Why "SEC fatigue" is a real problem in college football

Last year after Alabama beat Ohio State to win its sixth national championship in 13 years, I wrote a blog piece about how the dominance of the Crimson Tide was partially the fault of the other blue bloods in college football not holding up their end of the competitive bargain.

That’s still likely true a year later for a number of reasons, but there’s a bigger problem that I missed, and it wasn’t until the Orange Bowl on New Year’s Eve that I saw the error of my ways.

When I wrote the piece about how schools like Michigan, Florida and USC weren’t treating their programs like football factories, I was angry after a 2-4 disaster in Ann Arbor in the COVID shortened season of 2020. The perpetual underachievement of my football program had gotten to me and I was lashing out.

But now, writing this piece, Michigan finished the 2021 season with a 12-2 record, its first win over Ohio State in 10 years in dominant fashion, and a Big Ten championship, all of which earned it the school’s first ever berth in the College Football Playoff as the No. 2 seed.

The Orange Bowl against Georgia should have been a more competitive matchup. It wasn’t. Not even close.

We watched all of the trainwreck that night as the Bulldogs soundly put Michigan in its midwestern place with a 34-11 trouncing that was never close, not even when J.J. McCarthy, our vaunted 5-star savior at QB according to many in our fanbase, came into the game in the second half.

No, Michigan fans. They would not have made the game closer or won it if J.J. had started or played sooner. Be realistic, please.

The problem is almost never as easy as who is at QB for a team, especially in college. QBs can be game changers and elevate an entire team, no question about that, but when you get to the CFP you got to have the whole package at all 22 positions on the field, and this time it was clear that Michigan was missing something, even after a 12-win campaign, that Georgia had in spades.

Talent. 5-star talent to be exact. Across the entire field.

That’s what seriously helped walk-on QB Stetson Bennett to earn the starting job over J.T. Daniels, despite the Georgia fanbase thinking otherwise, and enabled the Bulldogs to crush Michigan and then finally slay the Nick Saban dragon in Alabama 33-18 to claim Georgia’s first national title since 1980, in a game that was a rematch of the SEC Championship Game just a month earlier.

That’s when it became clear that the problem isn’t simply the mindset of the other blue bloods in college football. It’s also the SEC’s dominance against the entire rest of the country. In ALL facets.

This goes beyond Saban’s ridiculous dynasty in Tuscaloosa as well. In fact, since 2006 the SEC has won 12 of the past 16 national championships in football. Alabama has won half of those, Florida and LSU have both won two, Auburn has one in 2010 with Cam Newton at QB, and now Kirby Smart’s Georgia team.

Florida State in 2013, Ohio State in 2014, and Clemson twice in 2016 and 2018 is all the rest of the nation has to speak of for national titles for more than a decade and a half.

Compare that to the previous 16 seasons when 15 different schools claimed national titles from 1990 to 2005. Granted it was a different time and split championships were absolutely a thing, even in the BCS era, but still you had every Power 5 conference in the actual mix. Even the Pac-12, which had Washington win a split title in 1991 and Pete Carroll’s USC squad win twice with a split title in 2003 and an outright championship the following year.

The vice grip that the SEC has built on college football’s ultimate prize since Urban Meyer’s Florida won the title in 2006 has been staggering, impressive, and utterly dominating…but now it’s getting tiresome.

Do the other college football blue bloods like USC, Florida State and certainly Michigan have to change their mindsets? Absolutely. With the onset of NIL and the transfer portal, anyone that works for these football programs and still says things like “we’re going to win the right way,” should be fired immediately. That part of my sentiment on treating college football as the billion-dollar minor league for the NFL that it is, hasn’t changed.

The bigger issue now is that the SEC has a stranglehold on 5-star talent, specifically in the southern states, and they’re still going across the country to Texas, California and the midwest and taking all the 5-star talent from those regions as well. Even if a school like Michigan does change its mindset, how can it compete with Bama, Georgia and the like for the sheer amount of depth in 5-star talent?

First they’ll tell you that stars don’t matter, player development does, and if that were truly the case then Michigan wouldn’t have been thumped as soundly as it was in the Orange Bowl, and Cincinnati would have put up more of a fight against Bama in the Cotton Bowl. Neither happened. As great as those teams were this past season, they simply didn’t match physically with the SEC’s players, and once again the pollsters were rewarded for putting Georgia at No. 1 to start the season and keeping them there all year until Bama beat them, only to have the Bulldogs win the national title rematch. They knew what many of the rest of us didn’t fully know until it was too late.

Then they’ll tell you “Ohio State” is the answer, and while it’s very true that the Buckeyes have been in full football factory mode for a long time, complete with Top 5 recruiting classes in multiple seasons, they still haven’t won a national title in 8 years, and have been thumped just as soundly by the likes of Bama and even Clemson in the CFP ever since. They are not the exception to the rule that many in the midwest think they are, despite all the talent they bring in.

But why is it a serious problem that the SEC is this dominant? Isn’t this just sour grapes from a Michigan fan whose team got rolled by the one that “it just means more” to?

Well, you could ask the audience why it’s a problem. 22.6 million watched the Bama-Georgia rematch, which was good for second-lowest ratings since the CFP format started in 2015.

But it was a 19 percent increase from the previous season! Yes, because last year was the lowest ratings.

Don’t even think of comparing any of this to national NFL ratings either, which went up 10 percent from 2020 are at its highest viewership ratings in six years. Draft Kings and NFL betting in general has a big part in that, but still.

The rest of the country is making it clear that SEC fatigue is real, and while we can’t count on any sort of regulation on recruiting, NIL enforcement or competitive balance in college football, it’s pretty clear that fans and viewers want to see helmets from others conferences more consistently in the national championship picture. The idea that the rest of us have to settle for conference titles and that’s it doesn’t sit well with respect to interest in the sport.

If you’re an SEC fan and you think that other fanbases or the audience for college football doesn’t matter, you’d be gravelly mistaken. Money rules the game on all sides and the advertisers that spent a bundle on those CFP games can’t be too happy that fewer people were seeing their advertisements because they’re tired of seeing Bama or Insert SEC Team Here winning it all. Again.

Maybe NIL is the great equalizer, but even then it comes down to whose boosters are willing to pay more for 5-star recruits, and once someone outside of the SEC does it for a year or two, how long before Bama, Georgia, Texas A&M or someone else in the talent-rich south bounces right back to do it bigger? There may be no answer in sight to the end of this SEC dominance, except the eventual retirement of Nick Saban, and even at that point the monster he created in the conference could be big enough to stand on its own after he leaves.

The NCAA better hope the rest of the country still cares enough to watch at that point.

The Difficult Truth About the College Football Playoff

Courtesy of Alabama Athletics

The 2020 Power 5 college football season ended with the Alabama Crimson Tide winning its 18th national title and seventh with head coach Nick Saban by defeating the Ohio State Buckeyes 52-24 in the national championship game. 

When the season started weeks late and in an abridged format for most schools, the question was whether or not the season would actually finish, and before that it was whether or not a season would actually happen. 

So yes, let’s take a moment to be thankful that despite COVID-19 protocols and outbreaks across the country that affected just about every program in the nation, a season did actually play out, even in abridged form. That’s no small feat given the size of these programs and how many coaches, staff and players are involved normally, now with added testing procedures and protocols to boot. 

It was Herculean in many ways, and while many debate if it should have even happened, in many ways it was a needed release for a lot of us that brought back a sense of normalcy in a time that is anything but normal. 

So now that it’s over, let’s talk turkey about where college football is for a bit in review. 

Alabama is Alabama. They have their own tier in college football. The one that has seven national titles since 2009. No one is competing with that, not even Clemson or Ohio State. 

If you talk to Michigan fans about it, and I’d be cautious of doing so, they’ll tell you it’s awful for college football and until the cheating gets reigned in, the College Football Playoff is just going to be the same 4 or 5 teams every year in Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State, Oklahoma and Notre Dame, and that’s no good for the game. 

They’re not wrong, but they’re still hitting the easy button with it, as are a lot of other college football programs in general. 

We know what the elite schools do. Football factories we call them. Places where kids don’t go to “play school” like Cardale Jones famously said years ago en route to his short lived XFL future. Whether you cry “no evidence” or not, it’s all there and it’s like Malone from The Untouchables said: “The problem isn’t finding it. The problem is who wants to cross Capone.” 

In this case, “Capone” is the SEC, and no the NCAA doesn’t want to cross them. Too much money involved. 

Alright fine, that’s a problem…...but the rest of us are using it as a crutch for the bigger issues. 

Take Michigan for example. In 2016 and 2017 they brought in back to back Top 5 recruiting classes without “going to the darkside.” In fact, more than a few people think they did in order to get the likes of Rashan Gary and Devin Bush to play in Ann Arbor, but Jim Harbaugh didn’t “let the hate flow through him,” he just got really creative the first two years and found a way to bring top flight talent to Michigan football. 

Then he lost that creativity and has been mired in mediocrity ever since, until this past season when his team disastrously clunked its way to 2-4, missing two games because of COVID-19, including the annual Ohio State matchup. 

What happened to Harbaugh that he was able to bring in Top 5 classes for two years and then became perennial Top 10? Was it really the influence of the elite programs? An uneven playing field? Kids that had no interest in playing school in Ann Arbor? 

No, it was because he was losing games. 

