 is primarily concerned with the New York City market and Notre Dame. The Big 10 could take Missouri just to have a lockdown on the St. Louis market, but after that they’re more likely to take Syracuse and Rutgers (possibly Pitt instead of Syracuse) and stop, and wait for that selection to cause the Big East to implode. At which point Notre Dame will come calling, the non-football schools will form their own conference, and six more schools end up orphaned.

Baylor I see going to Conference USA, the Kansas schools could bolt to the Mountain West and give that conference a championship game, and Iowa State could be stuck with the MAC. As for the Big East orphans, I see them getting split by the SEC and ACC. That would leave those two conferences with 15 schools each, one short of the Pac-16 and Big 16. I could see the SEC taking TCU and Memphis, giving it Memphis’ superlative basketball program and an inroad into the lucrative Texas market. The Mountain West could then replace TCU with (say) Nevada. The WAC then nabs a Conference USA team to keep the band together and give Louisiana Tech something resembling a playing partner, offsetting the addition of Baylor (or alternately, just nabs North Texas while C-USA nabs Troy). The former Big East non-football schools probably raid schools like Xavier from the A-10.

One thing to note is that the SEC could come out the big loser in this scenario. Last year the SEC signed contracts with CBS and ESPN that netted them billions of dollars and all sorts of concessions from ESPN – “SEC on ESPN” branding, an “SEC Weekly” show on ESPNU, and so forth – that the SEC thought made forming their own network unnecessary. Now, however, the Pac-10 is positioning itself to maximize value for its own new network, meaning if the ACC doesn’t do the same (and with its contract up right now, it’s entirely possible it won’t), the SEC will be committed to 15 years without its own network. The Big 10 isn’t lacking for games on ESPN, and the BTN’s distribution problems, part of the reason the SEC went to ESPN, have started to fade, so for the money sports the SEC may be at a significant exposure disadvantage, even with its syndicated games being beamed far and wide. I doubt most people in the SEC would prefer to add TCU, Memphis, and (say) Louisville and South Florida to wind up potentially losing much of its football advantage.

However, I do not see this becoming the new status quo in college football into perpetuity, for two reasons:

  • In theory, this creates four superconferences of 16 teams each, so organizing a playoff should be simple: just take the champions of each conference. You could even preserve the Rose Bowl as a semifinal, with an ACC-SEC Sugar or Orange bowl in the other semifinal. Easy, right? Well… except you still have a very strong Mountain West with Utah, BYU, arguably Air Force, Boise State, and most tellingly, the sometimes-good Kansas schools. That’s a coalition strong enough to mount a serious antitrust challenge to any playoff that exclusive, even if it becomes the only relevant non-BCS conference. We’d probably still end up stuck with some sort of imperfect BCS compromise as a result.
  • As mentioned, 16 is an unwieldy size for a college football conference, and could easily result in the formation of cliques. I’ve already mentioned how the Pac-10 will become the “old” Pac-10 and six Big 12 “interlopers” with only the Arizona schools and Colorado forming a narrow bridge between them. The ACC could have it even worse by taking on four Big East schools, which could join with the schools the ACC raided from the Big East a decade ago, especially Boston College, to butt heads with the conference’s Tobacco Road base. As these new TV contracts come up for renewal, people’s TV watching habits may change again, with the Internet becoming the new means for most people to watch sports. The result could be another conference shake-up in a decade’s time that could even result in some conference shrinking, including the ACC splitting in two and some of the Big 12 renegades seceding from the Pac-10 to join some of the better Mountain West teams in a pseudo-Big 12 revival.

However… there are now rumors swirling that Texas A&M is more interested in joining the SEC than the Pac-10. Certainly the SEC would prefer to add A&M, the second-most storied program in the state despite its recent hard times, than TCU, but I’m not buying this story because I’m thinking wherever Texas goes, A&M will follow (from what I’ve read there is no love lost between Texas and the SEC, so that’s out), though if they can maintain their rivalry as a nonconference game more power to them. If A&M does go to the SEC, the Pac-10 could add Utah; I’ve never been a fan of the Colorado-Utah route to the Pac-12, mostly because it doesn’t preserve those natural geographic rivalries, but in this case adding one fewer Big 12 team could help prevent the forming of cliques and Utah is geographically situated to help bolster the bridge between the two parts of the conference. However, there’s also a chance that the defection of A&M could completely undermine the package deal bringing the Big 12 South to the Pac-10, rendering everything unpredictable yet again. Texas to the Big 10 might not be dead yet; the Big East may be offering Notre Dame as a sacrificial lamb to salvage the rest of the conference (“just take Missouri and/or Texas rather than Syracuse or Rutgers!”). Stay tuned.

