Time for college football to put the Whammer-Jammer, Yellow Hammer down on Alabammer!

    Alabama is College Football Playoff Committee’s No. 2? As pointed out in previous Salvos here, this is the “smoke and mirror strategy” pervaded by the slippery Mr. Finebaum (Law degree from UT) and other misinforming pundits.  Don’t know how anybody can buy into Paul’s SEC bias.  The committee says Cincinnati, who fell out of the Top 4, only has one “signature” win – over No. 8 Notre Dame.  Where’s Alabama’s “signature win”? FCS Mercer? Southern Miss?  Texas A&M – oops, that was a loss!  Maybe one of the also-rans out of the SEC – like Tennessee or Mississippi State?  Oh wait, they lost games to Pitt and Memphis, so they can’t be signature wins.  They are just SEC also-rans, maybe even embarrassments.

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     Disrespected Cincy struggled against Navy’s triple-option offense, but still won. Tennessee opted out against playing that same offense against Army next season.   Holy smoke, Bama plays 1-7 Mexico State the week after next!   Read Ryan McGee’s latest Weekly Bottom 10 column on ESPN.com. “Whew Mexico State” and “Southern Missed” come in at seven and ten respectively in THE ESPN BOTTOM TEN.  They ever talk about that on SportsCenter? Alabama #2? Based on these credentials? What a joke!

Mixed message here

     Howie Kussoy, Sports Editor for the New York Post, says one thing we agree with, but doesn’t put his money where his mouth is.  He analyzes the UNC-Wake Forest this weekend appropriately reporting here: “‘The polls do not matter and come into our discussions,’ Play-off Committee Chair Gary Barta said with a straight face on Tuesday night. Then may I ask, ‘Where would Wake Forest – the only undefeated team in the ACC and the only team in the nation to score 35 points in every game this season – be ranked if its name were Clemson?’”  Right on the money, Howie.  Over-rated Clemson started at the top right from the get-go. Turned out not to be the same college football team without Trevor Lawrence, et al.

    However, he contradicts himself when he selected North Carolina -2.5 against the Deacons.  What did he base that on, the preseason polls?  We see he was wrong earlier when he picked UVA to beat Wake.  Wake held UVA and Brennan Armstrong to 17 points.  We attended UVA games where the Cavs put up 34 and 49 points respectively against Louisville and BYU – BYU! – on the road both times.  He thinks Sam Howell will have an easier time against Wake than Sam Hartmann will have against UNC who gives up 30 points per game? The Tar Heels don’t run the triple option like Army unless he knows something no one else following college football does.  Where are these pundits’ heads when they make these predictions?

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Look in the mirror, “After the Fall Paul”

     After last week’s win by Michigan State over Michigan, 37-33, “Monday-morning” Paul says that Jim Harbaugh isn’t the best HC in the state of Michigan.  If Paul Finebaum’s so astute, why didn’t he say that last week?  His inference back then was that Michigan’s fate would be sealed against Ohio State at the end of the season, not against the Spartans.  Right here, in Salvos, we nicely agreed with him that Michigan would not make the CFP, but pointed out where he was wrong. 

     We stated, “We see this week’s road trip to No. 8 Michigan State (7-0, 4-0) definitely a challenge to the Wolverines’ unblemished record.  In two weeks, when they go to No. 20 Penn State, if the Lions can cast some doubts aside, that’s a second.”  We forecasted Michigan’s fate would be sealed before they met the Buckeyes.  Mr. Finebaum’s not the best college football forecaster anywhere. He has no room to criticize if this is supposedly his forte.  Call him “After the Fall, Paul”.

Here’s a friendly suggestion to Paul Finebaum and Nick Saban

     Since Tennessee backed out on Army next year and picked up Akron instead (more on the Zips later), Collegefootballfan.com would like to make a proposal. Paul Finebaum said he was disappointed in his Ama Mater’s dastardly decision to cancel and do this dishonor to vets and service members around the country. Nick Saban always likes to open the Alabama season at a neutral site to offset any supposed home team advantages, the kind soul that he is.