I mean sure, there’s plenty of cases where kids like Najee Harris and Alex Leatherwood, kids that Michgan recruited, are going to be swayed by the elite programs, but you don’t do yourself any favors with the rest of the top tier kids on the fence when you’re .500 against lowly Michigan State, wishy-washy Penn State, and now under .500 against a Wisconsin program that hasn’t recruited higher than upper 30’s in decades. In fact, I don’t know that they ever have recruited higher than that. 

Kids want to play and they want to win. Bottom line. That’s what Alabama, Clemson and OSU are doing and have been doing for a number of years now, creating a system of continuity, high expectations and rich rewards. That’s the real factory aspect of it. 

The problem is, the closest that any of the next tier non-elite teams have come to achieving this is Oklahoma and Notre Dame, and before you argue that Oklahoma is an elite program, I’ll ask you to point to their CFP National championship game appearances, let alone their national titles. 

Exactly. Oklahoma is VERY good under Lincoln Riley and they’ve ruled the Big 12 in recent years, but you need to get to the title game at least for the “elite” conversation. 

So you have Oklahoma ruling a conference with no defense that’s all air raid spread, and Notre Dame winning 11 to 12 games with a questionable schedule at best, but still getting that perceptive respect from the CFP at least twice in the last 3 years. Maybe Oklahoma has gone to the dark side with some of the talent they have, but Notre Dame? Doubtful. 

If they can reach the CFP twice in the last three years, there’s no excuse for blue bloods like Michigan, Texas, USC, Georgia and Florida to name a few, to not be in that conversation, and the reason they aren’t isn’t all because Alabama, Clemson and OSU are “force choking” the field. It’s also because rather than be Luke Skywalker in Return of the Jedi, they’re content to be Luke at the end of Empire Strikes Back, with a chopped off hand, denying the truth of their situation, and screaming into the void as they fall down the Cloud City pit. 

Since 2007 when Nick Saban was hired at Alabama, those aforementioned blue bloods have done the following: 

MICHIGAN - Four under .500 seasons, no conference titles, 11-2 best record in 2011

USC - One under .500 season, a nearly decade gap between conference titles in 2008 and 2017, 11-3 best record in 2017

TEXAS -  Four under .500 seasons, One national title game appearance in 2009, 10-4 best record since then

GEORGIA - One under .500 season, one conference title and national title game appearance in 2017, 13-2 best record in that same year

FLORIDA - Two under .500 seasons, one conference title and national title in 2008, 11-2 best record since 2009(twice in 2012 and 2019)

If you’re telling me that all of that for those five programs is their ceiling, given the money, resources and alumni they all have, and the fact that Notre Dame in the last 3 years, has gone to a place twice where only one of them(Georgia) has been ONCE ever, and that it’s because Alabama, Clemson and Ohio State keep them there by breaking the rules, I’m going to call BS on that. Sorry not sorry. 

I can’t speak for the other four schools, but I’ll tell you the problem at Michigan is mindset. We are a mentally weak program right now and we can’t get out of our own way to accept the modern game because we are too busy romanticizing the glory days of Bo and the Ten Year War. We refuse to treat college football as the billion-dollar business that it is, because we still believe that “student-athlete” is a real thing, and that if we start calling these players “amateur athletes,” then we throw away our integrity in the process. Complete and utter lazy button BS. 

As a result of this mindset, we underachieve. Heavily. There’s no reason Michigan shouldn’t be doing more than what Notre Dame has in the past few years, and schedule isn’t an excuse. Look at the Big Ten, it’s no juggernaut conference once you get past Ohio State. Same goes for the Big 12 and Texas and definitely for USC and the Pac-12, a conference that has only ever sent two schools(Oregon and Washington) to the CFP since it started. 

Georgia and Florida have tougher roads being in the SEC, but if Auburn can find a way to beat Bama five times since Saban was hired, the Bulldogs and Gators should be able to figure it out once or twice. 

The ultimate point here is that when it comes to the playing field and the future of the College Football Playoff, it’s a two-way street. Yes, it would be better if the playing field were more level, but it’s not and we’re just going to have to deal with it. Yes, it would be better if the CFP expanded to include more teams, but there’s no guarantee of that. It’s all only half of the equation at the end of the day. 

The other half is these programs climbing out of the pit of mediocrity and holding up their end of the bargain competitively speaking. Michigan fans have no excuses to make about OSU’s unfair practices when we can’t even beat Michigan State, Penn State, Wisconsin, or in 2020’s case, Indiana. Four, five and six-loss seasons aren’t going to cut it for Texas, USC and Florida, and as for Georgia…...have Auburn teach you how to beat Saban every once in a while. Despite his trophy case, his teams can be beaten and have been at times. Time for you to figure it out. 

That’s my takeaway right now on the future of college football after 2020. While so many fans and alumni are decrying the evil empire in Tuscaloosa winning yet another national title on a heavily tilted playing field, it’s time for a lot of us to swallow some pride and admit our programs aren’t doing nearly enough to even get to a point where we can rightfully complain about the tilted playing field. 

Congrats to Alabama again, and thank you for beating the evil in Columbus. Somebody had to do it. 

Sports in the time of COVID-19

Sports are back…...and if I’m being honest about it, I’m really just now starting to enjoy them again. 

It’s been well over a month since the NHL and NBA enacted their bubble plans and MLB started its “let’s just cross that bridge when we come to it, but no fans” plan. Throughout the whole time I was cautious, uncertain if it felt right to be watching pro sports in this weird as hell time in human history with a global pandemic still raging and currently decimating the United States. 

Then football came back and I got into it. Now I’m in a seriously different place altogether. 

Here’s the thing: a part of me did feel guilty about enjoying sports again while COVID-19 is continuing to decimate families and the lives of millions, either directly with the virus’ deadly effects, or indirectly because of economic decisions stemming from it. For months we argued if sports should even come back this year at all since a vaccine is still at least an end of the year prospect. 

So when they did come back with hockey, basketball and baseball, I was just playing it cool. I started to get into NHL playoffs because I was curious about the setup, and I followed the postponements that were happening in MLB because of COVID breakouts. Basketball is my least favorite sport, so I was relying on everyone else to tell me what was happening there. 

To be honest, the NBA and NHL have been impeccable. The bubble plan has worked to this point and we’re almost done with conference finals in hockey and close to starting them in the NBA. Both leagues have made the most of their situations playing “on the road,” and the quality of play hasn’t taken a hit. I take the NBA fans word for that, but I can tell you hockey has been phenomenal to watch. No virus fear on that ice from players at all, and they shouldn’t be because their leagues have done a tremendous job keeping them safe. 

I thought baseball was going to shut down after the first week or two of breakouts, but they continue to march on with this 60-game season, handling situations as they arise. It’s been tricky, but they’re still going. 

Now the NFL is in the mix, having just finished Week 1, and though there was no preseason, this just feels “right.” Like, of all the things that 2020 has turned upside down, the NFL still started in September, and the most we have to deal with so far is pumped in crowd noise to empty stadiums. 

You just hope everything goes well for all of the leagues going forward. Well, I do at least. Admittedly, there is definitely a sentiment of people wanting to see COVID-19 ravage these leagues, so that in some way they can say “told you so” to the dudebros and anti-maskers that have been chanting “let them play” this entire time. 

While I get it, because those dudebros and anti-maskers are literally a public menace and danger to us all, telling them off shouldn’t come at the expense of these players, who want to find a way to make it work through this crazy time just as much as any of us sane people do. 

So as sketchy as I am about NFL teams travelling this season, I sincerely hope no player or coach contracts the disease, especially with people like Washington head coach Ron Rivera getting IV’s before the game so he can be on the sidelines while battling cancer. That’s just crazy tough. 

As weird as it is dealing with all four major sports playing at the same time, and still waiting to see if the Big Ten and Pac-12 reverse their decisions not to play college football while the Big 12 and ACC have now started, and the SEC still set to start soon, it is seriously comforting to see sports back on the broadcast and if they can seriously keep the players safe through all this, then I’ve got nothing to feel guilty about. It’s not like I don’t still dress like Bane to go to the grocery store and I’m taking the pandemic as seriously as anyone terrified of it could be. 

But enough of that. Here’s a roundup from all the action through Monday the 14th: 

NFL

The Lions are still the damned Lions, blowing 4th quarter leads and making me look like a prophet to all of my Bears fan mutuals that wanted Mitch Trubisky jettisoned off the planet for three quarters. Now they’ll never doubt me again when I tell them they have nothing to worry about…...while I continue to suffer my lifelong SOL(Same ol’ Lions) pain. 

On a happier note, the Chiefs still look like the Chiefs, Cam Newton is going to set QB rushing records in New England if he stays upright, and Lamar Jackson is trying to become more dangerous by adding a deep ball. Kyler Murray looked against the 49ers like he used to when I watched him at Oklahoma and that’s terrifying for the NFC West, especially with a former Big 12 QB as his head coach. 

If your team lost don’t take it too seriously, even if you’re a Cowboys fan. NFL is still playing 16 games, so you’ve got a whole season. Worry if they’re still winless by Week 3 or 4. 

Oh, and I wouldn’t count out Tom Brady just yet. It’s not like the NFC South is some juggernaut division and if anyone is determined not to suck like that again, it’s the 43-year old dude that feeds off of people writing him off. Let’s give it the month to see what he does before finally piling dirt on his incredible career. 

