f13.net

Ok, I am going to start this simply because Illinois is yet again in the news for spending a ton of money to fire a coach they literally just gave a contract to.

At least this time, they did it because they decided to drop a huge load of money (which is ridiculous when they don't have money to fill faculty positions and are cutting staff across all of campus) on Lovie Smith.

So Illinois might have a decent football team in two to three years which is amazing to think after the $5 million+ debacle that was the circumstances surrounding Beckman being fired in September.

I'll take this time to say, I'm not sure Lovie Smith is actually a good coach anymore despite his prior records. Or in spite of them. And now he'll have to recruit.

Also, will Butch Jones be fired at Tennessee? What a shitshow down there.

Georgia keeps recruiting well and people here love the Kirby Smart hire, but I'm not sold until we actually do more than talk and recruit. Richt was able to do those things well, he just couldn't coach in the big games.

Keep an eye on Harbaugh too. He's insane enough to post Kim Kardashian like nudes of himself if he thought it'd get him more recruits or a blurb in the paper.

Don't know if anyone was paying attention to the draft news stories, but Ole Miss's Laremy Tunstil had quite a bad night. First someone posted a picture of him with a bong on Twitter, Then someone posted a screenshot of a chat of Tunsil asking for (and receiving) money from an Ole Miss coach. Then he was asked about it in the post-draft press conference and admitted the screenshot was real and that he took money from coaches. Shortly thereafter he was removed from the room by his agent.


Well, at least he didn't buy any tattoos.

To be honest I assume at least half the players going in the first round have done both of those things (taking money and doing drugs), they just aren't stupid enough to get caught. Maybe I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure he still goes early in the draft. Rather than concerns about bong hits I think teams are more worried about his inability to cover for himself.

edit; Wait, the draft already happened. So he dropped, but still went pretty high. Honestly I think Miami got a steal getting him so late.

He already did. Went 13th.  Probably dropped 5-10 spots because of it, which means a hacked vine cost the dude between 4-10 million dollars.

Here we go boys and girls... Yes, I realize Tenn squeaked by App St which actually started the college football season, but no one cares about the Vols, and even less so now. App St should have won but tripped over their own dicks.

Houston has the biggest game today IMHO. Lose and they are done for the Nation Championship, win and win out the season and they are in.

USC trojans and Alabama should be a Bama grinder. LSU and Wisconsin at Lambeau should be interesting if LSU's passing game is as inept as it always is. Les Miles seat could get superheated if he loses this game.

Strangely enough, it doesn't seem late enough in the summer to already start the football season...

Well that's step one.

Ohio State set a school record for offensive yards so I'm happy. Sure it's against a cupcake school but I'll take it as a good sign that we're still loaded even with all the talent we lost to the draft.

And LSU is basically worthless. Still no offense and no offensive play calling. Les Miles was great the first couple of years, but obviously does not believe in a passing game.  Sigh... I give up.


edit: well that's a wrap. See you guys next year but only if Les Miles is gone. I can't support this team anymore... and I'm a Browns fan.

UGA can get to the SEC championship with Eason at QB and a healthy Chubb. But nobody can beat Alabama if they play like that all season.

OK, I laughed at that. :awesome_for_real:

The only consolation from this weekend was Notre Dame losing to Texas. Otherwise I am done for the year.  :oh_i_see:

That ND v Texas game was crazy. Good lord that Texas QB is massive.

The shirts around campus are hilarious.

I'VE GOT CHUBB
CHUBB IT UP
CHUBBY CHASER

lots in that vein

Thanks for stopping by Clemson. I always like it when somebody gives the bugs a reality check on that high school offense they run. You know, before UGA gets the chance at the end of the year to ruin their season.

Never quite understood why that program holds onto that triple option crap... nor why kids actually go there to play football.

1 - They can't afford to fire the triple option coach because their AD is in financial shambles
2 - They don't go there. They get 2 and 3 star recruits for the most part.

That Utah/USC game was one of the best games I've been to despite having to sit the whole time in the rain.

Ole Miss finally finished a game. Sorry, Paelos.

Tenn beats FL? Duke beats ND? what world am I living in?   :awesome_for_real:

Notre Dame, USC, and BYU are all 1-3. It is a beautiful world, whatever it is.