    Collegefootballfan.com suggests Alabama schedule two upcoming season openings with twists – back-to-back seasons at two totally different sites against the same team, but not in nearby Atlanta as usual.  Real neutral sites instead.  We propose that Bama open against Army (or even play later in each season, and replace an FCS opponent). Play the first-time in the Meadowlands where the Corps of Cadets could attend, for instance, and play the following year in Arlington, Texas where The Tide has opened against a few teams in recent years.  Playing there would deliver great Army interests in the state of Texas, too.

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 Everybody wins – Army, Bama, fans, New Mexico State, Paul

      And for the benevolent Alabama fans who say they play New Mexico State to help fund their athletic program financially, send NMSU a donation made from the profits from these games instead! Maybe even contribute to a few beleaguered FCS programs.  This arrangement would be win-win-win+ for all involved.  I’ll make the connections to get this started. Let me know.

James Franklin speaks fundamentally

  We can say that we don’t always agree with what PSU HC and former East Stroudsburg QB James Franklin’s calls in certain game situations. However, we liked what he said after the CFP votes came out Tuesday night. He stated as he’s said this in the past, “I think the first thing you have to do if you’re not going to have a true playoff system … is make sure everybody is playing under the same model. How can you have some conferences that play FCS opponents and other conferences that don’t? How can you have some conferences that are playing 9 conference games and others playing 8?” This is a very serious inadequacy with college football.

      Let’s think. In what “Power Five” conference does every school play an FCS team? In what “Power Five” conference of 12 teams or more do they only play eight conference games instead of nine which could be easily done eliminating some very uninteresting and unnecessary non-conference games? Think about it. The answer is revealed at the end of our Salvos.

Adam Rittenberg’s “Shaky starts”?

   ESPN’s Adam Rittenberg has been left out of our Salvos since Paul Finebaum provides us with so many interesting topics.  If we had more time, we could call out many of these pundits who have what we’ll call “negative impact” to the fairness of college football. Adam insinuates teams like Ohio State and Auburn got off to “shaky starts” and have made amends since the season is now half over. It’s astounding what blind eyes pundits have to the reality of college football.

  Ohio State fell to Oregon early in Week 2 and fell from No. 3 to No. 9.  Adam notes this week, “Ohio State didn’t look sharp Saturday night against Penn State, delivering a product not unlike the one it had 50 days earlier against Oregon.” Gee, why were the Buckeyes so sharp those five weeks in between averaging 50 points per game? Against Tulsa, Akron (told you they’d come up later), Rutgers, Maryland, and Indiana. How come this all gets swept under the rug?  These teams have combined records of 16-25. None have winning records.  The Buckeyes play 5-2 PSU at home and Adam wonders why they’re struggling, particularly against one of the best defenses in the nation?  Here’s your answer Adam: they beat up on weaklings relatively speaking.  Like Saban asked, “Did any of you guys ever play sports?”

    All these top teams need to be given a second thought before being put on a pedestal because they have beaten “nobodies”.  Look, there are outstanding teams out there that can’t get their competitive matches every week based on conference schedules for one thing, but the best gauge is to judge this inter-conference play until they play formidable conference foes. When teams go out of their way to load up on a few more other weak programs, that has to be taken into consideration.  The fact that Ohio State’s one loss at home to Oregon needs to be weighed-in into this analysis very heavily. 

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Different definition of “Shaky start” for the Auburn Tigers

  As for Auburn’s “shaky” start, it’s shaky as to who they decided to start with. They beat Akron (noted again), 60-10, and then beat FCS Alabama State, 62-0, in their first two games. Just send Alabama State a donation or have the Educational Chancellor of the state of Alabama make a money transfer or something.  A week later they lose to Penn State, 28-20. So is this what Rittenberg refers to as a shaky start?  After PSU, the Tigers got a big break at home in their win over Georgia State.  That was “shaky”. Things are even shakier now as we can see that they’ve gone 3-1 getting clobbered by Georgia and playing other teams getting beaten as most in the SEC do every season by UGA and Bama.