NHL

Dallas is in the Stanley Cup finals for the first time in 20 years? I hate that because I figured it out before the announcers said it, because I remember the last time it happened. 2000 when they lost to New Jersey in six on an OT goal from Jason Arnott, in Dallas. I’m not that old dammit, it doesn’t feel like it was two decades ago. 

Anyway, Vegas was my pick to win it all so that’s down a different path now. Odds are Tampa Bay will finish off the Islanders and set up a Stanley Cup showdown that I think few saw coming, but given how many seven-game serieses we had in the second round alone, you can’t count New York out until they’ve lost that fourth game, so we’ll see. 

It’s amazing how fantastic a job the league has done with the bubble playoffs, considering how badly they’ve mangled the draft, and yes I’d say that even if I wasn’t a Wings fan. It’s seriously just a dumb system that makes no sense at all. Ah well. 

MLB

I really haven’t watched any games but it looks like all the divisions are tight going into the homestretch, with the possible exception of the AL West. This is one where I’m going to wait until the playoffs set up and go from there because it looks like a crazy different field is possible in this odd duck of a season. Tampa Bay winning the AL East? San Diego 15 games over .500? Wild. Should be fun to watch. 

NBA

With Milwaukee and Toronto gone and all the major dark horses out, this looks like it’s the Lakers title to lose, which before the pandemic was totally a “win one for Kobe” storyline. It’s still probably that, just with a lot of extra factors now involved. As of the time of this post, the Clippers were set to play Game 7 against Denver. Maybe they have a shot, but if you need seven games to take out Denver, potentially, can you really beat Lebron and AD? More savvy NBA fans could answer that one better than I can. 

NCAA

Someone let me know when the Big Ten is actually set to play games officially. Until then, I don’t want to hear anything about votes happening, meetings convened or teams that are rumored to still not play and how much those alumni are going to be outraged over it, so much that they’ll sue for personal emotional distress in the most selfish manner possible. 

That’s all I got for this week. Here’s hoping all the ones after this stay fun. I think we need it, seriously, since 2020 has been anything but. 

NHL proves it is a masterclass of parity

I watched more playoff hockey this past season than I have in the last decade and there’s a big reason for that.

I’ve been a hockey fan for 23 years but admittedly things went south for me after the second of Gary Bettman’s THREE lockouts during his tenure as Commissioner of the National Hockey League. Seriously, I know three strikes is a baseball thing but why does this man still have his job? Especially with as much as he is soundly booed across the entire league? I digress.

The second NHL lockout that wiped out the 2004-2005 season and played a decent part in why Steve Yzerman never got to 700 goals in his career(yes, I’m still bitter about that) is the one that really changed the game of hockey from what I knew and enjoyed for nearly a decade into what the game has evolved into now. That’s when the salary cap era began, that’s when the big rule changes came into play and most importantly from a fan standpoint, that’s when National Hockey Night on ESPN officially died and the “Versus Rebirth” rolling into the NBC Sports era officially started. It was jarring, it was different and even though I gave it a shot for the first few years because the Red Wings were still great, I didn’t like it. It was too different for me in many ways.

So once the Wings started their descent into mediocrity, I checked out for a good bit. I followed from afar and kept minimal tabs on winners and losers, but I didn’t watch nearly as religiously as I used to, which was disappointing because hockey has been my 1B favorite sport along with my 1A of football for a long time. I didn’t like that I wasn’t digging how the game had changed overall.

Within the last five or six years though, I was trying to come around. The Wings were in a rough place and it was only getting rougher, but there were some fun things happening, most notably when it came to the Stanley Cup winners. Outside of Chicago’s non-dynasty winning in 2010, 2013 and 2015 and Pittsburgh’s back-to-back wins in 2016 and 2017, you had the LA Kings winning it all as an 8-seed in 2012, only to come back two years later to win again with actual home ice 2014. That was a great story.

Washington finally getting over the hump 20 years since the 1998 finals when the Wings swept the Capitals in four games was fun to watch, mostly for Alex Ovechkin who can now retire with a cup victory in his career. That was another great story.

Then you get to the 2019 NHL playoffs, which was seriously just a thing to behold.

In the weeks leading up to the playoffs, I had caught some games on Hockey Night In Canada during late workout sessions at the gym. I saw enough to rekindle my sports hatred for Toronto and Pittsburgh and also raise an eyebrow at the New York Islanders and Columbus in the process. I also had no idea Calgary was really good again either and yes, I was rooting against Tampa Bay breaking the 1995-1996 Red Wings record for most victories in a single season. Once a Wings fan, always a Wings fan. Period.

When the chaos actually started in the first round of the playoffs, it was seriously the most fun I’ve had following hockey in a long time. First the Islanders got out of the first round with a sweep of the Penguins, which warmed my heart but it wasn’t exactly an upset. What WAS an upset though, was Columbus taking out Tampa Bay in its own shocking sweep that ended on the Blue Jackets home ice. In four games, the President’s Trophy winner was dispatched by a franchise that had never won a playoff series before in its existence. Incredible.

Then Colorado, a franchise I used to loathe with great intensity, dispatched Calgary in five games, which now meant that both 8-seeds in the NHL playoffs got out of the first round in five games or less. Unbelievable.

If that wasn’t enough, there were THREE Game Sevens in the first round, the least fun of which was Boston eliminating Toronto, though I did appreciate the Leafs going home in an early exit. Believe it or not, Carolina beating Washington in double overtime to win that series and send the defending champions home was second place in terms of the Game Sevens on the “fun” meter. No, the best one by far was San Jose scoring four goals in a matter of minutes in the third period to erase a 3-0 deficit and take a 4-3 lead late in the game, only to have Las Vegas tie it in the final minute before San Jose ultimately won in overtime. One of the craziest, most high octane Game Sevens I’ll ever see in my life.

In the second round, Carolina went on a roll and swept the Islanders, keeping its clock from reaching midnight into the third round, while every other series went at least six games and San Jose needed another seven game series to dispatch Colorado, the team that knocked out the top seed in the Western Conference. Mind you the entire time, St. Louis was going about its business knocking out Winnipeg in six games and Dallas in seven games, before rinsing and repeat the same formula against San Jose in the conference finals to reach the Stanley Cup Finals for the first time since Richard Nixon was the President of the United States, while Boston hit the snooze button on Carolina in a sweep to punch its ticket.

With all of this happening in the earlier rounds, that made it all the more fitting that St. Louis, the team that was in last place in January without a consistent starting goaltender at the time, would battle and claw their way through another seven game series, the sixth total in the NHL playoffs this season, to win its first Stanley Cup in franchise history. Thus concluding the true year of the underdog in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, from Round 1 all the way to the end.

There’s no other league that does parity quite like the NHL does. This is hardly the first time we’ve seen a major underdog hockey club win it all, but having so many major upsets in the first round and seeing a last place team in January win it all six months later is nearly impossible in each of the other professional leagues. Upsets of this magnitude rarely happen if ever in the NBA, MLB only puts 10 out of 30 teams into the playoffs in the first place so there’s really no true underdogs that even make the Fall Classic, and the NFL’s parity is so blatantly manufactured and mostly takes place during the regular season, that a team that may have started the year as an underdog might have a bye week in January once the playoffs start, and even that hasn’t been enough to push aside a franchise like the New England Patriots from going to four of the last five Super Bowls and winning three of them.

Meanwhile in the NHL, all you have to do is make the field of 16 and get hot at the right time. It doesn’t even need to be the whole team, it could be just your goalie, a case that could certainly be made about Jordan Binnington, the 25-year old Blues goalie that stood on his head in crucial games for St. Louis, including Game 7 of the Finals where he stopped 32 of 33 shots to seal the win.

Before Binnington it was Jonathan Quick standing on his head for the LA Kings when they won in 2012 as an 8-seed. Before that it was the 2006 Edmonton Oilers that were an 8-seed in the West before smashing their way to become the first 8-seed in NHL history to make the finals, even pushing Carolina to seven games before losing the series.

Indeed, the NHL has cornered the market on parity in professional sports in a way that no other league can truly claim, and if it’s going to be this much fun to watch on a yearly basis, then count me all the way back in……especially if and when the Wings get good again.

How Urban Meyer defeated Ohio State

On Wednesday August 22, 2018 we witnessed the end of a powerful and mostly proud era of Ohio State University.

I say mostly proud because the recent controversy isn’t the first time that the school and its football program have been implicated in scandal. Seven years ago, amid an NCAA investigation into improper benefits violations involving OSU football players, then head coach Jim Tressel was forced to resign from the program after a 94-22 win-loss record, six conference titles and a national championship in 2002. Long before that, the school fired its long-time patriarch Woody Hayes after he punched a Clemson nose guard during the 1978 Gator Bowl. He had coached OSU for 28 years with a 205-61-10 record, 13 conference titles, and five national championships.

The two coaches that had arguably the most success for the Buckeyes in their time were both dismissed summarily amid scandal, which clearly indicated that no matter how successful a coach was for OSU, one man was never bigger than the team or the school itself.

That’s all over now with the revelation that OSU’s current head coach, Urban Meyer, will retain his job and only receive a three-game suspension for his dereliction of duty in properly reporting the domestic abuse perpetrated by one of his ex-coaches, Zach Smith in 2015. For comparison sake, Meyer’s record with the Buckeyes in six seasons is 73-8 with two conference titles and a national championship in 2014. Those numbers and records clearly seem to mean more now than they did back in the days of Tressel or Hayes that’s for sure.