And how. They exposed the unsolvable problem on the Georgia team: Mark Richt couldn't recruit offensive line talent for shit. The current line we have sullies the good name of Hot Garbage. Nick Chubb is a phenomenon and he's looked like crap because he's stuck in a Martha Reeves and the Vandellas song.

UW v AZ was far to close for my liking, but I am overjoyed to escape with a W. Weird shit always happens to them in Tucson.

Wow. This UGA game is pretty amazing. Good job bulldogs.

edit: holy shit...  :ye_gods: :drill:

I was there live. It was just confusing. The whole team is just confusing.

We have a QB though.

The last 5 minutes of that game was as you said, confusing. Was watching with my gf half paying attention and I started shouting with they strip sacked your QB for the touchdown that Tenn was going to win it on that miracle stupid play. Then the bomb happened and my gf looked up and said, well so much for that notion. To which I responded that the kid redeemed himself. Then the hail mary and I looked back at her and she was just shaking her head...

Meanwhile, LSU wins huge over Missouri in the first game sans Hatter.   :drill:

I lost much money on Missouri because LSU decided they can play offense suddenly. The SEC makes no sense this year except Alabama is good.

Hoping it isn't so much Alabama being good as just being better than the rest in a down year. I could die happy if UW managed to make the playoffs and then shit all over Nick Saban.

Gameday coming to the game next week Way.  With how banged up we are and how dominant UW is I expect a boatrace, but if Joe Williams can run like he did today (332 yds, 4 TDs) it might make it interesting.

Never thought I'd say this, but hoping Michigan takes tOSU to the woodshed and knocks them completely out of the playoff discussion with that second loss. I hate Mich and can't stand Harbaugh, however not as much as Urban and the Buckeyes.

Doesn't matter though, Alabama is pretty much in a league by themselves somewhere between Div I and the NFL. I don't see them losing out to anyone this year.

It's the only time I can remember when two teams were undefeated this late in the year, and one team was a more than 2 TD favorite. And that team covered. Silliness with Alabama right now.

Hail to the victors. Michigan gonna kill all these teams with their defense and lose in the championship game to Bama.

Ohio State didn't kill their chances but a loss to Michigan puts them to sleep. Also a loss in the final would put the Big 10 out of the playoff if Ohio State was the rep.

About goddamned time. This past week a large portion of the state couldn't even watch the game, since the dumbfuck Pac12 can't make a deal with DirecTV, and Comcast has the Pac12 channel in a sports package that costs extra (I was playing poker and the casino was too cheap to spring for the package, even though they use Comcast  :oh_i_see: ) Top 5 teams should be seen by as large an audience as possible, ffs. OTOH, I did hit my first live royal of my poker career, which was worth $700 and a nice jacket (and the pot!), so I am pretty glad I decided to try to watch the game there instead of at home  :grin:

Heh, nice pull.

I guess if there are 3 illegal blocks in the back on a punt return they somehow cancel each other out.  :oh_i_see:

Pac12 officiating is never NOT a complete shitshow. They are literally the most incompetent collection of refs anywhere. The basketball refs are just as bad.

That was quite a game. I knew it was going to be close, but that was a bit closer than I had hoped. If the Utes had a more accurate QB they would have won that, most likely.

And fuck the SEC bias forever.

Ya, I think Williams was too keyed up playing his old team. Oh well, hope to see the Huskies again in the PAC-12 championship game.

SEC is so weak overall this year, but the rankings outside of A&M seem not sooo biased? The playoff has really injected some more reality into them it seems. Its Alabama and then a massive drop compared to other conferences having better balance. We'll see if either playoff opponent can put together the kind of high quality game(plan) needed to beat Bama and make for another memorable playoff year. Clemson has been too lucky for me to stand, really hope they don't make the playoffs somehow. Beyond that I pray for a 1-loss Buckeyes vs undefeated Michigan classic and this season will have been pretty cool.

I live in Cali and I haven't been able to catch a single UW game because fuck paying for cable until tomorrow night vs USC on Fox. Hope they don't choke.  

 :uhrr:

Dawgs over Auburn! We don't completely suck!