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Factor this as objectively as one can

   Pundits and CFP pollsters need to look at the competition before even considering wins, total points, and margins of victory. Like everything else in the media, there is too much politicking going on in college football. There’s intent here to water-down schedules purposely by programs because they see the media is blind regarding this parameter.  In the end it’s all about the money. However, we see solutions to doing this better even with the green stuff still in the way.

Week 9, Our top college football games in Review

  We called for Coastal Carolina to squeak by Troy State as the Trojans defense would offer a challenge. They surprisingly put up more points than we expected though. The Chanticleers triumphed, 35-28… As mentioned, Mel Tucker had his disrespected Spartans up for Michigan in front of the home crowd, and we noted that the Spartans beat the Wolverines at the Big House the previous season.  They came out on top, 37-33, and catapulted into the first edition of the CFP (What do these weekly ratings matter? Six more weeks of college football to go, including conference championships).

  Auburn came out on top of Ole Miss, 31-20, having performed better against comparable competition and playing at home as we noted.  Just another game between also-rans in the SEC. Ho-hum…NC State’s defense came up as expected against Louisville and derailed the Cardinals by more than one TD, 28-13. Collegefootballfan.com hopes The Wolfpack is on a collision course with Wake Forest since we will be at that game on November 13.

  We fell apart on our selections late in the day as we expected SMU to win over Houston since they seemed to have more scoring capabilities. Houston won in a fight to the finish at home, 44-37. Unless SMU surprises Cincinnati on November 20, the Houston Cougars will probably play the Bearcats in Nippert Stadium on December 4.  We have to consider trekking up to that one! …We understand Penn State’s Sean Clifford started off well and played healthy even silencing the Horse Shoe crowd for a while.  The returned fumble by the Buckeyes was big, and they prevailed, 33-24.

Our Best College Football Games of Week 10

    Our game this Saturday, unofficially known as the rivalry called “100 Miles of Hate”, is where we go this weekend.  Since we live right in the middle, how can we not go? ConferenceUSA teams, the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers (4-4, 3-1) meet the Middle Tennessee State Blue Raiders (4-4, 2-2), in Bowling Green, KY. Both come off convincing C-USA wins.  WKU defeated Charlotte (4-4, 2-1) 45-13, while MTSU clubbed Southern “Missed” (1-7, 0-4), an Alabama favorite, 35-10.

     MTSU surprised Marshall and fell by three to Charlotte.  Charlotte was WKU’s best win. Prior to that on consecutive weekends, they beat ODU and FIU. Both have one win apiece. Both fell to No. 16 UT San Antonio (8-0) by competitive scores. WKU QB, Bailey Zappe is second in the nation yardage-wise in passing. This game will be close. With WKU at home, they will win by three with a lot of hate going back and forth. We’re rooting for our home team, Middle Tennessee, though. By the way, we read that these two may continue this rivalry in the MAC in upcoming seasons.

Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy Game

     Army (4-3) vs. Air Force (6-2) in Arlington, Texas. (Tell Bama Army plays there, too.)   Both run the triple option. This is for the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy. The Air Force Falcons take it home with a win since they already beat Navy, 23-3. Army will have to still beat Navy if they defeat Air Force. The Cadets have lost three-straight to the three best teams on this year’s slate. 

The Falcons come off a 20-14 loss to then No. 22 San Diego State, two weeks ago. This is difficult to call.  Army’s triple-option has not been as effective on the road as it’s been at home. Air Force’s defense knows this offense and has had two weeks to prep as well. No one runs it better in practice than they can. The rivalry factor plays into this.  Air Force needs to win, and Army can’t afford lose. We’ll give this slight edge here to Air Force by a TD.