Since the Zach Smith scandal began at OSU and Meyer was implicated to have known about it since it happened, a great debate has raged across the country about exactly what punishment Meyer should receive coming off of the administrative leave he had been placed on after it was determined that he openly lied to several reporters at Big Ten Media Days when he said he didn’t know about the domestic violence situation and even suggested that it was fabricated. OSU fans have been outright defiant in their defense of him, stating that Meyer did nothing wrong and in many cases, victim blaming Courtney Smith, the ex-wife of Zach Smith who says he was abusing her in the past. Questions of legalities, procedures and all manner of ethics were thrown on the table at once for everyone to discuss for the two weeks that OSU investigated the situation.

In the end, none of it mattered because the board of trustees wanted him to remain, providing a statement that seems to openly admit and sanction his lying about the situation in the first place.

Thus, brings us to the end of an era with Ohio State where it didn’t matter how much success a coach had at the program, the program and the school always came first, and they would simply find a new head coach to pick up where the previous one had left off in terms of success on the field. That’s clearly not the case anymore since Meyer will be keeping his job and serving a paltry suspension that ends before the bulk of the Big Ten season even begins, which now has the school and the program sending two messages to all of us:

1 – Urban Meyer is bigger than Ohio State.

2 – Enabling domestic violence is not a serious offense at Ohio State.

The actions of the Board of Trustees and the school president completely confirm both of these things and it’s extremely unfortunate, because not only does it tarnish the perception of OSU as a school that is respectful to women, but it also eliminates the “blueblood” status of the football program being the most important entity on campus. Clearly that’s no longer the case, as Urban Meyer has won said status for himself against the football program with his tone-deaf and clumsily arranged “victory” over the board and the school.

Sadly, the OSU faithful will never even realize the truly monstrous defeat they have just suffered at the hands of a single head coach. Right now, Meyer has the entire city of Columbus putty in his hands. They’re openly defending his lies, they’re attacking journalists on social media like a mob and they’re holding rallies to support his deceitful employment and make no mistake it is PROVEN deceitful. He openly LIED about knowing of Smith’s domestic violence and then later admitted that he lied MULTIPLE times. That alone should be enough to warrant termination on the grounds that no one in or outside the program should ever trust you again. If you lied to dozens of reporters to cover up the abuse of one of your coaches, how do the parents of a recruit know you won’t lie to them? How do the players, other coaches or administration know? What do you tell the mothers of recruits about your lack of attention to domestic violence? What do you tell the female students on campus as well? How can anyone rightfully trust you again?

For Buckeye fans, it seems all he has to do is win at a 90 percent clip and beat Michigan on a regular basis. As long as he does that, his assistants can do whatever they want, as Smith did for far too long. If that’s how the school is going to treat this from now on, then I suggest renaming the school “The Urban Meyer University,” or at least stop saying “The Ohio State University,” because if you’re good with this suspension, then you don’t believe your school is big enough to warrant such a stately title. If you did, Meyer’s fate would have been the same as Tressel or Hayes and you’d be talking about how you’ll still win the Big Ten no matter who coaches your team. It’s too bad you don’t have any more confidence in your program as a whole……or self-respect.

P.S. OSU defenders, please save your "whataboutisms" when reading this post. We have heard them all and quite frankly, when you are scrutinized enough by everyone else to the point that you have to deflect attention from your own troubles by claiming that everyone else has them as well, that just makes you look more pathetic and fanboyish. Not a good look. Just a thought. 

IN MEMORIAM: Keith Jackson (1928-2018)

The first time I heard Keith Jackson's voice in a college football game was on September 27, 1997. That afternoon, he and Bob Griese called Notre Dame at Michigan in Ann Arbor, which turned out to be a thrilling 21-14 comeback win for Michigan that kept the Wolverines perfect early in the season right before Big Ten play began the next week. 

I had only been a football fan for about a year even though I was a fan of the University of Michigan itself since I was four years old. The way this game was called on this day set the tone for my expectations on how college football games should be called for the rest of eternity. It was classic, it was memorable and it was professional. No silly jokes, no egregious mistakes and no inflammatory commentary. That was the day that I learned for myself that Keith Jackson was THE best play-by play commentator in the business and he would be unmatched by anyone else in the country at that position. 

I enjoyed so many of his calls over the next few years before his retirement from the broadcast booth and he always seemed to call the big Michigan games in the short time that I was able to hear him. Some big wins over Penn State in 1997 and 1998 and the classic 1997 Ohio State game are some that come to mind personally. Since his retirement and thanks to YouTube, I've gone back to watch and hear a lot of his great calls over the years that I never got to experience live. To say that Jackson really was the last "classic" college football play-by-play commentator would be an understatement. The world of play-by-play changed so much after his retirement and it's not the same as it was when he was in the booth. That's not just because he left, but also because of how the world of college football and how we consume it changed with new technologies and advancements in social media and the Internet itself. In many ways, Jackson's retirement at the time was perfect because he never got wrapped in what play-by-play has become today and that's a GOOD thing for those of us who are great fans of him. 

As I reflect on the recent passing of Keith Jackson at 89 years of age, I'm left with a bittersweet realization that there will never be another "Keith Jackson" when it comes to calling college football games, which speaks to how unique and irreplaceable he is, but also to how we will never have someone of his level in the broadcast booth ever again. That's not a shot at those who call games now, it's just remarking on how fantastic Jackson was at his craft. I am thankful for the short time that I was able to enjoy his calls of Michigan games before his retirement and it is no understatement to say that he will be sorely missed by all of us who loved his great calls over an incredible career. 

RIP Keith Jackson. You've got "daylight and green grass in front of you" now, buddy. 

Sound bites, introductions, funny comments and play calls of Keith Jackson calling Michigan football.

Stop blaming Golden State for why the NBA sucks

The Golden State Warriors are NBA champs. They did so by winning a league-best 67 games in the regular season, and then swept Portland, Utah and San Antonio en route to beating the Cleveland Cavaliers in five games in the finals. They lost a grand total of ONE game in the playoffs this season. Total and utter dominance, for certain. 

To hear a lot of people tell it, the Warriors' very existence is the root of all evil in professional basketball today. The fact that the "Dubs" went out and got Kevin Durant to assemble a "super team" that no one in the league had any chance of beating, is apparently the reason why the 2016-17 season was so boring and predictable because it was a foregone conclusion that Golden State would win it all.

That's somehow the Warriors' fault, or at the very least Durant since he left Oklahoma City high and dry just to win a title with a loaded team. Now the NBA is seemingly ruined because this is what is making the league non-competitive, predictable and no fun to watch. The product itself suffers because the "super team" concept is killing it. 

That might be the most ridiculously lazy conclusion for any fan to make, sour grapes or not, but to hear people tell it today in the wake of Golden State's title, it's the most valid reason on the planet for why the NBA is a garbage product. 

To these people arguing this, I have one question: What about the other 28 teams in the league? 

I say 28 because even though they really aren't a "super team," the Cavaliers are head and shoulders the best team in the Eastern Conference and are pretty definitively the second-best team in the league. We all could have predicted before the season started that the finals would be a collision course between Cleveland and Golden State, and as long as the key superstars on both sides don't make any major moves elsewhere, we can predict that for the next couple of years at least. I agree that it's boring and predictable, but how is that the Cavs and Warriors' fault? Where is the rest of the NBA in this equation? 

The NBA has a salary cap, so this really isn't a case of "haves" and "have nots" like it is with baseball where there is no limit on spending. Sure it's a soft cap with luxury taxes if you go over in the NBA, but that still doesn't account for why two teams, neither of which is the highest valued team in the league, are so far ahead of everyone else in terms of competitive balance. In fact, Cleveland was one of three franchises that lost money last year along with the Los Angeles Clippers and Oklahoma City because of excessive payrolls that triggered their luxury tax. The Cavs lost $40 million, which was the fifth-largest loss in NBA history according to Forbes, due to $185 million in player costs. Golden State's value as a franchise DID increase to $2.6 billion this year, but that puts them third behind the New York Knicks and Los Angeles Lakers in terms of most valuable franchises. All 30 teams earned $5.9 billion in revenue last year and the average value of franchises went up 9 percent to $1.36 billion on average apiece. 

The point here is that NBA teams are not so far away from Cleveland or Golden State that they can't spend as much money as either team did for Lebron James or Kevin Durant. Sure it hurt the Cavs financially, but they did get a title out of it last year and they've been to three straight NBA finals now. So is anyone going to point the finger at teams like New York, the Lakers, Boston, Chicago, the Clippers, Brooklyn, Houston, Dallas or Miami for why the competitive balance is out of whack in the league? Those teams along with the Warriors are your Top Ten most valuable franchises in the NBA as listed by Forbes. Why are THEY off the hook for their bad business decisions that weaken the league far more than Golden State's "super team" does? 

The Warriors as a franchise did what they had to do and got a player that got them back to the finals to win it again. It doesn't matter that it was Kevin Durant and that their team was strong enough with Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and the rest of the lineup that they didn't need a player quite as strong as Durant to get back over the hump. The opportunity was there and they took it, as any well run franchise should do. Calling the Warriors' moves "unfair" and claiming that what they did is ruining the game is asinine at best, outright lazy and ignorant at worst. Golden State is the model for what a strong NBA franchise should do: draft well, develop your talent, build a strong core and then pull the trigger on a strong free agent or two to get you to the promised land. 