And LSU actually beat Arkansas this year... amazing. Watching Pitt beat Clemson was astounding. The campus actually feels happy this morning.

It was a great game played by LSU. It was a great defensive game played by Georgia. (Our offense is still poop).

Saw that coming, what a shitshow that day was. Fuck Clemson though so that was nice. Need a Penn State loss to clean up the B1G results thanks to Michigan's upset that night as well.

Remainder of season xmas list: Another Clemson loss. Hopefully some exposure of Bama weaknesses. Nobody from Big12 making the playoffs. Either Colorado or UW running the table the rest of the way and making it in.

What a shame that there is no super strong contender from outside the power 5. Western Michigan did beat Northwestern by 1 but they are still not making it I'd imagine.

Bama only has one weakness and it's in the secondary. And nobody has the kind of offensive line to stop their front pressure enough to exploit it regularly.

Bama has only one weakness and it's called the "hookers and blow". 

The Washington game will be interesting because I guarantee 95% of the SEC people have never seen them play a snap. I have and they dominated a Stanford team by smashing them to pieces up front. It wasn't a bunch of razzle dazzle flinging it bullshit.

Now can they do that to Bama? No. Can the defense hold it's own against Bama's offense? Yes, it can. But it needs to create turnovers or they have no shot. There's a reason that Washington is a 16.5 point dog and Florida was a 24.5 point dog. Washington can play with Bama. I'd be hesitant to lay the 16.5 knowing it's a bias spread given that the country has no idea what Washington is really about.

Bamas main weakness is potentially everything. In that we don't know if they have played anyone decent. The entire SEC scheduled puff pastries for their out of conference games and did poorly (besides Bama of course). A lot of the teams Bama played were ranked when they played them... but not at the end of the season. The exception being USC, Auburn, Florida, and LSU ... And the USC they played at the start of the season is not the USC that ended up number 9 in the nation*. Auburn, Florida, and LSU all have the same scheduling issue that Bama has in that they play in the SEC and schedule puff pastries for ooc games.

Another way to say it would be that statistically it's hard to disambiguate being good and playing bad teams. While this doesn't make much of a difference within a conference between a conference the limiters are the number of interlocking games played. Which is very small for the SEC And because of this initial ratings make a big difference in both SoS and SoR estimations

Well we will find out which is which on the 31st I guess

*which is almost certainly going to murderize Penn St in the rose bowl. There is an article in the Seattle times which says that oddsmakers would give Michigan and USC better odds against Bama and I am not sure I disagree. i also think that they got the final 4 right but got the order wrong. Should have been Bama/OSU/UW/Clemson. Clemson at 2 is clownshoes

I mean by that logic you don't know if anybody is good. I don't think you can handwave away the asswhipping Bama put on USC because they ended up finishing stronger (against pretty much unranked garbage with the exception of Colorado and Washington). USC also lost to Stanford and Utah which are the other ranked teams left. So I would argue that USC deserves their spot, and Bama didn't make it even remotely close.

That's more than I can say for Clemson or Washington, who played nobody of consequence outside their limited conferences. Clemson's early win over Auburn by just 6 points speaks to the issues you'd see against Bama when they trounced Auburn by 18, and probably should have beaten them way worse. Washington has zero out of conference credibility so I think they are the bigger question mark. But again, common opponent would tell you they couldn't hold up to USC, and Alabama better on every front than that USC team.

However, common opponents don't always mean something when you have to wait a few weeks and play on the biggest stage. Both Washington and Bama have coaches who have played there. But Bama has kids who've done it recently, and Washington doesn't. I think it stays closer than people would guess, but I don't think Bama loses outright.

The argument that the SEC plays some sort of slipshod out of conference schedule is BS. 