(If that blog post comes to fruition – and given how conveniently it matches its author’s opinions and hopes I’m skeptical, and even its author only gives it a 24% chance of happening – the Big 12 probably isn’t dead but instead raids the Mountain West of BYU, TCU, Air Force, and maybe New Mexico, leaving Boise State really wishing it hadn’t committed to the Mountain West so soon…)

More problems with expanding the NCAA Tournament

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Did I hear Dan LeBatard correctly yesterday on PTI? Apparently most coaches don’t like creating a playoff for college football, but they do like expanding the NCAA Tournament to grotesque levels.

Why? In college football, you can go .500, go to a bowl game, and save your job. In college basketball, it’s NCAA Tournament or bust – you have to be in the top 18% of teams in the country to save your job.

Here’s the thing: you may be able to go .500 and save your job, but that doesn’t mean anyone gives a bleep about your team. Most people only care about the undefeated and one-loss teams in the thick of the national championship hunt, and if they’re really diehard, the races at the top of the BCS conferences. Any smart playoff proposal will keep the bowls in some way, and it’s not like people care that much about the teams that wouldn’t be in the playoff anyway, so how exactly would it change the status quo?

And why shouldn’t college basketball be any different from college football, the NBA, or the NHL? Why shouldn’t the NIT, CBI, or CIT be enough for a coach to keep their job, and why shouldn’t merely making the NCAA Tournament be good enough for a coach to get a hefty extension?

You know what I think the problem is? I think the problem is that, unlike in college football, the mid-majors really are the majority. The BCS conferences really do select a third to a half of their teams to the NCAA Tournament as is, so in that sense, it makes sense for them to say “NCAA Tournament or bust”. In that sense, it’s heartening to see the number of at-large spots given to mid-majors double this year, even if it was only because the Pac-10 sucked. Improving parity will make the NCAA Tournament feel more special and give more respect to the NIT. Expanding the tournament, on the other hand, will only worsen and entrench the “NCAA Tournament or bust” dictum given to BCS-conference coaches, while making the tournament feel less special.

(It’ll also render schedule irrelevant. Am I really supposed to believe that the 32 teams just outside the NCAAs are dominated by major conference teams, but magically, there’s only one major-conference team in the next 32 and it’s from the Pac-10? Do we really want every Tom, Dick, and Harry that goes .500 to almost automatically get to the Big Dance?

2010 Golden Bowl: TCU v. Alabama

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Golden Bowl II: #6 TCU v. #1 Alabama
TCU can’t beat Alabama. The Rose Bowl was the real national championship game. Sure, TCU looked impressive beating the tournament’s seed, and are playing closer to home, but TCU is TCU and Alabama is Alabama. Alabama has the Heisman trophy winner and NFL talent up and down the field. Most people can’t name a single player on the Horned Frogs. Under the old BCS, TCU would have lost to Boise State in the Fiesta Bowl – Boise State! This game is just a coronation of something everyone already knows – Alabama, holders of three legs of Da Blog’s Grand Slam, will pick up the final leg and become Golden Bowl champion. Right?

TCU returns the opening kickoff to their own 40, and gain even more yardage when Alabama gets nailed for encroachment, the second straight year the Golden Bowl starts with the SEC team being nailed for encroachment before the first play from scrimmage. Last time Stafon Johnson got nailed behind the line; this year Joseph Turner gets out-of-bounds after getting just past midfield for the first. Turner picks up another two yards before Andy Dalton floats it out to Jeremy Kerley just past the marker. But the drive stalls: Tucker gets nailed behind the line, a toss to Bart Johnson just gets back to the line of scrimmage, and another pass attempt gets batted down at the line. With the ball at the 41, the Horned Frogs elect to punt, but the punt goes into the end zone.