As far as the rest of the league is concerned, only half of those Top Ten most valuable franchises, Golden State, Houston, L.A. Clippers, Boston and Chicago, made the playoffs. That means the other half of franchises that are considered the most valuable in the league and made a minimum of $185 million in revenue last season, sucked on the court. Four of them, Dallas, LA Lakers, New York and Brooklyn, finished in the Bottom 10 of the season standings, with the Nets dead last having won 20 games out of an 82-game season. I guess that's all because of Kevin Durant going to the Warriors, right? 

What about the other teams that DID make the playoffs? Did Durant going to Golden State really keep Houston and San Antonio from being more competitive in the playoffs? Or do those teams have other issues that kept them from winning a game against the Dubs in the postseason? How about Boston, Washington or Toronto, the top three records in the East? What really kept any of them from giving the Cavs a battle en route to the finals? Was it because Lebron is just that good, or do the failings of those teams have anything to do with it either? 

Ultimately, the problem with the NBA does not rest on what two teams are doing, but rather on what the other 28 are failing to do. I'm a Detroit Pistons fan and I don't have enough time in this post to explain to you the mountain of problems that franchise is suffering right now, yet we are about to get a new arena next season. I promise you it won't be filled every night if the team keeps floundering, and that has nothing to do with Cleveland or Golden State's success. The same can be said for fans of any other NBA franchise with regard to competitive balance. 

This isn't even getting into the fundamental issues that the NBA has, like continuing to pay millions to 19 and 20-year old players solely on their potential and running a league where defense is now officially an afterthought. When your best defensive team points per game (Utah) is still allowing an average of 97 points per contest, that tells you the state of defensive basketball as a whole in the NBA. No one wants to see defense, the game is not called in a way that truly allows it and these players are largely not interested in playing it to any major intensity. That is the NBA today. 

So as much as I'm sure many people want to point the finger at Golden State's "super team" or at Kevin Durant in particular, especially basketball fans in Cleveland or Oklahoma City, the fact is that the blame really goes everywhere else around the league and on the league itself when it comes to the product being boring, predictable and difficult to watch. The most you can blame either the Cavs or the Warriors for is taking advantage of the rest of the league's widespread weakness. If the NBA wants more competitive balance and an exciting playoffs to watch, then the rest of the league needs to step up and make better decisions when it comes to building teams that have a shot to win. It's a complicated process, but that's what GM's are paid big money to do. When more of them start doing it, then the league can begin to get stronger again. Until then, get ready for Round Four of Warriors-Cavs in 2018 because the rest of the NBA is in no position to stop it......yet. 

NHL ROUNDUP: I need an Ottawa-Nashville Stanley Cup finals, please

This is the Stanley Cup Finals match-up I am hoping to see this year. Pittsburgh and Anaheim fans would disagree. 

For the first time in 25 years, I didn't have a horse in the race for the Stanley Cup Playoffs. I'm a Detroit Red Wings fan and thanks to a front office that is incapable of handling an NHL that limits everyone's spending, we found ourselves on the outside looking in without a playoff spot to be had. 

This is just one instance of how the National Hockey League has changed over the years. The other would be to look at the conference finals match-ups right now, with the Nashville Predators set to take on the Anaheim Ducks in the West and the Ottawa Senators getting ready to battle the Pittsburgh Penguins in the East. In both cases, one team waited for the other to finish a seventh game in the semifinal round. Anaheim did so against Edmonton in a series that went back and forth with lead changes until the Ducks finished the job in Anaheim, while Pittsburgh nearly blew a three games to one lead, losing Games 5 and 6 to Washington before shutting out the Capitals 2-0 on the road to reach the conference finals yet again. 

Ok, maybe not everything has changed over the years in the NHL. The Washington Capitals still can't be counted on to win. Anything. Ever. As bad as this season was for the Red Wings, I couldn't imagine being a Caps fan overall. At least I have 4 Stanley Cups in the past 20 years to show for some tough times. All a Caps fan has in that same period of time is 6 conference semifinals losses, 7 first round playoff exits, 7 seasons of missing the playoffs and ONE Stanley Cup Finals appearance......in 1998 when they were swept by the Red Wings. 

It's not for lack of trying either. The Capitals have tried almost everything. Talent, coaching, organizational changes and even a major rebuild that helped them land one of the best players in the world who would become the face of the franchise in Alexander Ovechkin. Yet for his entire NHL career now spanning 12 years, he's never even been to the Eastern Conference Finals, usually running into Pittsburgh, the New York Rangers or Tampa Bay pushing them out of the playoffs in two rounds or less. I thought they might have a shot with Barry Trotz behind the bench, but even he can't get this franchise to the conference finals, let alone the Stanley Cup Finals. If you're a Caps fan, you likely need a hug......a BIG hug for the last 20 years of abject failure. I'd give you one if I could. 

Now we have to deal with the Penguins in the conference finals. Again. As if we haven't had enough of Commissioner Gary Bettman's golden boy Sidney Crosby and his next-level catalog of cheap shots and chippy play to go with his future Hall of Fame career, playing once again for the chance to hoist Lord Stanley's chalice. The Ottawa Senators, a franchise younger than The Simpsons that briefly tasted a Stanley Cup final in 2007 stands in Pittsburgh's way after dispatching two Original Six teams, Boston and the Rangers, in six games each. They don't have home ice, but they are surely our only chance to keep Crosby and his motley crew from reaching the final round. As a long time Crosby and Penguins hater, I need that to happen for sure. 

That's only half the battle, though. The other half is out west with a franchise that is also younger than The Simpsons and kept Ottawa from winning a cup in 2007, the Anaheim Ducks, and their next opponent the Nashville Predators. After sweeping Calgary in the first round, Anaheim needed every bit of seven games to dispatch the Edmonton Oilers to reach its fifth conference final in franchise history. Nashville on the other hand, swept Chicago in Round 1 and took care of St. Louis in six games for Round 2 to reach its first conference final ever. In Everdom. For the record, the Predators are barely older than Family Guy for reference. 

My hatred of the Ducks goes back to when they were still associated with Disney and called themselves "The Mighty Ducks." Don't get it twisted, I love those movies but the team was more than annoying and pesky on the ice. Paul Kariya and Teemu Selanne were just annoying to deal with, even on a team that missed the playoffs more often than it made them in the first decade. I respected the talent, but they would win games they had no business winning a lot of times and they almost won a cup that they had no business winning in 2003 with a team that had no offense and a white hot goalie. It wasn't long after that they dropped the "Mighty" from their moniker, changed the logo and color scheme and became the consistently decent to solid Anaheim Ducks we have seen for the last decade. My hatred still remains though, and Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry haven't done anything to change that one bit. 

I SHOULD hate Nashville still for the time that Shea Weber tried to decapitate Henrik Zetterberg in the 2012 playoffs, but he's in Montreal now via a trade for one of my favorite players, P.K. Subban, so my hatred has waned in that regard, along with time. In addition, the Preds have been a great story so far and they are definitely the biggest underdog left in the playoffs so they aren't too difficult to root for. Plus, Nashville is 2-0 against the Ducks in the playoffs all-time, winning four games to two in the first round of the 2011 playoffs and four games to three in the first round last year as well. I'm sure plenty would say that Anaheim is due for some payback and home-ice advantage will assist them, but the Predators will be a tough out to say the least. 

At any rate, my displeasure for both Pittsburgh and Anaheim means that I am rooting for an Ottawa-Nashville finals, which would be great theater as the Senators would try to become the first Canadian NHL franchise to win a Stanley Cup in 24 years, and the Predators would try to win their first cup in franchise history on their first ever finals appearance. Putting my fan preference aside, wouldn't that be more exciting than watching Anaheim try to win its second cup in a decade or Pittsburgh trying to win its third cup in 8 years and also win in back-to-back seasons? I think so. You probably don't agree with me if you live in Anaheim or Pittsburgh, though. Oh well, here's hoping you both lose in the conference finals. It's not like I have a team to personally root for anyway. Why hasn't Ken Holland been fired yet? That's another topic for another offseason blog post. There's still a lot of hockey left to be played this season yet. 

Why the NHL isn't what it used to be

I figured out the real reason that I don't watch hockey like I used to anymore. 

I started watching hockey hardcore in the mid 90's when the Detroit Red Wings were one of the best if not the best franchise in the league. At the time, they were the only Detroit professional sports team that was in that position to win it all, but I didn't jump on the bandwagon right when they won a Stanley Cup in 1997. No, it was actually two years before that when they lost in the finals to New Jersey. The following year they when they set a record for most wins in a season with 62, they got crushed by Colorado in the conference finals and so did my heart, but I stuck with them and got rewarded as a fan with Stanley Cups in 1997, 1998 and 2002. 

I absorbed any and everything that the NHL did for almost a decade from 1995 to 2004, and then the second of commissioner Gary Bettman's NHL lockouts happened. Well they aren't his exactly, but they both happened on his watch as did the third one in 2012. It was that second one that really hurt me though because it wiped out a whole season and was the official line of demarcation between the NHL that I used to know and the one that we all know now. 