SEC OOC quality games
Alabama versus USC (W)
LSU versus Wisconsin (L)
Auburn versus Clemson (L)
Arkansas versus TCU (W)
Mississippi State versus BYU (L)
Mississippi versus Florida State (L)
Mississippi versus Memphis (W)
Florida versus Florida State (L)
Aggie versus UCLA (W)
Tenn versus Va Tech (W)
Georgia versus North Carolina (W)
Georgia versus Georgia Tech (L)
Missouri versus West Virginia (L)
Kentucky versus Louisville (W)
Vanderbilt versus Georgia Tech (L)
South Carolina versus Clemson (L)

Big Ten counterexample
Ohio State versus Oklahoma (W)
Michigan versus Colorado (W)
Wisconsin versus LSU (W)
Penn State versus Pitt (L)
Michigan State versus BYU (L)
Michigan State versus Notre Dame (W)
Northwestern versus Duke (W)
Nebraska versus Oregon (W)
Minnesota versus Oregon State (W)
Minnesota versus Colorado State (W)
Indiana versus Wake Forest (L)
Illinois versus North Carolina (L)


Those are pretty damned similar.  And, I'll note, that every SEC team plays a quality team from another conference.  Iowa and Illinois do not and the teams that the lower end of the Big Ten schedule some questionable opponents from the bigger conferences, such as Wake Forest, Duke, Oregon State, and Colorado State (which I threw in as a quality opponent because they usually are decent). 

I have this argument with my father-in-law regularly (who is a USC trojan fan).   The other conferences schedule plenty of patsies and the SEC has done fine in OOC games against quality opponents this year. 

By SoS the SEC is third to the Pac12 and Big 10. Bamas SoS counting USC would rank 3rd in the SEC... It would rank 8th in the Big 10 and 9th (almost 10th) in the Pac 12.

Granted this is better than the UW (which is also better than Clemson) but that counts USC for Bama when they were literally different teams at the time and it's generally inflated by the SECs originally high quality estimations. They started at 1,5,9, 11, 18, and 25 in the AP. They ended with 1,17,19 and 20.  Big 10 started with 3 ranked then ended with 6. Pac 12 5 to 4 but ranks generally improved.  That isn't a coincidence.



*and they were not at the time.

 :why_so_serious:

You aren't kidding are you. Bama has had how many years in a row of top 3 recruiting classes? Both lines as usual are probably best in the country. Their RB probably isn't great but all three of them are huge usually so good enough and they tend to have plenty of 5-star college guys on the back seven of their defenses as well, every fucking year.

I doubt UW stands a snowball's chance in hell, I'll be pulling for them hard the whole way but lets not kid ourselves. Alabama isn't some gee who knows how good they really are type team this year. Even if the SEC was particularly weak they still went undefeated with one scare @ Ole Miss? Going undefeated in any conference is hard. Ask Ohio State about that egg they lay in Happy Valley plus four scares vs Mich, MSU, Wisconsin and Northwestern. Two of those are not at all in the conversation of good teams.

Alabama looks to be having one of those class all of their own type years. Clemson is flukey, Ohio State has not gelled into a cohesive identity/plan, UW won a strong Pac-12 without being forged into some kind of awesome team. They looked meh vs Cal, vs USC and honestly I was at the Pac12 championship game and I def didn't see a team that I thought could hang with Bama.

Anyone is better than Saban and his UK-esque recruiting juggernaut and their shithead southern fans but if everyone knows this is their title to lose.

Who cares, Army beat Navy for the first time in 15 years.
Plus having the most badass uniforms seen on a football field this year.

Ohio State will probably put up a tough game against Alabama and very well could win. 
Clemson will have a rough go, but might win 2 out of 10 against the Tide.
Washington will lose by 3 touchdowns. 

I don't see how Ohio State can win unless Isiah Prince has some type of major come to jesus and learn how to play RT moment in the coming weeks ok their shit backup who they had no replacement for is out for the season soooooo yeah I think they are just proper fucked vs Bama. They are also a better defense this year vs teams looking to pass than teams looking to lean on a bruising run game which does not play to the strengths of this year's edition of the defense.

If they could force Hurts to pass a lot I do think they could generate 10 (easy) points via turnovers and that could make the difference but that's 5 too many if's to call it anything but a long shot, game of their lives type situation.

I'm too biased against Clemson to give them fair evaluation. I've hated them passionately since that Louiseville game they had no business winning and then doubly so after that NCST game they lost but for a lol kicker moment. I'm fairly certain they have a high ceiling and I'd put them even to beat Ohio State or close to it but I think Alabama exposes them free in a championship matchup, Watson is no VY.

I'm a PAC12 homer, but Bama will destroy Washington. They're just too good on defense for Browning to do much. Alabama will probably generate points in every phase of the game.