Trent Richardson gains 16 yards on the pitch to put the Tide right into business. Mark Ingram is not as successful, only gaining one yard on his first carry, but six on his second, but gets overthrown on a third-down pass play, forcing the Tide to punt the ball back, a play that goes from the Tide 43 to the Frog 42. Matthew Tucker gets stopped at the line of scrimmage but Turner gains three, but Dalton scrambles back to the line of scrimmage to force another punt. Richardson gets runs of two and three yards before Greg McIlroy’s first completed pass of the day is to Colin Peek for a good ten yards. Ingram only gains one yard the next play, and when he’s given the ball again it’s nullified by a holding penalty. But that’s nothing compared to when McIlroy hands the ball off to Roy Upchurch only to see him lose the ball, giving TCU the ball on the Tide 43. But Turner gains two, Tucker only gets back to the line, Dalton throws an incompletion, and TCU punts the ball into the end zone again. The defenses are stout with a little over five minutes left in the first quarter.

Ingram gets a couple of two-yard gains, with Alabama saving a fumble on the second, but a screen pass to Marquis Maze doesn’t quite get back to the line, forcing another punt and another TCU short field. Tucker is given the ball on a draw and takes it up five yards, but that’s nothing compared to what happens when the ball is given to Edward Wesley: he immediately breaks past the defense and takes it 55 yards for the touchdown. TCU 7: Florida 0.

Alabama returns the ensuing kickoff to the 23, and Richardson goes nowhere on first down, Ingram only gains six, and Upchurch is stopped after one, forcing another punt. TCU, as on the last drive, gets the ball on their own 40, and gives the ball to Turner for five yards. Wesley gains only three yards this time but it sets up Turner to cross midfield and pick up the first down. Tucker gets stopped at the line to end the quarter.

Wesley gains two to start the quarter before Dalton connects with Kerley to the 27, the furthest downfield either team has run a play. Wesley gets stuffed at the line on first down and takes it for four on second, and Jercell Fort can only get three on third. But Ross Evans comes on and lets a 37-yard field goal attempt sail through the uprights, extending the lead. Alabama returns the ensuing kickoff to the 28, and Ingram immediately picks up 11 yards and the first down. Ingram picks up one the next play, Richardson picks up six on the draw, and Ingram just picks up the first down. Upchurch gets runs of threee and four yards, but on third and three Terry Grant can only gain one, and Alabama is forced to punt again. But they did manage to cross midfield, and their punter is able to pin the Frogs at the 8.

Fort gets a big 12-yard gain to give the Frogs some breathing room, but Turner only gets two, Tucker three, and Dalton overthrows his intended receiver on third down, and the ensuing punt is returned to the Alabama 47. Grant immediately breaks out a 20-yard run to put them at the 33. After Ingram, Richardson, and Grant each inch the ball a few yards closer, it’s 4th and 3 and Leigh Tiffin comes on for a 43-yard field goal attempt. The ball slips inside the upright and Alabama is back within a touchdown. The ensuing kickoff is caught at the 7 and returned to the 37, but Wesley, Fort and Dalton gain two, two, and three respectively, and Alabama gets the ball back at the same spot as before. Ingram gets nailed for a loss of five and a pass to Julio Jones just gets back to the line, but McIlroy throws it to Jones again and he breaks out a 30-yard run to the 28. Ingram takes it another six yards but McIlroy is forced to scramble for a yard on second and has his pass batted down on third, forcing a successful 38-yard field goal to cut the deficit to four.

TCU gets an even shorter kickoff, catching it at the 14, but only take it to the 35. Tucker and Dalton only gain a yard each and Dalton gets nailed for the only sack either side had all day, and once again Alabama gets the ball past their own 40. Ingram once again sees a short gain negated by holding, then sees McIlroy overthrow him on the play that counts. Ingram gets stuffed and McIlroy unsuccessfully lobs it up on third down. Dalton uses up the remaining time with one last hail-mary pass, but the Horned Frogs still head into the break up 10-6, although Alabama seems to have the momentum.