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    No. 10 Wake Forest (8-0, 5-0) – not Clemson – visits North Carolina (4-4, 3-3). We tipped our preference previously in “Mixed message here”.  UNC comes off a loss to Notre Dame and has also lost to Georgia Tech and Florida State. Wake QB Sam Hartmann turns out to be the Heisman candidate this year, not UNC’s Sam Howell. Sam at Wake Forest has the horses around him this year. Sam at Carolina sky blue doesn’t.  The Deacons will win by two touchdowns setting up a big ACC game the week after for us in Winston-Salem vs. NC State.

   Liberty (7-2) at No. 15 Ole Miss (6-2): the Flames record is over-inflated this season with victories over one-win teams such as ODU, UMass, and North Texas. The two losses are by three points to so-so at-best Syracuse and UL-Monroe. The rest of the wins are over teams the SEC likes to schedule.  And despite their current QB Malik Willis transferring from Auburn when he had success against Ole Miss and Lane Kiffin, Ole Miss should win this big at home.  If not, that will give us a lot more ammo about the stature of the SEC.  We plan to see Liberty host Louisiana (7-1), leaders of the SunBelt, on November 20. A Liberty win here would make that game more interesting, but even we say Ole Miss should win this by more than two TDs at home against former HC Hugh Freeze.

SEC entertainment for those who like to fantasize

No. 12 Auburn (5-2,2-1) at No. 13 Texas A&M (6-2, 3-2) are both SEC also-rans. Auburn already lost to UGA, and despite A&M’s 41-38 win at home over Bama, they fell at home to mediocre Arkansas and Mississippi State. However, since their win vs. Alabama, momentum seems to have shifted their way with dominant wins over SEC bottom feeders Mizzou and South Carolina. Auburn sandwiched their loss to No. 1 Georgia with wins over other struggling SEC teams who can’t beat the two best teams in the conference either. We look for A&M to keep the momentum going their way now. Auburn will have to make up for this when they host Alabama in the Iron Bowl.  A&M should win Saturday by ten.

 Prepare the Remote!

   LSU (4-4,2-3) at No. 2? Alabama should not be a prime-time game. Ed Orgeron is on his way out at LSU. His team already lost to UCLA, Auburn, Kentucky, and Mississippi. You know what they say about snowballs’ chances in hell?   Turn this off and watch something else before the first half is over.  Alabama beats another struggling SEC program here by three TDs, just like they did to Ole Miss, Mississippi State, and Tennessee.

Tennessee (4-4, 2-3) at No. 18 Kentucky (6-2,4-2) could be the most entertaining among the SEC broadcasts this weekend. The Vols lost to Pitt, beat some nobodies, lost to struggling Florida (4-4,2-4), lost to struggling Ole Miss in the Brew-fest at home, and then fell in line with the rest of the SEC losing to No. 2? Alabama by 28. Kentucky comes in with a two-game losing streak to No. 1 Georgia (again like every other SEC challenger) and Mississippi State, The Leach Project. 

     Three of the first four wins were close against weaker teams. They beat Florida (who may win the state of Florida championship if they beat FSU. The already beat FAU and USF) by seven and beleaguered LSU by three TDs (prime-time vs. Bama -ha!). Kentucky’s undefeated at home, and UT is 1-2 on the road. We’ll take Bourbon over Whiskey in this one by 10 points. Should be fun – better than watching Bama busting LSU.

Steve Koreivo, ed. – Author of Tales from the Tailgate: From the Fan who’s seen ’em all! Click on the title here to get your copy now. Great short story-reading for the Man Cave or while on the toilet seat.

Answers to: In what “Power Five” conference does every school play an FCS team? In what “Power Five” conference of 12 teams or more do they only play eight conference games instead of nine which could be easily done eliminating some very uninteresting, non-conference games?

SEC! SEC!