Washington is a much better team than Clemson. Almost as good as Ohio*. I don't doubt that Bama is favored just that the variance is a lot higher than people are giving them credit for.

*by SRS the list is Alabama(25), Ohio(21.7), Washington (21.6), Michigan(19.9), Penn(17.5), USC(17.5), Clemson(16.1). There is a good deal of variance in this due to limited cross conference play but it's still pretty decent

If my suspicion about Browning being secretly injured the past month is correct, and he is healthy in time for Alabama, Washington has a shot. If he is just off and not playing well for some other reason, they are doomed.

That Rose Bowl was fantastic. Well, not defensively, but probably one of the more entertaining games of football I've seen this year.

Alabama is going to probably going to curb stomp Clemson pretty hard. Washington gave them a decent defensive effort (that secondary, jesus), but the Washington offense couldn't do a damn thing. I'm guessing that a whole Sarkesian (drunk/pilled or not) will do better than a token Lane Kiffin effort. Still, Clemson could win. COULD. I'm just feeling that a "Hulk SMASH" effort is coming out of Bama for this one.

Ohio State was all sorts of sad. They looked like a 90s Big 10 team trying to play a modern era game.

Yeah UW's coach said the Alabama defense might be the best he has ever seen. They are huge and fast. UW played about a C+ game. If they had played their best, it might have been a pretty interesting contest.

Not sure we played a C+ game or if the Bama defense was just good against us. We didn't get any breaks* but besides the one long run from Bama and the bad interception the game was played pretty cleanly. Call the fumble unlucky(we had 1 fumble they recovered and they had two fumbles they recovered) and the pick six bad. That is only a handful of mistakes. Maybe we could have generated more offensive but i am not sure.

Because the cameras tend to focus on the QB its hard to tell what is happening down field. Alabama's front 4 were so strong that they could run 7 in their pass coverage zone. That meant that our receivers were never open. Double or triple teamed at any point past the line of scrimmage even when running a 3 wide set. Even if we set 5 on the line with 5 receivers we were going to be outnumbered in the pass. The only way we could reasonably get yardage was on the screen passes and that required more or less a rusher biting on the wrong side of the field.

If we had played perfect and/or the refs had been half decent we might have had a shot at them.

It also appears that the world(including me) was wrong about the ACC this year, damn.

Clemson/Bama could be a good game.

*All the bounces went Bama's way(Bama recovers all fumbles, Bama touches a punt allowing UW to get the ball back but it doesn't get called as such despite clearly happening). Bama straight cheated and got away with it(induced a snap by faking the snap count). They almost never got called for penalties that really should have been called(a few really bad targeting penalties that did not get called, and a number of decently bad holds).

Browning was bad. He missed several throws he should be able to make, and held the ball too often (which was probably the defense as much as anything). I didn't like the offensive game plan adjustments either. They needed to find more ways to get John Ross the ball.

And yes, it felt like every missed call went Alabama's way, but I don't think it affected the outcome too much.

Alabama will get calls because they are the 1990s Chicago Bulls. Everyone knows how good they are so they are going to get the benefit of the doubt. Plus in general I think people want the Death Star to win. Nobody outside of Carolina gives a shit about Clemson other than the fact they are playing Alabama. I'd wager that 75% of the people who root for Clemson this weekend are rooting for them because they aren't Alabama.

I'd say 95% (how many Clemson fans are there?). The Death Star is boring, no one ever roots for the Death Star unless they are Death Star fans (I'm a Pats fan, I know this for a fact). I so hope Clemson beats them so we can see sad Saban face (ok so it looks like every other face he makes).

I think you're wrong. I think most of SEC country will take up for Alabama. I know how they think around here and there's a heavy regional sentiment about rooting for the SEC over another conference.

There's the rest of the country that can't stand Alabama because success and conference. But most SEC fans will pull for the Death Star. And this will be a LOOOOOOOOW rated championship in my mind. It's a rematch and I don't think Clemson has improved enough to make a dent.

Eh. Calls are one thing but simulating the snap count actually made me mad. (OK i was mad at the targeting that wasn't called too)  that is what took the game from "goddamn refs" to "cheating bastards"

Suck it Saban.