Alabama gets the ball on their own 29 to start the second half and immediately come running out the gate, with Ingram picking up six yards the first play from scrimmage. Two runs by Richardson pick up the first down, followed by a six-yard run of his own and another first down on an encroachment penalty. But while Ingram picks up a yard, Upchurch gets nailed behind midfield to make it 3rd and 12, and McIlroy throws an incompletion to force a punt. TCU is pinned on the 18, but Dalton calls his own number for five yards, followed by a 6-yard pickup by Tucker for the first. But Wesley gets nailed behind the line, Turner only gets back to the line, and Dalton is forced to scramble, forcing another punt. The punt is only returned to the 37 but Ingram immediately picks up 5 yards. Upchurch is stopped just short of the marker, setting up Ingram for another 5-yard run to just past midfield. Maze gets a screen pass that is stopped at the line, and Richardson picks up four before Ingram bursts through for 13 yards, putting the Tide at the 32. He gains another five yards to put them inside the 30, and Grant adds another two. But the toss to Colin Peek loses a yard, which may prove crucial when the Tide try a 43-yard field goal attempt that sails to the left, keeping the deficit at four instead of one.

But Turner and Tucker don’t do much and Dalton throws another incompletion, and the ensuing punt puts the Tide just barely behind midfield. But Grant only picks up two and Ingram one, and another toss to Peek doesn’t do anything, and the ensuing punt gets returned all the way to the 20 – another wasted opportunity. Turner pounds for 11 yards but Wesley, Fort, and Turner can’t combine for another first down before the quarter ends, giving TCU fourth and one. The punt, however, is only taken to the 35.

Ingram and Richardson don’t gain much but it’s enough to create third and two after an encroachment penalty, but Ingram only gets back to the line and Alabama punts again. This time TCU gets it on their own 32. Turner picks up a yard and Fort gets nailed for a loss of three, but Dalton connects with Johnson for 14 yards and the first. Turner and Tucker once again are stuffed and Dalton throws another incompletion, forcing yet another punt – this one only returned to the 26. Ingram gets 2, Upchurch gets 5, and Grant loses 2, and the ensuing punt is taken to the 44. TCU is suddenly winning the field position battle, which is not what Alabama wants exchanging three-and-outs and behind.

Turner picks up six yards to midfield, but Tucker only gains two and Turner goes nowhere, but the Tide get the ball back at the 21. Richardson gets nailed at the 16, but Ingram’s two-yarder sets up an encroachment penalty that nullifies the loss, setting up a pass to Maze for 14 yards and the first. But after Ingram gains four, Richardson and Upchurch are stalled, and with 4:52 left Alabama punts it back to TCU, who get it at the 33. Wesley gets the ball on two draw plays bracketing an incompletion, the second for 12 yards, but Turner, Fort, and Dalton get nowhere, and Alabama gets one last chance to come back from the 26 with two minutes left.

The drive starts well, as Ingram picks up 14 immediately on a draw play that gets out of bounds. But Richardson loses three yards, and McIlroy can’t find anyone downfield and scrambles out of bounds at the line of scrimmage, setting up third and 13 with 1:43 left on the 37. Incredibly, Nick Saban returns to the run, and even after Grant is stuffed behind the line to set up fourth and 14, calls a draw play to Grant. Alabama gives the ball back with 1:36 left and two timeouts, and they use them for a heroic stop. Dalton takes off himself to gain two – timeout, 1:32 left. Wesley picks up two – timeout, 1:28 left. Fort is stopped at the line, and TCU, caught in “no man’s land”, only runs the clock down to one minute before Dalton takes the ball and is stopped at the 35, not far from where Alabama left off.

This time Saban entrusts McIlroy with the game, and he doesn’t disappoint, hitting Peek at the marker, and spiking the ball to stop the clock with 37 seconds left. McIlroy steps back, quickly throws it to Richardson… out of his reach. 31 seconds. McIlroy is forced out of the pocket and sprints out of bounds for a meaningless yard. 25 seconds, fourth and nine, ball game comes down to this play. McIlroy steps back and stays in the pocket for several seconds. Finally he throws it up to Peek…

…and over his head.