Rules changed, players changed and a salary cap went up. Suddenly this NHL looked a lot different than what I remembered before the second lockout and I didn't like it much, not nearly as much as I used to. Was it because I got older and started leaning more toward football and baseball? Did I have blinders on for the way things used to be since so many people told me how great the game of hockey had become now and I just couldn't see it? Was it simply because all of the players I grew up watching were now retired and many gone into the Hall of Fame? I'll admit it's still weird seeing Steve Yzerman as the GM of Tampa Bay instead of wearing No. 19 down at Joe Louis Arena. Maybe I am getting old. 

But seriously, the true reason finally came to me when the NHL released the list of the 100 Greatest Players of All Time. I read this whole list three times, and each time I read it for a different reason. 

First I read it to make sure Steve Yzerman was on it. Check. Good, now the list isn't complete crap. 

Second, I read it to see how many players on it were former Red Wings in their careers. 28. Damn right. GO WINGS. 

Finally, I read it to see how many players on the list were ones that I actually grew up watching live either in person or on TV. 40, and only six of them are either currently active or only recently inactive like Pavel Datsyuk. 

There it is. That's why hockey changed for me. It wasn't just because of the strike in 2004, it was also because an era where 34 of the best players in NHL history that all played at the same time had ended. I didn't know it at the time, but I had literally started watching hockey during a golden age for the NHL. It was so obvious looking at the names on the list: 

Ray Bourque, Martin Brodeur, Pavel Bure, Chris Chelios, Paul Coffey, Sergei Fedorov, Peter Forsberg, Ron Francis, Grant Fuhr, Mike Gartner, Wayne Gretzky, Dominik Hasek, Brett Hull, Jaromir Jagr, Pat Lafontaine, Brian Leetch, Mario Lemieux, Nicklas Lidstrom, Eric Lindros, Al Macinnis, Mark Messier, Mike Modano, Scott Niedermayer, Joe Nieuwendyk, Adam Oates, Chris Pronger, Luc Robitaille, Patrick Roy, Joe Sakic, Teemu Selanne, Brendan Shanahan, Scott Stevens, Mats Sundin and Steve Yzerman. 

That's more than a third of the list of the greatest players of ALL TIME and they all played at THE SAME TIME. Incredible. What are the odds of us seeing that much all-time great talent on the ice at once ever again? 

This isn't an indictment of current NHL superstars in the league now, it's really just pointing out that there aren't nearly as many of them in the league at once anymore and it likely will never be that way ever again. So when I talk about how different the game is today than it was in the 90's when I loved it as much as life itself, it's because I was watching it at the peak of its combined talent level. The odds of the NHL ever reaching that zenith ever again especially with continued expansion efforts and how the rules have changed since the 90's era are slim to none. 

So maybe I should accept that and move on, right? After all, it's not like the NHL is devoid of talent today. There's much of it that I don't know and am not familiar with, much like I'm not familiar with the Red Wings being one of the worst teams in the league like they are now. The rules have changed but the game still remains the same and I really should give it another shot because I do miss it. A lot. 

But don't tell me that it's as strong talent-wise now as it was in the 1990's. The NHL now agrees with me that it isn't. Not by a long shot. 

COLLEGE FOOTBALL WEEK 1 BREAKDOWN

College football is back......and with a incredible bang, to boot. 

The first weekend of college football was nothing short of spectacular. I mean, wow. We saw the whole gamut in four days of awesome from surprisingly close games, to surprisingly not close games, to flat out awesome upsets in the Top 25. So much happened that even now, days later and the Labor Day weekend long gone, I'm still decompressing from it. 

So let's hit some of the big moments from last weekend that have already made 2016 a great college football season so far: 

Houston QB Greg Ward Jr. threw for 321 yards and two touchdowns in the Cougars 33-23 upset over Oklahoma. 

HOUSTON EXPOSES THE SOONERS

Clearly the Cougars are out to prove that last year's 13-1 record with a Peach Bowl win over Florida State wasn't a fluke. I think now they have our full attention after they just dominated a CFB playoff team from last year. Oklahoma dropped out of the Top 5 to 13 in the Coaches Poll and 14 in the AP poll after a 33-23 season opening loss to Houston that featured a Kick Six touchdown on a missed field goal attempt. Seriously, a Kick Six in Week 1. Fantastic. Houston's in the Top 10 now and we'll see how long they stay there threatening to cause havoc for the Power 5 schools looking to make the playoff this year. They've already got Oklahoma reeling and looking to bounce back fast against Louisiana-Monroe. 

Wisconsin RB Corey Clement rushed for 86 yards and a touchdown in the Badgers 16-14 win over LSU at Lambeau Field in Green Bay. 

THE BADGERS REMIND THE NATION THAT THEY ARE GOOD BY BEATING LSU

There are two constants in college football: Wisconsin is always good and LSU is always overrated. Seriously, I've never quite understood how LSU gets so much praise every season and Wisconsin just doesn't. The Badgers have had six 10-win seasons in the last decade, three Big Ten championships in a row from 2010 to 2012, and haven't missed a bowl game in 14 seasons. LSU on the other hand since winning a national title game in 2008 has won the SEC once in that span and are just 4-4 in bowl games since 2008. They also have this tendency to not have even solid QB's running their offense. So why were we all that surprised that Wisconsin beat them? In Wisconsin? At Lambeau Field, no less? I sure as hell wasn't, and that's not taking anything away from the Badgers beating a Top 5 SEC school, knocking the Tigers down to 22 in the Coaches Poll and 21 in the AP Poll while Wisconsin went from being unranked to 16 in the Coaches Poll and 10 in the AP Poll. I'm saying they should have gotten more credit, perhaps. Kudos to the Badgers for mostly containing Leonard Fournette and contributing to what was an abysmal day overall for the SEC. More on that later. 

Texas QB Tyrone Swoopes dives for the game winning touchdown in double overtime against Notre Dame. 

TEXAS PULLS OFF THE TRUE UPSET OF THE WEEK AGAINST THE IRISH

Last year, the Longhorns managed 163 yards of offense and one field goal in 60 minutes of play and got destroyed 38-3 by Notre Dame in South Bend. This year, they eclipsed those numbers well before halftime and kept going to the tune of 517 yards of offense and a 50-47 double overtime victory over the Irish, which dropped the Domers to 21 in the Coaches Poll and 18 in the AP Poll, while pushing Texas into the Top 25 at 20 in the Coaches Poll and all the way up to 11 in the AP Poll. Longhorns head coach Charlie Strong, who seems like he's been coaching for his job each of the last two seasons balanced his two-QB system masterfully in the game between freshman passer Shane Buechele who threw for 280 yards, 2 touchdowns and an interception, and senior runner Tyrone Swoopes who had three rushing touchdowns including the game winner to end it in the second overtime. Meanwhile, Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly after watching DeShone Kizer lead the Irish to late season playoff contention and a 10-3 record, couldn't decide who he wanted to play at QB between Kizer and Malik Zaire in the first half before coming to his senses on Kizer for the rest of the game. That shouldn't have been in doubt in the first place and it really shouldn't be now, but Notre Dame might have a bigger problem with its defense this season as they lick their wounds and look to bounce back at home against Nevada, while the Longhorns look to ride this momentum for as long as they can. This might be real fun to watch for sure. 

Alabama true freshman QB Jalen Hurts got past a fumble and an interception to score four total touchdowns in the Crimson Tide's obliteration of USC, 52-6. 

NICK SABAN'S FOOTBALL FACTORY CONTINUES TO BE FULLY OPERATIONAL

I actually thought for a moment in the first half that USC had a shot to pull off the biggest upset of the day itself at the "Jerrydome" in Dallas. Then Alabama remembered that they were Alabama and promptly killed my Cherry Wheat buzz with 38 unanswered points on the way to a 52-6 annihilation of Southern Cal. This with a true freshman at QB, who fumbled on his first play from scrimmage and threw an interception but scored four total touchdowns in the game. Anybody really surprised at this at all? Of course not, this is standard operating procedure for The Crimson Tide. We just have to wait and see what they do in the SEC this season, which starts in a week and a half when they go to Ole Miss to try and exact revenge for their one loss early last season. 

The Big Ten went 12-2 in Week 1 while the SEC went 7-6 with a couple of losses from Top 25 ranked teams. 

THE BIG TEN SHOWED UP WHILE THE SEC SPUTTERED

12 of the 14 Big Ten teams that played opening weekend won. That includes Purdue and Illinois who both won big for coaches Darrell Hazell and Lovie Smith respectively, but not Northwestern who surprisingly lost to Western Michigan by a point and Rutgers who got absolutely drilled by Washington. Michigan State and Minnesota survived close calls with Furman and Oregon State, Iowa, Indiana, Nebraska and Penn State won comfortably against their opponents and Maryland thrashed FIU while Michigan and Ohio State absolutely throttled Hawaii and Bowling Green by 60 and 67 point margins respectively, and of course Wisconsin with the top conference win of the weekend against LSU. The SEC on the other hand wasn't so lucky at all. Alabama took care of business along with Florida and Georgia while Texas A&M, Arkansas and Tennessee squeaked by their opponents, but Auburn, Mississippi State, Missouri, Kentucky, Ole Miss and LSU all lost in Week 1, prompting the "SEC is overrated" chatter earlier than I can remember hearing it. The season just started and there's months of football to be played yet, but it's nice hearing how the Big Ten looked dominant while the SEC struggled mightily, even if just for one week. 

Michigan State vs. Ohio State is not a rivalry

I hate both of these schools with a burning passion. The thing is, I don't feel a lot of hatred between them so I'm wondering how it's a "rivalry" at all. 

