 |
||||||||||||||||
Bring it On October is here, and we're about to embark on one of the best sports months of the year. MLB Playoffs....NFL and College football match-ups get interesting....Chase for the Cup....college hoopsters....and more talk about a NHL lockout. Take your pick. The first weekend of October will give us perhaps the best collection of college football games this year. Just take a look at some of the games this Saturday:
That's just a small sample of how many interesting match-ups we've got this week in college football. This past weekend was bizarre...I just wasn't blown away by any of the Top 10 teams, and it appeared that all of them were looking ahead or not in the mood to dominate. The good news is that there were no major upsets, this side of #8 Stanford losing at Washington...maybe everybody was looking ahead to this upcoming weekend slate of games? I'll tell you another thing that was lost this past weekend in college football, and that was "defense". When I turned on the West Virginia-Baylor game, I should have realized it was going to be one of those weekends. What took place in Morgantown was insane. Both teams lit up the air with footballs and tons of points....the Mountaineers survived 70-63, and quarterback Geno Smith finished up with 8 TD passes and 656 passing yards. Even in the defensive-minded SEC, nobody could tackle....Between the Hedges in Athens, the Dawgs and Vols scored at will in a 51-44, Georgia win. All-in-all, there were 3,160 points scored in 52 FBS games on Saturday, and it was the 2nd highest average scoring day since 1937. It was one of those weekends. Now that we've played one month of college football, the real Top 25 poll should be released....we've had time now to see everybody get challenged. If I had a vote, my Top 5 would look like this:
No pre-season hype....just the eyeball test. But starting this upcoming weekend, expect some seismic shifts in the polls and college football landscape....it's finally time to play some meaningful conference games. I'm still trying to figure out which sporting event pissed me off the most on Sunday.....the Panthers and their ability to suck in the Georgia Dome, or Team USA throwing up all over itself in the Ryder Cup? Either way, both games/matches were high drama and highly disappointing. Don't get me wrong; I was riveted to the couch and the TV, but the endings were both nauseating. Let's start with the Panthers.... There's no doubt that they played better than the last time we saw them....but they had the game right where they wanted, except for Cam Newton's terrible fumble with 2 minutes to play and Ron Rivera's inability to play for the win. I know people will play the armchair QB in this case, but I would never allow a game to be determined by a decision I make to put my weakest unit on the field. I think Cam Newton should be able to pick up a foot for the win 99.9% of the time.....I have very little faith that the Panthers' defense could stop a good high school team when it mattered. Even when the Falcons got the ball at the one-foot line with 60 seconds and no timeouts, I can guarantee you that every Panther fan was still concerned that the game was far from over. That's because the fans in that case are right....we've seen terrible defense from Carolina for a long time. I have more faith in the offensive line, the tens of millions the team has spent on RBs and "Superman" at QB to gain a foot for the win, than I do with the Panther defense being able to stop a cold. The team is now 1-3...and more importantly, 3 games behind the division leading Atlanta Falcons. I have as much faith in this team making a wild card playoff run as I did watching the Panthers' defense in the Georgia Dome with a minute to play. Now, for the choking conquests of the USA Ryder Cup team.... Good grief, where do I start? There was a time when the scoreboard read USA 10-4 over Europe on Saturday....now keep in mind that there were still 2 matches left to be completed on Saturday in addition to the 12 singles matches on Sunday, and all we needed was a few more W's. It didn't work out for the Red, White and Blue. We choked. Steve Stricker looked scared to death....Tiger Woods failed to win a single match the whole week....and Captain Davis Love III was apparently more interested in making sure his buddy Michael Jordan had good seats as the team's assistant. It was a complete meltdown on Sunday as the Euros rallied for a record-breaking victory. Listening to the Euro fans chant their "Ole, ole, ole, ole..." theme on American soil is tough to take.....it will be similar to what Dodgers fans will experience this week, when my SF Giants roll into their dump and officially bury them from the post season. I also got pissed at Phil Mickelson, who seemed to be more interested in being well-liked than going for the throat on Sunday. If I saw him clap and high-five his competitor one more time, I was going to scream. He drives me nuts....and watching our multi-millionaire collection of spineless golfers go soft on Sunday was making me sick. The Ryder Cup is an incredible event....and it produces consistently great drama every two years....but this loss was a tough one for the USA....it's one that will be talked about for ages. And somewhere in heaven, Seve Ballesteros is smiling...karma is a bitch. |
|
|||||||||||||||