Great game, good for Clemson getting the monkey off the back of Clemsoning. Pretty amazing to see an interim coach pull this team to awesome heights 8 years later.

I hope to see the same from my Dawgs eventually and get our own 1980 monkey off our back.

Bama was spinning its wheels most of the game on offense. Not hard to defend run-run-screen. I was calling the plays to my gf before the huddle broke... Good for Watson upping his stock and good for College Playoffs. I was rooting for Bama if for nothing else, SEC pride... but it gets stale when the same shit happens every year.

Next year should be a hoot.

After that first roughing call, I went from not caring to wanting Alabama to lose in the worst way.  Fuck them.

I'm actually surprised Clemson didn't screw it up. I was expecting some sort of Russel Wilson v Pats moment.

I don't watch much college football, but I saw the second half of this game. Watson looked WAY better than the Alabama QB (whose name I don't remember).

Hurts. And he is a true freshman - maybe 19 years old? maybe?

18 actually. Looked fantastic against lesser competition, but his weaknesses tend to show up against better competition. He'll get better, or should. If he doesn't development a downfield passing game, then the recipe for beating Alabama is basically written in stone. Now, whether teams can do that or not, remains to be seen.

Watson should be the first QB taken unless he has some really awful hidden medical/character issue. The rest of the guys touted for the draft looked absolutely terrible in their bowl games.

Well Watson clearly has some brain damage from that game. I don't even think he realized he had played it at the end of it, he was talking like the season still had another game.

Browning was supposedly hurt but even then Watson looked so much better than him that there is nothing that i can see taking Watson off the number 1 pick spot

Not a 1st pick type QB. 1st round sure, but not with the first pick. I am hopeful the Browns aren't that stupid... HOPEFUL I SAID. But really, I'd take Mike Williams before Watson if I was picking off Clemson.

I see a lot of places rating Lamar Jackson and Baker Mayfield higher with Browning right below. One of the Alabama mutants probably goes before a QB, but it is Cleveland. They'll latch onto a dumb idea and sail it into port.

edit:

But yah, the Browns do really need a QB. RG3's legs haven't made it through a complete season yet.

The Browns need a QB. They will pick a QB. They do not have the luxury to not pick a QB. Its a lottery sure, but you've got to play the lottery to win.

Frankly he looks amazing as a first pickup.

You are obviously unhinged. The Browns need much more than a QB and Watson is not great enough to waste it on. You take the best available which are mainly on the defensive side of the ball. We have QBs and we have a HC who supposedly knows QBs. You also have no OL to protect a QB... which is why the Browns have employed 400 QBs since 1999. So no...

Is this just the title game making people suddenly think Watson is this awesome prospect? I still think Browns should take Garrett no question. I would warn against picking somebody because they played well in 1 game.

Watson has played well in other games and bowls seem to confirm that the ACC was significantly underrated (which should increase the value of their players)

As for the Browns. Yea they need other spots. But the QB is the most important. A great O line doesn't matter if your QB is bad and if your QB is magic then you can have the worst O line in the game and still do Ok.

I'd just like to point out how many times the Browns have tried that so far with ZERO success. We are talking years bordering on decades (plural). Without a sureshot QB in this year's draft, why sacrifice another 2 years of shit QB work in Cleveland with yet another overrated prospect? Watson is an OK QB... probably be successful at the next level, but he is not a franchise saver. Work the defense and OL and then 2018 or 2019 get a QB.

Bama has another 5 star QB behind Hurts if he can't develop a downfield passing game. He's out of Hawaii and his name is Tua something. So as usual don't count on that recipe staying the same very long.

Seattle and Dallas have proven that if you spend your money and resources on making other units great, you can gamble a bit on a young QB. That is how I would rebuild in Cleveland- solidify the offensive line and the defense, and draft a QB in a later round. Obviously not every late rounder is Wilson or Prescott, but there are serviceable QBs in every draft. You could also trade for Tony Romo if you HAD to have a QB next year. I don't think Dallas will ask a king's ransom for him, since he is old, fragile, and extremely expensive. They may even just cut him and you can sign him, but then you risk him signing elsewhere.

Losing the lottery does not imply you don't have to play. If the Browns cannot win the lottery they can't win at non-QB drafting either.