Yeah ok, this is going to sound like sour grapes coming from a Michigan fan, but hear me out on this one, I have a real reason for it.

Now to begin with, this comes from CBS Sports website where Chip Patterson wrote an opinion piece about the top modern college football rivalries, stating Michigan State and Ohio State as the top dog of them all. 

For the purposes of my big reason why I disagree with him, I'll cite one section of it that relates to what I'm talking about: 

Now, to make this clear, I am not doubting at all the recent success that Michigan State and Ohio State have shared and how titanic their matchups have been since 2013. They met in the B1G title game that year and MSU won to dash the Buckeyes national title hopes, then the following year J.T. Barrett and company walked into East Lansing at night and torched the Spartans 49-37 en route to their B1G and eventual national championship. Last year with OSU as the favorite to reach the playoff again, MSU used a combination of stifling defense and atrocious play calling by OSU (10 carries for Ezekiel Elliott for the whole game) along with a steady running attack when needed to beat the Buckeyes 17-14 to once again dash OSU's national title hopes and propel the Spartans to another B1G title and a College Football Playoff berth. 

There is no question based on this article that if rivalries were completely defined by measure of success against a particular team back and forth, that MSU vs. OSU would be the best modern college football rivalry. 

The thing is, measure of success is not what completely defines rivalries. It's only part of the conversation. There's one critical part of the rivalry equation that in my opinion is sorely missing from the Michigan State-Ohio State equation, a piece that one might think would take a long time to develop but really doesn't when you think about it: 

Hatred. Pure, unbridled, raw hatred. 

It's what Ohio State feels for Michigan and what Michigan feels for Ohio State. It's what Michigan State feels for Michigan and for the past eight years, what Michigan has felt for Michigan State. It's what Alabama and Auburn, Notre Dame and USC, and Oklahoma and Texas all feel for each other. Does anyone get the sense that either Michigan State or Ohio State feels hatred for each other? On that level? 

Here's how the CBS Sports article tries to quantify it: 

All of that is true, but I'm not hearing a whole lot of hatred there. After that stunning loss to MSU last year, Ezekiel Elliott blasted his coaches, not Michigan State. There was no real trash talk from either side before or after that game and there never really has been, at least not anything that has made major headlines. 

But when they asked Woody Hayes why he kept going for two against Michigan in 1968 his answer was, "Because I couldn't go for three." That's hatred. 

When Mike Hart made his infamous "Little Brother" comment toward the Spartans in 2007, it was MSU head coach Mark Dantonio himself who made a crack about Hart's 5 foot 8 stature and uttered the now famous words in East Lansing, "Pride comes before the fall." He also said it's not over and it was just starting. That's hatred. 

Recently when the Big Ten Network bus visited Ohio State's campus, the following was done to the bus to observe a rule on campus about an anti-MIchigan dress code: 

That's hatred.

Notice how the Spartan emblem is completely untouched. That's not hatred. 

This topic was recently discussed on a local Detroit radio show, the "Valenti and Foster" program that airs from 2pm to 6pm on 97.1 the Ticket. Mike Valenti is well known to most Michigan fans as a huge Spartan homer that makes his show extremely difficult for a Michigan fan to listen to these days with the last eight years of success MSU has had on the football field. When discussing this topic, he naturally agreed with the CBS Sports article but his producer Mike Sullivan made a comment that struck me, saying that he was at the MSU-OSU game last year and he heard an OSU staff member say, "Michigan is not our rival anymore, it's Michigan State." 

Had I been listening to that show live and not later on a podcast segment, I might have called in to ask Sullivan what would happen to that Ohio State staff member if he uttered the word "Michigan" in front of Urban Meyer, considering that all over OSU's facilities you see this instead: 

Here's what happens when you Google the acronym "TTUN":

See, THIS is hatred and THIS is a rivalry. Now I know that Michigan-Ohio State is a game that hasn't meant anything at all since 2006 when it was the #1 vs. #2 matchup in Columbus and I know that this hatred I'm using as an example is a product of decades of emotions and battles on and off the field and on the surface, it doesn't hold water to the "modern rivalry" definition, but how can you possibly have a rivalry without some level of genuine hatred between schools? Isn't that part of it? The trash talking? The crazy quotes and guarantees? The snide remarks from coaches and players? Any measure of after the whistle violence or incident? 

I've seen none of that between MSU and OSU in the past three years and that's why I can't call it a rivalry. They only have half of the formula complete, which is playing meaningful games against each other with everything on the line. If only someone could talk a little trash, get a little spark going, make a guarantee or a coach makes a snide comment. 

Of course if you get that at all in this "rivalry" you won't get it from Dantonio, who was OSU's defensive coordinator for three seasons under Jim Tressel. You won't get it from Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer who has nothing bad to say about Michigan State whatsoever, in spite of the two heartbreaking losses they have given him and his team, their only two losses currently in the B1G as Valenti and other Saprtans would love to remind us all. 

But when Meyer was on David Letterman after the Buckeyes won the national championship, he refused to utter the word "Michigan" on national television. 

That's hatred and you need that in a rivalry. If Michigan State and Ohio State are really to be the best modern college football rivalry in the land, somebody better start publicly hating the other because this is the tamest "rivalry" I've ever seen in college football. 

I'm black and I've been watching hockey for 20 years

My favorite hockey team in the history of ever, the Detroit Red Wings, battling the team I hate the most these days, the Chicago Blackhawks. Neither made it past the first round of the playoffs this year. 

Anybody see that Tony X exchange happen on Twitter last month? It was during the first round of the NHL playoffs between the Chicago Blackhawks and the St. Louis Blues and it went viral pretty quick: 

So Tony X is a black man that stumbled across the first round of the NHL playoffs, loved it and live tweeted about it as you just saw. His 15 minutes of fame got him tons of retweets, national attention, interviews on news shows and meeting a bunch of NHL players past and present, all of whom welcomed him as a new fan to hockey. 

I heard about this the day after it happened and I had two reactions: 

1 - I'm glad at least one more black person on this planet now watches hockey. 

2 - Welcome to the club, Tony X. I'm black and I've been watching hockey for 20 years. 

When I was a little kid, I was a huge baseball fan. Growing up in Detroit, I loved the Tigers. I had all of their baseball cards, watched every game and even had some of my own kids sized gear. My dad and I went to a good number of games at Tiger Stadium. 

As I got older, the geek in me took hold and I started moving away from baseball and getting into science fiction and video games. My Saturdays consisted of playing Super Mario World and watching Star Trek for a good few years. I never lost my love for sports, though. The thing is, by then the Tigers weren't very good and I wanted to watch a team that was capable of winning an actual championship like other cities had. Enter the Detroit Red Wings. 

The Detroit Red Wings have won four Stanley Cups since I started watching hockey in 1996. This first one in 1997 is probably still my favorite. Incredible team. 

The 1995-96 season is when I started watching hockey. I was 13 years old and the Wings had just set an NHL record for wins in a season with a 62-13-7 record. Everyone was considering them a lock to win the Stanley Cup, but as most Wings fans know, they got bounced in the Western Conference Finals by the Colorado Avalanche in six games, the same series in which Claude Lemieux smashed Kris Draper's face into the boards at the end that started the Wings-Avs rivalry. I was more than upset. In fact, I was yelling and screaming most of the night. Not a happy time at all. 

I came back the next year watching just about every Wings game that was televised that I could watch, which meant anything other than what was on PASS Sports because we didn't have that channel and I could only watch replays of games on the weekends. Most of the time it was UPN 50 or CBC for me. I watched A TON of hockey. By the all-star break, I knew every team's best players and every goalie and backup goalie. I was beyond obsessed. 

It only got worse when the Wings won their first Stanley Cup in 42 years that season. They had me, hook line and sinker. I loved every second of it. 

The tough part was getting anyone else in my family to watch it. My dad was open to the idea here and there and we went to a game or two over the years after that, but my uncle is the only one that I've able to consistently talk and watch hockey with. 

When Jarome Iginla led the NHL in scoring in the 2001-02 season, I thought it would be the perfect hook to get more of family to watch hockey. 

So I started looking for black players in the league just so I could say, "Look! There are black hockey players! This is why you should watch it now!" I found out about Grant Fuhr and his time in Edmonton with Wayne Gretzky, Mark Messier and the Oilers dynasty. I learned about Anson Carter, Donald Brashear and Mike Grier. I thought I had the perfect selling pitch when Jarome Iginla won the Art Ross Trophy in the 2001-02 season. How many times has a black man led the National Hockey League in scoring? Once: Him. 

My family cheered for the Wings because they were local but they never got into the game like my uncle and I did. National Hockey Night on ESPN was appointment viewing for us all the time and it was glorious. 

Today, the NHL is in a different place after three lockouts since 1994-95 and there's a salary cap in place, and while the rules changes have done everything to make the game less punishing and more scoring-driven, it hasn't killed my love for the game one bit. Hockey is my 1B favorite sport with Football as my 1A and it will always be that way, without question. 

And I'm not going to lie, I love surprising people with that revelation. One of my favorite hockey fan moments was when I was working at GameStop and a Canadian family visiting the area had come into the store looking to buy an XBOX. They were wearing Toronto gear and I had to tell them I was a huge Wings fan. We got into a good discussion for about 15 minutes about hockey history, going back to the Edmonton-Calgary rivalry in the 80's. I will never forget the stunned look on these guys' faces at what I knew about the game. They were surprised to see an American know so much about hockey, let alone a young Black American. It was priceless. 