Dalton takes victory formation to seal Alabama’s doom and a stunning victory for college football’s “little guys”. Unsurprisingly for such a run- and defense-heavy game, it’s a running back that takes MVP, and Wesley gets it almost by default for by far the longest play of the game, and only touchdown. He ran the ball 10 more times for 31 more yards, but the play everyone will remember was the one that was key to the game, the only time anyone seemed to figure out the other’s defense.
Final score: TCU 10, Florida 6

Defending the Current Rooney Rule

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There’s a lot of complaining about NFL teams trying to circumvent the Rooney Rule by making token interviews with potential black coaches and then hiring the guy they wanted to hire all along, and I want to take a few moments to set the record straight.

In the past, the main defense of this practice was that even if they had no chance of getting the job, perhaps they could make an impression that would lead to them getting some job in the future, that would get them into the “good ol’ boys network”. I’m going to say right now that Leslie Frazier is going to be named a head coach in the NFL a year from now, and I’d bet better-than-even odds that he would not have if he weren’t interviewed for the Seahawks job. I mean, every hardcore football fan in America has heard of Frazier now; how many heard of him before he became a symbol of everything “wrong” with the Rooney Rule?

If a team has someone in mind for their head coaching vacancy, why not let them hire that person? I mean, if, as I’ve heard people suggest, the practice constitutes something Roger Goodell needs to do something about, what do you do about it? Do you force teams to hire black head coaches when they don’t want to? Do you force the Seahawks to hire Leslie Frazier instead of Pete Carroll? If not, how do you determine when to lay down the law and when not to? Even when it’s time to lay down the law, how do you do so? How do you close loopholes without getting ridiculous? How do you avoid “reverse racism”? It just seems impossible and unnecessary to enforce the spirit of the law on top of the letter.

Funny how none of the previous instances have resulted in as much outrage as now…

Why the firing of Jim Mora proves the Seahawks will always be mediocre under either the new GM, or Paul Allen’s ownership.

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The Seahawks had a bad season. But their record wasn’t any worse than the Browns who could very easily make the playoffs next year the way they ended this year. Regardless, you can’t say Jim Mora deserved to be fired on his own merits after one season. A team really needs to tank to justify that.

Still, when I heard the news this morning I was willing to consider any number of unfortunate but understandable reasons. Perhaps they had a new GM in mind who didn’t like Mora, or they decided they needed a complete purge and Mora got caught up in that.

But if they fired Jim Mora to hire Pete Carroll, as is being heavily rumored? To go after yet another coach that was great in college but which is far from a guarantee of NFL success – one that has ALREADY proven he couldn’t hang it in the NFL? Carroll, I hope, isn’t deciding one rebuilding year at USC is a sign he’s completely over the hill in college and needs to bolt back to the NFL where he couldn’t hang it.

If the Seahawks are letting themselves toss out a coach that doesn’t deserve it because they’re stupid enough to be blinded by a coach’s credentials in college while ignoring his NFL chops (and before you tell me he has an NFL-style offense and grooms NFL players, keep in mind the struggles of Matt Leinart and Reggie Bush in the NFL), then either whoever made this move as a condition to become GM will be completely unable to turn the Hawks around, or Mike Holmgren was a better GM than we thought to lead the Hawks to the Super Bowl despite Paul Allen’s ownership.

And I’m not even normally a Hawks or Trojans partisan.

Predictions for the Pro Football Hall of Fame Class of 2010

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The Pro Football Hall of Fame’s selections are performed by a panel of 44 leading NFL media members including representatives of all 32 NFL teams, a representative of the Pro Football Writers of America, and 11 at-large writers.

The panel has selected a list of 15 finalists from the modern era, defined as playing all or part of their careers within the last 25 years. A player must have spent 5 years out of the league before they can be considered for induction into the Hall of Fame. Players that last played in the 2004 season will be eligible for induction in 2010.

During Super Bowl Weekend, the panel will meet and narrow down the list of modern-era finalists down to five. Those five will be considered alongside two senior candidates, selected by a nine-member subpanel of the larger panel last August, for a total of seven. From this list, at least four and no more than seven people will be selected for induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

My prediction for the Pro Football Hall of Fame Class of 2010 is:

Jerry Rice
Emmitt Smith
Shannon Sharpe
John Randle
Russ Grimm

Hall of Fame Game: 49ers v. Cowboys