So yeah, when I read Tony X's tweets from the Blackhawks-Blues game last month, it took me back to when I was first becoming a hockey fan two decades ago. Outside of my uncle, I've found maybe a handful of other black people that are definite hockey fans over the years and follow the NHL. I've always wished that there were more and I'm glad there are more players in the league today like P.K. Subban, Wayne Simmonds and Evander Kane. Hockey is one of the best sports out there and the more fans there are like me, my uncle and Tony X now, the merrier as far as I'm concerned. It's a great game and more black people SHOULD watch it. 

On that note......GO WINGS!!!!!!!

Why Christian McCaffrey is right, but he's going to have to get used to it

In his sophomore year at Stanford, Christian McCaffrey broke the single-season all-purpose yards record with 3,864 yards, and was one of only two FBS running backs in 2015 to rush for over 2,000 yards. 

Stanford running back Christian McCaffrey doesn't like stereotypes for white athletes. Recently, he told Sports Illustrated that he thinks his athleticism isn't fully appreciated simply because he is white: 

Yeah, he's not wrong about that. At all. There is without question a stereotype about white athletes and it's existed for some time now. Certain positions in sports are just assumed to be dominated by a particular race. In football, quarterback is still a largely "white" position. So is Tight End, Offensive Lineman for the most part, kickers and punters. The skill positions, wide receiver, running back, defensive back and linebacker are considered to be largely made up of black players. That's just the expectation, not the rule. 

In McCaffrey's case being a running back, he's in a unique situation where his race is definitely affecting his perception. I watched a good amount of Stanford football last season and I will tell you that if I had a Heisman trophy vote, it would have been for him over Deshaun Watson of Clemson and Derrick Henry of Alabama, who won the award. I know Henry and Watson slugged it out for the national championship playing for the two best teams last year, but Christian McCaffrey as a sophomore was light years ahead of both of them in terms of explosiveness, athleticism and the ability to change a game at any point. He is an electric player and will certainly be a Heisman candidate in his Junior year. 

You'll never convince me that part of the reason he didn't win the Heisman Trophy wasn't because he's white. It most certainly played a part in how he is perceived by voters, pundits and fans. We shouldn't deny that, we all do it. Even white fans make jokes about it. 

You don't see white running backs in the NFL very much and when you do, it's an oddity that everyone looks at with wonder. Toby Gerhart, who also came from Stanford, Peyton Hillis, Danny Woodhead to name a few more current ones. Go down the list and dig up Mike Alstott, Travis Jervey, Merrill Hodge and Frank Gifford. 

Mike Alstott was one of my favorite white running backs in the NFL, but after becoming Purdue's all-time leading rusher with 3,635 yards, he was drafted in the second round by Tampa Bay to be used as a running fullback and never eclipsed 1,000 yards rushing in a season in 11 years with the Buccaneers. 

Go look at a few way too early Heisman lists for this season. McCaffrey is listed as low as 4th in a number of them. This is a kid that broke the single season NCAA record for all-purpose yards with 3,864 last year, obliterating Barry Sanders' old record at Oklahoma. He and Henry were the only Football Bowl Subdivision running backs to rush for over 2,000 yards last season, yet Henry got a Heisman Trophy and a second round draft selection from the Tennessee Titans while McCaffrey prepares for his Junior year and hoping to follow in Henry's footsteps, at least to win the Heisman and get drafted. 

He's understandably concerned that being a white running back could make him a later-round oddity in the NFL Draft instead of a first-round millionaire, something his father Ed, a three-time Super Bowl champion largely considered one of the best white wide receivers in NFL history might know something about. A Stanford grad as well, Ed McCaffrey was a 3rd round pick in the 1991 NFL draft by the New York Giants. 

Ed McCaffrey played 13 seasons in the NFL for the Giants, 49ers and Broncos, won three Super Bowls and caught 565 passes for 7,422 yards and 55 touchdowns. 

Conversely, Christian's younger brother Dylan, a Michigan commit in his senior year of high school, likely won't face this issue as he is a quarterback, a position generally assumed for white players and the flip side to Christian's concerns. Yes, he will be unfairly stereotyped for being a white running back......much the same way as black quarterbacks are also unfairly stereotyped. 

Christian's situation is not unusual or unique to almost any black QB that comes into the NFL. There is a definite assumption made that black QB are more athletic runners and not strong pocket passers, an assumption that has been true in some, but not all cases. This stigma has led to players like Russell Wilson and Cam Newton being unfairly judged on their abilities to play quarterback in the NFL and it makes it even more difficult for black backup QB's, who don't seem to last in the league nearly as long as the starters do. Is that because they aren't good enough to be a backup, or is some of that because of the perception that they aren't as good at the QB position in the first place? 

Cam Newton and Russell Wilson had to deal with the same stereotype about black QB's in the NFL, but both have fought their way through it to become excellent passers. They are the exceptions to the rule though, just like Christian McCaffrey will have to be. 

Just as Christian McCaffrey doesn't hear the words "explosive" or "athletic" used for white skill position players, Deshaun Watson or Deshone Kizer of Notre Dame doesn't hear the words "pocket presence" or "cerebral" used for black quarterbacks. It doesn't take anything away from Christian's point, but it does show that he is not alone in this racial stereotyping that goes on in sports, especially football. 

The bottom line with all of this is that Christian McCaffrey is hopefully learning a valuable lesson in this situation: Racial stereotypes based on position do exist and apply to several players, not just him or any other white skill players. Is it right? No, but it is real and it's not going away anytime soon, so the young man best move forward and have the best Junior season he can have at Stanford, enough to put him on the radar and get his name back on that Heisman ballot, win it and then maybe impress an NFL franchise enough to take him in the first round, all of which is still entirely possible. It ultimately depends on him, not the people who think a white running back is "weird" or "tough" instead of "explosive" and athletic." 

Who still watches ESPN regularly?

Keith Olbermann. Bill Simmons. Jason Whitlock. Colin Cowherd. Skip Bayless. Mike Tirico. Brad Nessler. Chris Spielman. 300 employees. Grantland. Seven million subscribers. 

That's the bulk of ESPN's losses over the last two years, revenue not withstanding. Those names have departed within the last year alone, either through firings or quitting for another job on a rival network. A lot of those names are household for a sports fan in some way. I liked Olbermann and Simmons, loved Tirico, Nessler and Spielman on football games, collegiate and pro, was 50-50 on Whitlock and I hated Cowherd and Bayless, but still listened to their musings just so I could disagree with them. 

Now, none of those personalities, all of whom had made an impression with "The Total Sports Leader," are there anymore to entertain any of us. 

Which begs the ultimate question: Who is still watching ESPN? And why? 

Even before all of the recent shakeup in Bristol, I wasn't watching the four-letter network for more than college football games and 30 for 30 documentaries. Everything else within that channel from First Take to SportsCenter has taken a definite hit in quality within the last decade. 

A closer look at the seven millions subscribers lost by ESPN shows that they are made up of cable customers either downgrading their packages to lower options that don't include ESPN, or cutting the cord altogether and opting for Internet connection streaming entertainment only through apps and websites. 

I tried both of those options myself at different points, first going Internet only to cut my bill down to $45 a month, and then later once again dropping to a lower cable package to drop my price from a higher level. In both cases, I came back to a Comcast package that included ESPN because of live sports. I needed it then and I still need it now and that might be the saving grace for ESPN's seemingly sinking ship of a network. 

The thing is, with the network hemorrhaging money in the first place and having to cut costs, there is now competition that smells blood in the water and sees a shot to strike into the Disney-ESPN juggernaut. It's no surprise or coincidence that Colin Cowherd and Skip Bayless have both gone to FOX Sports and now Chris Spielman will be joining them to do NFL football. Mike Tirico who had been with the four-letter network for decades dropped a rock-solid spot on Monday Night Football to go to NBC and handle their olympics coverage in Rio this summer, and there's speculation that he is next in line for NBC Sunday Night Football after Al Michaels retires at some point. 

Brad Nessler is headed to CBS to call NFL games until he takes over SEC football broadcasts from Verne Lundquist. 

All of these networks have a lot of ground to make up before they can even come close to usurping ESPN, but it's not getting any easier for the folks in Bristol for sure. Whatever major sports personalities the network had for people to tune in to are now mostly gone and fans are hit or miss on the ESPN programming today. Even pregame and postgame shows for live sports are taking a hit on the network because of the NFL, NBA, MLB and the NHL all having their own networks with their own programmed pregame and postgame shows. 

And then there's the Internet itself. Live sports is still finding its way through the web, but it has made strides in the last few years with Yahoo paying for the rights to exclusively broadcast an NFL game last year, Twitter buying the rights to stream ten Thursday Night Football games globally over the web, and MLB reaching a three-year deal with FOX to live stream baseball games in 15 markets on mobile devices and computers. ESPN has a WatchESPN app that works the same way if you have an ESPN subscription, but given where the landscape of TV is headed, they may want to go the HBO route and offer WatchESPN as an app by itself for a monthly fee. 

The bottom line is that ESPN is a shell of its former self in terms of being a quality sports network and fans are getting wise to it. There's more options now for games, highlights and general information that we need to know that unless we are watching a game that can only be found on ESPN, or checking out the latest 30 for 30 documentary, we are changing the channel.